Soul Notes

BIBLICAL MISTAKES

Today, far too many people sit attentively, being spoon fed by someone, either from a pulpit or a television screen, telling them what God said in the holy scriptures. This is very dangerous, because so many of them never question what they are hearing, but accept it as true, regardless of reality or facts. Why? Because they have been told that it is the word of God and WHO, would ever challenge the word of God? Worse than that, the early Catholic Church even put you to death for disagreeing with them --- even when they were completely wrong!

Well, I agree that we should never question God but, I am going to give you some examples of highly questionable biblical stories that lay question on the men who wrote them. I will give you the book, verse and chapter so you can go look it up yourself, but, I want to point out that the examples I will be using are just a small few of the many inaccuracies and contradictions to be found in our Bibles. The point of our discussion is not to discredit the Bible, but rather to help you learn to read and study scripture with an open mind --- seeking the intent of what the writer may be trying to say rather than accepting a perfect word for word translation. The only way you are going to accept the need to do that is to see some blatant examples for yourself.

The best place to start is at the beginning. So, let's start in the book of Genesis with the story of the creation of the world --- and of man. Just about everyone knows that story because it is such a great story. It is a story told in amazing detail, in fact, unbelievable detail, especially, once we get to Adam and Eve. It is as if an ABC news team was following their every move.

According to the first chapter of Genesis, God created the heavens and the earth and light, then separated the light from the darkness, and he did all of that on the first day. Ok, then what? Well, he then divided the waters with a firmament, and he created heaven, and now, according to the Bible, it was the end of the second day.

We all know that a day occurs when the earth spins one time around its axis, causing the sun to appear to rise in the east and set in the west. Keep that in mind, and read on until you get to verses 16 through 19. Verse 16 says, "and God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule night: he made the stars also."

And, in verse 17, "and God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,"

In verse 18, "and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good."

And, verse 19 says "and the evening and the morning were the fourth day."

Did you catch that? it said the evening and the morning were the fourth day. So, God created the sun and the moon, and the stars on the forth day. Interesting.

How did we measure all of those other days and nights, since there was no sun until the forth day? Was the second day, which had no sun, different from the fifth day that did have a sun?

If the light, which God created on the first day, was obviously not the sun, what was it?" Do we already have a conflict before we can get out of the first chapter of Genesis?

Lets move on, still in Genesis, to chapter two, and hold up a finger each time a human being is mentioned for the first time in this creation of man story --- we may amaze ourselves.

In the 7th verse of chapter two, we have to raise one finger, to represent God's creation of Adam. In verse 22, God created a woman so, let's raise a second finger. In chapter four, in the 1st verse, we are told of Eve giving birth to Cain. Now we have a third finger raised. In the 2nd verse of chapter four, the birth of Abel is cause for a fourth finger to be raised. This would indicate that four human beings have been created by God, to exist on the planet earth, according to the Bible, as of the 2nd verse of chapter 4 of the book of Genesis.

As we keep reading, we come to verse 8, where Cain killed his brother Abel. So now, we must take one finger down and we are back to three fingers in the air, representing a mother, a father and a son as the only living humans on the earth. As we read on, we learn of God's displeasure with the action of Cain against his brother and in the 16th and 17th verses it says: (16)"and Cain went out of the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden." (17) says, "and Cain knew his wife and she conceived and bare Enoch…"

See a problem here? We have just carefully traced and recorded the creation of the human race, according to the Bible, and something went terribly wrong with our analysis. Cain went to the land of Nod, found a wife and had children.

Where did this "land of Nod" come from? Where did Cain's wife come from? Who were her parents? Who were their parents? Was Nod a city, or a land that Adam had named? Are we to believe what we have read is accurate? If we do, then we must admit that a lot of the story is missing.

Well, how much is missing? Did the writer of Genesis make all this up, or make a huge literary mistake in chronology of the creation? Who was the writer of Genesis anyway? Was it Moses? How did he know all this? A lot of people claim he was inspired by God, yet if that is true, we should have the whole story, without such difficulties. Obviously Moses was mistaken or, we don't have a complete version of the Bible.

If you claim the Bible to be irrefutably accurate, then someone in this group of the first three original human beings, had to have an incestuous relationship, for no matter how long they lived, or how many children Eve had, a father and a daughter, or mother and a son, or brother and a sister would have had to produce an offspring sooner or later otherwise, you and I would not be here. The story just doesn't work, does it?

Now, for fun, study the story of the great flood and Noah and how all manner of animal was gathered up and put into Noah's boat. As you read this Genesis story, take time to think about all of the animals --- I mean all of the animals on earth that are going to live with Noah and his family for 40 days and nights during the rains and another 150 days while the water went back down. Think about how he rounded up polar bears and panda bears, and Komodo dragons (the types of animals that were not even on the same side of the planet as Moses); how he housed them with camels, and squirrels and birds of all types. Think about how he fed them all and gave them water to drink and cleaned up after them. Try to picture what was going on there with a male and female of all of the animals in the entire world. Can you visualize the termites and the fleas and the roaches and the worms and the snakes, etc., etc. Problem is, you have to include every living creature, if you believe the story.

How did he get those polar bears from the arctic circle, and didn't they get pretty hot on the boat? And, how did they all get back home? It is a long way for a polar bear to walk from Mount Arafat to the North Pole, plus some of his journey will be a record breaking swim.

Speaking of his boat, the Ark, in today's measurements, would be 450 feet long, (1 ½ football fields); 150 feet wide (about the width of a football field); and, about 4 stories tall (even though it had only 3 levels). And, it wasn't two of every animal on the planet, it was 2 of the unclean ones and 7 of the clean ones. This is beginning to sounds ridiculous, isn't it?

Most biblical scholars agree that the probable author of Genesis was Moses. Now, imagine you are Moses, or someone of his time, and you earnestly want to share your belief in a higher power with your friends and loved ones. You want to bring to mankind, some "reasonable" explanation of how things all began. You want them to realize the power and importance of a superior force in their life. Problem is, you don't know much about science, the universe, the depths of the oceans, or where the sun or moon comes from each day. You don't even know that the earth is round. You don't know about, NASA, the NRA, DNA, the PTA, the USA, or zygotes, dram chips, geosynchronous orbits, tau neutrinos, space shuttles, submarines, atoms, retro rockets or synapses in the brain. You don't know about Copernicus, Charles Darwin, Ho Chi Minh, Sir Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Monica Lewinsky, Hitler, Bill Gates, Mother Teresa, Captain Kirk, Martin Luther King, Buddha, Mohammed, Elvis, or Jesus Christ. You've never heard of airplanes, electric trains, or ink stains. In short, compared to anyone alive today, you know very little about anything. But, go ahead and tell us how the entire universe, including mankind, came about.

"Well, he was inspired by God", you say, again. After reading what we just read about the creation of man, directly from the Bible does that seem inspired by God to you? Furthermore, I was completely shocked to learn, in my later life, that Moses, the alleged author of the first five books of the Old Testament was a common murderer. Isn't that something? Well, it is in the King James Version of the Bible and in the Jewish Torah. It's right there in Exodus, chapter 2, verses 11 & 12. The receiver of God's commandments, a common murderer and when he realized someone knew what he had done, he fled from Egypt to another land. He must have felt very hypocritical as he was explaining the ten laws of God to all his followers, especially the one about not killing.

Let us now turn our attention to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Have you ever wondered where was his mother on the day that he promised his own resurrection from the dead? If you are of the Christian faith, I am pretty sure that your religious leaders have not spent very much time on that subject.

As a parent, had I witnessed the brutal execution and agonizing death of my son, and knew that he was telling people that on the third day following his burial, he would emerge from his tomb, I would have been the first thing he saw when he arose, especially if he had been the child I had given birth to after having been impregnated by God himself. But again, according to the Bible, she and the faithful followers of the man, his disciples, were not there. That hits me as real strange. We are told that Mary Magdalene and the "other Mary" (if you read Matthew), or Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome (if you read Mark), or "the women also which came with him from Galilee" (if you read Luke), or only Mary Magdalene (if you read John) came early to the tomb where Christ had been buried. Pick a gospel writer you like, I guess, since none of them can agree on who showed up that morning!

It is disturbing that none of these men can agree on who arrived at the tomb that morning, except ---that they all fail to mention Mary, the mother of Jesus. It is even more disturbing that each one of the four Gospel writers relates a story of people who came to the tomb, but apparently, were not too convinced that Jesus was going to rise up from the dead. The book of John tells us that Mary Magdalene was afraid that the body had been stolen; or, when they realized the body was not there, "…they were much perplexed…"according to the book of Luke; or Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome showed up with spices so that they "might come and anoint him." Both Mark and Luke say that the women came to the tomb with spices to anoint the body. Why would they come to the tomb with spices, on the morning he had said he would arise from the dead, if they knew and believed?

John tries to cover for the women and the disciples, in his version, by saying they were not aware Jesus was to arise on the third day. In Chapter 20, verse 9 he says, "for as of yet, they knew not the scripture that he must rise again from the dead."

Well, John, I am sorry but, that is really a very bad excuse. First, the "scriptures" which detail the life and death of Jesus (Gospels) would not be written for another 30 years, so certainly, they could not have known them! But, more importantly, when the scriptures were written, it is clear that, of course they knew of the resurrection promise. The book of Luke clearly states they knew. According to Luke, the "two men", believed to be angels, that were in the tomb when the women finally came looking for Jesus, actually admonished them for even being there, by saying:

"…he is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying the son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again. And, the Bible says: "and they remembered his words."

"Aha" they probably thought. "Yeah, I remember him saying that, now that you mention it", is the reaction we could expect from the account told to us by Luke. If you had been in their place, do you think Jesus' promise to rise from the dead would have slipped your mind? Me neither. But, there is more.

Jesus was with his disciples on the coasts of Cesarea Philippi, and, according to Matthew, "from that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day."

Jesus and the twelve disciples were on their way to Jerusalem, when he pulled them aside and said, "behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests, and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the gentiles to mock him and to scourge, and to crucify him: and the third day he shall rise again."

When Jesus was with his disciples, Peter, James and John (brother of James) in Galilee, he told them "the son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men: and they shall kill him, and on the third day he shall be raised again."

Mark confirms the account given by Matthew and relates the same story of the three men coming down from a mountain with Jesus, and Jesus, "…charged them that they should tell no man what they had seen, till the son of man were risen from the dead."

Those are not all, but only a few of the biblical verses that confirm that a third day resurrection plan was certainly no secret. And, the information was not just reserved for his closest friends. Even his enemies knew about it. After he was taken from the cross and placed in his burial tomb, his enemies were fearful that one of his followers would steal his body to make it look like he had arisen from the dead. Why would they fear such a thing? Because the chief priests and Pharisees had also heard about the promised resurrection. They went to Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea, to obtain a soldier to stand watch over the tomb to prevent a theft of the body, "saying, sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, after three days I will arise again."

So, everybody knew about the promised resurrection. Despite John's confused account, everybody knew. Have you ever thought about that? Well, think about it. If you are Christian, then it is in the Bible you hold as being the word of God. Think of the incredible conclusions that could be drawn here. If the story is accurate, then apparently, no one, not even his mother, believed, or remembered he would come back from the dead. If they did believe him, well it just wasn't important enough for them to be there that morning to greet him. The ones that did show up only came to anoint a dead body. Modern day Christians all over the world wake up before dawn to attend Easter sunrise services in remembrance of that biblically chronicled event, but the disciples, his followers and even Jesus' mother, slept-in on the morning of the real happening.

Another puzzling discrepancy is that the prophesized messiah of the Old Testament was supposed to be called "Immanuel", not Jesus. The prophet Isaiah was very explicit in Isaiah chapter 7, verse 14 "… and shall call his name Immanuel." He did not say his close friends would refer to him, sometimes, as Immanuel. No, Isaiah said a virgin would conceive, bear a son, and "shall call his name Immanuel", but Mary, the mother of Jesus did not do that. The four Gospel writers, Matthew Mark, Luke, and John, who give us the accounts of Jesus' life from birth to death, never refer to him as Immanuel. Matthew uses the name in chapter 1, verse 23, but he is only repeating the fact that the name Immanuel (spelled with an E for some reason by Matthew) had been prophesized by Isaiah.

To make matters worse, an angel is reported to have come to Joseph, the surrogate father of Jesus, in a dream, to assure him that Mary's unexpected pregnancy was of divine intervention. When speaking to Joseph, the angel said that Mary would have a son and, "…thou shalt call his name Jesus"…". that is the story as told by Matthew.

Isaiah, the prophet, said that a virgin would conceive, bear a son, and "…shall call his name Immanuel. But, the angel told Joseph, "…thou shalt call his name Jesus"…". Either Isaiah was wrong, or the angel was wrong, or the messiah will, in fact, be called Immanuel by his mother when he is eventually born. Now, there is a sobering thought for Christians!

But wait. Scholars believe that the book of Matthew was written between 60-66 A.D., or 60-66 years after the birth of Jesus, or 60-66 years after this angel told Joseph what to name his son. Since the angel spoke to Joseph in a dream, how could Matthew possibly have known what the angel said? In fact, did Matthew even know Joseph? Had Matthew ever spoken to Joseph? Again, turning to scholars of the Bible, we find that Joseph, the stand-in father of Jesus, presumably died before the crucifixion, therefore, there appears to be no historical support that Matthew and Joseph even knew one another. In fact, after Jesus reached the age of 12 years old, there is no more biblical record of Joseph.

You can "suppose" that Jesus told Matthew about the angel coming to Joseph in a dream, or that an angel told Matthew, or God told Matthew. But, you would be making all that up. You have absolutely nothing to support any such thing.

So, did it happen? I have no idea. Does it matter? Of course not. The point of the issue here, is simply to get you to ask, how do we know about the angel speaking to Joseph regarding Mary's pregnancy? And, to understand that the only source we have is Matthew --- and he wasn't there, and there is no support for his ever being told such a thing.

Is it a big deal? Probably not. But you see, the Gospel of Matthew is reputed to have been written for Jewish converts, so it was absolutely necessary to show that Jesus was definitely the prophesized messiah. Accordingly, since Matthew was obviously aware that everyone knew this man by the name "Jesus", he used some poetic license to add this small bit about Joseph having a dream and being directed in the dream to call his son Jesus (verse 21) and then, in the next 2 verses (22 & 23), tries to make it appear that everything pieced together neatly to fulfill prophesy. The fact that he created a story in which an angel and an Old Testament prophet were in disagreement, had to be resolved. So, take a look at Matthew's three verses together:

(21) "and she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.

(22) now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the lord by the prophet, saying,

(23) behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us."

First, you don't have to be a seminary graduate to detect a problem with the wording in verse 21 compared to the wording in verse 23. Second, many of his followers, who truly believed Jesus to be the messiah, would occasionally call him Immanuel, because that is what the Hebrew tradition, by way of the prophet Isaiah, had told them the messiah's name would be [meaning God among us]. Since "they" were occasionally referring to Jesus by the name Immanuel, Matthew seized upon a very subtle word change to make his point. Look again at verse 23. Do you see the word "they"? Matthew added that. The prophet Isaiah did not say "they". Isaiah referred to the virgin having a son and calling him Immanuel. When she did not do that, Matthew had to add the term "they" referring to other people, so he could make it look like the prophecy had been fulfilled. Pretty clever, Matthew.

Let's go over one more story and I think my point will have been made. Most all Christians can relate the story of Jesus Christ hanging on the cross and his interaction with the two thieves that were also being crucified that day. According to the story in the Gospel of Luke, one of the thieves "…railed on him, saying, if thou be the Christ, save thyself and us." The other thief however, rebuked the first thief for his comments and then turned to Jesus and said "…lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom." Then, Jesus replied, "…verily, I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise."

That is a great story told by Luke and one which Christians have repeated to show the mercy of Jesus, right up to his final moments on the cross, but we have a small problem. Remember, there were four Gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John who each gave a detailed account of the last hours of Jesus Christ, including his crucifixion. The version above was told by Luke. Mark and John make no mention of such a conversation at all, which is ok. But, Matthew has a different recollection altogether.

According to Matthew, the people who passed by the crosses, and the chief priests and scribes and elders mocked Jesus and said, "…if he be the king of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him," "he trusted in God; let him deliver him now if he will have him: for he said, I am the son of God." And, what did the thieves say at this point, according to Matthew? "the thieves also which were crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth".

Oops. St. Matthew tells us that both thieves got onto Jesus for not saving himself and them too; that both thieves mocked Jesus just like those that passed by. Just the opposite of the story told by Luke. So, who do we believe? Personally, I don't care what was said, or not said, that day by these thieves, because it doesn't change my beliefs one way or another. However, it does show me that I can not just pick out a story from the Bible and trust it to be true. Clearly there are conflicts. Maybe it happened, maybe it did not. Since they are completely opposite stories, one of the two Gospel writers is wrong. There can be no debate on that.

What disturbs me is how Matthew and Luke (as well as Mark and John), waited some 30 or more years after the crucifixion of Jesus to write their gospels; men who did not even know Jesus or his family until they were adults. It is also disturbing that the Gospels appear to be eye-witness accounts of events, when in fact they are after-the-fact (by as much as 60 years) writings when the main subjects (Jesus and Joseph), and maybe Mary, were no longer available on earth to confirm or refute the accuracy of what was being written.

Does all of this change your faith? I certainly hope not, because none of it is important. It is nothing more than events in biblical history. If the writers got confused, or if they added a little here and there to help explain what they were trying to say, or if a lot of accuracy of our Bibles was lost in the hundreds of translations through the years, so what?

It just points out that we have to be very careful as we read through religious teachings and recognize that they are filled with inaccuracies, things were added and lost during the many translations, and even the writers often used poetic language and parodies akin to the times, in order to get their point across. Blind acceptance is an extremely dangerous approach to your true understanding of your own religious beliefs and to the ultimate mental awakening we are seeking.

Fundamentalist, whether in science, religion, or in any discipline, are characterized by their total refusal to allow any challenge to their personal belief. I saw a very fundamentalist bumper sticker that read "God said it, I believe, and that's all there is to it". At first, I thought it was cute, a little closed-minded, but cute. Then, I realized that it wasn't cute at all. It was one of the most narrow-minded things I have ever read and, I find it hard to believe that in this age of information, that someone actually adhered to this bumper sticker philosophy, so much, they were proud to stick it onto their car!

If I heard God say something, then I would believe it and it would sure be "all there is to it". But I haven't heard a word yet and neither have you. Furthermore, to take the written word we have today as the exact way God said it, is absurd. In fact, God says very little in religious scriptures. We read that Moses said God said it, or Joshua said God said it, some unknown writer claims that God said it, or that Elisha, or Muhammad, or Adam, or Peter, or Joseph, and dozens more said they heard it from God in a dream or, we read the accounts of what was supposedly said by angels, and carefully recorded by saints, but we just went through that previously with Matthew and Luke, and once again, under scrutiny, it did not work out so well for us.

For the Christian world, I defer my opinion that God has not spoken to any of us, to the words attributed to Jesus Christ in the book of John, where Jesus says:

"and the father himself which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape."

All of us have been told by someone else that God said it but, even Jesus tells us that God has not been seen or heard. Nevertheless we look to our religious "leaders", and assume they must know what they are talking about. They must somehow know that the Bibles they wave at us are in fact the actual word of God. That is what they keep telling us as they stare at us, yell at us, and dare us to even question one word of the Bible that they tightly grip in their hands. They scare and intimidate us into submission to their belief that it is the blessed word of God, just as if God had penned each word on the very pages himself. In between their burst of passion, and just before they ask you to send or deposit money, they gasp for the air needed for their next sentence, then they repeat that "this is the holy word of God", this is the "holy scripture" this is the "spoken word of the almighty", this is the "infallible book of eternal truth".

Caution and prudence are required when seeking the truth. Those of the Christian faith may want to open their Bible to Proverbs and underline the 15th and 18th verses in the 14th chapter, which reads, (15)"the simple believeth every word: but the prudent man looketh well to his going." (18)"the simple inherit folly: but the prudent are crowned with knowledge." Christian or otherwise, it is a pretty good message for all of us.