Category Archives: Contradictions

Should people rejoice at the misfortune of others?

Contradictions, ,

No.

Job, the most blameless and upright person on earth, said that if he had ever rejoiced over his enemy’s misfortune or gloated over his enemy’s trouble (which he hadn’t), then he would deserve to have his crops replaced with briers and stinkweed.

David, a man after God’s own heart, wished that everyone who gloated over his distress would be put to shame and confusion.

Solomon, who was wiser than anyone else ever, said that whoever gloats over disaster will not go unpunished. Even if you want to see bad things happen to your enemies, he says you shouldn’t let your heart rejoice and gloat when they stumble and fall, because then God will disapprove of your attitude and will stop doing bad things to your enemies.

God had Ezekiel tell the Ammonites and the Edomites that because they rejoiced when Israel became desolate, God was going to bring other nations to wipe out the Ammonites and make Edom desolate. And God had Obadiah tell the Edomites that they should not gloat or rejoice over the misfortune and destruction of Judah.

Yes.

The Bible says rejoicing over the misfortune of others is what righteous people do. The righteous see the ruin of the wicked and rejoice, and the innocent mock their foes when they are destroyed. David said the righteous would laugh at Doeg when God killed him. And he said the righteous will be glad when they are rewarded by getting to dip their feet in the blood of the wicked.

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Were there plants when Adam was created?

Contradictions,

Genesis 1 says God made the land produce vegetation, and so the land produced plants and trees, on the third day. Then God made mankind, and gave them all the plants and trees on earth as a source of food, on the sixth day.

But Genesis 2 says God formed the first man when “no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up“.

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Is anything deprived of the warmth of the sun?

Contradictions

David says the sun runs its course from one end of the heavens to the other, and nothing is deprived of its warmth. And Jesus says God causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good alike.

But Job, who speaks the truth about God, says God speaks to the sun and it does not shine. So everything must be deprived of the warmth of the sun when he does that. And when God speaks to Job later, he says the wicked are denied light.

David, contradicting his own previous claim, acknowledges that a stillborn child never sees the sun. And his son Solomon mentions the same thing.

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How many wives did Jacob have?

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Jacob wanted to marry Laban’s daughter Rachel, but Laban tricked him into marrying Rachel’s sister Leah instead. Then Laban let him marry Rachel too.

Later, it says Rachel gave Jacob her servant Bilhah as a wife. And then Leah gave him her servant Zilpah as a wife. So Jacob had four wives.

But after that, it says Jacob was traveling with “his two wives” and “his two female servants”. Since when does he only have two wives?

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Does God want people to sacrifice their children?

Contradictions, , ,

No.

God’s law says you shouldn’t sacrifice your children to Molek, and if you do, you can be stoned to death. It also says not to sacrifice your sons and daughters in the fire at all. Not even as a way of worshiping God, because God hates it when people worship their gods that way. Whenever God’s people and kings do sacrifice their children, the Bible generally says that what they’re doing is detestable and evil and makes God angry.

God told Jeremiah repeatedly that it had never even occurred to him to command people to do such a detestable thing as to burn their children in the fire. God told Ezekiel that his people were defiling themselves with this bloodshed. Hosea says God threatened to destroy his people for sinning by offering human sacrifices. And Micah didn’t seem to think God wanted him to offer his firstborn, or anything else, for that matter. David too claims that God doesn’t desire sacrifices and offerings at all.

Yes.

But obviously David and Micah were wrong to think that God didn’t want sacrifices. God’s laws demand loads of those. And sometimes he even demands that people sacrifice their children to him.

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Has anyone besides Jesus gone to heaven?

Contradictions

Yes.

Job claimed to have a friend who was in heaven, who interceded between him and God.

The last time anyone on earth saw Elijah, he was being taken up to heaven in a whirlwind.

Isaiah said the king of Babylon had fallen from heaven. He also mentioned that the king had said he would ascend to the heavens, and evidently he had succeeded. How else would he have fallen from there?

Jesus claimed that starting during the life of John the Baptist, violent people had been raiding the kingdom of heaven. Jesus also said a criminal would go to paradise the day he died.

Paul claimed to know a man who “was caught up to the third heaven“, or paradise. And Paul also said that God had raised his followers up and seated them in the heavenly realms.

No.

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Should people believe the truth?

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Yes.

Jesus thinks that if he tells people the truth, they should believe it.

Paul points out that if you think you’re something when you’re not, you’re deceiving yourself. And he presumably thinks that would be a bad thing, or else what would be the point of mentioning it?

Paul also says that people who don’t believe the truth will be condemned, and that people can be saved through belief in the truth.

And he advises Timothy to turn away from ideas that are falsely called knowledge.

No.

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Can idols eat?

Contradictions,

No.

Moses warned the Israelites how God would punish them if they ever made any idols. He said God would kill most of them and send the rest to live in other nations where there would be more idols for them to worship. And he described those idols as “man-made gods of wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or eat or smell“.

Yes.

Moses also said that when God was done punishing his people for idolatry, God would gloat about the gods they used to worship, and would call them “the gods who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings”.

And through Ezekiel’s prophecies, God said his people had given their children as food to their idols.

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Who saw Jesus first after the resurrection?

Contradictions,

Two Marys

According to Matthew, Mary Magdalene and another Mary were the first to find out that Jesus had risen. And then they saw him, before they got a chance to tell the disciples what they’d heard. So none of the disciples even heard that Jesus was alive before the Marys saw him. And I think we can assume they hadn’t independently seen him yet either, or the angel wouldn’t have told the Marys to tell the disciples that Jesus was alive.

One Mary

According to Mark, Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene first. It doesn’t mention any other Mary. And it says when she told the others that Jesus was alive, they didn’t believe her. So that’s further confirmation that no one else had seen him yet.

John agrees with Mark that Mary Magdalene was the first to see the resurrected Jesus. John also says that when Jesus first appeared to some of his disciples after the resurrection, it was to ten of them at once.1

Two disciples

According to Luke, some women found out that Jesus was alive, but they didn’t see him (which contradicts Matthew and Mark). The women told the disciples, who didn’t believe them. Then Peter went to look at the tomb himself, but he didn’t see Jesus either, and he wasn’t sure what had happened to Jesus. So at this point, no one has seen Jesus alive yet.

Then it says Jesus appeared to two disciples, who were seven miles away from the others at the time. When they got back to Jerusalem, they told the other disciples about it. Then Jesus appeared to all the disciples there, and they were shocked, because the disciples in Jerusalem hadn’t seen him alive yet. So when some of the disciples first saw Jesus resurrected, it was only two of them, not ten, contrary to John.

Just Peter

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