The Bible, the word of God does NOT have any error. God does NOT make even an error. It’s the translators who made errors in their translation. Why are there so many English versions of the Bible? The onus is on everyone to find the inspired English translation. Many English versions are NOT the word of God. There is only one translation that is the inspired word of God. Look for it.
@@jk11222 Your god created literally EVERY THING but you expect everyone to believe he can't figure out how to get his word out without 100s of contradictions, misprints, etc.
@@Dan-xu4sd The problem arises when you have clear contradictions with OT and NT principles which precipitate such doctrines as Dispensationalism, Covenant Theology, etc., all of which rather than suggesting man got it wrong when writing down their inspiration, the motivation of God was wrong. Which is easier to square with? Clearly when reading the Bible, we can draw inspiration from passages that man's responses are bad because we see God constantly redeeming him. However, if we read it with the assumption that God has changed his perspective about men, that is where we have a REAL problem!
Bring back Tom Holland, NT Wright and Jordan Peterson, altogether if possible. Maybe add Bart Ehrman to the mix. Then re-ask that panel the same question. That would be an exciting event.
When Jesus says "you have heard it said... but I say to you..." He isn't disagreeing with the Torah! He's correcting popular teachings of the time with proper understanding of Scripture. When He quotes the Bible, He says "it is written," when he's quoting popular teaching he says "it was said," (He corrects some teaching which quotes the Bible but misunderstands it (e.g. Matt. 5:38), and some that teaching which was not based on Scripture at all (e.g. 5:43)). The idea that Jesus is disagreeing with the Old Testament is untenable once you understand that the sermon on the mount shows Jesus correcting unbiblical teaching of His time, not correcting the Bible.
Love this. Unscripted, Uncut. Christians with different opinions talking about important questions. It would be interesting though if both parties would be willing to not only understand the other person but even to correct their own opinion if the arguments of the other one are better. So to speak if both of them would seek the truth together instead of just defending their own opinion.
To be scrupulously fair to Steve Chalke, I think one has to ignore the way he presents in debate: talking over and interrupting his opponents; the constant, unsubstantiated claims that serious scholars subscribe to his positions, and the routine use of personal anecdotes - as a substitute for scriptural evidence - does little to enhance his credibility. But if we can leave all that baggage aside, perhaps it would be more charitable to judge what he is trying to say, rather than the manner in which he says it. Steve claims that he has a high view of Jesus, and a high view of scripture. This is not strictly accurate: he has a high view of a re-imagined Jesus - a liberal, user-friendly, inclusive Jesus who has been grossly misunderstood by all but Steve Chalke. A Jesus who shares Steve's disdain for every part of scripture which doesn't agree with Steve's agenda. The Holy Spirit may be the author of some of the bible, but clearly not those sections which disagree with this re-imagined Jesus. If Steve Chalke really had a high view of Jesus, he would not find it necessary to re-invent him. As for a high view of scripture, that could only be true in a world where a 'high view' is synonymous with contempt. It seems Steve has created such a world - at least, in his imagination.
*"the constant, unsubstantiated claims that serious scholars subscribe to his positions"* This is one of my top-level complaints, ironically, about Bart Erhman. (That, and his trick of saying "even if that were true, it wouldn't affect my position" every time he's backed into a corner. I want just one person debating him to insist he list all the factors that _do_ affect one of his positions prior to the debate.)
Wilson, well done. You certainly held your patience and spoke clearly, even when forced to speak quickly and being spoken over, but mostly for upholding what Chalke refuses to even hear. I heard you. I thank you. I agree with what you presented.
Steve Chalke sounds like he graduated from the schools of Bart Erhman and Andy Stanley Theological Seminaries. It's so painful to listen to his 'brand' of theology in which he hypocritically thinks is in the 'lens of Jesus Christ'. So very painful.
Steve Chalke has no idea about the exegesis of Scripture- its nothing to do with what we think its all explained in translation and understanding the Bible in full- Gods plan for Israel, His church His timeline- these men are so Anglican with no depth
Thank you Unbelievable? for bringing so many great and informative conversations! It seems that Andrew is trying to be clear and consistent and Steve is trying to be persuasive without being clear about what he is trying to persuade people of. The treatment of "eye for an eye", by Steve, was quite a false representation of both what Jesus said and the judicial context of the idea in the Old Testament which is about justice, not revenge. As I continue listening it seems that Steve admits that the original context of the "eye for an eye" command is about justice and not revenge. But this undercuts his whole point, or so it seems to me.
Mike Winger here is a comment I feel needs response! From somoneone else copied: Jay Hu There are resolutions given for some of these, but most times it is really reaching. Did God use his name Yahweh or not? Gen 15:7 and Exodus 6:3 Were all Egypt's livestock killed in the 5th plague or not? Exodus 9:6 and 12:29 Must the passover be from flocks only? Ex 12:5. Or also from the herd? Deut 16:2 Could it be boiled or not? Ex 12:9 and 2 Chr 35:13 Could it be celebrated in households, or not? Ex 12, Deut 16:5-6, Luke 22:11 How many horsemen did David take? 2 Sam 8:4 and 1 Chr 18:4 At the end of 4 or 40 yrs? 2 Sam 15:7 Killed 800 or 300? 2 Sam 23:8 and 1 Chr 11:11 Is Jerusalem conquered by Joshua,Josh 12:10; or David, 2 Sam 5:6? Did David take Goliath's head to the walled Jebusite city of Jerusalem, 1 Sam 17:54? (See 2 Sam 5:6). Did Saul meet David and twice interact with Jesse in 1 Sam 16: 19-22 or meet David and not know his father in 17:55-56? Who killed Goliath? David in 1 Sam 17 or Elhanan in 2 Sam 21:19 and who did Elhanan kill, Goliath or his brother in 1 Chron 20: 5 7 or three yrs of famine? 2 Sam 24:13 and 1 Chr 21:12 50 or 600 shekels? 2 Sam 24:24 and 1 Chr 21:25 How many stalls? 1 Kings 4:26 and 2 Chr 9:25 How many chief officers? 1 Kings 5:16 and 2 Chr 2:18 How many cubits high? 1 Kings 7:15 and 2 Chr 3:15 How many baths? 1 Kings 7:26 and 2 Chr 4:5 How many chief officers? 1 Kings 9:23 and 2 Chr 8:10 Did Baasha die around the 26th yr reign of Asa or is he alive in Asa's 36th yr? 1 Kgs 16:6, 8 and 2 Chr 16:1 Is Ahaziah 22 or 42? 2 Kgs 8:26 and 2 Chr 22:2 (most versions) Was Jehoiachin 18 or 8? 2 Kgs 24:8 and 2 Chr 36:9 What day was temple burned? 2 Kgs 25:8 and Jer 52:12 Compare the numbers of sons of same men. Ezra 2 and Neh 7 How many singers? Ezra 2:65 and Neh 7:67 The most sensible explanation for many of these is that there are different traditions/sources of the same events. Here are a few more in relation to Moses authorship of Torah. The Edomite kings listed in Genesis 36 did not live until after Moses was dead Moses is referred to in the 3rd person in several passages There are places named that Moses could not have known (he never entered the Promised Land) The Hebrew of the text includes terms that were developed long after Moses' death Moses' death is included in Deuteronomy. Camels are listed in Abraham's retinue, but camels were domesticated around 1000, long after Abraham (1550 BCE) and even Moses (1250 BCE) The text mentions Philistines in the time between Abraham and Moses, but the Philistines did not enter the coastal areas of Canaan until around 1200 BCE (after Moses). The text says, "At that time the Canaanites were in the land" (Gen 12:6), which implies the author writes in a time when they were no longer there -- but they were clearly there when Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan after Moses' death. Statements such as "before any king ruled over the Israelites" (Gen 36:31) imply a time in the writer's mind when kings had ruled over the Israelites -- but none ever did in Moses' lifetime. In Deuteronomy 34, the writer says, "There never arose another prophet in Israel like Moses." It didn't seem to make sense that Moses' -- or even God, in Moses' time -- would write such words. Other details were noticed as well. Certain parts of the Torah use words for places and things that are different from other parts. For instance, some stories (Exodus 3, 17, and 31; Deuteronomy everywhere but once) used "Horeb" as the name for the mountain where Moses receives the Law, while other parts of the story (Exodus 16, 19, 31, 34; Leviticus and Numbers throughout; and Deuteronomy 33) use the name "Sinai"
But Mike Winger, the problem with you is that you say the city of Tyre was not rebuilt and yet there are videos of it on youtube today. Now I can't listen to you anymore...
I believe Steve does a lot better job making his case than Andrew. Andrew seems to think that among all of the sacred books that have been included in different versions of the Bible and different translations of the Bible a perfect script that Jesus would say has no errors. Just think about that for a second.
The Old Testament are the words of God, but it is a shadow / a represetation that bring us to the New Testament. It is not the reality which can reveal the true nature and character of God. That's why Jesus came to reveal the Father to us. John 1:14 - And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. John 1:17 - For the law was given by Moses, BUT grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
The debate went completely off tangent. I was waiting to hear what the errors were supposed to be, and waiting to hear the rebuttal. However, all it became is an argument over the meaning of 'the Word of God'. I mean sure, it may be an interesting tangent, the Bible is a library of books that contain different authors perspectives, how many books are there in the Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant Bibles, is Jesus referring to the New Testament when he says 'Word of God', etc etc etc. but still...But the main point - 'Does the Bible contain errors?' is not addressed.
@@NoContextRDH I think there is a difference from how we generally go about believing things vs being hypervigilant about which ideology you should either adopt or guard yourself from believing. How about we just believe what's most likely/apparent? Choosing to only believe what you think you should believe at the expense of reality is confirmation bias.
Even if you hold the erroneous view that the Bible is inerrant, then who has the final authority to interpret it, but more fallible humans. The evidence is in the failure of the Catholic Church to give perfect interpretation, see history, and the fact there are many denomations of Christian thought. Therefore, each person is ultimately responsible for their faith, i.e., knowledge of scriptures, the nature of reality, and their relationship with God
I think the issue is that when you label something (e.g. The Bible as "inerrant") it shows that YOU in particular have thought this through and distilled the text and now have the answer. That's really good! BUT you can't kind of push people through that process right to the end so that they end up where you are without them thinking through it themselves. It seems that so many evangelicals really think (at least in a relational person to person sense) that THEY have the word of God and are kind of gatekeepers for it. That's true in a sense, but really only when it comes to the Scriptures and what they say. NOT what they THINK it says exactly. This leaves them with this uncomfortable feeling they don't like AND I would say, from my experience, leaves them uncomfortable with people in general and ineffective at good evangelism. People, flesh and blood people with their own mind and feelings etc, will eventually resent that attitude. It's analytical but not relational and none of us is first and foremost a "brain". That's my thoughts anyway.
Exactly my thoughts on it! So many evangelicals are terrible at evangelism because they’re willing to die on so many hills they don’t need to die on when it comes to certain things like inerrancy, age of the earth, evolution, etc.
To ask the guests to position themselves on the very short example of Bart Ehrman's journey, eg his lecturer writing "Maybe Mark made a mistake." on his paper gives them grounds to write Bart Ehrman's off as a "backslider". The presenter gave some very easy points to guests.
Is funny Bart Ehrman called dr and obviously found contradiction in the holy bible, but in the case of Mark 2:26 you can read 1sa 22:20 2sa 8:17 and 1 Chr 18:16 and see both Abiathar and Abimelech( father-son) had both names interchangeably. I hope Bart Ehrman open his heart
It seems to me that most Christian theologians define inerrancy as “without error in the original autographs.” So with that definition, they’re admitting that we don’t currently have an inerrant Bible, and we never WILL have an inerrant Bible since we don’t possess the original autographs. How do we know the Bible is inerrant if inerrancy only applies to the original autographs, which we don’t have?
Autograph copies referees to hand written copies not original writings form the hand of the original author. Just to let you know. Common mistake. At any rate this is my take :Why should that mater if some of it is not inspired and some is myth legend primitive cosmology biases embellished or any other human trait . If 100 words were from God would you believe , how about 50 , what about 10 , what if just 1 word is from God ? One word from God that is enough.
What kind of question is this? There’s been like 16 versions of the Bible before the King James Version, translated between multiple languages of course there’s been errors and changes to the book. It’s not like there was a printing press back then, they were translating the books by hand. This is ridiculous to even ask, people’s common sense goes out the window when it comes to the Bible.
I know right, its actually crazy how the bible went through all that, and when we discovered the over 25,000 ancient manuscripts from the 1st century it is identical to what we have today in the original languages. some would say its a miracle
The problem with this talk is that they talk about the Bible, the contradictions, errors in the Bible in abstact terms, never addressing specific errrors, contradictions. I would have liked to hear e.g. what they think about Genesis chapters 1-11. Has there been a flood, or not? (It is absolutely clear that the flood cannot have happened the way described in the Bible.) How do they explain the discrepancies of Jesus's death between the synoptics on one hand and John on the other? (Last supper as Easter supper, institution of Eucharist vs. last supper BEFORE Easter, no institution of Eucharist.)
Steve should learn to not interrupt. Each person needs to be able to complete their thoughts. He sounds like someone who must have control of the conversation in order to make his point.
Recently, I've been in a marathon discussion with some atheists online and the conversation soon turned to the supposed absurdity of the flood account. Their assertion that the story was nothing more than fiction allowed me to ask them to prove their claim and accept the burden of proof which was eagerly accepted. What resulted was as to be expected, the usual points that geology has shown there never was a global flood and that the flood account was stolen from the Sumeriansand and Babylonian. At first glance, this seems like a slam dunk but its actually far from it. I was able to point out how they read the account through a litteralistic lense not unlike Ken Ham, and fail to apply any context to the story before reaching their conclusions. Context being "the circumstances that form the setting for an event, statement, or idea, and in terms of which it can be fully understood." This failure to acknowledge such things as the limited geographical knowledge of the word by these ancient societies or the different literature style used as compared to what we now see today cannot be overstated and cannot be overlooked and ignored In short, by failing to apply context, the litteralistic view is therefore incomplete and an assessment and conclusion based upon an incomplete understanding must be dismissed. Personally, I've always been of the opinion that the flood account was based upon an epic local flood event such as the black sea deluge or Doggerland deluge off the east coast of the UK etc and this doesn't detract from the underlying message within the account. The application of context is key to understanding many supposed problems within the bible and this is something atheists tend not to do
Local flood account is not credible at all... Gen 7 v 19-24 They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. 20 The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.[e][f] 21 Every living thing that moved on land perished-birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. 24 The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
@@maxboucher86 In Hebrew, the word translated “earth”, can be translated “land”. Nothing in the Biblical account of the flood requires it to be universal so as to have flooded Scotland or Canada. Nothing in the Biblical account of the flood is opposed to the flood having flooded part of the Ancient Near East, and not Scotland or Canada. In fact, the second interpretation fits much better with what the text says. Neither is there anything in the text that requires it to be an account of an historical event, or about a real individual human being named Noah aged 600 when the Flood began. There is no reason why the Flood account cannot be a myth. I firmly believe in the authority of the Bible, as being in some sense “God-breathed”. It does not follow, that because the Bible comes to us with the authority of God, that therefore everything in it that we might suppose to be historical, must therefore be historical. It is a much more complicated and much more interesting set of books than skeptics or Fundamentalists seem to realise. I loved the reference to the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1760).
I find it interesting the bible says that god would not bring "confusion", or something like that. Yet we have scholars on both sides of the argument that can not agree on what the heck the bible says. There is always a more "in depth" message. Sounds a lot like believers trying to extract the meaning they need other than what it actually says.
Of course, fake believers argue against real believers' stands on the Bible. Fake believers, and nonbelievers, have to define God down to justify the lifestyles they support. Everything Steve Chalke believes about God and the Bible is structured to support perverse lifestyles.
@@tiagoscherer1158 It’s the true born again believers that the bible is revealed to. The biblical scriptures tell us this!!!!! The non - believers will NEVER understand the WORD OF GOD/ HE will keep them blinded to HIS TRUTH!!!! Pray that ur heart and eyes may be opened. GOD BLESS. The bible is spiritual and only those that are truely born again in the spirit can comprehend!!!!>
Great subject for discussion, but so argumentative with raised voices I found this too stressful to listen to - it gave me a headache! Can we hear some more peaceful conversations please so that more can be said and heard without guests speaking over each other and raising their voices please?
The discussion about "losing faith" prior to 5:00 says a lot about what is really a concern here. Actual truth be damned, enter the apologists with their Gish-galloping, tap dance around the blatant errors. _Viz._ " ...for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." (NASB) Matthew 12:39-40 Yet Jesus was interred for only a day & a half. What day of the week did that infamous third night fall? Sweep the obvious aside and you get to keep your "faith".
A fascinating debate, and thought-provoking. It makes me wonder how God could have spoken to a pre-Jesus world in any other way. Christians can all agree that the Old Testament tells the story of God preparing His chosen people for the arrival of His Son, but in order to do that He had to present a veiled image, an image which was unclear and 'fuzzy'. It doesn't mean the image was a false one, it just means there would inevitably be disagreement over it, even after Jesus had fulfilled it. I therefore agree with Andrew Wilson.
@@mattr.1887 Think about how life would be if God had given us a very clear image. Would we be free agents, able to make our own choices and decisions and exercise free thought? I doubt it.
FYI, Bart Erhman didn't "lose his faith" in the Word of God. As the apostle John so eloquently wrote: "They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us." (1 John 2:19)
Christians feel they are so special. They have the "only way". If you started Christian and ended up not... Then you wasn't a special Christian to begin with...lol. (Edit:. Do you want a cookie now, entitled Christian?)
@@GTSongwriter IF a Christian feels that they're special as you allude to, then very clearly they are not a Christian. Nobody is born a Christian. The teachings of Christ Himself clearly demonstrate that there are both sheep and wolves beholden to Him i.e. those that truly follow Him and those that don't, that are in name only.
@@LiffeyKing Is your Christian religion the "only true" religion? Everyone that doesn't believe will go to hell? The Bible is infallible? The Christian God is the "only God"? Do you not feel special to be part of something that stands against anyone that doesn't believe like you do? Do you feel it's your right to say to anyone that you have the only religion that is to be believed and all others are false? What do you think happens to those people that never hear the word of the Bible that live in a country that burns the Bible. Do they also go to hell? Does that not make you feel special because you was born in a country that allowed you to hear the Bible? Those other people that never hear the word will die and be lost to hell forever? Yes, Christians feel special and is reason they thump that Bible around. If it was a religion of openness and kindness, then it would also not consider itself the "only way". My youth is where I learned how harsh the Christian Religion can be. There are rules to abide by and no freedom to explore other religions. The Christian religion is against homosexuals, but what about those people born with 2 sexes. If those people love either sex, are they not homosexual? God created them, yet he is against his own creation? There are so many contradictions of the Bible, it is requiring Christians to become scholars in order to defend thier faith. Even with that, there are still contradictions that even baffle the Christian scholars! I'll end up debating with Christians for days. They will end up having no answers and fall on the same topic, "I have faith". Personally, if my religion considered a book infallible, yet someone comes along and disapproves it...am I going to sit there are still believe anyhow? No! I'm going to question it. Someone has been lying to me about my religion and I would need to figure out why. To just believe in something, knowing it has flaws when it doesn't suppose to have flaws is plain out being ignorant. Maybe they are comfortable with what there is and what they can't explain they just blindly follow anyhow. Put a carrot on a stick in front of a horse, and he'll keep walking towards it. He doesn't need to believe in anything else other than someday he might obtain that carrot. We all know he can't get that carrot, but the horse has faith. He believes without reason. Faith kills people. Imagine those of the Muslim religion. Some of them are willing to strap bombs to themselves in showing of faith and to go blow up thier enemies. Christianity is a dying religion. So many things going wrong with it. In children's church, I witnessed older adults sexually abuse kids during children's church. Nobody believed me as I was just a kid with a wild imagination. So many pedophiles in church. Would anyone want to raise thier children in a place where pedophiles run about? So many bad things happening with the Christian religion, it's no wonder the Christan community is becoming smaller. Someone needs to rewrite the Bible so that it agrees with the new age, else this religion will soon die. There are scripture in the old testament that allows a pedophile to have a baby with his daughter and blames it on him being too drunk to know. If the Christians are only going to use the New testament, then they should throw out the old one. Keeping the old one with the new one creates so many more contradictions. Christians have so many variations of thier religion, which one is the "only way"? Baptist, Methodist, Catholics, to name a very few. Yeah, there are probably over a hundred variations of Christianity. Where does one begin? (Edit: swipe misspelled stuff)
The text CONTAINS the THINKING of MAN. How he interprets what was given to him by God. What i believe Mr Chalke is saying the ‘thinking’ of man is wrong, not the writing of the word of god. The word of god contains the thinking of man in ADDITION to the word of god
@@zakpatten7631 God JUDGES EACH christian. you are responsible for your own actions just like a criminal in a law court. But God can just as equally work through a Christian who has it wrong just like he works through an unbeliever e.g. King of Babylon and Daniel. .
@@zakpatten7631 What did Jesus say to the disciples at the end of Johns Gospel? 'what concern is it of yours...'. we do not need to require if some teacher is right or wrong for ultimately if your heart in pure in its search, the Holy Spirit will plant in you what is required. every christian has a unique path. it may be in contradiction to other christians. you have to TRUST your heart. if you know your bible well the HS will reveal it to you.
This is the way I look at it (I am a Historian not a theologian). The 66 book- library that we call the Bible, I would say are historically accurate in many ways. I think using words like Inerrant, infallible, Literal, metaphorical, and so on are not really helpful words to use since those words have different meanings to different people. Andrew is Correct when he calls the Bible authoritative, but on the other hand Steve is also right when he says that Jesus is the word of God (Hebrews 1). This library that we call the Bible contains a plurality of views that we need to respect, and I think that's why God uses people to convey his divine message. Jesus is the focus not the Bible, We use the Bible in order to learn about Jesus and his wonderful teachings and deeds not the other way around. I personally don't get so hot and bothered by terms like inerrant, infallible etc. I personally try to focus on what God wants to tell me through Jesus in his word (The Bible) when I read it. I do think that the Bible is error-free in all that it intends to teach, theologically, Historically and scientific (considering the limited understanding of those writers and their time). For example, when my car breaks down, I don't go to the Bible to find answers on how to fix a car, since that was not the intention for which it was written. Bottom line, let's use the Bible for what it was intended, to guide us to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ!
How do you know about Jesus if the bible is not infalible and inherant, how do you know what is written about Jesus is accurate? This view leads to unbelief rather quickly.
The Bible is absolutely true when it says that only your Maker can perfectly cover for you Himself and remake you again from the inside out by the power of His tue word as no one else can. Physical reality is entirely relative and subject to change. God's eternal truth is forever.
I was associated with New Frontiers Church in Brighton for a number of years , sadly quite a few practices that really bothered me greatly and I eventually left .
Oh of course, the problem with Bart is that he just didn't believe hard enough. As if believing in a text that contains thousands of inaccuracies, contradictions and errors is a virtue!?! Theology is not an intellectual pursuit. You can't start your enquiry with the assumption that the text in question is completely true and accurate.
Hebrew and Greek have completely different grammar .What are the translation error in Septigunt, how can any translation of any literature, which mmakes it essentially a second hand literature can be infallable?
Exactly. The New Testament is most definitely fallible because it's based on mistranslations of verses from the OT that have been taken out of context and in some cases even fabricated to further the narrative/agenda of Christianity.
Really good platform provided here for discussion, Justin. Appreciate what you do. Divergent NT accounts are not the best place to start with this, I don't think. The OT has much more formidable and explicit....even numerical contradictions of the same things in two different accounts. More Christians need to reckon with what the text itself says. When Andrew presses Steve on "is the bible the Word of God", he has many assumptions that are unsaid by the scripture itself. Does he think his 66 book canon is the Word of God? The Masoretic OT? The LXX? Other varying Jewish canons? The longer ending in Mark? The Johannine comma? The deuterocanonical books? Prior to the late Reformation, nobody had a 66 book canon....nobody had the "bible" he holds in his hands. This says nothing of someone who simply denies inerrancy...an extrabiblical doctrine. Even Christian scholars affirm that much of the OT material is written hundreds of years after the purported events, for theological and political reasons. This is seen in the type of Hebrew used, anachronisms, information in the story that we know comes from much later.
*The OT has much more formidable and explicit....even numerical contradictions of the same things in two different accounts.* A contradiction is not an accusation to be thrown around lightly. Just because two different accounts contain two different numbers, this does not necessarily a contradiction make. *More Christians need to reckon with what the text itself says.* I totally agree. I'm willing to recon if you think you have a contradiction. I can take a couple examples if you'd like.
Jay Hu There are resolutions given for some of these, but most times it is really reaching. Did God use his name Yahweh or not? Gen 15:7 and Exodus 6:3 Were all Egypt's livestock killed in the 5th plague or not? Exodus 9:6 and 12:29 Must the passover be from flocks only? Ex 12:5. Or also from the herd? Deut 16:2 Could it be boiled or not? Ex 12:9 and 2 Chr 35:13 Could it be celebrated in households, or not? Ex 12, Deut 16:5-6, Luke 22:11 How many horsemen did David take? 2 Sam 8:4 and 1 Chr 18:4 At the end of 4 or 40 yrs? 2 Sam 15:7 Killed 800 or 300? 2 Sam 23:8 and 1 Chr 11:11 Is Jerusalem conquered by Joshua,Josh 12:10; or David, 2 Sam 5:6? Did David take Goliath's head to the walled Jebusite city of Jerusalem, 1 Sam 17:54? (See 2 Sam 5:6). Did Saul meet David and twice interact with Jesse in 1 Sam 16: 19-22 or meet David and not know his father in 17:55-56? Who killed Goliath? David in 1 Sam 17 or Elhanan in 2 Sam 21:19 and who did Elhanan kill, Goliath or his brother in 1 Chron 20: 5 7 or three yrs of famine? 2 Sam 24:13 and 1 Chr 21:12 50 or 600 shekels? 2 Sam 24:24 and 1 Chr 21:25 How many stalls? 1 Kings 4:26 and 2 Chr 9:25 How many chief officers? 1 Kings 5:16 and 2 Chr 2:18 How many cubits high? 1 Kings 7:15 and 2 Chr 3:15 How many baths? 1 Kings 7:26 and 2 Chr 4:5 How many chief officers? 1 Kings 9:23 and 2 Chr 8:10 Did Baasha die around the 26th yr reign of Asa or is he alive in Asa's 36th yr? 1 Kgs 16:6, 8 and 2 Chr 16:1 Is Ahaziah 22 or 42? 2 Kgs 8:26 and 2 Chr 22:2 (most versions) Was Jehoiachin 18 or 8? 2 Kgs 24:8 and 2 Chr 36:9 What day was temple burned? 2 Kgs 25:8 and Jer 52:12 Compare the numbers of sons of same men. Ezra 2 and Neh 7 How many singers? Ezra 2:65 and Neh 7:67 The most sensible explanation for many of these is that there are different traditions/sources of the same events. Here are a few more in relation to Moses authorship of Torah. The Edomite kings listed in Genesis 36 did not live until after Moses was dead Moses is referred to in the 3rd person in several passages There are places named that Moses could not have known (he never entered the Promised Land) The Hebrew of the text includes terms that were developed long after Moses' death Moses' death is included in Deuteronomy. Camels are listed in Abraham's retinue, but camels were domesticated around 1000, long after Abraham (1550 BCE) and even Moses (1250 BCE) The text mentions Philistines in the time between Abraham and Moses, but the Philistines did not enter the coastal areas of Canaan until around 1200 BCE (after Moses). The text says, "At that time the Canaanites were in the land" (Gen 12:6), which implies the author writes in a time when they were no longer there -- but they were clearly there when Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan after Moses' death. Statements such as "before any king ruled over the Israelites" (Gen 36:31) imply a time in the writer's mind when kings had ruled over the Israelites -- but none ever did in Moses' lifetime. In Deuteronomy 34, the writer says, "There never arose another prophet in Israel like Moses." It didn't seem to make sense that Moses' -- or even God, in Moses' time -- would write such words. Other details were noticed as well. Certain parts of the Torah use words for places and things that are different from other parts. For instance, some stories (Exodus 3, 17, and 31; Deuteronomy everywhere but once) used "Horeb" as the name for the mountain where Moses receives the Law, while other parts of the story (Exodus 16, 19, 31, 34; Leviticus and Numbers throughout; and Deuteronomy 33) use the name "Sinai"
@@CanadianOrth Wow. I'm a Christian too. I am looking up the passages you provided. I do see the contradictions and errors. That is proof that the bible is not inerrant.
Andrew has failed to look at the first commandment. ‘Love the lord your god’ The israelites should have questioned themselves by saying, this law we have, what does it mean BY love? The rules follow rule nbr 1. You seek god by seeking to know the truth of love, not the truth of the law of rules.
Steve please allow others to reply or state their view. I enjoy these debates and I like Steve because he challenges me to dig deeper. I'm more on Andrews page but I like these types of questions.
Most people are not scholars. To argue Biblical 'truth' is found when one studies it in a complex, obscure way that requires a load of mental gymnastics, implies the text isn't authoritative. Surely God would make it as easily accessible as possible for most people. To require anything more than black on white, text on paper, obvious interpretations, doesn't make sense. Belief shouldn't require a spreadsheet of interpretations that needs a complex web of explanations in order to be convinced it's true. Come on, these are fairy tales that are susceptible to crumbling under any in depth analysis. Asserting it's true doesn't cut the mustard.
Interesting opinion. Can you elaborate on what you're talking about a little more? Right now it comes off as a hit a run comment but would like to hear what exactly your referring to?
One thing it works of to say is to believe as a child. Keep a child like belief perhaps that is why some scholars have talked themselves out of faith. Yes language is powerful and has meaning to man.
An eye for an eye never meant that literally. It meant what the worth of that eye was to the injured party and that value would need to be fully paid the injured party. So the law meant compensation for the full value of the loss. A hunter who lost his right eye would be severely impacted and find much of his future lifetime earnings severely impaired. As such the value given to him as compensation would be high.
I so much appreciate this conversation as it seems to mirror a discussion my brother and I have been having for the last decade, though admittedly, much less scholarly. And like Steve, my brother is in a position of authority as a prison chaplain in charge of the homosexual/transgendered wing. And much like my brother, Steve’s position is lacking any type of clarity. How many times was Steve asked to get specific about a particular passage as his prior comments were unclear only to respond in more generalities with less clarity. It appears to me Steve has already decided what is moral and is reading it into the text interpretations only a professional mental gymnast could impart. Steve needs to be quite careful as he is in a position of authority and will be held to the highest standard. Again, like my brother, he preaches that monogamous homosexual relationships are fine with God suggesting that monogamy, or the the lack of promiscuity is the key. My point is why doesn’t the Bible affirm that by simply saying that instead of specifically condemning homosexual offenders right along side of fornicators? Why not just say promiscuous fornicators? I believe God loves clarity, and if scholarly men of good conscience have to repeatedly ask for clarity only to end up more confused, it may be time to rethink his position.
God loves clarity? That's news to me, as far as I know, nearly nothing in the bible is clear at all. If it was to be taken literally, you are allowed to enslave jews and beat them, as long as they don't die afterwards within 3 days. And also all of humanity would be descendents of two humans, but somehow without incest.... hm.. doesn't seem so clear to me
I'd love to hear Steve's point of view presented by someone who isn't constantly interrupting his opponent or raising his voice when someone else starts to talk.
It would seem to me that Steve’s point is situational and based on what he is trying to mold the scriptures around. He revised his idea every time he speaks, because he has to make it conform to his argument. Hard to follow somebody like that.
A couple of things I'd like to bring up. Clearly before we can discuss anything about the bible we need to specify what the bible is. This doesn't seem to me to equate to what Jesus talked about in the Gospels: he is refering to the Scripture, which is mainly the Pentateuch (Torah); therefore we need to split that off from questions like, Does the New Testament contain errors? The bible didn't even exist as such until centuries later (I just went looking for an exact date/council and it could even be considered as late as Trent en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_biblical_canons ). Also looking at some examples of where it is claimed that Jesus says that Scripture is the word of God, I see that he is referring to things specifically reported to be God's words, eg Luke 24:44-45, "Now He said to them, 'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures." -- specific prophesies Matt 15:6, "he is not to honor his father or his mother. And thus you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition." -- 10 commandments sent by God Mark 7:13, "thus invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and you do many things such as that.” -- 10 commandments sent by God John 10:35, “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken)." -- in the previous verse "I have said you..." showing that this is a report of the Word of God So is it that the only parts of the OT which are the Word of God are the parts which the OT and/or NT claim to be, and the other parts are human reports of what happened? And in the NT, similarly only the parts which are the Word of God are the parts reported to be spoken by Jesus or The Father? (ie the red letter bible highlights the Word of God in red) Oh yeah, I took the examples above from the page carm.org/bible-isnt-word-god-it-contains-word-god
The Bible has hundreds of contradictions, here are a few examples: 1.How many soldiers did Israel and Judah have? 2Samuel 24:9- The census count was Israel:800,000 Judah:500,000. 1 Chronicles 21:5- The census count was Israel: 1,100,000 Judah: 470,000. 2.How old was Jehoiachin when he began to reign? 2 Kings 24:8 Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months.-KJV 2 Chronicles 36:9 Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem-KJV 3.In Matthew 23:35 Jesus refers to Zechariah son of Barakiah when in fact the incident was about Zechariah son of Jehoiada in 2 Chronicles 24:20. 4.In Mark 2:25-26 Jesus refers to Abiathar as High Priest when in fact Ahimelech was High Priest at the time of the incident he describes in 1 Samuel 21:1-6. 5.How much did David pay for the property? 2SA 24:24 David paid 50 shekels of silver for the purchase of a property. 1CH 21:22-25 He paid 600 shekels of gold. 6. In Matthew 21:19-20 Jesus curses the fig tree and it withers IMMEDIATELY. But when you read the same story in Mark 11:13-15 you'll realise that Jesus cursed the fig tree and nothing happened. Then the NEXT MORNING in verse 20-21 the disciples realised that the fig tree had withered. 7.Could the women touch Jesus when they went to his tomb? YES In MATTHEW 28:9 - Mary Magdalene and the other Mary saw Jesus and came and 'held him by the feet and worshipped him' NO But in JOHN 20:17- On visiting the tomb, Jesus warned Mary Magdalene 'Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended to my father'
You make the classic mistake of not considering other people's viewpoints. The Bible has many viewpoints that nonbelievers and fake believers have to 'show' as contradictions to justify the lifestyles they support.
In the beginning was the word. Jesus affirms the Old Testament. He used the law to show that it's not even close to what God requires. Jesus lived the perfect life. John 3:16. Love this series. God bless
Does the Bible contain errors? Before we can ask this question, we must answer the question: What is the Bible? What we know of the Bible started with multiple oral histories - some stretching over a period of thousands of years. Each telling was heard in the context of one time and retold in the context of a different time.. Like a game of telephone, each retelling likely suffered some loss of fidelity. Eventually, the oral histories were recorded - some in Hebrew, some in Aramaic, and some in Greek. The New Testament was recorded within a few hundred years of the actual events, so we can assume they did not suffer from this same loss of fidelity... much. Eventually, all of the texts were translated into English (of a sort). As with any translation, it can be difficult to equate one word or phrase in one language to another, especially if you do not have first hand knowledge of the context of the time of origin. At the time of these translations some texts were included and others were rejected for various reasons. The point is, people made these decisions. Therefore, people determined what the Bible would become. It is likely that various human biases necessarily crept into these translations. Over the years, there have been other translations - each with an intent to make the old tests more accessible to modern societies... by making them less like the originals. Even still, two people can read the same texts and get entirely different meanings. This has to do with the way the human brain works. We pattern match. We take something from one historical context for which we have little or no knowledge and match it to contexts that align with our own experience. So... Does the Bible contain errors? If by this we mean does it fail to faithfully capture and convey the events and mental states of the original experiencers? Of course it contains errors. Even though we might feel that the words of Jesus have been captured faithfully, I offer this thought. In Luke 14:27 Jesus says, "Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple." Think about the symbolism of the cross as we know it (sacrifice). Then think about the symbolism of the cross as the disciples knew it before Jesus' crucifixion (criminality). Do you think these are the words of Jesus or the words of the author, projecting 80 years later?
It doesn't matter. The bible is HEBREW and for the 12 tribes. Maybe it would have been better to steal the Navajo or Yaqui religion since it's closer to home?
@@byronloves7472 he’s a Hebrew Israelite who has a unique ideology. The book of acts and letters of Paul debunk all their teachings but they conveniently don’t follow those books.
Many historians and bible scholars e.g. Richard Carrier and Bart Ehrman acknowledge the bible has thousands of mistakes, therefore how can it be the inerrant word of God? Also the main religions tell us God is perfect and unchanging so why does God's views appear to have reflected society's norms at the time? A moral, perfect and all knowing God does not change his views just because society does. If this is so, what kind of God is he, when so much of what was culturally acceptable thousands of years ago is no longer morally justifiable? I used to be a Christian but the more I asked difficult questions it no longer made sense! I agree with some comments below...it would be great to listen to a debate with someone like Bart Ehrman etc. For those interested there are some great debates on You Tube with Christians like William Lane Craig and athiests/agnostics such as Sean Carroll, Richard Carrier, Sam Harris, Michael Shermer, the late Christopher Hitchens and many more. My thinking has been challenged by these people and it's the best thing that ever happened to me.
The question you ask is very simple to answer, the Bible was written by normal fallible people that was inspired by the Holy Spirit, the book is not perfect in the sense that it does reflect the time it was written and never claimed to be otherwise. When Christians use the word inerrant word of God it refers to the prophetic message that the Bible provides, in other words, the message in the Bible is truthful.
@@kimdanielsen4368 I was talking to the other guy but you too didnt answer the question you were attempting to answer. It's very obvious which part of her comment you were addressing, do I have spell it out for you? Read the thread over again ,I'm not going to hold your hand. As for your reply to her comment, Youre the typical Christian apologetic making excuses for the bible. If it were inspired by God and it were truthful ,there wouldn't be errors and contradictions in the bible. Truthful equates to perfect. When you say it's not perfect then it can't be truthful. It can't be truthful with imperfections, errors and contradictions in it.
This conversation was more about the meaning and significance of the Bible than a petty argument about whether it contains errors. It was surprising in a good way, given the title. Steve, stop interrupting!
Bart Erman Lost his faith largely too personal hardships that expose the weakness in his logic and faith. Unfortunately, I believe it is the death of his wife that did this. Though as a person, he had to freely choose to succumb to such notions as a godless existence. It is really quite sad, he seems like an interesting fellow, a nice gentleman, and a all-around amiable person.
There's just one tiny little thing wrong with your post. Sarah Beckwith is STILL ALIVE and working at Duke University!!! I think it's admirable of the faculty at Duke to give a dead person gainful employment, don't you?
It's all there in black/red and white for anyone to see for themselves. There are definitely errors and contradictions in the bible. The bible is your authority and reason for believing. You should question and rethink your beliefs.
(John 10:26-28) "But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. {27} My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: {28} And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand."
If one were to get 99 percent of the facts right and 1 percent wrong, would that mean that they’re reliable.. Yes! We can never be perfect. But on the other hand, if one were to get 50 percent of the facts right and 50 percent of the facts wrong, should we trust them? It would take a lot of faith that’s for sure.
If you want the Word of God, then go within. God speaks to each person directly. Books can be helpful but books are secondary information. "The Knowledge of the Kingdom of Heaven is Within."
Save your bs sarcasm for somebody named Adam or Eve. Nothing could be more invisible than a human being. WHO will even know YOU existed, who knows - past tomorrow? But Jesus is still here. And if you dug up your great great great great grandma's great great great grandpa, HE would know who Jesus was too! Playa hater you are.
+Tony "Save your bs sarcasm for somebody named Adam or Eve." *Okay, that makes zero sense.* "Nothing could be more invisible than a human being." *Okay, that makes zero sense.* "WHO will even know YOU existed, who knows - past tomorrow?" *Okay, that makes zero sense. Good job. numb nuts, your 0 for 3 so far.* "But Jesus is still here." *Gee, how convincing!!! LMMFAO!!* "And if you dug up your great great great great grandma's great great great grandpa, HE would know who Jesus was too!" *No, he might claim to know, but just like your deluded ass, he'd just be making shit up.* "Playa hater you are." *WOW!! Such potent arguments!!!! Ahahahahaaa!!!! Time for you to grow up and drop the imaginary friends, little boy.* *I look forward to your further demonstration of the dangers belief that invisible magicians exist has bestowed upon your dumb ass.*
Simple question. Why could not God make sure the Bible is inerrant thus indicating that this collection of texts is not simply human works, but God's words? The fact that God failed to do so, is not an indication that this collection of texts has nothing to do with God, and maybe there is not even such a thing as an omnipotent God?
"Inerrant" is not a word I find in the Bible. We don't need to believe all of the stories literally to follow Jesus and live the Spiritual life he desires for us. Speaking only for myself, if Jesus was a myth, I would still follow his teachings and commandments. That's no different than how Buddhists view the Buddha. So, I may not believe all the stories literally, but nothing will stop me from following Him.
I love listening to the sanity of Andrew, but cannot stand the heretical nonsense that Steve spouts. Can you get Andrew on the show more, and get rid of Steve.
Andrew, do you believe the apostles were wiser than the israelites under moses? Substitute the apostles into the mosaic law for a day. How would they have acted differently to what is recorded ‘in the word of God’? The errors in the bible are to do with the errors of man.
Question for Andrew - when Jesus said the Bible is the word of God, was he not referring to the Hebrew Bible? The New Testament wasn’t finalized until 397 AD. What gives the Christian warrant to find the New Testament reliable? Surely, it’s not the New Testament as it did not exist as a corpus at its writing. Any reference to the word/Bible by the New Testament writers surely didn’t include the New Testament? If I’m wrong, I welcome further info.
Yes, Jesus referred to the Old Testament when commenting on Scripture, but His new teachings were creating the New Testament even as He spoke and did new things, miracles, prophesied, dying on the Cross, the Resurrection and Ascension. When He rose from the Tomb, He opened the Scriptures of the Old Testament to show how they were all fulfilled in Him. The 2nd Epistle of Peter was written around AD 66. Peter says in 2 Peter 3: 15-16, "And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; 16As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction." So Peter certainly considered Paul's letters to be inspired Scripture. All the books of the New Testament that we have today were completed by about AD 91-96. The trouble started when other later writings claimed to have been written at the same time, but were actually gnostic heretical texts written later. So eventually the church had to hold meetings to define what was scripture and what was not, hence your date of 397. But Christians back in the 2nd century had already made similar lists to those made post-Constantine and these earlier lists were used to define which books were authentic and which were not.
Mk had Jesus ask "Why does this generation ask for sign. Truly I tell you, no sign will be given it". So, what happened to NT 'promise' [all are lies, anyway] to merely ask and you shall be given? Another scribe has Jesus also saying: Unless you see the signs, you will not ever become a believer in God. 2 Co 4:18 contradicts the necessity to see miracles, by saying that believers do not need to see; they need just to have blind faith in Jesus.
If homosexually is wrong in the Bible, where does the people born with both sexes belong? If they have sex with either sex, are they not homosexual for which God created them?
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It's cute when religitards pretend to be intellectuals.....
The Bible, the word of God does NOT have any error. God does NOT make even an error. It’s the translators who made errors in their translation. Why are there so many English versions of the Bible?
The onus is on everyone to find the inspired English translation. Many English versions are NOT the word of God. There is only one translation that is the inspired word of God. Look for it.
@@jk11222 Your god created literally EVERY THING but you expect everyone to believe he can't figure out how to get his word out without 100s of contradictions, misprints, etc.
The problem starts when Andrews view is called "Biblical" while Steve 's is called "controversial"... both are biblical and controversial
Steve's is not biblical.
@@Dan-xu4sd the problem Is that Steve is Biblical but your assumptions about what the Bible says are not actually Biblical
So true!!
@@dcbcplymouth YES!
@@Dan-xu4sd The problem arises when you have clear contradictions with OT and NT principles which precipitate such doctrines as Dispensationalism, Covenant Theology, etc., all of which rather than suggesting man got it wrong when writing down their inspiration, the motivation of God was wrong. Which is easier to square with? Clearly when reading the Bible, we can draw inspiration from passages that man's responses are bad because we see God constantly redeeming him. However, if we read it with the assumption that God has changed his perspective about men, that is where we have a REAL problem!
Bring back Tom Holland, NT Wright and Jordan Peterson, altogether if possible. Maybe add Bart Ehrman to the mix. Then re-ask that panel the same question. That would be an exciting event.
Maybe add Michael heiser to that list too
And throw Ricky Gervais into the mix, I'd pay to see that.
Yes*
Yes and bring Steve Chalke back so he could interrupt all 4 of them as they made their points.
@@bonnie43uk lol
When Jesus says "you have heard it said... but I say to you..." He isn't disagreeing with the Torah! He's correcting popular teachings of the time with proper understanding of Scripture. When He quotes the Bible, He says "it is written," when he's quoting popular teaching he says "it was said," (He corrects some teaching which quotes the Bible but misunderstands it (e.g. Matt. 5:38), and some that teaching which was not based on Scripture at all (e.g. 5:43)). The idea that Jesus is disagreeing with the Old Testament is untenable once you understand that the sermon on the mount shows Jesus correcting unbiblical teaching of His time, not correcting the Bible.
Love this. Unscripted, Uncut. Christians with different opinions talking about important questions. It would be interesting though if both parties would be willing to not only understand the other person but even to correct their own opinion if the arguments of the other one are better. So to speak if both of them would seek the truth together instead of just defending their own opinion.
Steve is not a Christian.
Great stuff! I've only recently discovered your program and I'm loving the content. May God bless you in your work.
To be scrupulously fair to Steve Chalke, I think one has to ignore the way he presents in debate: talking over and interrupting his opponents; the constant, unsubstantiated claims that serious scholars subscribe to his positions, and the routine use of personal anecdotes - as a substitute for scriptural evidence - does little to enhance his credibility. But if we can leave all that baggage aside, perhaps it would be more charitable to judge what he is trying to say, rather than the manner in which he says it.
Steve claims that he has a high view of Jesus, and a high view of scripture. This is not strictly accurate: he has a high view of a re-imagined Jesus - a liberal, user-friendly, inclusive Jesus who has been grossly misunderstood by all but Steve Chalke. A Jesus who shares Steve's disdain for every part of scripture which doesn't agree with Steve's agenda. The Holy Spirit may be the author of some of the bible, but clearly not those sections which disagree with this re-imagined Jesus.
If Steve Chalke really had a high view of Jesus, he would not find it necessary to re-invent him. As for a high view of scripture, that could only be true in a world where a 'high view' is synonymous with contempt. It seems Steve has created such a world - at least, in his imagination.
*"the constant, unsubstantiated claims that serious scholars subscribe to his positions"*
This is one of my top-level complaints, ironically, about Bart Erhman. (That, and his trick of saying "even if that were true, it wouldn't affect my position" every time he's backed into a corner. I want just one person debating him to insist he list all the factors that _do_ affect one of his positions prior to the debate.)
Goated comment.
Wilson, well done. You certainly held your patience and spoke clearly, even when forced to speak quickly and being spoken over, but mostly for upholding what Chalke refuses to even hear. I heard you. I thank you. I agree with what you presented.
Steve Chalke sounds like he graduated from the schools of Bart Erhman and Andy Stanley Theological Seminaries. It's so painful to listen to his 'brand' of theology in which he hypocritically thinks is in the 'lens of Jesus Christ'. So very painful.
Steve Chalke has no idea about the exegesis of Scripture- its nothing to do with what we think its all explained in translation and understanding the Bible in full- Gods plan for Israel, His church His timeline- these men are so Anglican with no depth
I can't really blame him though. I would think we could blame the God that doesn't clearly put his message out there.
“No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says.
He’s always convinced that it says what he means.”
George Bernard Shaw.
Stuff George benard that's not true at all
Isn't that basically the same thing?
@@acupanraphaelgio7925
No
@@HipHopTV_Official
It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
Mark Twain.
@@Jebbersful mark twain is an idiot
Thank you Unbelievable? for bringing so many great and informative conversations!
It seems that Andrew is trying to be clear and consistent and Steve is trying to be persuasive without being clear about what he is trying to persuade people of.
The treatment of "eye for an eye", by Steve, was quite a false representation of both what Jesus said and the judicial context of the idea in the Old Testament which is about justice, not revenge.
As I continue listening it seems that Steve admits that the original context of the "eye for an eye" command is about justice and not revenge. But this undercuts his whole point, or so it seems to me.
Mike Winger here is a comment I feel needs response! From somoneone else copied:
Jay Hu
There are resolutions given for some of these, but most times it is really reaching.
Did God use his name Yahweh or not? Gen 15:7 and Exodus 6:3
Were all Egypt's livestock killed in the 5th plague or not? Exodus 9:6 and 12:29
Must the passover be from flocks only? Ex 12:5. Or also from the herd? Deut 16:2 Could it be boiled or not? Ex 12:9 and 2 Chr 35:13 Could it be celebrated in households, or not? Ex 12, Deut 16:5-6, Luke 22:11
How many horsemen did David take? 2 Sam 8:4 and 1 Chr 18:4
At the end of 4 or 40 yrs? 2 Sam 15:7
Killed 800 or 300? 2 Sam 23:8 and 1 Chr 11:11
Is Jerusalem conquered by Joshua,Josh 12:10; or David, 2 Sam 5:6?
Did David take Goliath's head to the walled Jebusite city of Jerusalem, 1 Sam 17:54? (See 2 Sam 5:6).
Did Saul meet David and twice interact with Jesse in 1 Sam 16: 19-22 or meet David and not know his father in 17:55-56?
Who killed Goliath? David in 1 Sam 17 or Elhanan in 2 Sam 21:19 and who did Elhanan kill, Goliath or his brother in 1 Chron 20: 5
7 or three yrs of famine? 2 Sam 24:13 and 1 Chr 21:12
50 or 600 shekels? 2 Sam 24:24 and 1 Chr 21:25
How many stalls? 1 Kings 4:26 and 2 Chr 9:25
How many chief officers? 1 Kings 5:16 and 2 Chr 2:18
How many cubits high? 1 Kings 7:15 and 2 Chr 3:15
How many baths? 1 Kings 7:26 and 2 Chr 4:5
How many chief officers? 1 Kings 9:23 and 2 Chr 8:10
Did Baasha die around the 26th yr reign of Asa or is he alive in Asa's 36th yr? 1 Kgs 16:6, 8 and 2 Chr 16:1
Is Ahaziah 22 or 42? 2 Kgs 8:26 and 2 Chr 22:2 (most versions)
Was Jehoiachin 18 or 8? 2 Kgs 24:8 and 2 Chr 36:9
What day was temple burned? 2 Kgs 25:8 and Jer 52:12
Compare the numbers of sons of same men. Ezra 2 and Neh 7
How many singers? Ezra 2:65 and Neh 7:67
The most sensible explanation for many of these is that there are different traditions/sources of the same events. Here are a few more in relation to Moses authorship of Torah.
The Edomite kings listed in Genesis 36 did not live until after Moses was dead
Moses is referred to in the 3rd person in several passages
There are places named that Moses could not have known (he never entered the Promised Land)
The Hebrew of the text includes terms that were developed long after Moses' death
Moses' death is included in Deuteronomy.
Camels are listed in Abraham's retinue, but camels were domesticated around 1000, long after Abraham (1550 BCE) and even Moses (1250 BCE)
The text mentions Philistines in the time between Abraham and Moses, but the Philistines did not enter the coastal areas of Canaan until around 1200 BCE (after Moses).
The text says, "At that time the Canaanites were in the land" (Gen 12:6), which implies the author writes in a time when they were no longer there -- but they were clearly there when Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan after Moses' death.
Statements such as "before any king ruled over the Israelites" (Gen 36:31) imply a time in the writer's mind when kings had ruled over the Israelites -- but none ever did in Moses' lifetime.
In Deuteronomy 34, the writer says, "There never arose another prophet in Israel like Moses." It didn't seem to make sense that Moses' -- or even God, in Moses' time -- would write such words.
Other details were noticed as well. Certain parts of the Torah use words for places and things that are different from other parts. For instance, some stories (Exodus 3, 17, and 31; Deuteronomy everywhere but once) used "Horeb" as the name for the mountain where Moses receives the Law, while other parts of the story (Exodus 16, 19, 31, 34; Leviticus and Numbers throughout; and Deuteronomy 33) use the name "Sinai"
But Mike Winger, the problem with you is that you say the city of Tyre was not rebuilt and yet there are videos of it on youtube today. Now I can't listen to you anymore...
I believe Steve does a lot better job making his case than Andrew. Andrew seems to think that among all of the sacred books that have been included in different versions of the Bible and different translations of the Bible a perfect script that Jesus would say has no errors. Just think about that for a second.
The Old Testament are the words of God, but it is a shadow / a represetation that bring us to the New Testament. It is not the reality which can reveal the true nature and character of God.
That's why Jesus came to reveal the Father to us.
John 1:14 - And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
John 1:17 - For the law was given by Moses, BUT grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
Fanatics like you who lie incessantly with your god fiction are a danger to others.
1:37 terrible, maddening music clip loop ends
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The debate went completely off tangent. I was waiting to hear what the errors were supposed to be, and waiting to hear the rebuttal. However, all it became is an argument over the meaning of 'the Word of God'. I mean sure, it may be an interesting tangent, the Bible is a library of books that contain different authors perspectives, how many books are there in the Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant Bibles, is Jesus referring to the New Testament when he says 'Word of God', etc etc etc. but still...But the main point - 'Does the Bible contain errors?' is not addressed.
Of course the Bible is not fully correct but some of it is
If you feed your doubt, your faith will die.
If you feed your faith, your doubt will die.
Sounds like confirmation bias
@@DJ5780how can any one come to believe anything then?
@@NoContextRDH I think there is a difference from how we generally go about believing things vs being hypervigilant about which ideology you should either adopt or guard yourself from believing. How about we just believe what's most likely/apparent? Choosing to only believe what you think you should believe at the expense of reality is confirmation bias.
I believe that 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth'' was an improvement on what went before - strict equivalence so a sort of rough justice.
That was stolen from the Hammurabi Steele though
Even if you hold the erroneous view that the Bible is inerrant, then who has the final authority to interpret it, but more fallible humans. The evidence is in the failure of the Catholic Church to give perfect interpretation, see history, and the fact there are many denomations of Christian thought. Therefore, each person is ultimately responsible for their faith, i.e., knowledge of scriptures, the nature of reality, and their relationship with God
I think the issue is that when you label something (e.g. The Bible as "inerrant") it shows that YOU in particular have thought this through and distilled the text and now have the answer. That's really good! BUT you can't kind of push people through that process right to the end so that they end up where you are without them thinking through it themselves. It seems that so many evangelicals really think (at least in a relational person to person sense) that THEY have the word of God and are kind of gatekeepers for it. That's true in a sense, but really only when it comes to the Scriptures and what they say. NOT what they THINK it says exactly. This leaves them with this uncomfortable feeling they don't like AND I would say, from my experience, leaves them uncomfortable with people in general and ineffective at good evangelism. People, flesh and blood people with their own mind and feelings etc, will eventually resent that attitude. It's analytical but not relational and none of us is first and foremost a "brain". That's my thoughts anyway.
Exactly my thoughts on it! So many evangelicals are terrible at evangelism because they’re willing to die on so many hills they don’t need to die on when it comes to certain things like inerrancy, age of the earth, evolution, etc.
Not the Andrew Wilson i was looking for
To ask the guests to position themselves on the very short example of Bart Ehrman's journey, eg his lecturer writing "Maybe Mark made a mistake." on his paper gives them grounds to write Bart Ehrman's off as a "backslider". The presenter gave some very easy points to guests.
Is funny Bart Ehrman called dr and obviously found contradiction in the holy bible, but in the case of Mark 2:26 you can read 1sa 22:20 2sa 8:17 and 1 Chr 18:16 and see both Abiathar and Abimelech( father-son) had both names interchangeably. I hope Bart Ehrman open his heart
Exactly.
Cool, try mark1:41
Steve Chalke keeps interrupting Andrew Wilson.
So does the moderator
It seems to me that most Christian theologians define inerrancy as “without error in the original autographs.” So with that definition, they’re admitting that we don’t currently have an inerrant Bible, and we never WILL have an inerrant Bible since we don’t possess the original autographs. How do we know the Bible is inerrant if inerrancy only applies to the original autographs, which we don’t have?
Autograph copies referees to hand written copies not original writings form the hand of the original author. Just to let you know. Common mistake.
At any rate this is my take :Why should that mater if some of it is not inspired and some is myth legend primitive cosmology biases embellished or any other human trait . If 100 words were from God would you believe , how about 50 , what about 10 , what if just 1 word is from God ? One word from God that is enough.
98% the same. no theological differences.
Steve is talking about the New and Old Covenant... he is not addressing the inerrancy of Scripture that is discussed...
What kind of question is this? There’s been like 16 versions of the Bible before the King James Version, translated between multiple languages of course there’s been errors and changes to the book. It’s not like there was a printing press back then, they were translating the books by hand. This is ridiculous to even ask, people’s common sense goes out the window when it comes to the Bible.
I know right, its actually crazy how the bible went through all that, and when we discovered the over 25,000 ancient manuscripts from the 1st century it is identical to what we have today in the original languages. some would say its a miracle
The problem with this talk is that they talk about the Bible, the contradictions, errors in the Bible in abstact terms, never addressing specific errrors, contradictions. I would have liked to hear e.g. what they think about Genesis chapters 1-11. Has there been a flood, or not? (It is absolutely clear that the flood cannot have happened the way described in the Bible.) How do they explain the discrepancies of Jesus's death between the synoptics on one hand and John on the other? (Last supper as Easter supper, institution of Eucharist vs. last supper BEFORE Easter, no institution of Eucharist.)
Steve should learn to not interrupt. Each person needs to be able to complete their thoughts. He sounds like someone who must have control of the conversation in order to make his point.
Steve is a good example of the fool blurting out his folly. Has nothing to say and won't stop saying it.
But unfortunately a lot of influence. Should have none.
Recently, I've been in a marathon discussion with some atheists online and the conversation soon turned to the supposed absurdity of the flood account.
Their assertion that the story was nothing more than fiction allowed me to ask them to prove their claim and accept the burden of proof which was eagerly accepted.
What resulted was as to be expected, the usual points that geology has shown there never was a global flood and that the flood account was stolen from the Sumeriansand and Babylonian.
At first glance, this seems like a slam dunk but its actually far from it.
I was able to point out how they read the account
through a litteralistic lense not unlike Ken Ham, and fail to apply any context to the story before reaching their conclusions.
Context being "the circumstances that form the setting for an event, statement, or idea, and in terms of which it can be fully understood."
This failure to acknowledge such things as the limited geographical knowledge of the word by these ancient societies or the different literature style used as compared to what we now see today cannot be overstated and cannot be overlooked and ignored
In short, by failing to apply context, the litteralistic view is therefore incomplete and an assessment and conclusion based upon an incomplete understanding must be dismissed.
Personally, I've always been of the opinion that the flood account was based upon an epic local flood event such as the black sea deluge or Doggerland deluge off the east coast of the UK etc and this doesn't detract from the underlying message within the account.
The application of context is key to understanding many supposed problems within the bible and this is something atheists tend not to do
Dan Harte It sounds pretty dodgy to ask them to disprove something without telling them what to disprove.
Local flood account is not credible at all... Gen 7 v 19-24 They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. 20 The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.[e][f] 21 Every living thing that moved on land perished-birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.
24 The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
@@maxboucher86 In Hebrew, the word translated “earth”, can be translated “land”. Nothing in the Biblical account of the flood requires it to be universal so as to have flooded Scotland or Canada.
Nothing in the Biblical account of the flood is opposed to the flood having flooded part of the Ancient Near East, and not Scotland or Canada. In fact, the second interpretation fits much better with what the text says.
Neither is there anything in the text that requires it to be an account of an historical event, or about a real individual human being named Noah aged 600 when the Flood began. There is no reason why the Flood account cannot be a myth.
I firmly believe in the authority of the Bible, as being in some sense “God-breathed”. It does not follow, that because the Bible comes to us with the authority of God, that therefore everything in it that we might suppose to be historical, must therefore be historical. It is a much more complicated and much more interesting set of books than skeptics or Fundamentalists seem to realise.
I loved the reference to the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1760).
Grand Canyon resulted indirectly from the global flood.
I find it interesting the bible says that god would not bring "confusion", or something like that. Yet we have scholars on both sides of the argument that can not agree on what the heck the bible says. There is always a more "in depth" message.
Sounds a lot like believers trying to extract the meaning they need other than what it actually says.
Of course, fake believers argue against real believers' stands on the Bible.
Fake believers, and nonbelievers, have to define God down to justify the lifestyles they support.
Everything Steve Chalke believes about God and the Bible is structured to support perverse lifestyles.
@@igotstoknow2 Thanks for agreeing with me, the bible is so erroneous and confusing, people can make up whatever they want about what it says.
@@tiagoscherer1158 It’s the true born again believers that the bible is revealed to. The biblical scriptures tell us this!!!!! The non - believers will NEVER understand the WORD OF GOD/ HE will keep them blinded to HIS TRUTH!!!! Pray that ur heart and eyes may be opened. GOD BLESS. The bible is spiritual and only those that are truely born again in the spirit can comprehend!!!!>
@@myroom1913 yes christianity is exclusive...not inclusive like a loving god(definitely not yours) would have.
@@myroom1913 thanks for confirming how perverse your non-existing god is. What a load of BS.
Great subject for discussion, but so argumentative with raised voices I found this too stressful to listen to - it gave me a headache!
Can we hear some more peaceful conversations please so that more can be said and heard without guests speaking over each other and raising their voices please?
The discussion about "losing faith" prior to 5:00 says a lot about what is really a concern here.
Actual truth be damned, enter the apologists with their Gish-galloping, tap dance around the blatant errors.
_Viz._ " ...for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE
SEA MONSTER, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in
the heart of the earth." (NASB) Matthew 12:39-40
Yet Jesus was interred for only a day & a half. What day of the week did that infamous third night fall?
Sweep the obvious aside and you get to keep your "faith".
A fascinating debate, and thought-provoking. It makes me wonder how God could have spoken to a pre-Jesus world in any other way. Christians can all agree that the Old Testament tells the story of God preparing His chosen people for the arrival of His Son, but in order to do that He had to present a veiled image, an image which was unclear and 'fuzzy'. It doesn't mean the image was a false one, it just means there would inevitably be disagreement over it, even after Jesus had fulfilled it. I therefore agree with Andrew Wilson.
Why did God need to give us an unclear image?
@@mattr.1887 Think about how life would be if God had given us a very clear image. Would we be free agents, able to make our own choices and decisions and exercise free thought? I doubt it.
The mental gymnastics that grown men go through in order to justify their belive in one of thousands of holy books is quite astonishing.
Gymnastics is always good isn't it?
@@olavc.oevele1902 Indeed, astonishing nonetheless.
Totally agree, Steve Chalke and other men who think like he does.
FYI, Bart Erhman didn't "lose his faith" in the Word of God. As the apostle John so eloquently wrote: "They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us." (1 John 2:19)
Depends if you are Calvinist or not.
I'm now more than ever of the view that Steve's boat never left port in the first place!
Christians feel they are so special. They have the "only way". If you started Christian and ended up not... Then you wasn't a special Christian to begin with...lol. (Edit:. Do you want a cookie now, entitled Christian?)
@@GTSongwriter IF a Christian feels that they're special as you allude to, then very clearly they are not a Christian. Nobody is born a Christian. The teachings of Christ Himself clearly demonstrate that there are both sheep and wolves beholden to Him i.e. those that truly follow Him and those that don't, that are in name only.
@@LiffeyKing Is your Christian religion the "only true" religion? Everyone that doesn't believe will go to hell? The Bible is infallible? The Christian God is the "only God"? Do you not feel special to be part of something that stands against anyone that doesn't believe like you do? Do you feel it's your right to say to anyone that you have the only religion that is to be believed and all others are false? What do you think happens to those people that never hear the word of the Bible that live in a country that burns the Bible. Do they also go to hell? Does that not make you feel special because you was born in a country that allowed you to hear the Bible? Those other people that never hear the word will die and be lost to hell forever? Yes, Christians feel special and is reason they thump that Bible around. If it was a religion of openness and kindness, then it would also not consider itself the "only way". My youth is where I learned how harsh the Christian Religion can be. There are rules to abide by and no freedom to explore other religions. The Christian religion is against homosexuals, but what about those people born with 2 sexes. If those people love either sex, are they not homosexual? God created them, yet he is against his own creation? There are so many contradictions of the Bible, it is requiring Christians to become scholars in order to defend thier faith. Even with that, there are still contradictions that even baffle the Christian scholars! I'll end up debating with Christians for days. They will end up having no answers and fall on the same topic, "I have faith". Personally, if my religion considered a book infallible, yet someone comes along and disapproves it...am I going to sit there are still believe anyhow? No! I'm going to question it. Someone has been lying to me about my religion and I would need to figure out why. To just believe in something, knowing it has flaws when it doesn't suppose to have flaws is plain out being ignorant. Maybe they are comfortable with what there is and what they can't explain they just blindly follow anyhow. Put a carrot on a stick in front of a horse, and he'll keep walking towards it. He doesn't need to believe in anything else other than someday he might obtain that carrot. We all know he can't get that carrot, but the horse has faith. He believes without reason. Faith kills people. Imagine those of the Muslim religion. Some of them are willing to strap bombs to themselves in showing of faith and to go blow up thier enemies. Christianity is a dying religion. So many things going wrong with it. In children's church, I witnessed older adults sexually abuse kids during children's church. Nobody believed me as I was just a kid with a wild imagination. So many pedophiles in church. Would anyone want to raise thier children in a place where pedophiles run about? So many bad things happening with the Christian religion, it's no wonder the Christan community is becoming smaller. Someone needs to rewrite the Bible so that it agrees with the new age, else this religion will soon die. There are scripture in the old testament that allows a pedophile to have a baby with his daughter and blames it on him being too drunk to know. If the Christians are only going to use the New testament, then they should throw out the old one. Keeping the old one with the new one creates so many more contradictions. Christians have so many variations of thier religion, which one is the "only way"? Baptist, Methodist, Catholics, to name a very few. Yeah, there are probably over a hundred variations of Christianity. Where does one begin? (Edit: swipe misspelled stuff)
Yes. This is like people arguing about Harry Potter in two thousand years. Ridiculous and an enormous waste of time.
Harry Potter is much more moral than the Bible.
The text CONTAINS the THINKING of MAN. How he interprets what was given to him by God. What i believe Mr Chalke is saying the ‘thinking’ of man is wrong, not the writing of the word of god. The word of god contains the thinking of man in ADDITION to the word of god
So how do we know what is gods word and what is the thinking of man? It comes down to the enterpreter? It’s like opening Pandora’s box.
@@zakpatten7631 God JUDGES EACH christian. you are responsible for your own actions just like a criminal in a law court. But God can just as equally work through a Christian who has it wrong just like he works through an unbeliever e.g. King of Babylon and Daniel. .
@@gjeacocke I agree with that statement I just don’t understand how it relates to the question.
@@zakpatten7631 What did Jesus say to the disciples at the end of Johns Gospel? 'what concern is it of yours...'. we do not need to require if some teacher is right or wrong for ultimately if your heart in pure in its search, the Holy Spirit will plant in you what is required. every christian has a unique path. it may be in contradiction to other christians. you have to TRUST your heart. if you know your bible well the HS will reveal it to you.
This is the way I look at it (I am a Historian not a theologian).
The 66 book- library that we call the Bible, I would say are historically accurate in many ways. I think using words like Inerrant, infallible, Literal, metaphorical, and so on are not really helpful words to use since those words have different meanings to different people.
Andrew is Correct when he calls the Bible authoritative, but on the other hand Steve is also right when he says that Jesus is the word of God (Hebrews 1). This library that we call the Bible contains a plurality of views that we need to respect, and I think that's why God uses people to convey his divine message.
Jesus is the focus not the Bible, We use the Bible in order to learn about Jesus and his wonderful teachings and deeds not the other way around.
I personally don't get so hot and bothered by terms like inerrant, infallible etc. I personally try to focus on what God wants to tell me through Jesus in his word (The Bible) when I read it.
I do think that the Bible is error-free in all that it intends to teach, theologically, Historically and scientific (considering the limited understanding of those writers and their time).
For example, when my car breaks down, I don't go to the Bible to find answers on how to fix a car, since that was not the intention for which it was written.
Bottom line, let's use the Bible for what it was intended, to guide us to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ!
How is Jesus the focus when Jesus said, NOT MY WILL, but the WILL of the FATHER... Jesus taught about the FATHER.. not about himself..
All very interesting. Only problem, there are no gods.
How do you know about Jesus if the bible is not infalible and inherant, how do you know what is written about Jesus is accurate? This view leads to unbelief rather quickly.
The Bible is absolutely true when it says that only your Maker can perfectly cover for you Himself and remake you again from the inside out by the power of His tue word as no one else can. Physical reality is entirely relative and subject to change. God's eternal truth is forever.
Spoken like a zealot moron who fingerpaints on bathroom walls with his own shit.
Andrew needs to slow down.
Steve isn't giving him the chance to
I was associated with New Frontiers Church in Brighton for a number of years , sadly quite a few practices that really bothered me greatly and I eventually left .
can you give a few examples? מלאך ערני
Is new frontiers Steve’s church?
@@morganparkman2708 It is Andrew Wilson’s
I'd also be interested in hearing examples.
Oh of course, the problem with Bart is that he just didn't believe hard enough. As if believing in a text that contains thousands of inaccuracies, contradictions and errors is a virtue!?! Theology is not an intellectual pursuit. You can't start your enquiry with the assumption that the text in question is completely true and accurate.
If something is supposed to be the words of god it shouldn’t have contradictions very simple
Steve chalk has upset everybody including Christian at kings community church hatfield
Hebrew and Greek have completely different grammar .What are the translation error in Septigunt, how can any translation of any literature, which mmakes it essentially a second hand literature can be infallable?
Exactly. The New Testament is most definitely fallible because it's based on mistranslations of verses from the OT that have been taken out of context and in some cases even fabricated to further the narrative/agenda of Christianity.
Can Steve Chalk ever engage in conversation without constantly interrupting, and actually try to listen to his opponent?
Really good platform provided here for discussion, Justin. Appreciate what you do.
Divergent NT accounts are not the best place to start with this, I don't think. The OT has much more formidable and explicit....even numerical contradictions of the same things in two different accounts. More Christians need to reckon with what the text itself says.
When Andrew presses Steve on "is the bible the Word of God", he has many assumptions that are unsaid by the scripture itself. Does he think his 66 book canon is the Word of God? The Masoretic OT? The LXX? Other varying Jewish canons? The longer ending in Mark? The Johannine comma? The deuterocanonical books? Prior to the late Reformation, nobody had a 66 book canon....nobody had the "bible" he holds in his hands. This says nothing of someone who simply denies inerrancy...an extrabiblical doctrine.
Even Christian scholars affirm that much of the OT material is written hundreds of years after the purported events, for theological and political reasons. This is seen in the type of Hebrew used, anachronisms, information in the story that we know comes from much later.
*The OT has much more formidable and explicit....even numerical contradictions of the same things in two different accounts.*
A contradiction is not an accusation to be thrown around lightly. Just because two different accounts contain two different numbers, this does not necessarily a contradiction make.
*More Christians need to reckon with what the text itself says.*
I totally agree. I'm willing to recon if you think you have a contradiction. I can take a couple examples if you'd like.
Jay Hu
There are resolutions given for some of these, but most times it is really reaching.
Did God use his name Yahweh or not? Gen 15:7 and Exodus 6:3
Were all Egypt's livestock killed in the 5th plague or not? Exodus 9:6 and 12:29
Must the passover be from flocks only? Ex 12:5. Or also from the herd? Deut 16:2 Could it be boiled or not? Ex 12:9 and 2 Chr 35:13 Could it be celebrated in households, or not? Ex 12, Deut 16:5-6, Luke 22:11
How many horsemen did David take? 2 Sam 8:4 and 1 Chr 18:4
At the end of 4 or 40 yrs? 2 Sam 15:7
Killed 800 or 300? 2 Sam 23:8 and 1 Chr 11:11
Is Jerusalem conquered by Joshua,Josh 12:10; or David, 2 Sam 5:6?
Did David take Goliath's head to the walled Jebusite city of Jerusalem, 1 Sam 17:54? (See 2 Sam 5:6).
Did Saul meet David and twice interact with Jesse in 1 Sam 16: 19-22 or meet David and not know his father in 17:55-56?
Who killed Goliath? David in 1 Sam 17 or Elhanan in 2 Sam 21:19 and who did Elhanan kill, Goliath or his brother in 1 Chron 20: 5
7 or three yrs of famine? 2 Sam 24:13 and 1 Chr 21:12
50 or 600 shekels? 2 Sam 24:24 and 1 Chr 21:25
How many stalls? 1 Kings 4:26 and 2 Chr 9:25
How many chief officers? 1 Kings 5:16 and 2 Chr 2:18
How many cubits high? 1 Kings 7:15 and 2 Chr 3:15
How many baths? 1 Kings 7:26 and 2 Chr 4:5
How many chief officers? 1 Kings 9:23 and 2 Chr 8:10
Did Baasha die around the 26th yr reign of Asa or is he alive in Asa's 36th yr? 1 Kgs 16:6, 8 and 2 Chr 16:1
Is Ahaziah 22 or 42? 2 Kgs 8:26 and 2 Chr 22:2 (most versions)
Was Jehoiachin 18 or 8? 2 Kgs 24:8 and 2 Chr 36:9
What day was temple burned? 2 Kgs 25:8 and Jer 52:12
Compare the numbers of sons of same men. Ezra 2 and Neh 7
How many singers? Ezra 2:65 and Neh 7:67
The most sensible explanation for many of these is that there are different traditions/sources of the same events. Here are a few more in relation to Moses authorship of Torah.
The Edomite kings listed in Genesis 36 did not live until after Moses was dead
Moses is referred to in the 3rd person in several passages
There are places named that Moses could not have known (he never entered the Promised Land)
The Hebrew of the text includes terms that were developed long after Moses' death
Moses' death is included in Deuteronomy.
Camels are listed in Abraham's retinue, but camels were domesticated around 1000, long after Abraham (1550 BCE) and even Moses (1250 BCE)
The text mentions Philistines in the time between Abraham and Moses, but the Philistines did not enter the coastal areas of Canaan until around 1200 BCE (after Moses).
The text says, "At that time the Canaanites were in the land" (Gen 12:6), which implies the author writes in a time when they were no longer there -- but they were clearly there when Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan after Moses' death.
Statements such as "before any king ruled over the Israelites" (Gen 36:31) imply a time in the writer's mind when kings had ruled over the Israelites -- but none ever did in Moses' lifetime.
In Deuteronomy 34, the writer says, "There never arose another prophet in Israel like Moses." It didn't seem to make sense that Moses' -- or even God, in Moses' time -- would write such words.
Other details were noticed as well. Certain parts of the Torah use words for places and things that are different from other parts. For instance, some stories (Exodus 3, 17, and 31; Deuteronomy everywhere but once) used "Horeb" as the name for the mountain where Moses receives the Law, while other parts of the story (Exodus 16, 19, 31, 34; Leviticus and Numbers throughout; and Deuteronomy 33) use the name "Sinai"
@@CanadianOrth Wow. I'm a Christian too. I am looking up the passages you provided. I do see the contradictions and errors. That is proof that the bible is not inerrant.
@@uncertainty7421 But is it?
@@disaj7460 Read the bible from cover to cover and you will see for yourself.
Andrew has failed to look at the first commandment. ‘Love the lord your god’
The israelites should have questioned themselves by saying, this law we have, what does it mean BY love? The rules follow rule nbr 1.
You seek god by seeking to know the truth of love, not the truth of the law of rules.
Graham Jeacocke im sorry but hou need to make your point, which is what?
Steve please allow others to reply or state their view. I enjoy these debates and I like Steve because he challenges me to dig deeper. I'm more on Andrews page but I like these types of questions.
Most people are not scholars. To argue Biblical 'truth' is found when one studies it in a complex, obscure way that requires a load of mental gymnastics, implies the text isn't authoritative.
Surely God would make it as easily accessible as possible for most people. To require anything more than black on white, text on paper, obvious interpretations, doesn't make sense. Belief shouldn't require a spreadsheet of interpretations that needs a complex web of explanations in order to be convinced it's true.
Come on, these are fairy tales that are susceptible to crumbling under any in depth analysis.
Asserting it's true doesn't cut the mustard.
The bible makes Mein Kampf look like a nursery rhyme. How anyone can believe in a book with so many vile affirmations is beyond me.
Interesting opinion. Can you elaborate on what you're talking about a little more? Right now it comes off as a hit a run comment but would like to hear what exactly your referring to?
@@mattverville9227 The murders ethnic cleansing probably. War atrocities.
I was really hoping for more from these guys - but they kept talking over each other and interrupting.
Yes, send both of them to the Headmaster's office! Pity because I think there was some quite sensible comment above the hubbub.
Yes. Unusual for Andrew Wilson, other times I have seen him he is pretty good at listening to the other person and then responding.
I agree: the commentator should give a certain amount of time to each/ then one speaks and the other actually listens : then the other responds!!!!!
Cool! Love this channel. Keep the good work!. Thanks!🤙🏻👍🏻
One thing it works of to say is to believe as a child. Keep a child like belief perhaps that is why some scholars have talked themselves out of faith. Yes language is powerful and has meaning to man.
Steve just needs to come out as Atheist so we can leave this discussion
An eye for an eye never meant that literally. It meant what the worth of that eye was to the injured party and that value would need to be fully paid the injured party. So the law meant compensation for the full value of the loss.
A hunter who lost his right eye would be severely impacted and find much of his future lifetime earnings severely impaired. As such the value given to him as compensation would be high.
So turning the other cheek would be better advice ?
I so much appreciate this conversation as it seems to mirror a discussion my brother and I have been having for the last decade, though admittedly, much less scholarly. And like Steve, my brother is in a position of authority as a prison chaplain in charge of the homosexual/transgendered wing. And much like my brother, Steve’s position is lacking any type of clarity. How many times was Steve asked to get specific about a particular passage as his prior comments were unclear only to respond in more generalities with less clarity. It appears to me Steve has already decided what is moral and is reading it into the text interpretations only a professional mental gymnast could impart. Steve needs to be quite careful as he is in a position of authority and will be held to the highest standard. Again, like my brother, he preaches that monogamous homosexual relationships are fine with God suggesting that monogamy, or the the lack of promiscuity is the key. My point is why doesn’t the Bible affirm that by simply saying that instead of specifically condemning homosexual offenders right along side of fornicators? Why not just say promiscuous fornicators? I believe God loves clarity, and if scholarly men of good conscience have to repeatedly ask for clarity only to end up more confused, it may be time to rethink his position.
God loves clarity?
That's news to me, as far as I know, nearly nothing in the bible is clear at all. If it was to be taken literally, you are allowed to enslave jews and beat them, as long as they don't die afterwards within 3 days. And also all of humanity would be descendents of two humans, but somehow without incest.... hm.. doesn't seem so clear to me
I agree with Andrew and as he pointed out - Jesus trusted scripture. Steves probably a really nice guy, but long stories need to be cut down.
I'd love to hear Steve's point of view presented by someone who isn't constantly interrupting his opponent or raising his voice when someone else starts to talk.
It would seem to me that Steve’s point is situational and based on what he is trying to mold the scriptures around. He revised his idea every time he speaks, because he has to make it conform to his argument. Hard to follow somebody like that.
Steve probably thinks a wolf in sheep’s clothing is as innocent as a dove and wise as a serpent.
A couple of things I'd like to bring up. Clearly before we can discuss anything about the bible we need to specify what the bible is. This doesn't seem to me to equate to what Jesus talked about in the Gospels: he is refering to the Scripture, which is mainly the Pentateuch (Torah); therefore we need to split that off from questions like, Does the New Testament contain errors? The bible didn't even exist as such until centuries later (I just went looking for an exact date/council and it could even be considered as late as Trent en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_biblical_canons ). Also looking at some examples of where it is claimed that Jesus says that Scripture is the word of God, I see that he is referring to things specifically reported to be God's words, eg
Luke 24:44-45, "Now He said to them, 'These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.' 45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures." -- specific prophesies
Matt 15:6, "he is not to honor his father or his mother. And thus you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition." -- 10 commandments sent by God
Mark 7:13, "thus invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and you do many things such as that.” -- 10 commandments sent by God
John 10:35, “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken)." -- in the previous verse "I have said you..." showing that this is a report of the Word of God
So is it that the only parts of the OT which are the Word of God are the parts which the OT and/or NT claim to be, and the other parts are human reports of what happened? And in the NT, similarly only the parts which are the Word of God are the parts reported to be spoken by Jesus or The Father? (ie the red letter bible highlights the Word of God in red)
Oh yeah, I took the examples above from the page carm.org/bible-isnt-word-god-it-contains-word-god
The Bible has hundreds of contradictions, here are a few examples:
1.How many soldiers did Israel and Judah have?
2Samuel 24:9- The census count was Israel:800,000 Judah:500,000.
1 Chronicles 21:5- The census count was Israel: 1,100,000 Judah: 470,000.
2.How old was Jehoiachin when he began to reign?
2 Kings 24:8
Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months.-KJV
2 Chronicles 36:9
Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem-KJV
3.In Matthew 23:35 Jesus refers to Zechariah son of Barakiah when in fact the incident was about Zechariah son of Jehoiada in 2 Chronicles 24:20.
4.In Mark 2:25-26 Jesus refers to Abiathar as High Priest when in fact Ahimelech was High Priest at the time of the incident he describes in 1 Samuel 21:1-6.
5.How much did David pay for the property?
2SA 24:24 David paid 50 shekels of silver for the purchase of a property.
1CH 21:22-25 He paid 600 shekels of gold.
6. In Matthew 21:19-20 Jesus curses the fig tree and it withers IMMEDIATELY.
But when you read the same story in Mark 11:13-15 you'll realise that Jesus cursed the fig tree and nothing happened. Then the NEXT MORNING in verse 20-21 the disciples realised that the fig tree had withered.
7.Could the women touch Jesus when they went to his tomb?
YES
In MATTHEW 28:9 - Mary Magdalene and the other Mary saw Jesus and came and 'held him by the feet and worshipped him'
NO
But in JOHN 20:17- On visiting the tomb, Jesus warned Mary Magdalene 'Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended to my father'
You make the classic mistake of not considering other people's viewpoints. The Bible has many viewpoints that nonbelievers and fake believers have to 'show' as contradictions to justify the lifestyles they support.
Moderator needs to keep Steve from cutting Andrew off. Not a debate when one guy just over talks the other.
In the beginning was the word. Jesus affirms the Old Testament. He used the law to show that it's not even close to what God requires. Jesus lived the perfect life. John 3:16. Love this series. God bless
Thanks for this
Does the Bible contain errors? Before we can ask this question, we must answer the question: What is the Bible?
What we know of the Bible started with multiple oral histories - some stretching over a period of thousands of years. Each telling was heard in the context of one time and retold in the context of a different time.. Like a game of telephone, each retelling likely suffered some loss of fidelity. Eventually, the oral histories were recorded - some in Hebrew, some in Aramaic, and some in Greek. The New Testament was recorded within a few hundred years of the actual events, so we can assume they did not suffer from this same loss of fidelity... much.
Eventually, all of the texts were translated into English (of a sort). As with any translation, it can be difficult to equate one word or phrase in one language to another, especially if you do not have first hand knowledge of the context of the time of origin. At the time of these translations some texts were included and others were rejected for various reasons. The point is, people made these decisions. Therefore, people determined what the Bible would become. It is likely that various human biases necessarily crept into these translations. Over the years, there have been other translations - each with an intent to make the old tests more accessible to modern societies... by making them less like the originals.
Even still, two people can read the same texts and get entirely different meanings. This has to do with the way the human brain works. We pattern match. We take something from one historical context for which we have little or no knowledge and match it to contexts that align with our own experience.
So... Does the Bible contain errors? If by this we mean does it fail to faithfully capture and convey the events and mental states of the original experiencers? Of course it contains errors.
Even though we might feel that the words of Jesus have been captured faithfully, I offer this thought. In Luke 14:27 Jesus says, "Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple." Think about the symbolism of the cross as we know it (sacrifice). Then think about the symbolism of the cross as the disciples knew it before Jesus' crucifixion (criminality). Do you think these are the words of Jesus or the words of the author, projecting 80 years later?
It doesn't matter. The bible is HEBREW and for the 12 tribes. Maybe it would have been better to steal the Navajo or Yaqui religion since it's closer to home?
who says the bible is only hebrew? and who says its for the 12 tribes alone... sounds like you don't know God
@@byronloves7472 he’s a Hebrew Israelite who has a unique ideology. The book of acts and letters of Paul debunk all their teachings but they conveniently don’t follow those books.
@@brotherhec2403 yea I know, I run into them often
@@brotherhec2403 thanks for the info though about acts 🧏🏽♂️ really good
Many historians and bible scholars e.g. Richard Carrier and Bart Ehrman acknowledge the bible has thousands of mistakes, therefore how can it be the inerrant word of God? Also the main religions tell us God is perfect and unchanging so why does God's views appear to have reflected society's norms at the time? A moral, perfect and all knowing God does not change his views just because society does. If this is so, what kind of God is he, when so much of what was culturally acceptable thousands of years ago is no longer morally justifiable? I used to be a Christian but the more I asked difficult questions it no longer made sense! I agree with some comments below...it would be great to listen to a debate with someone like Bart Ehrman etc. For those interested there are some great debates on You Tube with Christians like William Lane Craig and athiests/agnostics such as Sean Carroll, Richard Carrier, Sam Harris, Michael Shermer, the late Christopher Hitchens and many more. My thinking has been challenged by these people and it's the best thing that ever happened to me.
The question you ask is very simple to answer, the Bible was written by normal fallible people that was inspired by the Holy Spirit, the book is not perfect in the sense that it does reflect the time it was written and never claimed to be otherwise. When Christians use the word inerrant word of God it refers to the prophetic message that the Bible provides, in other words, the message in the Bible is truthful.
Caroline Sargeant
,
Acts 17:30 - "In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent."
That didn't answer her question at all
@@truman5838 Which of the questions was not answered? God has not changed in the Bible so that goes without saying.
@@kimdanielsen4368 I was talking to the other guy but you too didnt answer the question you were attempting to answer. It's very obvious which part of her comment you were addressing, do I have spell it out for you? Read the thread over again ,I'm not going to hold your hand.
As for your reply to her comment, Youre the typical Christian apologetic making excuses for the bible. If it were inspired by God and it were truthful ,there wouldn't be errors and contradictions in the bible. Truthful equates to perfect. When you say it's not perfect then it can't be truthful. It can't be truthful with imperfections, errors and contradictions in it.
This conversation was more about the meaning and significance of the Bible than a petty argument about whether it contains errors. It was surprising in a good way, given the title.
Steve, stop interrupting!
Imagine no religion, it's easy if you try, no hell below us....above us only sky
John Lennon
Prophet
Imagine is a masterpiece
Get peter enns on please
Bart Erman Lost his faith largely too personal hardships that expose the weakness in his logic and faith. Unfortunately, I believe it is the death of his wife that did this. Though as a person, he had to freely choose to succumb to such notions as a godless existence. It is really quite sad, he seems like an interesting fellow, a nice gentleman, and a all-around amiable person.
There's just one tiny little thing wrong with your post. Sarah Beckwith is STILL ALIVE and working at Duke University!!! I think it's admirable of the faculty at Duke to give a dead person gainful employment, don't you?
Passionate debate!
Gray haired guy: I’m an evangelist, so I convolute orthodoxy in every single issue that I debate on this show.
500 years before the 10 commandments? We know this because....
It's all there in black/red and white for anyone to see for themselves.
There are definitely errors and contradictions in the bible.
The bible is your authority and reason for believing.
You should question and rethink your beliefs.
(John 10:26-28) "But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. {27} My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: {28} And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand."
If one were to get 99 percent of the facts right and 1 percent wrong, would that mean that they’re reliable.. Yes! We can never be perfect. But on the other hand, if one were to get 50 percent of the facts right and 50 percent of the facts wrong, should we trust them? It would take a lot of faith that’s for sure.
If you want the Word of God, then go within. God speaks to each person directly. Books can be helpful but books are secondary information. "The Knowledge of the Kingdom of Heaven is Within."
I do wish Chalke would listen a bit more
False teaching always begins with "Did God really say"?
Does Jesus still condone burning witches, and if so where can we watch this?
New Guinea. Missionaries taught them not eat people but burn them to cinders instead. burn them.
Ding DIng Jesus never condoned burning anybody you fucking idiot. Who threw Christians to the lions you piece of shit?
+Tony Gilder *Thank you for demonstrating what belief that invisible magicians exist can do to a person.*
Save your bs sarcasm for somebody named Adam or Eve. Nothing could be more invisible than a human being. WHO will even know YOU existed, who knows - past tomorrow? But Jesus is still here. And if you dug up your great great great great grandma's great great great grandpa, HE would know who Jesus was too! Playa hater you are.
+Tony "Save your bs sarcasm for somebody named Adam or Eve."
*Okay, that makes zero sense.*
"Nothing could be more invisible than a human being."
*Okay, that makes zero sense.*
"WHO will even know YOU existed, who knows - past tomorrow?"
*Okay, that makes zero sense. Good job. numb nuts, your 0 for 3 so far.*
"But Jesus is still here."
*Gee, how convincing!!! LMMFAO!!*
"And if you dug up your great great great great grandma's great great great grandpa, HE would know who Jesus was too!"
*No, he might claim to know, but just like your deluded ass, he'd just be making shit up.*
"Playa hater you are."
*WOW!! Such potent arguments!!!! Ahahahahaaa!!!! Time for you to grow up and drop the imaginary friends, little boy.*
*I look forward to your further demonstration of the dangers belief that invisible magicians exist has bestowed upon your dumb ass.*
Simple question. Why could not God make sure the Bible is inerrant thus indicating that this collection of texts is not simply human works, but God's words? The fact that God failed to do so, is not an indication that this collection of texts has nothing to do with God, and maybe there is not even such a thing as an omnipotent God?
This is such a silly take
"Inerrant" is not a word I find in the Bible. We don't need to believe all of the stories literally to follow Jesus and live the Spiritual life he desires for us. Speaking only for myself, if Jesus was a myth, I would still follow his teachings and commandments. That's no different than how Buddhists view the Buddha. So, I may not believe all the stories literally, but nothing will stop me from following Him.
If they awarded gold medals for theological gymnastics then Steve Chalke would be an Olympic champion.
Did we even get a definition of "inerrancy" or "infallibility" here?? Yikes.
Well isn’t a good job then that it’s not us but GOD who opens the eyes of people’s hearts to truth.
Your god is a hate filled, murdering, genocidal asshole.
I love listening to the sanity of Andrew, but cannot stand the heretical nonsense that Steve spouts. Can you get Andrew on the show more, and get rid of Steve.
Lol. Heretical nonsense = anything you disagree with
@@beauchapman4155 no.
@@stuart3178 yes
@@beauchapman4155 ok Steve chalk is a Christian Universalist which isn't biblical. fact.
@@stuart3178 the Bible is not infallible. Fact.
Jesus calls the "Bible" the word of God? The Bible (New Testament) didn't exist while Jesus was alive.
Great point 😆
SHHHHH! Don't tell Christians that. LOL
Andrew, do you believe the apostles were wiser than the israelites under moses? Substitute the apostles into the mosaic law for a day. How would they have acted differently to what is recorded ‘in the word of God’?
The errors in the bible are to do with the errors of man.
Guy comes to a debate and claims Jesus says the bible is the word of God, but the New testiment doesn't even exist yet.
What if Mark got it wrong? More like, what aren't we understanding in the verse that Mark obviously knew and we don't?
Or, maybe Mark actually just got it wrong. Is that so impossible to believe?
What a stupid question .
There's lots and lots and lots and lots of errors in both versions !
That is why they call it wholy.
YEP!!!!!
There is NO where In any of Jesus speeches does he himself calls the TORAH (the OLD testament scriptures) the word of GOD.
I struggle to see how Steve Chalke can possibly describe himself as an "evangelical " Christian.
Question for Andrew - when Jesus said the Bible is the word of God, was he not referring to the Hebrew Bible? The New Testament wasn’t finalized until 397 AD. What gives the Christian warrant to find the New Testament reliable? Surely, it’s not the New Testament as it did not exist as a corpus at its writing. Any reference to the word/Bible by the New Testament writers surely didn’t include the New Testament? If I’m wrong, I welcome further info.
Yes, Jesus referred to the Old Testament when commenting on Scripture, but His new teachings were creating the New Testament even as He spoke and did new things, miracles, prophesied, dying on the Cross, the Resurrection and Ascension. When He rose from the Tomb, He opened the Scriptures of the Old Testament to show how they were all fulfilled in Him.
The 2nd Epistle of Peter was written around AD 66. Peter says in 2 Peter 3: 15-16,
"And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; 16As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction."
So Peter certainly considered Paul's letters to be inspired Scripture. All the books of the New Testament that we have today were completed by about AD 91-96. The trouble started when other later writings claimed to have been written at the same time, but were actually gnostic heretical texts written later. So eventually the church had to hold meetings to define what was scripture and what was not, hence your date of 397. But Christians back in the 2nd century had already made similar lists to those made post-Constantine and these earlier lists were used to define which books were authentic and which were not.
@@petera1036 and the earliest existing copy of 2 Peter is dated when?
Mk had Jesus ask "Why does this generation ask for sign. Truly I tell you, no sign will be given it". So, what happened to NT 'promise' [all are lies, anyway] to merely ask and you shall be given? Another scribe has Jesus also saying: Unless you see the signs, you will not ever become a believer in God. 2 Co 4:18 contradicts the necessity to see miracles, by saying that believers do not need to see; they need just to have blind faith in Jesus.
If homosexually is wrong in the Bible, where does the people born with both sexes belong? If they have sex with either sex, are they not homosexual for which God created them?
Hasn't anyone taken Theology 1A ?
9:00 Well said. Jesus is the word of God.
I love the point in 7:45