Fundamentalism annoys me. It does not take the Bible seriously, and makes a joke out of a faith that I cherish. In my experience, Fundamentalists have turned more people away from God than to God, and have (sometimes permanently) scarred the face of Christianity to those they turn away. This post is not so much a rant as it is begging for an answer that makes sense. It seems as if a good slogan for a Fundamentalist would be:
"It wouldn't be faith if it made sense."
If you are a Fundamentalist who does not agree with that slogan, then I beg of you to consider the rest of this post, and see if you wish to remain in your ignorance.
I will now proceed to show different examples that reveal the ludicrousness of the idea of "Biblical Inerrancy." Some are more interpretive than others, but all are worth noting. To keep the attention of any Fundamentalist that has made it this far, however, I will state the easiest ones first so they do not have to think too hard.
The Genealogy of Jesus in Matthew is different from Luke. Although there are many instances that they are different, I will only point out one. Who was Jesus' grandfather? Was it Jacob (Matthew 1.16) or Heli (Luke 3.23)? It should be noted that Matthew's gospel was written from a Jewish standpoint for a Jewish audience, and that even the genealogy was theology. In brief, Hebrew has no numbers, and they use letters instead (English equivalent: A=1, B=2, etc.). David in Hebrew is also the number 14. Matthew's genealogy has 14 generations between Abraham and David, between David and the exile, and from the exile to Jesus. This eliminates the argument that Matthew was skipping generations. Luke has 41 people between Jesus and David (as opposed to Matthew's 28). This would make one of them (or both of them) wrong.
The order of Creation is different in Genesis 1 and 2. In Genesis 1 it is clearly vegetation (day 3), water creatures (day 5), Land creatures (first thing in day 6), then mankind (end of day 6). The most important thing is that animals were created first, and then mankind was made to "have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth" (Genesis 1.26). There is little to no way that this can be interpreted in any way other than the creation of mankind as the final act of creation. Genesis 2, however, tells a different story. In Genesis 2, man is formed, then vegetation, then animals, then woman. This lends itself to more interpretation than Genesis 1, which is why it is often twisted around to conform. However, if the text is to be taken seriously, it must be seen as a separate account. Man is formed (2.7), Eden is planted (2.8), vegetation is grown (2.9), animals are created to help man (2.18), woman is made (2.22). Attention must be called specifically to the fact that in Genesis 1, Mankind is created to have dominion over the animals that already exist, whereas in Genesis 2, the animals were created to help man that already existed.
One of the funniest contradictions is the story of Jesus riding into Jerusalem. Matthew 21 records Jesus riding on two animals (a donkey and a colt), somehow straddling the two, while Mark 11 and Luke 19 tell the traditional story of a colt only. The author of Matthew apparently misread Zechariah 9.9 and told his story to conform to the way he read it.
Did Jesus pray that God would not make him go through with his crucifixion? Matthew 26.39, Mark 14.36, and Luke 22.42 tell the story of Jesus praying this very thing: that he wouldn't have to do what he was about to do. John 12.27 explicitly denies that Jesus would do such a thing.
Who incited David to take a census of Israel? 2 Samuel 24.1 says it was God, but 1 Chronicles 21.1 says it was Satan. Did David do it twice?
When was Passover the week that Jesus died? The synoptics (Matthew 26.17, Mark 14.12, Luke 22.7) say that Passover was on the Thursday night (the last supper). John's (18.39, 19.14, 31) gospel places Passover on Friday (the day of Jesus' death).
Did Jesus deliver his sermon on the mount or the plain? Matthew 5, in typical Matthew fashion, has Jesus, his Messiah, up on a hill to deliver his sermon (5.1). Luke, however, in making Jesus accessible to even the lowly of society, has him deliver it on a level plain (6.17).
There are many (many) more than those mentioned above, but I feel like these are representative enough. By ignoring these texts, or interpreting them to fit together in some twisted way, Fundamentalists insult the integrity of the Bible and turn away those that realize it.
I must clarify that I am not saying that Fundamentalists are bad or stupid people. I am saying that they either don't read the Bible they claim to be sacred, or do not understand what they read. Perhaps this is because they were raised this way, but that does not make it right. It makes it tragic.
1 comment:
Rayman,
First of all I love your idiot friendly structure...nice bitter humor. I sincerely appreciate your willingness to state that neither Matthew or Luke may have written a historically accurate genealogy. I must agree here that it is a grotesque misinterpretation of "the Gospel" to combine the stories of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John to have some altered more "united" picture of Jesus. This crudely manipulates much of the understood symbolism in actions and events found in particular gospels. As far as Matthew misquoting Zechariah, are you serious??!! The New Testament misquotes the Old Testament, NEVER! I also find this extremely hilarious, but also extremely hard to sweep under the rug. One of our esteemed professors, Dr. W. Glenn Jonas, once told me that, "yes Matthew reads what he wants to back into the Old Testament, but it became scripture so we have to give him that right." While Dr. Jonas had some degree of comical criticism of Matthew in mind, this has become Canon, do you think this justifies Matthew's misuse of Hebrew Scriptures? One other thing that I noted, in your defense of the "errant" bible, you said that David was incited by Satan and God, but you as a scholar know that there is no creation aside from what God has created, and that the Old Testament Satan was an accuser sent by God, so in a way, don't these say the same thing? Pulling all these abnormalities from within biblical texts is great scholarship...but what are we really proving. Conservatives aren't afraid to see the differences, they're just afraid to explain them away in a manner that questions the authority of the bible. See fundamentalists! Just because you question the historical accuracy of the bible, doesn't mean that you question it's significance or authority. I'm going to step out on a dangerous limb here and quote a highly controversial television show: south park. While I often disagree with some messages of the show, I feel that watching it and disagreeing with it makes much more sense than not understanding what you disagree with. Anyways...during a discourse on the importance of imagination, Kyle tells government officials that for something to make a difference it doesn't have to be real or have actually happened, that superman has had more influence on this world than most of the people surrounding him. While this quote lacks complete compatibility with biblical analysis, I think an overall precedent should be imported here. Just because we don't know exactly who Jesus' grandfather is, or just because we dont' know how many animals were on the ark, or we can't prove Jesus being born of a virgin, which CANNOT be proven outside of biblical text, this should not discredit true faith. We have made these conundrums important! Writing the bible off as completely inerrant neglects the human artistic reality of the bible as literature. The Bible is God's revelation written through human perspective. It is the most accurate, trustworthy understanding of God that we have. And in it's flawed vehicle, the message it carries becomes greater. Focusing so much on the bible that we forget the redemption it shows is asinine.
If we're caught up in defending the Bible's complete inerrancy, we forget the Bible's inclination for imperfect foolish methods encasing the most beautiful truths.
The message of the cross was complete foolishness...we cannot begin to understand the greatness of Jesus' actions in taking his own life. Yet, we pretend to understand sooo greatly that we can measure the accuracy of the accounts that we're given, this is not only ignorant but silly. The Gospel inspires belief whether or not it is perfect. It is still trustworthy and from God. And, as the bible itself shows testimony, God seems to have chosen the most unlikely vessels to carry his message. There was Abraham, who used his wife's servant to conceive a child because he was impatient, David who had an affair with Bathsheba, Jonah, who refused to do the Lord's will until he was forced to be consumed by a giant fish, John, an outcast living in the wilderness eating locusts and honey, a ragged group of unkempt fishermen, and a man who went around persecuting the thing that he came to love the most. God's message strives through broken voices! IF anything the brokeness of the vessel makes the message greater. Why can't we accept the same principle for the bible itself.
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