Bible Contradictions

"I do not hesitate to suppose that either the manuscript is faulty, or the translator has not caught the meaning of what was said, or I myself have failed to understand it." -- Augustine, Letter 82, AD 405¹

Summary

Of the alleged contradictions examined here, about two in five dissolve on a careful reading, about two in five have an answer that fits the texts but that the evidence does not settle, and about one in seven is a real difficulty, including three probable errors.  "The Bible is full of contradictions" is much weaker than the length of the lists suggests.  "The present text contains no error of any kind" cannot be shown either.  Every case is judged by one stated scale applied in both directions.

1. What was counted. The article takes every allegation in three skeptical lists and the hard cases pressed in the scholarship read for it: the Skeptic's Annotated Bible (569 index entries, one of which has lost its page), American Atheists' list (15 headings), Dan Barker's Easter challenge (20 questions and claims) and 25 cases from the scholarship, 629 in all. Merged where they ask the same question of the same passages, they make 266 distinct cases, each with a code, an anchor and a verdict. These are units of very different size, and the lists were chosen because they are large and widely circulated, not as a sample of the Bible. The counts below describe these lists, not an error rate for the Bible. A case index finds the main passages recorded for each case.
2. No real conflict (109 cases). In 77 cases the conflict disappears when the verses are read in context, and in 32 more the explanation has positive support from the texts themselves. Common causes: quoting a verse without its neighbors, one English word standing for two Hebrew or Greek words, a proverb read as a promise, and a command that the text itself says has changed.
3. Possible but unproved (113 cases). Here an explanation fits the texts, but nothing independent confirms it, and in some of these cases the natural reading favors the critic. This is not proof that the accounts agree, and it is not proof that they conflict. Most differences among the Gospels fall here: the evangelists selected, compressed and arranged their material, and Matthew and Luke often reworked Mark's wording.
4. Hard cases (41). Thirty-four are unresolved, four are answered only by strained harmonizations, and three are probable errors: Stephen's speech crediting Abraham with Jacob's purchase at Shechem (Acts 7:16), Luke's census under Quirinius about ten years after Herod's death, and Gamaliel's Theudas placed before Judas the Galilean (Acts 5:36). The unresolved cases include who killed Goliath, the day and hour of the crucifixion, Judas's death, where the risen Jesus first appeared to the disciples, and Ezra 2 against Nehemiah 7. The kings' synchronisms in 2 Kings 15-18 are strained: a full co-regency system fits every number, at a real cost in unstated assumptions.
5. Copying errors are real, but each has to be shown. Ten cases carry a copy-problem label, mostly numbers, such as Ahaziah's age (42 in Hebrew Chronicles, impossible beside his father's 40 years) and Jehoiachin's (8 or 18). The article uses the label only where there is evidence that the transmitted text is damaged, a surviving witness with another reading or a reading impossible in its own context, and it keeps three claims apart: that a variant exists, that the received reading is corrupt, and what the original said. A conjecture that no witness supports, such as "the brother of" Goliath, is graded as a conjecture.
6. The authors and ancient readers saw many of these tensions. First Samuel 15 says in one chapter that God does not repent and that he repented; Joshua says "So Joshua took the whole land" (Josh 11:23) and, two chapters later, "there remains yet very much land to be possessed" (Josh 13:1); Acts tells Paul's conversion three times with different details. That shows awareness, and sometimes it shows how a writer meant his words, but it does not by itself show that the statements agree. Augustine wrote a book on the Gospels' differences, the rabbis debated Ezekiel's conflicts with the Torah, and Samaritan scribes rewrote Deuteronomy 10:6 to match Numbers 33.
7. Moral objections are a different question. A command can be consistent with the rest of the Bible and still be judged wrong. The war on Canaan, Jephthah's vow and the slavery laws are classed as moral objections. Where the Bible's own principle is set against a narrative, as Ezekiel 18:20 against the death of Achan's family, the internal tension is stated as such.
8. What follows. A skeptic should argue from the hardest cases, not from the length of the lists. A believer who holds strict inerrancy has to treat three probable errors and thirty-four unresolved cases as open, not answered. Agreement on core events with divergent details is compatible with independent reports in some cases and with an author reworking a shared source in others; by itself it proves neither. The Verdict gives the counts and the strongest cases each way.

Contents

1. Part 1: How this article judges a contradiction
2. Part 2: Genesis 1 to 11
3. Part 3: The patriarchs, and Stephen's speech
4. Part 4: Exodus to Deuteronomy
5. Part 5: Joshua and Judges
6. Part 6: Samuel
7. Part 7: Kings and Chronicles
8. Part 8: Ezra, Nehemiah, the Writings and the Prophets
9. Part 9: The birth of Jesus
10. Part 10: The ministry of Jesus
11. Part 11: The passion
12. Part 12: The resurrection and the ascension
13. Part 13: Acts and the letters
14. Part 14: Law, salvation and Christian conduct
15. Part 15: God, angels and the devil
16. Objections and responses
17. Issues and unanswered questions
18. Verdict
19. Case index

Part 1: How this article judges a contradiction

What counts as a contradiction

Two statements contradict each other when they cannot both be true of the same thing, in the same sense, at the same time.  "Saul died by falling on his own sword" and "an Amalekite killed Saul" contradict each other only if both are offered as what actually happened.  If one is a report of what the Amalekite claimed, they do not.  That is the whole question in S01, and most cases in this article turn on a question of the same kind.

So the first job in every case is to say what each passage actually asserts.  Many alleged contradictions are not two assertions in conflict.  They are one of the following, and each needs a different kind of evidence.

1. Omission or selection. One writer mentions something another leaves out. Matthew has wise men and no shepherds; Luke has shepherds and no wise men. Bart Ehrman, who argues that the Bible contains many real contradictions, says of exactly this pair: "This is not a contradiction."² Silence is not denial unless the writer claims to be complete.
2. Arrangement. A writer puts events in an order other than the order they happened in. This is a contradiction only if the writer says, or clearly implies, that he is telling them in sequence.
3. Approximation. Round numbers, "about" figures and different ways of counting. Two round numbers can both be honest.
4. Different referent, scope or time. Two people with one name; a rule for one situation and a rule for another; a statement true in one year and false ten years later.
5. Idiom. Hebrew "son" can mean grandson or descendant; "seeing God" can mean several things. An idiom resolves a case only when the idiom is shown to exist and to fit the passage. "Can mean" must be shown to be "does mean" in context.
6. Translation. An English rendering creates a conflict the original does not have, or hides one it does.
7. Copying. The surviving manuscripts disagree, or one passage has suffered a copying error. This explains why the copies conflict, but it is a claim about evidence, and it needs evidence: a real variant reading, or a reading impossible in its own context together with a known kind of scribal slip.
8. Reported speech. The Bible records what someone said, and the speaker was wrong or lying. Recording a false statement is not making one.
9. A changed command. A law given to Israel and a teaching to the church differ because the speaker says the arrangement has changed. That is a claim to check against the text, not a word that settles it.
10. A moral or theological objection. "God commanded this, and it is wrong" is a serious objection, but it is a different objection from "the Bible says two incompatible things." Such cases are kept in the register, classed honestly, and answered as what they are.
11. An independent historical error. A statement can be false without contradicting any other biblical statement. Luke's census under Quirinius (B05) is mostly a question of this kind.

None of these categories proves that a given case is harmless.  Each one is a hypothesis.  A case is put in a category only when the text, the grammar or the manuscripts give a positive reason for it.

The same rules for every source

The standard applied here is the one a careful reader applies to two honest witnesses, or two good ancient historians, who describe the same event.  Augustine stated it in about AD 400, in the first full book on Gospel differences.  Writers are not unreliable, he said, "if, when several persons are recalling some matter either heard or seen by them, they fail to follow the very same plan, or to use the very same words, while describing, nevertheless, the self-same fact."³  He then turned the rule around:  any other writer who differs only in these ways "is as little chargeable with untruth."³  That is a symmetry rule.  It cuts both ways.

1. Against the critic. It is not fair to read two accounts with an exactness no one expects of any other pair of reports. If two newspaper stories give different crowd sizes, or one names a speaker and the other names his spokesman, no one calls either paper a liar.
2. Against the defender. It is not fair to rescue a text by a story that nobody would accept for a secular source. A harmonization is a hypothesis about what happened. It earns credit when the texts themselves point to it, or when outside evidence supports it. The bare fact that a reconciling story can be imagined is not evidence that it is true. As Ehrman puts it about the temple cleansing, "if you are creative enough, you can figure out a plausible explanation," but that alone does not show the explanation is right.²
3. Against both. Difference is not contradiction, and lack of corroboration is not contradiction. A detail found in only one source may be true or false, but it does not conflict with sources that are silent about it.

Two modern defenders take different routes, and both are used here only for the arguments they actually make.  Michael Licona argues that the Gospel writers used the same "compositional devices" as Plutarch, and defines them:  transferal, displacement, conflation, compression, spotlighting, simplification, expansion of narrative details and paraphrase.⁴  Lydia McGrew argues instead that the Gospels read like independent truthful memoirs, and that small unplanned agreements between them ("undesigned coincidences") are evidence of that.  She says plainly that her book is not a book on contradictions:  "Entire books have been written on the subject of alleged contradictions in the Gospels, and this is not one of those books."⁵  Elsewhere she argues directly against Licona's devices where they would change facts.  She defines a "fictionalizing literary device" as "an author's deliberately including in a putative historical work incidents, details, or speeches which he has (at least) no reason to think are accurate or even knows are inaccurate,"⁶ and she accepts ordinary selection, such as focusing on one person in a scene, as no fiction at all.⁶  The two defenders therefore agree that omission, summary and focus are normal, and disagree over whether the evangelists ever knowingly changed a fact.  This article does not assume that either approach is right.  A device is treated as an explanation only where the device would also be granted to a secular author, and where some trace of it shows in the text.  The sibling article Ancient Historiography and Compositional Convention tests the device theory in detail.

The verdict scale

Every case ends with one of six verdicts.  They grade how well the conflict is resolved, not how important it is.

1. No actual conflict. Read in context, the passages do not say incompatible things. Nothing needs to be added to either.
2. Well-supported explanation. There is a real tension on the surface, and the explanation that removes it has positive support in the text, the language, the manuscripts or outside evidence.
3. Plausible but unproved. The explanation is reasonable and fits the evidence, but nothing positively confirms it over the alternatives.
4. Strained. The explanation is possible, but it needs assumptions the texts do not suggest, or readings the words do not naturally bear.
5. Unresolved. Neither a natural reconciliation nor a clear error can be shown.
6. Probable contradiction or error. The best reading of the evidence is that the passages, as they stand, really disagree, or that one is in error.

A seventh label is used beside the six.  Copy problem means the surviving texts really disagree and the best explanation is a copying error.  That verdict is about the copies, and it is given only where there is evidence that the transmitted text is damaged at that point, of one of two kinds:  a surviving manuscript or ancient version with another reading, whose origin is better explained as the earlier text than as a later correction;  or a reading that is impossible or incoherent in its own context, such as a king made older than his father, together with a known way a scribe could have produced it.  A difference between two parallel texts that each make sense, with no witness to the other reading, is not given the label, even when a copying slip is the likeliest cause;  the case is graded on the conflict like any other, and the proposed slip is reported as a conjecture.  The label never settles what the original said, and it does not by itself say whether the original authors agreed.

Copies, translations and the originals

Nobody has an original manuscript of any biblical book.  The Hebrew Bible is read mainly in the medieval Masoretic Text, checked against the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Greek Septuagint and other ancient versions.  The New Testament is read in thousands of Greek manuscripts.  So "the Bible says" always means "the best reconstructed text says."

This matters in two directions.

1. A real variant can dissolve a contradiction in the copies. Where the Greek Septuagint and a Dead Sea Scroll say seventy-five persons went to Egypt and the Masoretic Text says seventy (P03), Stephen's "seventy-five" quotes a real ancient text. The conflict is between manuscripts, and it can be documented.
2. The missing originals are not a general escape. The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, a detailed evangelical statement of the doctrine, says that inspiration "applies only to the autographic text of Scripture, which in the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy."⁷ If the original can be recovered "with great accuracy," then an appeal to a lost original needs a reason in the evidence. A defender cannot invent a reading no manuscript has every time a passage is hard. This article grades an unattested emendation as an unproved hypothesis, not as a solution.

Three claims about any variant are kept apart.  That a variant exists is a fact about the manuscripts.  That the received reading is the corrupt one is a judgment, and the other reading can just as well be the later one:  ancient scribes and translators often brought one passage into line with another.  The Samaritan Pentateuch, for example, rewrites Deuteronomy 10:6-7 to match the itinerary of Numbers 33 (E13), which shows that the difficulty was felt in antiquity, not what Deuteronomy first said.  And what the original author wrote is a third, further claim, which the surviving evidence rarely settles.  A retelling such as Josephus' is evidence of how a text was read, not a manuscript of it.  Conversely, a copying error shown in a surviving text does not show that an author erred, and a conjecture that would remove a conflict does not show that the autograph lacked it.

Augustine's own rule, in the letter quoted at the top of this page, names three explanations to try:  a faulty manuscript, a faulty translation, or a faulty reading by the reader.¹  All three are tested here as claims about evidence.  He left out a fourth, which this article also tests:  that the author himself was wrong.

Quotations of the Bible in English are from the World English Bible, a public-domain modern translation.⁸  A script checks quotations in the two standard inline citation forms against the stored text; other quoted strings were inspected separately.  This is a wording check, not a check that each quotation proves the argument made from it.  Where the translation itself is the question, the Hebrew or Greek is quoted from the Westminster Leningrad Codex, the SBL Greek New Testament or Rahlfs' Septuagint, and any English rendering of those is this article's own.

What Christians claim about the Bible

Christians do not hold one doctrine of Scripture, and a contradiction costs each view something different.

1. Strict inerrancy. The Chicago Statement (1978) affirms "the complete truthfulness of Scripture," and then says what inerrancy does not require. It denies "that inerrancy is negated by Biblical phenomena such as a lack of modern technical precision, irregularities of grammar or spelling, observational descriptions of nature, the reporting of falsehoods, the use of hyperbole and round numbers, the topical arrangement of material, variant selections of material in parallel accounts, or the use of free citations."⁷ That list is close to categories 1, 2, 3, 6 and 8 above. On this view, one real error in an original manuscript, even in a number, is a problem for the doctrine. The same statement also says that "alleged errors and discrepancies that have not yet been resolved" do not undermine the Bible's truth claims.⁷ A skeptic is entitled to ask what evidence, on that view, would ever count against the doctrine.
2. Catholic teaching. The Second Vatican Council (1965) taught that the books of Scripture teach "solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation."⁹ Catholic theologians dispute whether "for the sake of salvation" limits the scope of "without error" or only names the purpose of the whole. On the restricted reading, a numerical discrepancy in Chronicles costs the doctrine nothing.
3. Incarnational or diversity views. Peter Enns, an evangelical Old Testament scholar, argues that Chronicles retells Israel's history for a new audience and shapes it to that purpose. He writes that "To insist that, somehow, Samuel—Kings and Chronicles must say the same thing about the same event tells us more about the modern interpreter than it does about the biblical texts."¹⁰ On this view, some differences are expected features of how the Bible was written, not problems to be solved.
4. Critical views. Ehrman argues that the Bible is "chock full of discrepancies, many of them irreconcilable,"² but says that is not his main point: the differences matter because they show what each author was trying to say, and because they "create certain problems for people with a certain kind of Christian faith (not for all Christians, however)."²

This article grades cases.  It does not decide between these doctrines, and its verdicts can be used by a reader of any view.  But the reader should keep four things apart.

1. A copying error in a number does not show that the original author erred.
2. A real error by one author in a number, a name or a date does not show that the central events the Bible reports did not happen. Historians find such errors in Josephus, Tacitus and Thucydides, and still use them.
3. A natural reconciliation of one case does not show that the whole Bible is free of error.
4. A doctrine that no evidence could ever count against is not established by a list of resolved cases either.

What "exhaustive" means here

No list can contain every objection anyone will ever raise.  "Exhaustive" here means something narrower and checkable:  every allegation in three named skeptical catalogues, plus the hard cases pressed in the scholarship read for this article, is assigned to a case and answered, and the assignment can be checked.

1. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible, by Steve Wells, a whole-Bible list with one page per allegation, the largest such list found for this article. Its contradiction pages were collected on 25 October 2026 from its sixty-six book indexes: 569 index entries. One entry's page now returns "No contradictions detail record found"; its index title survives and is answered from that title (J09).¹¹
2. American Atheists, "Biblical Contradictions," adapted from an article by Frank Zindler: 15 headed pairs or groups of verses.¹²
3. Dan Barker, "Leave No Stone Unturned: An Easter Challenge for Christians" (2000): 17 questions about the resurrection accounts and 3 further claims in its text.¹³
4. Scholarship: 25 cases that critical or defending scholars press and the three lists do not name as such, for example Mark 1:2's attribution to Isaiah, Theudas in Acts 5:36, and 1 Samuel 13:1.

That is 629 allegations.  Many are the same question asked twice, or one question asked once for each verse it touches.  After merging allegations that are genuinely identical, there are 266 distinct cases.  Allegations were merged only when the same passages raise the same question;  a different question about the same passages stays a separate case, or a separate numbered item within a case.  Each case has a code (G01, S03, X05 and so on) and an anchor in this article.  The research folder holds the full register, the case list, and a matrix that maps each of the 629 allegations to its case.  One script checks that every Skeptic's Annotated Bible page is assigned exactly once.  A second checks, page by page, that the case it is assigned to names each position's passages;  every page where it does not was read by hand and either answered in the text or given a written reason in the research folder.

These numbers are a way of making coverage checkable, not a measure of how often the Bible errs.  The units differ:  a Skeptic's Annotated Bible page can be one verse pair or thirty proof texts, an American Atheists heading can hold several questions, and the scholarship cases were chosen because they are hard.  Merging also changes the unit, since many pages can become one case.  The lists are large and widely circulated, which is why they were chosen, but they are not a random sample of the Bible's statements, and no count in this article is a rate of error.

The cases are not all equal.  About forty are serious:  real tensions that careful scholars on both sides take seriously.  These get long treatments.  Most of the rest are short, because once the passages are read in context the answer is short.  Where many allegations share one answer, such as the thirty-one maxims of conduct in L12, the answer is given once and each allegation is still named.

How the case entries are laid out

Each serious case gives the passages, what each says in context, the strongest form of the objection, the best answers with their evidence, what remains unexplained, and a verdict.  Shorter cases compress the same steps.  Numbers are worked out in the text where they matter.  No case uses a probability figure, because no honest number exists for these judgments.

Part 2: Genesis 1 to 11

Twenty cases.  The serious one is the order of creation in Genesis 1 and 2 (G01).  The Flood cases (G13, G14) are the classic evidence for the theory that Genesis was woven from two older sources;  they are judged here as statements in the finished text, which is what a contradiction claim is about.  Whether the creation and Flood accounts are true of the physical world is a different question, handled in the site's Genesis and Flood articles.

G01: The order of creation in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2

The texts.  Genesis 1 creates in this order:  plants (day 3), sea creatures and birds (day 5), land animals (day 6), then humanity, "male and female" (Gen 1:27).  Genesis 2 tells a second story.  When it begins, "No plant of the field was yet in the earth, and no herb of the field had yet sprung up" (Gen 2:5).  God forms the man (2:7), plants a garden (2:8-9), says "It is not good for the man to be alone" (Gen 2:18), and then:  "Out of the ground Yahweh God formed every animal of the field, and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them" (Gen 2:19).  No helper is found among them, so God makes the woman from the man's rib (2:21-22).

The objection.  Read in sequence, Genesis 2 has man first, then plants, then animals, then woman.  Genesis 1 has plants, animals, then man and woman together.  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists this as "The Two Contradictory Creation Accounts," with separate pages for plants, humans, animals, birds, Eve, and whether humans were first created "male and female."  Source critics explain the difference by two authors:  Genesis 1:1-2:3 from the Priestly writer, 2:4-25 from the earlier Yahwist.

Four separate questions.  The allegation bundles four claims, and they do not all stand or fall together.

1. Plants (2:5). Genesis 2:5 does not say there were no plants of any kind. It names two kinds, the siach of the field and the eseb of the field, and gives two reasons for their absence: no rain, and "There was not a man to till the ground." Umberto Cassuto, the Hebrew University commentator, noticed that the same phrase returns in the curse on Adam: the ground will bring forth "thorns and thistles," and "you will eat the herb of the field" (Gen 3:18), where "herb" is eseb. So, he argued, 2:5 means the thorny desert growth that springs up after rain and the grain that needs a farmer: "it is obvious that fields of wheat and barley and the like did not exist in the world until man began to till the ground."¹⁴ The reading has a positive textual basis, both reasons given in 2:5 point to it, and it needs no rearranging of the story. It is not the only possible reading, but it is the one the text supports. Genesis 2:8-9 then has God plant a garden and make trees grow in it after forming the man. That planting is in one place, "eastward, in Eden" (Gen 2:8), and nothing in Genesis 2 says there were no trees elsewhere; but that is a reading of the silence, not something the text states.
2. Animals and birds (2:19). This is the real difficulty. The verb wayyitser, "formed," is the ordinary Hebrew narrative form that usually moves the story forward. The NIV and the ESV render it "had formed," which removes the sequence. C. John Collins, who defends that rendering, admits that in the standard grammars Driver's view against it "has carried the day," and that in 1995 "The NIV alone of major versions has a pluperfect in this verse."¹⁵ His case is that the surrounding text fixes the order: "If we take Genesis 1:3-2:3 as conveying the broad-stroke story line ... we are entitled ... to read wayyitser in 2:19 as a pluperfect."¹⁵ Cassuto, who rejected the pluperfect as "simply an unsuccessful attempt at harmonization,"¹⁴ offered a different solution that rests on a detail most readers miss. Verse 19 forms only "every animal of the field, and every bird of the sky." Verse 20 has the man name three groups, and the first is "all livestock." The livestock were already with him. So Cassuto read 2:19 as God forming, from kinds already made, "particular specimens for the purpose of presenting them all before man in the midst of the Garden."¹⁴ That reading uses the verb in its ordinary sequential sense, and it explains the missing livestock, which the contradiction reading does not.
3. Birds from water or ground. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible says Genesis 1:20 makes birds from the water and 2:19 from the ground. The King James Version does read "Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth" (Gen 1:20, KJV). But the Hebrew has two separate jussives: "let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let flying things fly above the earth" (וְעוֹף֙ יְעוֹפֵ֣ף עַל־הָאָ֔רֶץ). It does not say what birds are made from. The modern translation reads "let birds fly above the earth" (Gen 1:20). This one is a translation artifact.
4. "Male and female" (Gen 1:27) and the woman's later making (2:22). Genesis 1:27 says what God made, not that both were made in one instant. Genesis 2 gives the detail. Jesus, in Matthew 19:4-5, quotes 1:27 and 2:24 in one breath as a single account: "he who made them from the beginning made them male and female" (Matt 19:4). Whatever one thinks of the sources, the earliest readers on record treated the two as summary and detail.

What remains.  Even its defenders admit the pluperfect is not the default reading of 2:19, and Cassuto's specimen reading, though it fits the text, is an inference.  A skeptic can fairly say that the most natural sequence of Genesis 2 is not the sequence of Genesis 1, and that two sources would explain that.  A defender can fairly reply that the final writer put the two side by side and joined them with the chiastic heading of 2:4, so he read them as a pair.  That shows the writer knew both accounts;  it does not by itself show that they agree, since an editor can also keep two sources he knows differ.  Each of the four claims above has a different status, and the overall order question is genuinely two-sided.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the animal order (2:19);  well-supported explanation for the plants (2:5);  no actual conflict for the birds' origin and for "male and female."  The sibling article Ancient Cosmology and Genesis gives the full grammatical survey.

G02: Light and day before the sun

Light appears on day 1, and "God divided the light from the darkness" (Gen 1:4).  The sun and moon are made on day 4, "to divide the light from the darkness" (Gen 1:18).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible asks which day the division happened.  The two verses do not say the same thing.  Day 1 reports that God divided light from darkness;  day 4 assigns the lights a job, "to rule over the day and over the night" (Gen 1:18), from then on.  A thing can be divided once and then given a keeper of the division.  There is a real question here, but it is a different one:  whether light without a sun makes physical sense.  That is a question about whether Genesis 1 is true of nature, not a contradiction between two of its verses.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G03: When the stars were made

Genesis 1:16 says of day 4, "He also made the stars."  In Job, God asks where Job was "when I laid the foundations of the earth" (Job 38:4), "when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?" (Job 38:7).  The objection is that stars sang at the earth's founding, before day 4.  Job 38 is poetry, and the line is built in parallel:  "morning stars" in the first half, "sons of God" in the second.  In Job the "sons of God" are heavenly beings who present themselves before God (Job 1:6, 2:1).  Hebrew poetry often pairs stars with heavenly beings (Judg 5:20 has "the stars" fighting from their courses).  The singing stars of Job 38 are most naturally the heavenly host, described in a figure, not a datable astronomical event.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

G04: "In the day" against six days

Genesis 2:4 speaks of "the day that Yahweh God made the earth and the heavens" (Gen 2:4), after Genesis 1 has used six days.  The Hebrew beyom followed by an infinitive is an idiom for "when."  Cassuto lists other places where it cannot mean a single day:  "in the day that Yahweh spoke with Moses in Mount Sinai" (Num 3:1), though Moses was on the mountain forty days;  and "the dedication offering of the altar, on the day when it was anointed" (Num 7:84), though the offerings in that chapter took twelve days.¹⁴  Genesis itself uses the idiom again:  "In the day that God created man, he made him in God's likeness" (Gen 5:1).  The idiom is shown, not merely possible.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

G05: When heaven was made

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets Genesis 1:1 ("the heavens and the earth") against 1:6-8 (the expanse called "sky"), Matthew 25:34 ("the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world") and John 14:2 ("I am going to prepare a place for you").  These passages use "heaven" for different things.  Genesis 1:1 pairs "heavens and earth" to mean everything.  Genesis 1:8 names the visible sky, the same Hebrew word shamayim.  Matthew 25:34 speaks of a kingdom planned from the beginning, and John 14:2 of a place being made ready within the Father's house.  None of them dates the creation of the same thing.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G06: Every tree for food against the forbidden tree

Genesis 1:29 gives humanity "every tree, which bears fruit yielding seed" for food (Gen 1:29).  Genesis 2:17 forbids one tree in one garden.  A general grant with one stated exception is not a contradiction;  laws and parents use the pattern all the time, and Genesis 2:16-17 states it in that form:  "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" (Gen 2:16-17).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G07: "In the day that you eat of it, you will surely die"

The texts.  God warns:  "for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die" (Gen 2:17).  Adam eats, and "All the days that Adam lived were nine hundred thirty years, then he died" (Gen 5:5).  The serpent had said, "You won't really die" (Gen 3:4).

The objection.  God's warning seems to fail and the serpent's denial to come true.  The critic can sharpen it:  the serpent also says "in the day you eat it, your eyes will be opened" (Gen 3:5), and that does happen at once (3:7).  The same phrase is fulfilled immediately for the serpent and not for God.

The answers.  Gordon Wenham rejects the easy answer.  "On the day" can mean "when," but here, he says, it stresses promptness, and the contradiction cannot "be resolved by retranslating 'on the day' as 'when.'"¹⁶  His own answer is that the story uses death in two senses.  To be expelled from God's presence was, in Israel's worship, to enter the realm of death, as a leper outside the camp was:  "In this sense they did die on the day they ate of the tree."¹⁶  The banishment from the tree of life (3:22-23) makes physical death certain from that day.  A second answer comes from the exact parallel Wenham cites.  Solomon tells Shimei, "on the day you go out and pass over the brook Kidron, know for certain that you will surely die" (1 Kgs 2:37).  The Hebrew is the same construction as Genesis 2:17 (בְּי֣וֹם ... מ֥וֹת תָּמ֑וּת).  Shimei later goes to Gath, brings back his slaves, "Solomon was told that Shimei had gone from Jerusalem to Gath, and had come again" (1 Kgs 2:41), and only then is he summoned and executed.  So the formula, in its closest parallel, fixes the day the death sentence becomes certain, not the day it is carried out.  Wenham himself cites this passage for promptness;  the narrative of the passage points the other way.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The Shimei parallel is real positive evidence that the formula can mean "on that day your death becomes certain."  But the story's own pairing with the serpent's immediately fulfilled "in the day" keeps the tension alive, and some readers will reasonably think the narrator meant the reader to feel it.

G08: Cain the wanderer builds a city

God tells Cain, "You will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth" (Gen 4:12).  Then "Cain left Yahweh's presence, and lived in the land of Nod" (Gen 4:16), and "He built a city" (Gen 4:17).  The objection reads 4:12 as a decree that Cain would never settle.  Three features of the text tell against it.  The land's name, Nod, is the same root as the word "wanderer" (nad), so the narrator has Cain "live in the land of Wandering."  The Hebrew of 4:17 uses a participle, "he was building a city" (וַֽיְהִי֙ בֹּ֣נֶה עִ֔יר), which describes an activity, not a finished town.  And the curse in 4:12 is first about the ground refusing him its yield;  a man driven from farming can still found a settlement.  The narrator plainly did not see a contradiction, and his wordplay suggests he meant the reader to see a restless man building against his sentence.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G09: The 120 years and the later lifespans

"His days will be one hundred twenty years" (Gen 6:3), yet Shem, Abraham (175) and many others live longer, and Psalm 90:10 gives "seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty years."  Wenham states the problem fairly:  in its immediate context the verse seems to mean "from now on nobody shall live to more than 120 years of age," but "within the wider setting of Genesis this interpretation is problematic."¹⁶  Two readings remain.  Keil, König and Kidner took the 120 years as a period of grace before the Flood;  Wenham suggests a maximum lifespan "only gradually implemented," noting that recorded ages decline after the Flood and that after Jacob "Only Aaron (123, Num 33:39) exceeds 120."¹⁶  That last claim is slightly wrong:  the priest Jehoiada "was one hundred thirty years old when he died" (2 Chr 24:15).  Two exceptions in a thousand years still fit a limit that became the norm, but they show that "limit" cannot mean an absolute cap.  Psalm 90 is a poem about the ordinary span, not a rule.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Both readings fit the text;  neither is forced by it.

G10: Enoch, seventh from Adam

Jude 14 calls Enoch "the seventh from Adam."  Genesis 5 lists Adam, Seth, Enosh, Kenan, Mahalalel, Jared, Enoch.  Counting Adam as the first, Enoch is seventh;  counting from Adam, he is the sixth after him.  Ancient counting was usually inclusive.  The phrase is also the one used in the book Jude is quoting, 1 Enoch.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G11: Enoch and Elijah taken up, against "no one has ascended"

Jesus says, "No one has ascended into heaven but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man" (John 3:13).  But Enoch "was taken away, so that he wouldn't see death" (Heb 11:5), and Elijah "went up by a whirlwind into heaven" (2 Kgs 2:11).  Hebrews then says of a group of the faithful, "These all died in faith" (Heb 11:13), and that "it is appointed for men to die once" (Heb 9:27).

1. John 3:13. The verse answers 3:12, "how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?" The claim is that no one has gone up to heaven and come back to report what is there, the question of Proverbs 30:4, "Who has ascended up into heaven, and descended?" Elijah did not come back to teach. This reading comes from the verse's own context, though a critic can say the words are absolute. (The WEB's further words "who is in heaven" are not in the SBL Greek text, which ends at "the Son of Man.")
2. Hebrews 11:13. "These all" follows a paragraph about Abraham, Sarah, Isaac and Jacob (11:8-12), and goes on to speak of the country "from which they went out" (Heb 11:15). It does not reach back to Enoch, whom the same chapter says did not see death.
3. Hebrews 9:27 states the general rule of human life. A general rule with acknowledged exceptions, which the same letter names two chapters later, is ordinary speech.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved for John 3:13;  no actual conflict for Hebrews.

G12: Nephilim after the Flood

If everyone outside the ark died (Gen 7:21-23), how are there Nephilim in Canaan (Num 13:33)?  The Numbers verse is reported speech.  It belongs to the spies who "brought up an evil report of the land" (Num 13:32), whom the narrative condemns.  The Bible reporting what frightened men claimed does not make the Bible assert it.  Genesis 6:4 also says the Nephilim were on earth "in those days, and also after that," which may describe a type of person rather than a single family line.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G13: Two of every kind against seven pairs

The texts.  Noah is told to bring "two of every sort" (Gen 6:19).  Later he is told:  "You shall take seven pairs of every clean animal with you, the male and his female. Of the animals that are not clean, take two" (Gen 7:2).  Then clean and unclean animals "went by pairs to Noah into the ship, male and female, as God commanded Noah" (Gen 7:8-9).

The objection.  Source critics assign 6:19-20 to one source and 7:2-3 to another.  The sharper form points at 7:8-9:  clean animals entered "by pairs," which seems to contradict seven.

The answer.  Genesis 6:19-20 is the general instruction;  7:2-3 adds a specific supplement for clean animals and birds.  Wenham notes why the text gives it:  the extra clean creatures are needed after the Flood, for the birds sent out to scout (8:7-12) and for the sacrifice of "every clean animal, and of every clean bird" (Gen 8:20).¹⁶  As for 7:9, the Hebrew shenayim shenayim, "two two," is the normal distributive idiom, "in twos."  It says how the animals went in, male with female, not how many went in.  Seven pairs can enter in pairs.  (The Hebrew of 7:2, shivah shivah, "seven seven," can mean seven pairs or seven individuals;  either way the text distinguishes clean from unclean.)

Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  Even if two sources were combined, the finished text is consistent:  a general rule, a stated supplement with a stated purpose, and an idiom for the manner of entry.

G14: Flood duration and chronology

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible asks four questions here.

1. Forty days or 150? "The flood was forty days on the earth" (Gen 7:17); "The waters flooded the earth one hundred fifty days" (Gen 7:24). The dates show that the forty days are inside the 150. The Flood starts on the seventeenth day of the second month of Noah's 600th year (7:11). After 150 days the ark rests "in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month" (Gen 8:4). From 2/17 to 7/17 is exactly five months; at thirty days a month, that is 150 days. The rain fell forty days, and the water stayed high for 150. Wenham, who discusses the source-critical view that two chronologies were merged, concludes that the editor's chronology "is quite coherent," and tabulates it from the announcement to Noah leaving the ark.¹⁶
2. Dried on 1/1 or on 2/27? "The waters were dried up from the earth" on the first day of the first month (Gen 8:13); "In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry" (Gen 8:14). The Hebrew uses two different verbs: charvu for the waters drying off the surface in 8:13, and yaveshah for the ground being dry in 8:14. Two stages, eight weeks apart.
3. When did Noah enter the ark? Genesis 7:7 has Noah enter "because of the floodwaters"; 7:13 has him enter "In the same day" that the Flood began. Verses 7:6-10 are a summary of the week before the Flood, ending "After the seven days, the floodwaters came on the earth" (Gen 7:10); verses 11-16 retell the day itself in dated detail. Summary followed by detailed retelling is a normal Hebrew narrative pattern, the same one as in G01.
4. Ark grounded before the peaks appeared? The ark rests on the mountains of Ararat on 7/17 (8:4), but "the tops of the mountains were visible" only on 10/1 (8:5). A ship grounds when the water drops to just above the highest ground beneath it; other summits need not show for weeks, and Noah's view was through one window (8:6) until he removed the covering (8:13). Nothing in the text says the ark's mountain was the first to appear.

Verdict:  no actual conflict.  The arithmetic of the dates is internally consistent.

G15: Noah's youngest son

Genesis 9:24 says Noah knew "what his youngest son had done to him," meaning Ham, but the family is always listed "Shem, Ham, and Japheth," putting Ham second.  No verse says the list is in birth order.  Genesis 11:26 lists "Abram, Nahor, and Haran," and Abram is often thought not to be the eldest;  lists put the most important name first.  The Hebrew of 9:24, beno haqqatan, means "his younger son" or "his youngest son" and could compare Ham with Shem alone.  Genesis 10:21 calls Shem "the elder brother of Japheth" in the WEB, though the Hebrew can also be read "the brother of Japheth the elder."  Verdict:  no actual conflict.  The objection treats a list as a statement of birth order.

G16: Noah a preacher of righteousness

Second Peter 2:5 calls Noah "a preacher of righteousness."  Genesis records no sermon, and records Noah's drunkenness (9:20-24).  Silence is not denial, and a later writer reporting something an earlier one omits is the commonest kind of difference.  The drunkenness shows that Noah was not sinless, which no text claims.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

G17: One language at Babel against the tongues of Genesis 10

Genesis 10 divides the nations "everyone after his language" (Gen 10:5, also 10:20, 31).  Genesis 11 then begins:  "The whole earth was of one language and of one speech" (Gen 11:1).  Genesis 10 is a table that runs ahead to the result, and closes with "The nations divided from these on the earth after the flood" (Gen 10:32).  Genesis 11 then goes back to tell how the division happened:  "there Yahweh confused the language of all the earth. From there, Yahweh scattered them" (Gen 11:9).  The pattern, a summary that runs ahead and then a narrative that goes back, is the same one seen in G01 and G14.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The arrangement is topical, and the text signals it by ending chapter 10 with the scattering that chapter 11 narrates.

G18: Same names, different fathers in the Table of Nations

Sheba is a son of Raamah (10:7), of Joktan (10:28) and of Jokshan (25:3).  Dedan is a son of Raamah (10:7) and of Jokshan (25:3).  These are different men in different family lines:  Raamah's line is Cush's, Joktan's is Shem's, and Jokshan is Abraham's son by Keturah.  Repeated names in different lines are common in Genesis;  there are two Enochs (4:17, 5:18) and two Lamechs (4:18, 5:25).  The third allegation is different:  1 Chronicles 1:17 lists "Aram, Uz, Hul, Gether, and Meshech" (1 Chr 1:17) among "The sons of Shem," while Genesis 10:23 says "The sons of Aram were: Uz, Hul, Gether, and Mash" (Gen 10:23).  Here the Masoretic text of Chronicles has lost the words "and the sons of Aram."  Ralph Klein's commentary restores them "with one Hebrew MS, LXX^A, other MSS, Arab., and Gen 10:23," and explains the loss "by homoioteleuton," an eye-skip between similar words.¹⁷  The supporting witnesses are few and mixed, and Codex Alexandrinus often brings Chronicles into line with other books, so its reading could be a correction rather than a survival.  What favors a loss is the Masoretic list itself, which makes Uz Aram's brother where Genesis makes him Aram's son, with a known mechanism to explain how.  Verdict:  no actual conflict for Sheba and Dedan;  copy problem for Uz, with a documented variant.

G19: Cainan in Luke 3:36

Luke's genealogy reads "the son of Cainan, the son of Arphaxad" (Luke 3:36).  The Hebrew Genesis has Arpachshad father Shelah directly:  "Arpachshad lived thirty-five years and became the father of Shelah" (Gen 11:12).  The Greek Septuagint inserts Kainan between them, with 130 years to his son's birth (καὶ ἐγέννησεν τὸν Καιναν, Gen 11:12 LXX).  So Luke follows the Greek text against the Hebrew.  Three explanations exist:  Luke copied a genealogy that included a name not in the original Genesis;  the Hebrew lost a generation the Greek preserves;  or a scribe of Luke added the name from the Greek Genesis.  The third is the common apologetic answer, resting on the claim that the earliest papyrus of Luke, P75, omits Cainan.  The sibling article Which Bible Text Gives the Right Date for Creation? checked the transcription and found that at this point P75's "omission" is inferred from the width of a hole in the papyrus, while another early papyrus has the name in ink.  The Septuagint's Kainan also shares his son Shelah's numbers, which suggests a duplication inside the Greek tradition.  Against that, the extra generation is older than Luke and not only Greek.  The Book of Jubilees, a Jewish retelling of Genesis from the second century BC, says that Arpachshad's wife "bare him a son in the third year in this week," whom it names Kainam, the father of Shelah (Jub. 8:1-5).¹⁸  Jubilees could itself depend on a Greek-type text of Genesis, so it shows that Kainan was in a Jewish tradition before Luke, not that he was in the original Genesis.  Verdict:  unresolved.  This is a textual conflict between Luke and the Hebrew Genesis.  It is not a contradiction between two inspired statements unless one also decides which text of Genesis is original, and that is not settled.

G20: No second flood, and the earth cursed again

God promises "There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth" (Gen 9:11).  Nahum says of Nineveh, "with an overflowing flood, he will make a full end of her place" (Nah 1:8), a picture of an army sweeping over one city.  God says, "I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake" (Gen 8:21), using the verb qallel;  Isaiah 24:6 says "the curse has devoured the earth," using a different noun, alah, the oath-curse of a broken covenant (24:5);  and Malachi 4:6 warns of striking the land "with a curse," using cherem, the ban of destruction.  Gen 8:21 promises not to repeat the Flood-judgment on the ground;  the prophets threaten covenant judgment on a people.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

Part 3: The patriarchs, and Stephen's speech

Eighteen cases.  The four serious ones come from a single speech:  Stephen's defense before the council in Acts 7, which retells Israel's history and differs from Genesis on Terah's death (P01), the tomb at Shechem (P02), the number who went to Egypt (P03) and the length of the stay (P04).  One point about all four should be stated first.  Acts reports a speech.  An accurate report of a speech that contains a mistake contains a mistake by the speaker, not by the reporter.  The Chicago Statement accepts "the reporting of falsehoods" as compatible with inerrancy.⁷  A skeptic is entitled to reply that Luke presents Stephen as "full of the Holy Spirit" (Acts 7:55) and gives no hint that he is wrong.  So each case below is judged twice:  is Stephen's statement defensible, and if not, what does that cost?

P01: Abraham's age leaving Haran and Terah's death

The texts.  "Terah lived seventy years, and became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran" (Gen 11:26).  "The days of Terah were two hundred five years. Terah died in Haran" (Gen 11:32).  "Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran" (Gen 12:4).  Stephen says that Abraham "lived in Haran. From there, when his father was dead, God moved him into this land" (Acts 7:4).

The objection.  If Abram was born when Terah was 70, he left at 75 when Terah was 145, sixty years before Terah died at 205.  Stephen says he left after Terah died.

The answers.

1. Abram was not the eldest. Gleason Archer, in the best-known evangelical handbook of Bible difficulties, argues that Genesis 11:26 gives Terah's age at the birth of his first son, and that Abram is named first because he matters most: "Even though he must have been born when his father was 130--and may therefore have been the youngest of the three--he was the most prominent of them all."¹⁹ The arithmetic works: 130 years plus Abram's 75 at his departure is 205, Terah's age at death (Gen 11:32). There is positive evidence that this formula works that way. Genesis 5:32 says "Noah was five hundred years old, then Noah became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth." But "Shem was one hundred years old when he became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood" (Gen 11:10), and Noah was 600 at the Flood (7:6), so Shem was born when Noah was 502. The "lived X years and fathered A, B and C" formula need not date every son. Against this answer: Abraham at 99 treats fatherhood at 100 as close to impossible (17:17), which fits oddly if his own father had him at 130.
2. Stephen followed a different text. The Samaritan Pentateuch gives Terah 145 years, not 205, so that Terah dies exactly when Abram leaves. Ronald Hendel, in the standard critical edition of Genesis 1-11, judges that reading a later correction and notes: "It is possible, though not necessary, that the S reading is reflected in Acts 7:4 and Philo, Mig. 177."²⁰ Hendel also records that Jewish and Christian readers noticed the difficulty in the narrative itself, because Genesis tells of Terah's death before God's call. Stephen's sequence follows the order of the Genesis story; it is the numbers that create the problem.

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible derives from the same arithmetic a second age for Abraham at Ishmael's birth, over 135, against the eighty-six of Genesis 16:16;  that page stands or falls with this case.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The first answer has real support from Genesis 5:32 and 11:10.  The second shows that Stephen's sequence was a known reading in his day.  If both fail, the error is in Stephen's speech, accurately reported.

P02: The tomb Abraham bought and where Jacob was buried

The texts.  Abraham bought the cave of Machpelah near Hebron from Ephron the Hittite (Gen 23:16-20).  Jacob was buried there:  "his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought" (Gen 50:13).  Jacob separately bought land at Shechem:  "He bought the parcel of ground where he had spread his tent, at the hand of the children of Hamor, Shechem's father, for one hundred pieces of money" (Gen 33:19), and Joseph's bones were buried there (Josh 24:32).  Stephen says:  "Jacob went down into Egypt and he died, himself and our fathers; and they were brought back to Shechem and laid in the tomb that Abraham bought for a price in silver from the children of Hamor of Shechem" (Acts 7:15-16).

The objection.  Abraham bought at Hebron from Ephron;  Jacob bought at Shechem from Hamor's sons.  Stephen fuses the two purchases and puts the patriarchs' burial in the wrong place.

The answers.

1. "They" means Jacob's sons, not Jacob. The Greek subject of "were brought back" can be "our fathers," the twelve sons, rather than Jacob too. Genesis says nothing about where Joseph's brothers were buried, so Stephen could be reporting a tradition that they lay at Shechem with Joseph. This removes the burial-place problem only partly. Josephus, writing toward the end of the first century, says the brothers' descendants "carried their bodies, and buried them at Hebron."²¹ The tradition that the brothers' bones were brought back to Canaan is older than Acts, and it too names Hebron. The Book of Jubilees, in the second century BC, says the Israelites "brought forth all the bones of the children of Jacob save the bones of Joseph, and they buried them in the field in the double cave in the mountain," that is, Machpelah (Jub. 46:9).¹⁸ Its editor R. H. Charles, who collected the same tradition from the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, wrote that "St. Stephen is beholden to this tradition for the statement in Acts vii. 15-16,"¹⁸ but Stephen's place is Shechem. A much later witness complicates this picture. In Letter 108.13.3-4, from late antiquity, Jerome describes Paula visiting Shechem and Jacob's well, then turning aside and seeing the twelve patriarchs' tombs on her route toward Sebaste. His Latin says "atque inde deuertens uidit duodecim patriarcharum sepulchra," or "turning aside from there, she saw the tombs of the twelve patriarchs" (this article's translation).²² This documents a later local identification near the route, not a first-century burial record or a tradition independent of Acts. It gives the Shechem reading some later support without deciding between it and the older Hebron tradition.
2. Abraham bought land at Shechem too. Archer argues that Abraham, who built his first altar at Shechem (Gen 12:6-7), probably bought land there, that the title lapsed, and that Jacob bought it back: "Stephen was undoubtedly aware of a reliable oral tradition that Abraham had in fact done so, even though the written record of the Old Testament had omitted this transaction."¹⁹ He supports the possibility with Isaac re-acquiring Abraham's well at Beersheba (Gen 26). But no source mentions an Abrahamic purchase at Shechem, and the purchase Stephen describes, from "the children of Hamor," matches Jacob's in Genesis 33:19 in every detail except the buyer.
3. Compression. Stephen telescopes two purchases and two burials into one sentence. The same speech does this elsewhere. "'I will judge the nation to which they will be in bondage,' said God, 'and after that they will come out and serve me in this place'" (Acts 7:7) joins God's words to Abraham (Gen 15:14) to his words to Moses at the bush, "you shall serve God on this mountain" (Exod 3:12), and moves the promised worship from Horeb to the land. The Shechem sentence is fused the same way: "a price in silver" fits Abraham's purchase, paid in silver at Hebron (Gen 23:16), while the sellers, "the children of Hamor," are Jacob's (Gen 33:19). So the fusion looks like a habit of this speech rather than a random slip. But compression explains how the sentence came to say what it says; it does not make what it says true. A summary that names the wrong buyer is inaccurate on that point, whatever the speaker intended.

Verdict:  probable error in the speech as reported.  Answer 1 needs a Shechem burial that the older Jewish tradition places at Hebron.  Answer 2 is strained:  it needs a purchase no text records, with the same sellers as Jacob's.  Answer 3 accounts for the shape of the mistake but not for its accuracy.  The sentence as it stands attributes Jacob's purchase to Abraham.  Whether this counts against Luke depends on whether one reads Acts as endorsing every detail of every speech it records.  Luke reports Stephen's speech in a way that suggests sympathy, but he does not comment on its details.

P03: Seventy or seventy-five to Egypt

The texts.  The Hebrew Genesis counts Jacob's family:  "All the souls of the house of Jacob, who came into Egypt, were seventy" (Gen 46:27).  So do Exodus 1:5 and Deuteronomy 10:22.  Stephen says Joseph "summoned Jacob his father and all his relatives, seventy-five souls" (Acts 7:14).

The evidence.  This is the cleanest case in the whole register of a contradiction that is really a disagreement between ancient copies.

1. The Greek Septuagint reads seventy-five at both Genesis 46:27 and Exodus 1:5 (ἑβδομήκοντα πέντε, Gen 46:27 LXX; πέντε καὶ ἑβδομήκοντα, Exod 1:5 LXX). Its Genesis 46:20 adds five grandsons and great-grandsons of Joseph (Machir, Galaad, Soutalaam, Taam and Edem), so Joseph's descendants number nine instead of two: ψυχαὶ ἐννέα (Gen 46:27 LXX).
2. A Hebrew manuscript from the Dead Sea Scrolls, 4QExod^b, reads "seventy-five" (חמש ושבעים) at Exodus 1:5. Eugene Ulrich's edition of the biblical scrolls records the reading with the bulk of the Greek, while a second scroll, 4QpaleoGen-Exod^l, reads seventy with the Masoretic text, and a third probably read seventy-five.²³

So "seventy-five" was not a slip by Stephen or Luke.  It was the reading of the Greek Bible and of at least one Hebrew text in use in the first century.  The two figures count differently:  seventy includes Jacob and Joseph's two sons, while the Greek seventy-five adds five more of Joseph's descendants.  Archer argues that both totals are correct "depending on whether Joseph's grandchildren are included."¹⁹

Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The variant is documented in Greek and in Hebrew.  Which count the original Genesis had is a separate question;  either way, Stephen quotes a real text and the conflict is between manuscripts, not between Stephen and the Bible he used.

P04: 400 years, 430 years and four generations

The texts.  God tells Abram his descendants will be afflicted "four hundred years" (Gen 15:13), and "In the fourth generation they will come here again" (Gen 15:16).  Exodus says "the time that the children of Israel lived in Egypt was four hundred thirty years" (Exod 12:40).  Paul says the law "came four hundred thirty years after" the covenant with Abraham (Gal 3:17).  Exodus 6:16-20 gives only four generations from Levi to Moses:  Levi, Kohath, Amram, Moses.

The objection.  Four hundred or four hundred thirty?  Four centuries in Egypt, or four centuries from Abraham?  And how can four generations fill four centuries, when 1 Chronicles 7:20-27 needs at least ten generations from Ephraim to Joshua, Moses' contemporary?

The answers.

1. 400 and 430. Four hundred is a round figure in a prophecy; 430 is a counted figure in a narrative. That is approximation, the kind the Chicago Statement and ordinary readers both allow.
2. Where the 430 starts. The Masoretic Exodus 12:40 counts 430 years "in Egypt." The Septuagint reads "in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan" (ἐν γῇ Αἰγύπτῳ καὶ ἐν γῇ Χανααν, Exod 12:40 LXX), and the Samaritan Pentateuch has a similar longer reading. On that text, the 430 years run from Abraham's arrival in Canaan, which is exactly what Paul says in Galatians 3:17, and Josephus too dates the Exodus "four hundred and thirty years after our forefather Abraham came into Canaan, but two hundred and fifteen years only after Jacob removed into Egypt."²¹ Paul is following the Greek text's chronology. Which text of Exodus is original is disputed; the sibling article Dating the Exodus sets out the evidence. Paul's statement is consistent with a real text, not invented.
3. Generations. Kenneth Kitchen, the Egyptologist, argues that the Hebrew dor in Genesis 15:16 means a lifetime "span" rather than a father-to-son generation, and cites an Assyrian king who used the cognate word for a period of about a century: "In the context, the four dor are another expression for the four centuries."²⁴ On Exodus 6, he argues that the list is not a complete genealogy but a "fourfold link" by tribe, clan, family group and individual.²⁴ There is evidence inside the text for this. At the census of Numbers 3:27-28, the Kohathite clans, of which the Amramites were one of four, counted 8,600 males. If Amram were Moses' literal father, the Amramite clan, about a quarter of the 8,600, could only be Moses, Aaron, their sons and grandsons, a few dozen males at most, not about two thousand. (The clan figures of Numbers 3 have their own textual problem, E18, but no reading of them comes near a few dozen.)

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for 400/430 and for Galatians 3:17;  plausible but unproved for the generations.  The Levi-to-Moses list really is short for 430 years in Egypt, and short-sojourn readers use it as evidence.  The case is a live dispute about chronology, not a proof of contradiction either way.

P05: Abraham's "only son"

God says, "take your son, your only son, Isaac" (Gen 22:2), and Hebrews calls Isaac Abraham's "only born son" (Heb 11:17), though Abraham also had Ishmael and, later, six sons by Keturah.  Both texts say in what sense Isaac was the only one.  Ishmael had already been sent away (21:14), and God had said "your offspring will be named through Isaac" (Gen 21:12).  Hebrews quotes exactly that line in the next verse:  "Your offspring will be accounted as from Isaac" (Heb 11:18).  The Hebrew yachid and Greek monogenes mean "only" in the sense of "unique, the one."  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible also asks whether Keturah was a wife (Gen 25:1) or a concubine (1 Chr 1:32).  Genesis itself calls her both:  Abraham "gave gifts to the sons of Abraham's concubines" (Gen 25:6), and the same double usage appears for Bilhah, whom Rachel gave Jacob "as wife" (Gen 30:4) and who is later "his father's concubine" (Gen 35:22).  A concubine was a wife of lower rank.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P06: Abraham married his half-sister; Jacob married sisters

Abraham says Sarah "is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife" (Gen 20:12).  Leviticus later forbids marrying "your sister, the daughter of your father" (Lev 18:9).  Jacob married two sisters, which Leviticus 18:18 forbids, and Amram married "his father's sister" (Exod 6:20), forbidden in Leviticus 18:12.  American Atheists cite the Abraham case and point out that God still blessed Sarah (Gen 17:16).¹²  These are not contradictions between statements.  Leviticus gives a law to Israel and says it is new:  "You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived. You shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan" (Lev 18:3).  The patriarchs lived before it.  The moral objection behind the allegation, that a holy God should not bless a forbidden marriage, assumes that the rule applied before it was given.  The text never says so, and Genesis narrates the consequences of Jacob's double marriage (rivalry, Gen 29-30) without praising it.  Verdict:  no actual conflict, classed as a changed command.

P07: Esau's wives and the Edomite names

Genesis 26:34 and 28:9 give Esau three wives:  Judith daughter of Beeri, Basemath daughter of Elon, and Mahalath daughter of Ishmael.  Genesis 36:2-3, the Edomite genealogy, gives Adah daughter of Elon, Oholibamah daughter of Anah, and "Basemath, Ishmael's daughter, sister of Nebaioth" (Gen 36:3).  So the same fathers have daughters with different names, and the name Basemath moves from Elon's daughter to Ishmael's.  Archer's solution gives two women second names, so that Elon's daughter was also Adah and Ishmael's daughter also Mahalath, and supposes Judith had no children;  double names, he says, are "quite numerous in the Old Testament."¹⁹  Double names are common (Jethro and Reuel, Jacob and Israel, Gideon and Jerubbaal), but nothing in the text suggests them here, and the swap of one name between two women is odd.  A different kind of explanation is that Genesis 36, which has its own heading (36:1), drew on a separate Edomite list whose names were not conformed to the earlier chapters.  That is a reconstruction of how the text came to be, with nothing but the heading and the differences themselves to support it, and it explains the disagreement rather than removing it.  Verdict:  strained as a harmonization;  as the text stands, the two passages name Esau's wives differently.

The other Edomite name allegations are lighter.

1. Anah, father or mother? The Hebrew of 36:2 and 36:14 calls Oholibamah "the daughter of Anah, the daughter of Zibeon," which can be read as making Anah female, while 36:24 makes Anah a son of Zibeon. But the second "daughter of" need not describe Anah. Genesis itself says that Anah was Zibeon's son and that Oholibamah was Anah's daughter (36:24-25), so she was Zibeon's granddaughter, and Hebrew uses "daughter" for a granddaughter as it uses "son" for a grandson (P11). Two ancient texts make the sense explicit by reading "son": the Samaritan Pentateuch, "Oholibamah daughter of Anah, son of Zibeon" (בת ענה בן צבעון) at both 36:2 and 36:14,²⁵ and the Septuagint, "Ana the son of Sebegon" (Ανα τοῦ υἱοῦ Σεβεγων, Gen 36:2 LXX). Either the Masoretic "daughter" is a slip of one letter (bat for ben), or the two versions clarified an ambiguous chain. No actual conflict, with a documented variant.
2. Two Anahs and two Dishons. Anah and Dishon appear both as sons of Seir (36:20-21) and as a son and grandson of Zibeon (36:24-25). Naming a child after an uncle is common. No actual conflict.
3. Timna. She is the concubine who bore Amalek to Eliphaz (36:12) and the sister of Lotan (36:22), but 1 Chronicles 1:36 seems to list her among Eliphaz's sons. The Septuagint of 1 Chronicles reads "and of Timna, Amalek" (καὶ τῆς Θαμνα Αμαληκ, 1 Chr 1:36 LXX), with Timna in the feminine as Amalek's mother, matching Genesis. The Hebrew of Chronicles abbreviates Genesis 36:11-12 and lets "Timna" stand in a list of sons. The Greek may preserve a fuller Hebrew text, or the translator may have supplied the sense from Genesis. Plausible but unproved: an abbreviation, not shown to be a copying error.
4. Korah. A "chief Korah" appears among Eliphaz's chiefs (36:16), though Korah was Oholibamah's son (36:5, 14, 18) and is missing from the list of Eliphaz's sons (36:11-12). The Samaritan Pentateuch lacks "chief Korah" in 36:16, where its verse begins "chief Gatam, chief Amalek," and keeps Korah among Oholibamah's chiefs in 36:18.²⁵ The Masoretic list has most probably picked up Korah from two verses later. The Samaritan text sometimes smooths difficulties, so its reading could also be a correction, but here the Masoretic extra name is the harder thing to explain. Copy problem, with a documented variant.

P08: Ishmaelites or Midianites sold Joseph

The brothers decide to "sell him to the Ishmaelites" (Gen 37:27);  "Midianites who were merchants passed by, and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites" (Gen 37:28);  "The Midianites sold him into Egypt" (Gen 37:36);  Potiphar "bought him from the hand of the Ishmaelites" (Gen 39:1).  Source critics see two versions woven together.  But the Bible elsewhere uses "Ishmaelites" as a broad name that includes Midianites:  after Gideon defeats the Midianites, the narrator explains their gold earrings, "because they were Ishmaelites" (Judg 8:24).  The words overlap in the way "Arab" and "Bedouin" overlap.  Who pulled Joseph from the pit in 37:28 ("they") is ambiguous in Hebrew.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation for the names;  the sequence in 37:28 remains compressed.

P09: Ishmael's age when sent away

Ishmael was thirteen at his circumcision (17:25), so about sixteen when Isaac was weaned (21:8).  Yet Abraham gave Hagar food and water, "putting it on her shoulder; and gave her the child" (Gen 21:14), and she "put the child under one of the shrubs" (Gen 21:15).  The Hebrew of 21:14 is ambiguous:  "he gave to Hagar, setting it on her shoulder, and the child."  It does not say the child rode on her shoulder.  The Septuagint does make the child the thing placed on her shoulder (καὶ ἐπέθηκεν ἐπὶ τὸν ὦμον καὶ τὸ παιδίον, Gen 21:14 LXX), which shows that ancient readers could take it that way.  The word for "boy" in 21:18, na'ar, is used of Joseph at seventeen (37:2).  A dehydrated teenager laid in shade fits 21:15.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The Hebrew permits a teenage Ishmael;  the scene reads more naturally of a younger child, which is why source critics assign it to a separate tradition.

P10: Beersheba and Bethel named twice

Abraham names Beersheba (21:31), and Isaac later names a well there, "Therefore the name of the city is 'Beersheba' to this day" (Gen 26:33).  Jacob names Bethel (28:19) and names it again (35:15).  The text explains the first case itself:  "Isaac dug again the wells of water, which they had dug in the days of Abraham his father ... He called their names after the names by which his father had called them" (Gen 26:18).  And chapter 35 already calls the place "Luz (that is, Bethel)" (Gen 35:6) before Jacob renames it after a second appearance of God.  Renaming to commemorate a second event is not a contradiction.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P11: Laban son of Nahor or of Bethuel

Laban is "son of Bethuel the Syrian" (Gen 28:5) and "Laban, the son of Nahor" (Gen 29:5).  Bethuel was Nahor's son (24:15), so Laban was Nahor's grandson.  Hebrew "son" covers grandsons;  Rebekah herself says she is "The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor's son" (Gen 24:47), and the shepherds in 29:5 name the famous ancestor.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P12: Dan named in Abraham's day

Abram "pursued as far as Dan" (Gen 14:14), but the city got that name only when the tribe of Dan took Laish:  "They called the name of the city Dan ... however the name of the city used to be Laish" (Judg 18:29).  This is a later place name in an older story, as a modern history might say Abraham traveled to "Iraq."  It is evidence about when and by whom Genesis was given its final form, which is a question about authorship.  It is not two statements in conflict.  Verdict:  no actual conflict, classed as an updated place name.

P13: Benjamin "a little one" with ten sons; sons or grandsons

Judah calls Benjamin "a child of his old age, a little one" (Gen 44:20), yet Genesis 46:21 lists ten sons of Benjamin who went to Egypt.  The word qatan means "young" or "youngest";  by Genesis' own numbers Joseph was then thirty-nine (41:46;  45:6), and Benjamin, born after the family left Laban (31:41;  35:16-18) and before Joseph was sold at seventeen (37:2), was a grown man of roughly twenty-two to thirty-three.  The lists of Benjamin's sons differ:  ten in Genesis 46:21, five clans in Numbers 26:38-40 (where Ard and Naaman are Bela's sons), three in 1 Chronicles 7:6, five in 1 Chronicles 8:1-2.  Several differences are spelling (Muppim and Shephupham, Huppim and Hupham), and the lists come from different times and purposes:  Numbers counts clans that survived to the census, and "son" in Genesis 46 covers grandsons.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The lists are not reconciled name by name, and some of the differences may be copying errors in long name lists.

P14: Where the brothers found the money

One brother finds his money at the lodging place (42:27-28);  all find their money when they empty their sacks at home (42:35).  Later the brothers tell Joseph's steward, "When we came to the lodging place, we opened our sacks, and behold, each man's money was in the mouth of his sack" (Gen 43:21).  The two narrative verses describe different moments:  one sack at the inn, the rest at home.  Verse 43:21 is the brothers' own compressed account to a man they fear, and an anxious speaker compressing two discoveries into one is ordinary.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

P15: Who Jacob wrestled

Jacob "wrestled with a man" (Gen 32:24), then says "I have seen God face to face" (Gen 32:30);  Hosea says he "contended with God" and "struggled with the angel" (Hos 12:3-4).  The narrative itself calls the being both a man and God, and Hosea uses God and angel in parallel lines.  In Genesis the "angel of Yahweh" speaks as God (16:10-13, 22:11-12).  These are three descriptions of one encounter, all already present in the texts.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P16: Who destroyed Sodom, and what was its sin

The angels say "we will destroy this place" (Gen 19:13), and "Yahweh rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah sulfur and fire" (Gen 19:24).  Agents sent by a ruler carry out his act, and the same verse says Yahweh "has sent us to destroy it" (Gen 19:13).  On Sodom's sin, Ezekiel lists "pride, fullness of bread, and prosperous ease" and neglect of "the poor and needy," and adds that "They were arrogant and committed abomination" (Ezek 16:49-50).  Jude names sexual immorality (Jude 7).  Jeremiah compares Jerusalem's prophets to Sodom because "they commit adultery and walk in lies" (Jer 23:14);  Jesus compares a town that rejects his messengers with Sodom, "it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city" (Matt 10:15), which is a comparison of guilt, not a statement of Sodom's sin;  and 2 Peter speaks of its "lustful life" (2 Pet 2:7).  Lists of several sins are not contradictory lists.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P17: Sarah's laughter and Sarah's faith

"Sarah laughed within herself" at the promise (Gen 18:12).  Hebrews says "By faith even Sarah herself received power to conceive" (Heb 11:11).  Doubt followed by faith is a change over time, and Genesis records her being rebuked for the laugh (18:13-15) before the birth.  The Greek of Hebrews 11:11 is also difficult:  the phrase for conceiving (katabolē spermatos) is normally used of the father, and many scholars read the verse with Abraham as subject, "by faith, with Sarah, he received power."  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

P18: Kings in Edom "before any king reigned over the children of Israel"

Genesis 36:31 lists "the kings who reigned in the land of Edom, before any king reigned over the children of Israel" (Gen 36:31).  The sentence looks back from a time when Israel had kings, or forward to kings already promised (35:11).  Like P12, this bears on when Genesis received its final form, not on whether its statements agree.  Verdict:  no actual conflict, classed as evidence about composition.

Part 4: Exodus to Deuteronomy

Twenty-eight cases.  The serious ones are the revelation of the divine name (E01), whether anyone has seen God (E02), Pharaoh's hardened heart (E03), the plague death toll in 1 Corinthians (E17), the Levite count (E18) and the place of Aaron's death (E13).  Many of the rest are law codes compared with each other.  The rabbis noticed some of these long before modern critics did, and the Talmud records how they handled them;  that record is cited where it bears on a case.

E01: "By my name YHWH I was not known to them"

The texts.  God tells Moses:  "I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty; but by my name Yahweh I was not known to them" (Exod 6:3).  Yet in Genesis the name is everywhere.  "At that time men began to call on Yahweh's name" (Gen 4:26).  God says to Abram, "I am Yahweh who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees" (Gen 15:7), and to Jacob, "I am Yahweh, the God of Abraham your father" (Gen 28:13).  Abraham names a place "Yahweh Will Provide" (Gen 22:14).

The objection.  This is the verse that launched the documentary hypothesis.  Gleason Archer, who rejects that hypothesis, summarizes its use fairly:  J. G. Eichhorn took Exodus 6:3 "to mean that according to that 'source' the name Yahweh was unknown until Moses' time," so that "all the references to Yahweh occurring in Genesis must have come from a different source."¹⁹  On that view, Exodus 6:3 and Genesis are two authors who disagreed.

The answers.

1. "Known" means known by experience. Archer argues that "to know that I am Yahweh" in the Old Testament means to learn by experience what the name stands for, and cites the same speech: "you shall know that I am Yahweh your God, who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians" (Exod 6:7).¹⁹ The strongest evidence for this reading is in Exodus itself. Pharaoh already knows the name: "Who is Yahweh, that I should listen to his voice to let Israel go?" (Exod 5:2, where the Hebrew uses "Yahweh" twice). Yet God says the plagues will happen so that "the Egyptians shall know that I am Yahweh" (Exod 14:4). In Exodus, "knowing" Yahweh plainly means more than knowing the word. On this reading, Exodus 6:3 says the patriarchs knew God as the Almighty who promised, not yet as the one who keeps the promise by redeeming a nation.
2. The narrator updated the name. A second view grants that the patriarchs did not use the name, and that Genesis puts it in their mouths, as it uses "Dan" in Abraham's day (P12). This saves Exodus 6:3's plain sense at the cost of saying Genesis is anachronistic in its divine speeches.

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's related page asks "What is God's name?" and lists Yahweh, God Almighty, the Lord of hosts, "I AM" (Exod 3:14), "Jealous" and others.  These are a name and many titles.  Exodus itself shows that "name" can mean character:  "Yahweh, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God" (Exod 34:14).  No text says God has only one title.

What remains.  Answer 1 has real support in Exodus' own usage, but the verb in 6:3 is passive, "I was not made known," and the most natural first reading is still about the name.  The niphal of "know" does not settle it either way.  Answer 2 is coherent but concedes a lot.  The documentary explanation is coherent too, and it makes no inerrancy claim at all.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

E02: Has anyone seen God?

The texts.  "Yahweh spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend" (Exod 33:11).  Nine verses later God says, "You cannot see my face, for man may not see me and live" (Exod 33:20), and lets Moses see only "my back; but my face shall not be seen" (Exod 33:23).  The elders "saw the God of Israel" and "ate and drank" (Exod 24:10-11).  Jacob says "I have seen God face to face" (Gen 32:30).  Deuteronomy says Israel "saw no form; you only heard a voice" (Deut 4:12), and also that "Yahweh spoke with you face to face on the mountain out of the middle of the fire" (Deut 5:4).  John says "No one has seen God at any time" (John 1:18).  American Atheists pair Genesis 32:30 with John 1:18;  the Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists all of these.

The answers.  The pairs are not all of one kind.

1. "Face to face" is an idiom for directness. The proof is Exodus 33 itself, where the same narrator puts "face to face" (Exod 33:11) and "You cannot see my face" (Exod 33:20) in one chapter, and Deuteronomy, which says "face to face" (Deut 5:4) about the same event at which "you saw no form" (Deut 4:12). Putting both statements nine verses apart shows that the writer knew both; what shows that he meant different things is how the Bible itself uses the phrase. The idiom means speaking personally and openly; Numbers 12:8 glosses Moses' privilege as "mouth to mouth, even plainly, and not in riddles."
2. Seeing a form is not seeing God's essence. The elders saw something, "Under his feet was like a paved work of sapphire stone" (Exod 24:10), a vision described by what was under the feet. Moses sees God's "back," a partial manifestation. Jacob says he saw God after wrestling a "man" (P15). The Old Testament consistently distinguishes manifestations of God from God's full presence, which kills.
3. John 1:18 makes the same distinction. It says no one has seen God, and in the next clause says the Son "has declared him" (John 1:18). John's point is that the earlier manifestations were partial and the Son's revelation is complete. Christian writers from the second century on read the Old Testament appearances as appearances of the Son, which is a theological reading, but John 1:18 at least shows the writer knew the Old Testament stories and did not think he was contradicting them.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The idiom is demonstrated inside the same chapters that are said to conflict.  The verdict does not settle the deeper theological question of how a God who cannot be seen is said to appear;  that is a question about what the texts mean, which they themselves raise.

E03: Who hardened Pharaoh's heart

The texts.  God says "I will harden his heart" (Exod 4:21);  "he hardened his heart" (Exod 8:15);  "Yahweh hardened the heart of Pharaoh" (Exod 9:12).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists the verses as a contradiction about who did the hardening.

The pattern.  The verses are not scattered at random.  Counting by English verse numbers and the Hebrew verb in each:

1. God predicts that he will harden before the plagues: 4:21 and 7:3.
2. Plagues 1 to 5: Pharaoh's heart "was hardened" or "was hard" (7:13, 7:14, 7:22, 8:19, 9:7), or Pharaoh hardens his own heart (8:15, 8:32). God is never the subject.
3. From plague 6: "Yahweh hardened the heart of Pharaoh" (9:12, then 10:1, 10:20, 10:27, 11:10, 14:8), with one more case of Pharaoh's own hardening after the hail: "he sinned yet more, and hardened his heart, he and his servants" (Exod 9:34).

Several of the early verses add "as Yahweh had spoken" (7:13, 7:22, 8:15, 8:19), referring back to the prediction.  The narrator presents Pharaoh's own stubbornness first, then God confirming it.  On that reading the verses describe one process from two sides, and the text says both are true:  Pharaoh "sinned" (9:34), which assumes he was responsible.

What remains.  The statements do not contradict each other;  they assert dual agency, which the Bible asserts elsewhere (Joseph's brothers "meant evil," "God meant it for good," Gen 50:20).  The real objection is moral and philosophical:  how can God harden a heart and still hold its owner responsible?  Paul faces exactly that question in Romans 9:17-19 and does not dissolve it.  That question belongs with the cases about God's character (L07).

Verdict:  no actual conflict as statements;  the moral question of judicial hardening is real and is classed separately.

E04: Moses' father-in-law: Reuel, Jethro, Hobab

Moses' father-in-law is "Reuel" (Exod 2:18), "Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian" (Exod 3:1), and possibly Hobab:  "Hobab, the son of Reuel the Midianite, Moses' father-in-law" (Num 10:29).  Judges 4:11 calls Hobab choten Moshe, which the WEB renders "Moses' brother-in-law."  The Hebrew choten normally means father-in-law;  the translation is a harmonization.  Three explanations are possible:  Jethro and Reuel are two names of one man (double names are common:  Jacob and Israel, Gideon and Jerubbaal);  "Reuel their father" in Exodus 2:18 means the girls' grandfather;  and in Numbers 10:29 the title "Moses' father-in-law" belongs to Reuel, not to Hobab, as the Hebrew word order allows.  Judges 4:11 then remains the hard verse, unless choten there means a relative by marriage more broadly.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The names may preserve different traditions about Moses' Midianite kin.

E05: Angel or God in the burning bush

"Yahweh's angel appeared to him in a flame of fire" (Exod 3:2), then "God called to him out of the middle of the bush" (Exod 3:4).  Stephen speaks of "the angel who appeared to him in the bush" (Acts 7:35), Jesus of God speaking at the bush (Mark 12:26).  Exodus itself uses both descriptions in three verses.  The "angel of Yahweh" in the Old Testament repeatedly speaks as God (P15);  whatever one makes of that theologically, the New Testament writers are quoting Exodus' own two descriptions.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E06: Did Moses fear the king?

After killing the Egyptian, "Moses was afraid" and fled (Exod 2:14-15).  Hebrews says "By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king" (Heb 11:27).  Moses left Egypt twice:  fleeing to Midian, and leading Israel out forty years later, when he openly defied Pharaoh (Exod 10:28-29).  Hebrews 11:27 can describe the second departure;  it comes in a passage that follows Moses' life roughly in order but places the Passover (11:28) after the departure, so the order is not strict.  If Hebrews means the first flight, it would contradict Exodus 2:14.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

E07: Moses slow of speech, "mighty in words"

Moses protests, "I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue" (Exod 4:10).  Stephen says Moses "was mighty in his words and works" (Acts 7:22).  One is a reluctant man's estimate of himself at the burning bush;  the other is a later summary of a career that produced the speeches of Deuteronomy.  Stephen's "words" may also include writings.  A self-deprecating claim and a later reputation are not contradictory statements of fact.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E08: All the livestock died, and then livestock again

The fifth plague strikes "your livestock which are in the field" (Exod 9:3), and "all the livestock of Egypt died" (Exod 9:6).  Then Moses warns that the hail will kill livestock in the field (9:19), and the tenth plague kills "the firstborn of livestock" (Exod 12:29).  The plague announcement limits itself to livestock "in the field," and the "all" of 9:6 refers back to that announcement.  Hebrew "all" is also regularly used of a large part (Exod 9:25 says the hail "struck every herb of the field," yet the locusts later eat what the hail left, 10:5).  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

E09: Sinai, Horeb and Moab; two forms of the Ten Commandments

The law is given at Sinai (Exod 19-20) and, in Deuteronomy, at Horeb:  "Yahweh our God made a covenant with us in Horeb" (Deut 5:2).  Horeb is Deuteronomy's name for the same mountain;  Exodus uses both (Exod 3:1, "God's mountain, to Horeb").  The covenant in Moab is explicitly a second one, "in addition to the covenant which he made with them in Horeb" (Deut 29:1).

The harder question is the wording of the Ten Commandments.  Exodus grounds the Sabbath in creation:  "for in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth" (Exod 20:11).  Deuteronomy grounds it in the Exodus:  "You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt ... Therefore Yahweh your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day" (Deut 5:15).  It also says "observe" where Exodus says "remember," and adds the field to the list of things not to covet.  Deuteronomy is presented as Moses' retelling forty years later, and it marks its quotations as quotations "as Yahweh your God commanded you" (Deut 5:12, 5:16).  A speaker restating a law with an added reason is ordinary.  But Deuteronomy also says "Yahweh spoke these words to all your assembly ... He wrote them on two stone tablets" (Deut 5:22), which, read strictly, claims its wording is the tablets' wording.  The Chicago Statement allows "free citations."⁷  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the two wordings;  no actual conflict for Sinai, Horeb and Moab.

E10: Who wrote the second tablets, and who made the ark

God says "I will write on the tablets" (Exod 34:1).  Then God tells Moses, "Write these words" (Exod 34:27), and "He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments" (Exod 34:28).  The "he" of 34:28 has no named subject in Hebrew.  On the most natural reading it continues the subject of the same verse, "He was there with Yahweh forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread, nor drank water" (Exod 34:28), which is Moses.  Defenders read a change of subject back to Yahweh, who promised in 34:1 to write, and note that the words Moses is told to write in 34:27 are the covenant laws just given (34:10-26), not the Ten Commandments.  Deuteronomy, retelling the event, names the writer:  "He wrote on the tablets, according to the first writing, the ten commandments" (Deut 10:4), where "He" is Yahweh.  On the ark, Moses says "So I made an ark of acacia wood" (Deut 10:3), while "Bezalel made the ark" (Exod 37:1).  A leader who has a thing made is said to make it, as "Solomon built the house."  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the writing:  the change of subject is grammatically possible and fits 34:1 and Deuteronomy 10:4, but it is not the natural reading of 34:28 taken alone;  well-supported explanation for the ark.

E11: What was in the ark; where the incense altar stood

"There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets" (1 Kgs 8:9).  Hebrews describes the Most Holy Place "having a golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant ... in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant" (Heb 9:4).

1. The contents. First Kings describes the ark when Solomon moved it into the temple, centuries after the wilderness; Hebrews describes the wilderness tabernacle. Things could be lost in between, and the ark had been captured by the Philistines (1 Sam 4-6). Exodus and Numbers say the manna and the rod were put "before the Testimony" (Exod 16:34) and "before the covenant" (Num 17:10), which means beside or in front of the ark, not necessarily in it. Hebrews goes beyond Exodus there, apparently following a tradition. Plausible but unproved.
2. The altar. Exodus puts the incense altar "before the veil that is by the ark" (Exod 30:6), that is, outside the Most Holy Place. Hebrews says the inner room was "having" it. The Greek echousa can mean "belonging to" rather than "containing," and 1 Kings describes the temple's incense altar the same way: "the whole altar that belonged to the inner sanctuary" (1 Kgs 6:22). The altar stood outside the veil but served the inner room; on the Day of Atonement its incense went inside (Lev 16:12-13). Plausible but unproved.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

E12: Water from the rock: struck or spoken to

At Rephidim in the first year, God says "You shall strike the rock" (Exod 17:6).  At Kadesh in the fortieth year, God says "speak to the rock" (Num 20:8), and Moses "struck the rock with his rod twice" (Num 20:11), for which he is barred from the land (20:12).  These are two events in two places nearly forty years apart, and the point of the second story is that Moses did what he had been told to do the first time instead of what he was told the second.  Both places are named "Meribah" ("strife"), which critics take as a sign of one story told twice;  but the name was a natural label for any spot where the people quarreled.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E13: Where Aaron died: Mount Hor or Moserah

"Aaron died there on the top of the mountain" (Num 20:28), Mount Hor, in the fortieth year (33:38).  Deuteronomy 10:6, a short itinerary note inside Moses' speech, says "The children of Israel traveled from Beeroth Bene Jaakan to Moserah. There Aaron died" (Deut 10:6).  The problem is more than the name.  In the itinerary of Numbers 33, Moseroth comes long before Mount Hor, and the order is the reverse:  "They traveled from Moseroth, and encamped in Bene Jaakan" (Num 33:31).  Archer and Haley both suggest that Moserah was the district around Mount Hor.¹⁹  That removes the place-name conflict but not the sequence:  Numbers puts Moseroth and Bene Jaakan years earlier on the route.  Deuteronomy 10:6-7 is a parenthetical fragment that interrupts Moses' speech, and may come from a different itinerary record.  Ancient scribes saw the problem.  The Samaritan Pentateuch rewrites Deuteronomy 10:6-7 to follow Numbers 33:  Israel travels "from Moseroth" to Bene Jaakan, then by Gudgodah, Jotbathah, Abronah, Ezion-geber and the wilderness of Zin to Mount Hor, "and Aaron died there."²⁵  That reading is a harmonization built from Numbers, so it shows how early the difficulty was felt, not what Deuteronomy first said.  Verdict:  unresolved.  "District" explains the name, not the route.

E14: Why Moses could not enter the land

Numbers says Moses was barred for his own act at Meribah:  "Because you didn't believe in me, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel" (Num 20:12);  Deuteronomy 32:51 says the same.  But in Deuteronomy Moses tells the people, "Yahweh was angry with me for your sakes" (Deut 1:37), and "because of you" (Deut 3:26).  Moses' sin happened in a crisis the people caused (Num 20:2-5), so "for your sakes" can mean "on account of what you provoked."  The narrator's account gives the reason;  Moses, in a speech, emphasizes the occasion.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  A reader may fairly hear self-justification in Moses' speech;  the narrative itself is consistent.

E15: Moses at 120: unimpaired or unable to go out and come in

"I am one hundred twenty years old today. I can no more go out and come in" (Deut 31:2);  "His eye was not dim, nor his strength gone" (Deut 34:7).  "Go out and come in" is an idiom for leading the people, especially in war.  Moses asks God for a successor "who may go out before them, and who may come in before them" (Num 27:17), and Caleb at eighty-five says his strength is the same "for war, to go out and to come in" (Josh 14:11).  Moses' next words give the reason he cannot lead them on:  "Yahweh has said to me, 'You shall not go over this Jordan'" (Deut 31:2).  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

E16: Moses "very meek"; Moses' death narrated in his book

"Now the man Moses was very humble, more than all the men who were on the surface of the earth" (Num 12:3), yet he orders the killing of Midianite women and boys (Num 31:14-18).  Humility before God is not the same thing as gentleness in war;  whether that order was right is a moral question (D14), not a contradiction about Moses' character.  The second allegation, that Moses could not have written that he was the humblest of men or narrated his own death (Deut 34:5-10), bears on authorship.  The Torah says Moses wrote "this law" (Deut 31:9);  it does not say he wrote every word of the five books, and the death notice is plainly written by someone else.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E17: The plague at Peor: 24,000 or 23,000

The texts.  After Israel's sexual sin and idolatry with the Moabite women at Peor, "Those who died by the plague were twenty-four thousand" (Num 25:9).  Paul writes:  "Let's not commit sexual immorality, as some of them committed, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell" (1 Cor 10:8).

The answers.

1. A different event. Archer argues that Paul is referring to the golden calf, because the previous verse quotes Exodus 32:6, and that Paul supplies the number Exodus leaves out.¹⁹ This does not survive reading Paul's list. First Corinthians 10:6-10 runs through separate wilderness sins: craving, idolatry (10:7, the golden calf), sexual immorality (10:8), testing God (10:9, the serpents of Num 21), and grumbling (10:10). Verse 8 names "sexual immorality," which is Peor's sin (Num 25:1), not the calf's.
2. "In one day." John Haley suggested in 1874 that Paul "may have intended to include only those who fell 'in one day'."²⁶ Numbers gives a total; Paul gives the toll of a single day, the rest dying later or by the judges' executions of Numbers 25:5. This fits Paul's added words exactly. It is also unprovable, because Numbers does not say how long the plague lasted.
3. A round figure from memory. Paul quotes from memory throughout his letters, and 23,000 against 24,000 is the kind of difference two honest speakers make. That is an error in a number by Paul, small and with no bearing on his argument.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Answer 2 rests on Paul's own qualifier.  Answer 1 should be dropped.  If answer 2 is wrong, the difference is a minor misstatement by Paul.

E18: Levite counts and Levite ages

Counts.  Numbers 3 counts the male Levites by clan:  Gershon 7,500 (3:22), Kohath 8,600 (3:28), Merari 6,200 (3:34).  That sums to 22,300.  But the total is "twenty-two thousand" (Num 3:39), and the total is used in a calculation:  the firstborn of Israel number 22,273 (3:43), and "the two hundred seventy-three of the firstborn of the children of Israel who exceed the number of the Levites" (Num 3:46) must be redeemed with money.  So 22,000 is not a rounding of 22,300.  The Greek Septuagint has the same figures.  Two explanations are offered.  A copyist may have turned "three" (shalosh) into "six" (shesh) in Kohath's figure, which differ in Hebrew by one letter;  8,300 would make the sum 22,000.  No manuscript checked for this article reads 8,300.  Or 300 Levites were themselves firstborn and could not count as substitutes, which is a later Jewish explanation the text does not state.  Verdict:  unresolved.  The total and the sum disagree in every text checked.  A one-letter slip in Kohath's figure is the simplest explanation, but it is a conjecture:  no witness reads 8,300, and the received numbers make sense individually.

Ages.  Levites serve from age thirty (Num 4:3), from twenty-five (Num 8:24), and in David's time from twenty (1 Chr 23:24).  Chronicles says why:  "For by the last words of David the sons of Levi were counted, from twenty years old and upward" (1 Chr 23:27).  Numbers 4 concerns carrying the tabernacle, and Numbers 8 the general service.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.  The texts say the rule changed.

Counting the Levites at all.  God says "Only the tribe of Levi you shall not count, neither shall you take a census of them among the children of Israel" (Num 1:49), then "Count the children of Levi" (Num 3:15).  The first forbids counting them among the fighting men;  the second orders a separate count of a different kind, from a month old.  No actual conflict.

E19: Who survived, and who spoke for entering

God promises Caleb the land (Num 14:24) without naming Joshua;  later "Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh remained alive" (Num 14:38).  Caleb alone speaks in 13:30;  "Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb" speak in 14:6.  Omission in one verse and inclusion in the next are not contradiction.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E20: Korah's sons swallowed or surviving

The earth "swallowed them up with their households, all of Korah's men, and all their goods" (Num 16:32).  Later, "Notwithstanding, the sons of Korah didn't die" (Num 26:11).  The narrator who wrote 16:32 adds the qualification himself, and 16:27 says only that Dathan and Abiram "stood at the door of their tents with their wives, their sons, and their little ones."  Korah's sons are not said to have stood with him.  The Korahite singers of the Psalms (Ps 42, 44-49) are their descendants.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

E21: Did Balaam curse Israel, and did Balak fight?

Balak "hired against you Balaam ... to curse you. Nevertheless Yahweh your God wouldn't listen to Balaam, but Yahweh your God turned the curse into a blessing" (Deut 23:4-5).  That is what Numbers 23-24 narrates:  Balaam was hired to curse and blessed instead.  Joshua 24:9 says Balak "arose and fought against Israel," and Jephthah asks, "Did he ever strive against Israel, or did he ever fight against them?" (Judg 11:25).  Joshua's next words say how Balak fought:  "He sent and called Balaam the son of Beor to curse you" (Josh 24:9).  Jephthah means that Balak never went to war over the land.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E22: Variant ritual rules

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists eight places where one ritual law seems to differ from another.

1. Unleavened bread, six days or seven. Deuteronomy says "You shall eat unleavened bread with it seven days" (Deut 16:3), then "Six days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the seventh day shall be a solemn assembly" (Deut 16:8). The same paragraph says seven; verse 8 marks the seventh as a holy assembly. No actual conflict.
2. Daily offerings. Exodus 29:36-39 commands a daily bull during the seven days of the priests' ordination, and then the perpetual two lambs; Numbers 28:3-4 gives the perpetual two lambs. No actual conflict.
3. The new moon offering. Numbers requires two bulls, one ram and seven lambs (28:11); Ezekiel's vision of a future temple prescribes one bull, six lambs and one ram (46:6). The rabbis saw this. The Babylonian Talmud says the book of Ezekiel "would have been suppressed because its contents, in many details, contradict matters of Torah," until Hananiah ben Hezekiah spent three hundred jars of oil working out its difficulties.²⁷ Its answer to this case is that Ezekiel teaches what to bring if two bulls or seven lambs cannot be found.²⁷ That answer is strained. The better observation is that Ezekiel 40-48 is a vision of a restored order with many changes from the law of Moses, including a different calendar of offerings, and does not claim to repeat it. Unresolved as harmony of laws; it is a known difference between a prophet's program and the Torah.
4. A congregation's unintentional sin. Leviticus 4:13-21 requires a bull as a sin offering; Numbers 15:24 requires a bull as a burnt offering and a goat as a sin offering. Jewish interpreters distinguish the cases, Leviticus for doing what was forbidden and Numbers for failing to do commandments (15:22). Plausible but unproved.
5. Intercourse during menstruation. Leviticus 15:24 makes the man unclean seven days; 20:18 says "Both of them shall be cut off." The second law describes a deliberate act, "he has made her fountain naked, and she has uncovered the fountain of her blood" (Lev 20:18); the first describes contact when "her monthly flow is on him" (Lev 15:24), which can happen unawares. Well-supported explanation.
6. Strangers at Passover. "No foreigner shall eat of it" (Exod 12:43); a "stranger" who is circumcised "shall be as one who is born in the land" (Exod 12:48). Two different Hebrew words, ben nekhar (a foreigner) and ger (a resident alien), and the same paragraph. No actual conflict.
7. Flying insects. Leviticus allows "all winged creeping things that go on all fours, which have long, jointed legs for hopping" (Lev 11:21), that is, locusts; Deuteronomy says "All winged creeping things are unclean to you" (Deut 14:19). Deuteronomy gives the general rule without the exception. Plausible but unproved.
8. Ignorance offerings for individuals. Leviticus 4:27-28 (a female goat), 5:15-16 (a ram, for trespass in holy things) and Numbers 15:27-28 (a female goat) are different cases of unintentional sin. No actual conflict.

E23: The borders of the land

God promises "from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates" (Gen 15:18);  Numbers 34:1-12 draws much smaller borders for the land to be divided among the tribes;  Ezekiel 47:13-21 draws borders for a future division.  A promise of the widest sphere of rule, a survey for tribal allotment and a prophetic vision answer different questions.  David's sphere of control reached toward the Euphrates (2 Sam 8:3).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E24: Every male of Midian killed, and Midian again

Israel "killed every male" in its war on Midian (Num 31:7), yet two centuries later the Midianites oppress Israel for seven years (Judg 6:1-6).  Midian was a wide confederation of nomadic clans from Sinai to Arabia;  Numbers 31 concerns the five chiefs allied with Moab near Peor (31:8).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E25: Different commands for Ammon, Moab, Edom and Canaan

Israel is told not to harass Moab or Ammon, whose lands God gave to Lot's descendants (Deut 2:9, 2:19), but later fights them (Judg 3, 11;  Jer 48-49).  Edomites are not to be despised (Deut 23:7), but Amaziah kills ten thousand (2 Kgs 14:7).  Commands about one generation's march do not bind later wars that the other nation started (Judg 11:4-12).  Ezekiel's vision of the restored land gives an inheritance "to the aliens who live among you, who will father children among you" (Ezek 47:22), against Numbers' command to drive out the land's inhabitants (Num 33:52).  Ezekiel speaks of resident foreigners in a future allotment, not of the Canaanite nations at the conquest, and like his new-moon offering (E22) it is a prophet's program, not a repeal of the earlier command.  Canaanites are to be driven out, the hornet "will drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite" (Exod 23:28), and destroyed, "you shall utterly destroy them" (Deut 7:2);  the two goals stand side by side in Deuteronomy 7:1-2, and whether they were just is a moral question (D14).

The real tension is Ruth.  "An Ammonite or a Moabite shall not enter into Yahweh's assembly; even to the tenth generation" (Deut 23:3), yet Ruth the Moabite becomes David's great-grandmother (Ruth 4:13-17).  Ezra and Nehemiah later enforce the law against marriages with Moabites (Ezra 9:1-2;  Neh 13:1-3, 23-27).  The Mishnah resolved this by reading the law as applying to men only:  Ammonite and Moabite converts are barred, "However, their female counterparts, even the convert herself, are permitted immediately."²⁷  The Hebrew of Deuteronomy uses the masculine forms Ammoni and Moavi.  The reading is old and grammatically possible, though it may have been devised to fit Ruth.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for Ruth;  no actual conflict for the changing relations with neighbors.  Intermarriage with Egyptians or Cushites (Joseph, Moses) is not forbidden by Deuteronomy 7:3, which names only the seven Canaanite nations.

E26: The lists of the twelve tribes

The twelve tribes are listed differently in Genesis 49, Numbers 1, Deuteronomy 33, Ezekiel 48 and Revelation 7.  Sometimes Levi is counted and Joseph is one tribe;  sometimes Levi is left out and Joseph is split into Ephraim and Manasseh;  Deuteronomy 33 leaves out Simeon;  Revelation 7 leaves out Dan and Ephraim and includes Levi and Joseph.  "Twelve" was the fixed number, and lists chose how to reach it.  No list claims to be the only possible one.  Why Revelation omits Dan is a real puzzle of interpretation, not a contradiction.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

E27: Who sacrifices and where

The law limits sacrifice to the priests (Num 18:7) at the tabernacle (Lev 17:1-9) and later to the place God chooses (Deut 12:5-14).  Samuel sacrifices at Mizpah (1 Sam 7:9) and Elijah on Mount Carmel (1 Kgs 18:30-38).  Two different tensions are bundled here.  Samuel was a Levite by genealogy (S16), and in his day the tabernacle at Shiloh had been destroyed and the ark captured, so the law's central place did not function.  Elijah was in the northern kingdom, where the temple was out of reach.  More basically, Exodus 20:24 permits altars "In every place where I record my name," while Deuteronomy 12 restricts sacrifice to one place once Israel dwells in the land and "he gives you rest from all your enemies around you" (Deut 12:10).  Critical scholars take Deuteronomy's rule as later than Exodus 20:24 and as unknown in Samuel's time.  On the text's own terms the central-place rule applies after the land is settled, and Israel's prophets acted in emergencies.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

E28: The size of the Exodus numbers

Israel leaves Egypt with "about six hundred thousand on foot who were men, in addition to children" (Exod 12:37), and the census counts 603,550 fighting men (Num 1:46).  That implies a total of about two million people.  This is not a contradiction between texts:  the census figures add up in every list.  It is a historical objection, and an old one.  The first-born males number 22,273 (Num 3:43) against 603,550 men.  Bishop John Colenso argued in 1862 that this meant "every mother in Israel must have had on the average forty-two sons!"  W. H. Green of Princeton quoted that line in order to answer it.²⁸  Some evangelical scholars read the Hebrew eleph, "thousand," as "clan" or "military unit," which shrinks the numbers;  but the census totals are summed as thousands in the text itself (603,550), so that reading has to say the totals were later misread and recomputed.  Verdict:  unresolved, as a question of historical plausibility rather than internal contradiction.  The sibling Dating the Exodus handles the chronology.

Part 5: Joshua and Judges

Nine cases.  The serious one is whether Joshua describes a complete conquest that Judges then contradicts (J02).  The best-known one, the iron chariots (J01), turns out to be about a pronoun.

J01: Iron chariots, and whether God can do anything

The texts.  "Yahweh was with Judah, and drove out the inhabitants of the hill country; for he could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron" (Judg 1:19).  American Atheists set this beside Jesus' "with God all things are possible" (Matt 19:26), under the heading "The Power of God."¹²

The answer.  In Hebrew the subject of the verbs is Judah, not Yahweh.  The verse reads, word for word, "And Yahweh was with Judah, and he took possession of the hill country, for not to dispossess the inhabitants of the valley, for chariots of iron were theirs" (וַיֹּ֖רֶשׁ אֶת־הָהָ֑ר כִּ֣י לֹ֤א לְהוֹרִישׁ֙ אֶת־יֹשְׁבֵ֣י הָעֵ֔מֶק, Judg 1:19).  "He took possession" is Judah, as in the parallel notices about the other tribes in the same chapter ("Ephraim didn't drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer," Judg 1:29).  The WEB's "he could not" keeps the ambiguity of the singular;  it is Judah who could not.  Three more passages show that iron chariots were not thought to be beyond God.  Joshua tells Ephraim, "you shall drive out the Canaanites, though they have chariots of iron" (Josh 17:18).  In Judges 4, Sisera has "nine hundred chariots of iron" (Judg 4:3), and "Yahweh confused Sisera, all his chariots, and all his army" (Judg 4:15).  And Judges itself gives the reason the tribes failed:  "Therefore I also said, 'I will not drive them out from before you'" (Judg 2:3), because they had made covenants with the inhabitants.

Verdict:  no actual conflict.  The claim about God's power rests on a misread pronoun.  Whether Judah's failure is well explained by Judges 2 is a theological reading of history, not a contradiction.

J02: A complete conquest or an incomplete one (Hebron, Debir, Jerusalem, Gezer, Hazor, Ai)

The texts.  "So Joshua struck all the land ... He left no one remaining" (Josh 10:40), and "So Joshua took the whole land" (Josh 11:23);  "Yahweh gave to Israel all the land which he swore to give to their fathers" (Josh 21:43).  But Judges 1 lists cities the tribes did not take, and the Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists six specific conflicts:

1. Hebron. Joshua takes it and leaves "no one remaining" (Josh 10:36-37); later Caleb "drove out the three sons of Anak" there (Josh 15:14); Judges 1:10 says Judah struck the same three.
2. Debir. Taken by Joshua (10:38-39) and later by Othniel (15:15-17; Judg 1:11-13).
3. Jerusalem. "the children of Judah couldn't drive them out" (Josh 15:63); Judah "fought against Jerusalem, took it ... and set the city on fire" (Judg 1:8); but Benjamin "didn't drive out the Jebusites" (Judg 1:21).
4. Gezer. Joshua struck its king "until he had left him no one remaining" (Josh 10:33), yet "They didn't drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer" (Josh 16:10).
5. Hazor. Joshua burned Hazor and killed its king (Josh 11:10-11); in Judges a "Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor" oppresses Israel (Judg 4:2).
6. Ai. Joshua "made it a heap forever" (Josh 8:28), yet "The men of Bethel and Ai" return from exile (Neh 7:32).

The answer.  The most important evidence is that Joshua itself contains both kinds of statement.  The same book that says "Joshua took the whole land" (Josh 11:23) begins its next section with God saying "there remains yet very much land to be possessed" (Josh 13:1), records the Jebusites (15:63) and Gezer (16:10) remaining, and ends with Joshua warning that God "will no longer drive these nations" out if Israel intermarries with "the remnant of these nations, even these who remain among you" (Josh 23:12-13).  A single author or editor put the sweeping summaries and the qualifying notices side by side, so he did not mean the summaries as claims of total conquest.  That shows how he meant them, though not by itself that either kind of statement is accurate.  Kenneth Kitchen argues that the summaries are the standard rhetoric of ancient war reports, and that the text qualifies its own "alls":  Joshua 10:20 says the enemy was destroyed "until they were consumed, and the remnant which remained of them had entered into the fortified cities" (Josh 10:20).²⁴  He gives parallels:  Thutmose III boasted that the army of Mitanni was "annihilated totally," though it fought for another century, and Mesha of Moab claimed that "Israel has utterly perished for always."²⁴

On the six cities:

1. Hebron and Debir were raided by Joshua's army and later had to be taken again for settlement. A town whose population flees or returns after a raid is normal in war. The sons of Anak driven out by Caleb are named individuals, consistent with a second campaign.
2. Jerusalem. Judah burned the city (Judg 1:8) but did not hold it, and the Jebusites remained "to this day" with both Judah (Josh 15:63) and Benjamin (Judg 1:21), until David took the citadel (2 Sam 5:6-9). Burning a city and failing to occupy it are compatible.
3. Gezer. Joshua 10:33 kills the king of Gezer and his army in the field near Lachish, not the city's population; Gezer itself stayed Canaanite until Pharaoh gave it to Solomon (1 Kgs 9:16).
4. Hazor was rebuilt. The Jabin of Judges 4 reigns generations after Joshua, and "Jabin" may be a dynastic name.
5. Ai in Nehemiah is a resettled site over six centuries later. "Forever" (olam) in a curse on a ruined city means "for a very long time," and Nehemiah's Ai may not stand on the same mound.
6. Hebron and Debir before and after Joshua's death. Judges 1:10-15 repeats Joshua 15:13-19 almost word for word: the three sons of Anak, Othniel taking Debir, and Achsah's request for springs. But Judges opens its chapter with "After the death of Joshua" (Judg 1:1), while Joshua sets Caleb's claim in Joshua's lifetime (Josh 14:6-15). The opening of Judges is not in strict order: after chapter 1 it goes back to Joshua dismissing the people and dying (Judg 2:6-9). So Judges 1:10-15 can be a recap placed under a loose heading. That is positive evidence for the reading, not proof of it. Plausible but unproved.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for the summaries and the six cities;  plausible but unproved for the order of Judges 1.  The sweeping summaries are qualified inside Joshua itself, and the ancient parallels show the idiom.  The separate question of whether the conquest happened as Joshua describes is historical and archaeological, and is not decided by this verdict.

J03: Twelve stones at Gilgal or in the Jordan

The Israelites carry twelve stones out of the Jordan and set them up at Gilgal (Josh 4:8, 4:20).  Then "Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests who bore the ark of the covenant stood; and they are there to this day" (Josh 4:9).  These are two memorials.  The Greek Septuagint says so outright:  "Joshua set up also other twelve stones in the Jordan itself" (καὶ ἄλλους δώδεκα λίθους, Josh 4:9 LXX).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

J04: Town lists that assign one town to two tribes

Zorah and Eshtaol are in Judah's list (Josh 15:33) and in Dan's (19:41).  Aijalon is a Levitical city "Out of the tribe of Dan" (Josh 21:23-24) and is listed under Ephraim in 1 Chronicles 6:66-69.  Border towns changed hands;  Dan lost its territory and migrated north (Judg 18), after which its southern towns were reckoned to Judah or Ephraim.  Chronicles was written centuries later and reflects later boundaries.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

J05: Achan son of Carmi, of Zabdi, "son of Zerah"

Achan is "the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah" (Josh 7:1), and also "Achan the son of Zerah" (Josh 7:24).  Zerah was his clan's ancestor, so "son of Zerah" means "the Zerahite," exactly as the first verse gives the full line.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

J06: Was Sisera asleep?

The prose says Jael struck "for he was in a deep sleep" (Judg 4:21).  The song says "At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay" (Judg 5:27), which may picture him standing.  Judges 5 is a victory poem, with poetic repetition ("he bowed, he fell") describing the fall of a dying man.  Nothing in the poem says he was awake.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

J07: Gideon's seventy sons, one escaping

"Gideon had seventy sons" (Judg 8:30).  Abimelech killed "his brothers the sons of Jerubbaal, being seventy persons ... but Jotham the youngest son of Jerubbaal was left" (Judg 9:5).  If Abimelech was one of the seventy and Jotham survived, sixty-eight died.  Seventy is a round number of the kind used for a large household (Jacob's seventy, the seventy elders), and Jotham himself later says Abimelech "slain his sons, seventy persons" (Judg 9:18).  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  It is a round number.

J08: Amalekites wiped out and Amalekites again; Haman the Agagite

Saul "utterly destroyed all the people" of Amalek (1 Sam 15:8), but David raids Amalekites (1 Sam 27:8) and fights them (30:1-17), "Not a man of them escaped from there, except four hundred young men who rode on camels and fled" (1 Sam 30:17).  An Amalekite claims to have killed Saul (2 Sam 1:8).  Simeonites later "struck the remnant of the Amalekites who escaped" (1 Chr 4:43).  Saul's campaign ran "from Havilah as you go to Shur" (1 Sam 15:7), one region of a nomadic people spread across the Negev and Sinai.  The texts themselves speak of a remnant that escaped.  As for Haman "the Agagite" (Esth 3:1), Agag was a royal name among the Amalekites (Num 24:7), and Esther may mean "of Agag's line" or may be using the name as a label for Israel's ancient enemy;  either way a descendant of escaped Amalekites five centuries later is no contradiction.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

J09: Joshua's long day, and "no day like that"

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's Joshua index lists the question "Has the sun ever stood still in the sky for 24 hours?" against Joshua 10:12, but the page it links to returns only "No contradictions detail record found for name long_day" (checked on both of the site's host names, 25 October 2026), so the passages it meant to set against each other are not known.  As titled, the question asks whether the event happened, which is a historical and physical question, treated in the sibling Old Testament Miracles as History.  The one text that could conflict with Joshua is Hezekiah's sign.  Joshua says "The sun stayed in the middle of the sky, and didn't hurry to go down about a whole day" (Josh 10:13), and adds "There was no day like that before it or after it, that Yahweh listened to the voice of a man" (Josh 10:14).  Later, at Hezekiah's request, "Isaiah the prophet cried to Yahweh; and he brought the shadow ten steps backward" (2 Kgs 20:11).  Joshua's sentence names what was unique:  a day on which God obeyed a man's command to the sun.  Hezekiah's sign was a sign God offered and a prophet prayed for, and it concerned a shadow on a stair.  Verdict:  no actual conflict between the texts;  whether either event happened is a separate question.

Part 6: Samuel

Twenty-six cases, more than any other book of comparable size.  The reason is mostly Chronicles, which retells David's reign from Samuel or from a Samuel text close to it, and differs from the Masoretic Samuel at many points.  The sibling article How Were Joshua to Kings Put Together, and How Freely Did Chronicles Rewrite Them? sets out how Chronicles used its sources.  Two facts from that work matter here.  Some of Chronicles' differences are deliberate changes by the Chronicler.  Others come from a Hebrew text of Samuel that differed from the Masoretic one, as the Dead Sea Scroll 4QSam^a shows.  So the first question in each Samuel-Chronicles case is whether the two books disagree, or whether the Masoretic Samuel and the Chronicler's Samuel did.

The serious cases are Saul's death (S01), David's two introductions to Saul (S02), the death of Goliath (S03), Michal's sons (S04), the census (S05 to S08), the chariot numbers (S09) and Abiathar in Mark 2:26 (S11).

S01: How Saul died

The texts.  First Samuel 31 narrates Saul's death:  "Therefore Saul took his sword and fell on it" (1 Sam 31:4), and his armor-bearer, seeing "that Saul was dead," did the same (31:5).  Second Samuel 1 then reports an Amalekite who comes to David with Saul's crown and says, "So I stood beside him and killed him" (2 Sam 1:10).  First Chronicles 10:4 repeats 1 Samuel 31;  then it says "Therefore he killed him" (1 Chr 10:14), where "he" is Yahweh.  Second Samuel 21:12 says the bones were recovered from Beth Shan "in the day that the Philistines killed Saul in Gilboa" (2 Sam 21:12).

The answer.  The narrator of Samuel tells us how Saul died, in 1 Samuel 31.  Second Samuel 1 does not repeat that narration;  it reports what a man told David, and the man had motives:  he brings Saul's crown and bracelet "to my lord," expecting reward.  The narrative gives every sign that he is lying.  It has already said the armor-bearer saw Saul dead, and David has the man executed on his own testimony, "for your mouth has testified against you" (2 Sam 1:16).  The Chicago Statement's "reporting of falsehoods" is exactly this.⁷  First Chronicles 10:14's "he killed him" states the theological cause of the same death, and gives reasons:  Saul did not keep Yahweh's word and consulted a medium (10:13).  Second Samuel 21:12 uses "killed" for the battle in which Saul died, which is ordinary speech.

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible adds two related allegations.  Chronicles says "all his house died together" (1 Chr 10:6), yet Ishbosheth and others survived (2 Sam 2:8, 21:8).  "His house" here means his household in the battle, as 1 Samuel 31:6 has it, "his three sons, his armor bearer, and all his men."  And Chronicles says Saul "didn't inquire of Yahweh" (1 Chr 10:14), though 1 Samuel 28:6 says "Saul inquired of Yahweh" and was not answered.  The Chronicler's charge is that Saul turned to a medium instead of seeking Yahweh in the way the law required, which 1 Samuel 28 itself narrates.  Different Hebrew verbs are used (sha'al in 1 Sam 28:6, darash in 1 Chr 10:14).

Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The text itself marks the Amalekite's story as a lie.

S02: When Saul met David

The texts.  In 1 Samuel 16, David is brought to Saul as a musician and "a man of war" (1 Sam 16:18);  "He loved him greatly; and he became his armor bearer" (1 Sam 16:21).  In chapter 17, David arrives at the battle as a shepherd boy bringing food to his brothers, Saul tells him "you are but a youth" (1 Sam 17:33), and after the fight Saul asks Abner, "whose son is this youth?" (1 Sam 17:55), and asks David, "Whose son are you, you young man?" (1 Sam 17:58).

The objection.  How can Saul not know the armor-bearer he loved?

The evidence.  Here the manuscripts preserve substantially different forms of the story, although the direction of development is disputed.  The Greek Septuagint in Codex Vaticanus has a much shorter version of 1 Samuel 17-18.  Emanuel Tov, the editor-in-chief of the Dead Sea Scrolls publication, summarizes:  the Greek "lacks 39 of the 88 verses (44 percent of the entire story)," including 17:12-31 and 17:55-58, the passages that introduce David a second time.²⁹  Scholars disagree about why.  Barthélemy, Gooding and Rofé argue that the translator knew a shorter Hebrew text that had already been abridged from a longer one;  Tov and Lust think it preserves an earlier, separate version of the story, and that the longer Hebrew text combined two versions:  "David is introduced twice to Saul ... he is twice appointed as an officer in Saul's army (18:5,13), and on two occasions Saul offers the hand of one of his daughters to David in marriage."²⁹  Tov argues the translator worked literally elsewhere and would not have cut so much on his own.

The harmonizations.  Defenders note that 17:15 says David "went back and forth from Saul to feed his father's sheep" (1 Sam 17:15), which places chapter 17 after chapter 16;  that Saul's question in 17:55 asks about David's father, since Saul had promised to free the family of the man who killed Goliath (17:25);  and that Saul's court had many musicians and armor-bearers.  Verse 17:15 is itself one of the verses missing from the Greek, which suggests that it is the joint, not independent evidence.

Verdict:  unresolved.  On the evidence of the Greek, the longer Hebrew text very probably combines two accounts of how David came to Saul.  Whether those accounts contradict depends on how much of chapter 16 one assumes Saul had forgotten or never noticed.  This is a real tension in the Masoretic text, and the textual evidence explains its origin better than the harmonizations do.

S03: Who killed Goliath

The texts.  David kills Goliath in 1 Samuel 17:50-51, and later the priest gives David "the sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the valley of Elah" (1 Sam 21:9).  But in a list of later battles, the Hebrew of 2 Samuel 21:19 reads:  "and Elhanan son of Jaare-oregim the Bethlehemite killed Goliath the Gittite, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver's beam" (וַיַּ֡ךְ אֶלְחָנָן֩ ... אֵ֚ת גָּלְיָ֣ת הַגִּתִּ֔י, 2 Sam 21:19).  The WEB, like many English translations, inserts the words "Goliath the Gittite's brother."  The Hebrew has no word for "brother" there.  This is a case where a translation hides a conflict.  First Chronicles 20:5 reads "Elhanan the son of Jair killed Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite" (1 Chr 20:5).

The answers.

1. Samuel is corrupt; Chronicles is right. Archer argues that a copyist of Samuel misread a damaged text: the object marker before "Lahmi" became "Beth" and produced "the Bethlehemite," "brother of" became the object marker before "Goliath," and "weavers" (oregim) slipped up from the end of the verse into Elhanan's father's name. "It is quite apparent that this was the true reading, not only for the Chronicles passage but also for 2 Samuel 21:19."¹⁹ The odd name "Jaare-oregim," "forests of weavers," does look like a copying slip, with oregim repeated from the line's end.
2. Chronicles corrected Samuel. Ralph Klein, in his critical commentary on Chronicles, argues the reverse: the Chronicler "changed 2 Sam 21:19 so that Elhanan killed not Goliath but Lahmi the brother of Goliath," which "presupposes he knew the conflict between 2 Sam 21:19 and the story of David killing Goliath in 1 Samuel 17."¹⁷ On his reading, the Chronicler built "Lahmi" out of "the Bethlehemite" and "brother" out of the object marker, using "graphically similar letters from his Vorlage."¹⁷
3. Two Goliaths. "Goliath" may have been a name used by more than one Philistine champion.

The evidence bearing on answers 1 and 2.  Archer's reconstruction needs Samuel's text to have read "Lahmi the brother of Goliath."  No manuscript of Samuel does.  The Greek Septuagint of 2 Samuel 21:19 agrees with the Hebrew that Elhanan killed Goliath (τὸν Γολιαθ τὸν Γεθθαῖον, 2 Sam 21:19 LXX), and the Qumran scroll 4QSam^a does not preserve this verse:  Eugene Ulrich's edition has its fragments of 2 Samuel 21:12-18 on one page and the next fragments begin at 22:17.²³  So the direction of the change cannot be proved, and the only surviving evidence is the two texts themselves.  The letters do look alike, but they look alike in either direction.  One part of the verse is plainly damaged:  "Jaare-oregim" repeats oregim, "weavers," from the end of the same verse, where Chronicles has the simple "Jair."  So corruption in 2 Samuel 21:19 is not a hypothesis invented for the occasion.  But the damage that can be shown is in the father's name;  the change that matters, "Lahmi the brother of," has no witness in Samuel.

Verdict:  unresolved.  As the surviving texts stand, Samuel credits Goliath's death to David in one place and to Elhanan in another.  The copying explanation is possible but unattested.  The Chronicler's version reads like a harmonization.  There is a real disagreement in the surviving wording; whether it arose in the traditions or through copying remains unsettled.  The proposed defense of inerrancy relies on an emendation that no checked manuscript supports.

S04: Michal's children, or Merab's

"Michal the daughter of Saul had no child to the day of her death" (2 Sam 6:23).  The Hebrew of 2 Samuel 21:8 speaks of "the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel" (חֲמֵ֗שֶׁת בְּנֵי֙ מִיכַ֣ל בַּת־שָׁא֔וּל, 2 Sam 21:8).  It was Saul's elder daughter Merab who "was given to Adriel the Meholathite as wife" (1 Sam 18:19).  The WEB prints "Merab" in 2 Samuel 21:8, by correction;  the Masoretic text and the main Greek text both read Michal (Μιχολ, 2 Sam 21:8 LXX).  The King James Version reads "the five sons of Michal ... whom she brought up for Adriel" (2 Sam 21:8, KJV), a harmonizing rendering of a verb that means "bore."  That rendering goes back to the Talmud, which reports the same answer:  "Merab gave birth to them and died, and Michal raised them in her house. Therefore, the children were called by her name."²⁷

The Aramaic Targum of Samuel combines the two readings:  "the five sons of Merab, whom Michal daughter of Saul raised, whom she bore to Adriel."³⁰  That is an ancient interpretation, like the Talmud's, not an independent copy of the Hebrew reading "Merab."  A few Hebrew and Greek manuscripts are reported to read "Merab," but none was checked for this article.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Adriel was Merab's husband, so a scribe's substitution of the better-known sister's name is the simplest explanation, but no witness checked here supports it.  The adoptive reading is old and possible, though the verb is "bore."

S05: Who incited David's census

The texts.  "Again Yahweh's anger burned against Israel, and he moved David against them, saying, 'Go, count Israel and Judah'" (2 Sam 24:1).  "Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to take a census of Israel" (1 Chr 21:1).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible adds James:  "God can't be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one" (Jas 1:13).

The answers.  Archer argues that both are true, as in Job, where God permits and Satan acts:  "God incited him in order to teach him and his people a lesson ... Satan incited him in order to deal a severe blow to Israel."¹⁹  The Hebrew of 1 Chronicles 21:1 has satan without the article, which may mean "an adversary" rather than the personal name;  the same verb, "moved" or "incited" (wayyaset), appears in both verses.  Critics see a theological change:  the post-exilic Chronicler would not say God incited a sin, so he named an adversary instead.  That is a description of how Chronicles differs, and Enns's view of Chronicles accepts it.¹⁰

What remains.  As narratives, the two verses can both be true, the way Job's losses are attributed both to Satan (Job 1:12) and to God (Job 42:11).  The deeper question is whether a God who "moved David" to an act he then punished is just, and how that fits James 1:13.  That question is the same as Pharaoh's hardening (E03) and is taken up under God's testing and tempting (D02).

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible also asks whether taking a census is wrong at all, since God commands censuses (Num 1:2;  26:2).  The law attaches a condition:  "each man shall give a ransom for his soul to Yahweh when you count them, that there be no plague among them" (Exod 30:12).  Neither Samuel nor Chronicles says what made David's census sinful;  Joab objects to it (2 Sam 24:3), and David says afterward "I have sinned greatly in that which I have done" (2 Sam 24:10).  A missing ransom, pride in military strength, or an order God had not given are all proposed;  none is stated.  Commanded censuses and a condemned census are not two answers to one question, but why this one was wrong is unexplained in the text.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved as dual agency;  the Chronicler's wording is a deliberate theological restatement.

S06: The census totals

Joab reports "eight hundred thousand valiant men who drew the sword" in Israel and "five hundred thousand" in Judah (2 Sam 24:9).  Chronicles reports "one million one hundred thousand" and "four hundred seventy thousand" (1 Chr 21:5).  Chronicles adds that Joab "didn't count Levi and Benjamin" (21:6), and, in another chapter, that Joab "began to take a census, but didn't finish ... The number wasn't put into the account in the chronicles of King David" (1 Chr 27:24).  Archer harmonizes:  Samuel counts only veterans in Israel and adds Benjamin's thirty thousand to Judah;  Chronicles counts reserves in Israel and leaves Benjamin out.¹⁹  Each step is possible, but none is suggested by either text.  The most important evidence is the Chronicler's own remark that the census was never finished or officially recorded.  On that remark, any total is an unofficial figure, and two unofficial totals of an unfinished count can differ.  Verdict:  strained as a harmonization of the numbers;  the Chronicler himself signals that the figures are unofficial.

S07: Seven years of famine or three

Gad offers David "seven years of famine" (2 Sam 24:13) or "three years of famine" (1 Chr 21:12).  The Greek Septuagint of 2 Samuel reads "three years" (τρία ἔτη λιμὸς, 2 Sam 24:13 LXX), agreeing with Chronicles, and the other two options in both books are threes (three months, three days).  Archer's alternative, that Gad came twice and the second offer was reduced, has no support in either text.¹⁹  Verdict:  copy problem, documented by the Greek;  the Masoretic "seven" is very probably a scribal change.

S08: Fifty shekels of silver or six hundred of gold

David "bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver" (2 Sam 24:24), and "gave to Ornan six hundred shekels of gold by weight for the place" (1 Chr 21:25).  The objects differ in the wording:  "the threshing floor and the oxen" against "the place."  Chronicles then identifies the place as the site of the temple (1 Chr 22:1;  2 Chr 3:1).  On this reading David paid a small sum for the floor and the animals he sacrificed that day, and a large one for the whole site.  The difference of objects is in the text;  the two-payment reading is an inference from it.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S09: Chariots and horsemen: 700 or 7,000; 1,700 or 7,000; horsemen or footmen

1. The war with Hadadezer. The Hebrew of 2 Samuel 8:4 says David took "one thousand seven hundred horsemen and twenty thousand footmen" (2 Sam 8:4); 1 Chronicles 18:4 says "one thousand chariots, seven thousand horsemen, and twenty thousand footmen" (1 Chr 18:4). The Greek Septuagint of 2 Samuel 8:4 reads like Chronicles: "a thousand chariots and seven thousand horsemen" (χίλια ἅρματα καὶ ἑπτὰ χιλιάδας ἱππέων, 2 Sam 8:4 LXX). The Masoretic verse also goes on to say David hamstrung "all the chariot horses," though it has not counted any chariots, a sign that words have dropped out. Copy problem, documented.
2. The Syrian war. Samuel has "seven hundred charioteers ... and forty thousand horsemen" (2 Sam 10:18); Chronicles has "seven thousand charioteers and forty thousand footmen" (1 Chr 19:18). Here the Greek of Samuel agrees with the Hebrew (ἑπτακόσια ἅρματα, 2 Sam 10:18 LXX), and the Qumran Samuel scroll does not preserve the numeral. Haley, in 1874, put such pairs down to the confusion of similar numeral signs.²⁶ That theory has a weakness: no surviving biblical manuscript writes numbers as signs; they are written as words, which makes a 700/7,000 slip a change of a word ending, still possible but less mechanical. Unresolved, most probably a copying error in one of the two books.

S10: David's chief warrior: 800 or 300; thirty or thirty-seven

The chief of David's warriors "killed eight hundred at one time" (2 Sam 23:8) or "lifted up his spear against three hundred and killed them at one time" (1 Chr 11:11).  The Greek of Samuel also reads eight hundred.  Three hundred is the number given for Abishai a few verses later in both books (2 Sam 23:18;  1 Chr 11:20), so Chronicles may have borrowed it from there by a copying slip.  The list of "the thirty" ends "thirty-seven in all" (2 Sam 23:39):  "the Thirty" was the name of an order of warriors, and the total counts the leaders and later replacements.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for 800/300:  a copying slip from the Abishai verse is a specific mechanism, but no witness of Chronicles reads 800;  no actual conflict for the thirty.

S11: Abiathar and Ahimelech, and Mark 2:26

The texts.  When David ate the holy bread at Nob, the priest was Ahimelech (1 Sam 21:1).  His son Abiathar escaped Saul's massacre and joined David (1 Sam 22:20), and became one of David's two high priests.  Jesus, in Mark, says David "entered into God's house at the time of Abiathar the high priest" (Mark 2:26).  Matthew and Luke tell the same story without the phrase.  A second problem is in the Old Testament itself:  2 Samuel 8:17 names "Ahimelech the son of Abiathar" as priest under David, reversing the father and son of 1 Samuel 22:20, and 1 Chronicles 18:16 and 24:6 follow it.

The objection.  This is the case that, by his own account, began Bart Ehrman's loss of confidence in inerrancy.  As a Princeton seminary student he argued that Mark's phrase meant "in the part of the scriptural text that has Abiathar as one of the main characters," and his professor wrote, "Maybe Mark just made a mistake."³¹

The answers.

1. "At the passage about Abiathar." Mark uses the same Greek construction, epi with the genitive, for a section of Scripture elsewhere: "in the book of Moses, about the Bush" (ἐπὶ τοῦ βάτου, Mark 12:26). So epi Abiathar could mean "in the Abiathar section." But in 12:26 the noun is a thing in the passage; in 2:26 the phrase is "Abiathar the high priest," which reads like a time marker, as in Luke 3:2. Ehrman himself later called his version of this argument "a bit of a stretch."³¹
2. "In the days of Abiathar, who became high priest." Abiathar was present at Nob and was the better-known priest of David's reign. Luke 3:2, the model time marker under answer 1, shows that such a phrase could name the leading priest of a period rather than the man then in office. Luke dates John the Baptist's preaching to "the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea" (Luke 3:1), "during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas" (Luke 3:2). The Greek, ἐπὶ ἀρχιερέως Ἅννα καὶ Καϊάφα, is the same epi with "high priest" in the genitive as Mark's ἐπὶ Ἀβιαθὰρ ἀρχιερέως. Yet Annas was not in office under Pilate. Josephus says Quirinius "appointed Ananus, the son of Seth, to be high priest," and that Valerius Gratus, the governor before Pilate, "deprived Ananus of the high priesthood" and appointed three others before "Joseph Caiaphas was made his successor."²¹ Luke still names Annas first, and Acts calls him "Annas the high priest" with Caiaphas beside him (Acts 4:6). The parallel has a limit that a skeptic will press: Annas had held the office, while at Nob Abiathar had not yet. It shows that the phrase could be loose about who held office at the moment; it gives no example of a future holder. Ancient manuscripts show that copyists felt the problem: Bruce Metzger records that some witnesses (Codex Bezae, Codex Washingtonianus and others) "omit ἐπὶ Ἀβιαθὰρ ἀρχιερέως, thereby conforming the text to Mt 12.4 and Lk 6.4," while others inserted the article so the phrase could mean "in the time of (but not necessarily during the high-priesthood of) Abiathar."³² The committee rated the phrase as certainly original.
3. The names were confused in the tradition itself. Second Samuel 8:17 and Chronicles already make Ahimelech Abiathar's son. Either there were two Ahimelechs, a grandfather and a grandson named for him (a common practice), or the Old Testament text itself had already confused the pair, in which case Mark's phrase follows a confusion found in his Scriptures.

Verdict:  unresolved.  Answer 2 is possible, and the text-critical evidence shows that early copyists also thought the phrase needed help.  The plain sense of "at the time of Abiathar the high priest" is that Abiathar held the office then, which on 1 Samuel 21 he did not.  Luke 3:2 shows that the same kind of phrase could be loose, but its loose case is a former high priest, not a future one.  If it is an error, it is a small one about which priest of the same family held office, in a saying whose point does not depend on it.  The Old Testament's own confusion of Ahimelech and Abiathar in 2 Samuel 8:17 is the strongest evidence that the names were already tangled.

Was David alone?  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible also notes that Ahimelech asks David, "Why are you alone, and no man with you?" (1 Sam 21:1), while Jesus speaks of "those who were with him" (Mark 2:25).  David himself tells Ahimelech that he has arranged to meet his young men elsewhere (1 Sam 21:2) and asks for bread for them (21:3-5).  No actual conflict on this point.

S12: Jesse's eight sons or seven

Jesse had "eight sons" (1 Sam 17:12), and seven pass before Samuel before David is sent for (16:10-11).  First Chronicles 2:13-15 names seven, with "David the seventh."  Chronicles names those who survived to found families;  a son who died young would drop out of a genealogy of houses, and 1 Chronicles 27:18 mentions an "Elihu, one of the brothers of David" who is not in the list of seven.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S13: David's sons: Chileab or Daniel; lists born in Jerusalem

David's second son is "Chileab, of Abigail" (2 Sam 3:3) and "Daniel, of Abigail" (1 Chr 3:1).  The Greek of 2 Samuel has a third form, Dalouia (Δαλουια, 2 Sam 3:3 LXX), which looks closer to Daniel than to Chileab.  Double names were common, and the name may also have been corrupted.  The lists of sons born in Jerusalem have eleven names in 2 Samuel 5:14-16 and thirteen in 1 Chronicles 3:5-8 and 14:4-7, which add Eliphelet and Nogah;  Chronicles repeats the name Eliphelet, which suggests a son who died and a later son named for him.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S14: Absalom's sons; Absalom's "forty years"

"Three sons were born to Absalom, and one daughter" (2 Sam 14:27), yet later Absalom says "I have no son to keep my name in memory" (2 Sam 18:18).  The sons are not named while the daughter is, which suggests they died young;  the pillar was raised "in his lifetime," undated.  Plausible but unproved.  Second Samuel 15:7 dates Absalom's revolt "At the end of forty years," which cannot be forty years from the events just narrated.  Josephus reads "four years":  "when four years had passed since his father's reconciliation to him."²¹  Whiston's note adds that the Armenian version, made from a copy of the Septuagint, also has "four."  Josephus is a retelling, not a manuscript, and the Armenian reading is reported here, not checked.  The two Qumran scrolls that cover the verse do not decide it:  Eugene Ulrich's edition prints "four years" in both, but inside the brackets that mark reconstructed text.²³  The strongest case for a copying slip is internal: forty years after Absalom's return would run past David's whole reign of forty years (2 Sam 5:4).  But the verse does not explicitly name that starting point.  Counting from an earlier event in David's career could avoid the impossibility, at the cost of supplying an unstated reference date.  The reported "four" and the narrative sequence make corruption a serious possibility; neither establishes an earlier biblical reading directly checked here.  Unresolved as a chronological claim, with a probable but unproved copying explanation.

S15: Saul's sons and Saul's grandfather

Saul's sons are "Jonathan, Ishvi, and Malchishua" (1 Sam 14:49), but "Jonathan, Malchishua, Abinadab, and Eshbaal" (1 Chr 8:33).  Abinadab died with his father at Gilboa (1 Sam 31:2), and Eshbaal is Ishbosheth's original name ("man of Baal," altered to "man of shame");  Ishvi is probably a third form of the same man's name.  The earlier list, given early in Saul's reign, may predate Abinadab's birth.  On the grandfather:  Kish is "the son of Abiel" (1 Sam 9:1), and "Ner the father of Abner was the son of Abiel" (1 Sam 14:51), so Kish and Ner were brothers;  but Chronicles says "Ner became the father of Kish" (1 Chr 8:33).  Saul's family used the names Kish and Ner more than once (1 Chr 9:36 lists both among the sons of Jeiel), and the Chronicler's line may name a different Kish or compress the generations.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the sons;  unresolved for Ner and Kish.

S16: Samuel a Levite or an Ephraimite; Samuel's firstborn

Samuel's father Elkanah was "of the hill country of Ephraim ... an Ephraimite" (1 Sam 1:1);  Chronicles puts the same line of Elkanah, Jeroham and Samuel among the Levites (1 Chr 6:27-28, 33-34).  "Ephraimite" can describe where a family lived:  Judges calls a Levite "of the family of Judah" because he lived in Bethlehem (Judg 17:7).  Critics answer that the Chronicler made Samuel a Levite to legitimize his sacrifices.  Plausible but unproved.

Samuel's sons were "Joel" and "Abijah" (1 Sam 8:2).  The Hebrew of 1 Chronicles 6 reads "the firstborn Vashni, and Abijah" (הַבְּכֹ֥ר וַשְׁנִ֖י וַאֲבִיָּֽה, 1 Chr 6:13 in the Hebrew numbering).  Vashni means "and the second":  the name Joel has dropped out, and "and the second" was read as a name, as in the King James Version.  The same chapter later names "Joel, the son of Samuel" (1 Chr 6:33).  Copy problem, documented within Chronicles itself;  the WEB prints the corrected text.

S17: Why God rejected Saul

Saul's offering at Gilgal (1 Sam 13:8-14) loses him a dynasty:  "now your kingdom will not continue."  His failure to destroy Amalek (1 Sam 15) loses him the throne itself:  "he has also rejected you from being king" (1 Sam 15:23).  Two failures with two consequences.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

S18: Samuel never saw Saul again; "Is Saul also among the prophets?" twice

"Samuel came no more to see Saul until the day of his death" (1 Sam 15:35), yet Saul later "prophesied before Samuel" at Ramah (1 Sam 19:24).  The Hebrew of 15:35 says Samuel did not again go to see Saul;  in chapter 19 Saul comes to Samuel's town hunting David.  The proverb "Is Saul also among the prophets?" arises in 1 Samuel 10:11-12 and is cited again in 19:24, "Therefore they say."  A saying can be born once and confirmed later.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S19: Philistines subdued all Samuel's days

"So the Philistines were subdued, and they stopped coming within the border of Israel. Yahweh's hand was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel" (1 Sam 7:13).  Yet under Saul, while Samuel still lived, the Philistines are encamped in Israel (13:5-19).  "All the days of Samuel" may mean his judgeship before Saul, which 7:15-17 summarizes in the same passage.  The verse is a summary with the sweep of the Joshua summaries (J02).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S20: Jonathan's first slaughter

Jonathan struck the Philistine garrison at Geba (1 Sam 13:3);  later, "That first slaughter, which Jonathan and his armor bearer made, was about twenty men" (1 Sam 14:14).  "First" refers to the first killing of that day's battle at Michmash.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

S21: One hundred foreskins or two hundred

Saul asked a bride-price of one hundred foreskins (1 Sam 18:25);  David brought two hundred (18:27);  later David demands Michal back, "whom I was given to marry for one hundred foreskins of the Philistines" (2 Sam 3:14).  The price set was a hundred;  David paid double.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

S22: The ark at Kiriath-jearim twenty years

"From the day that the ark stayed in Kiriath Jearim, the time was long—for it was twenty years; and all the house of Israel lamented after Yahweh" (1 Sam 7:2).  But the ark stays there through Saul's reign until David moves it (2 Sam 6:2-3), which is more than twenty years.  The twenty years run to the national repentance under Samuel that the verse introduces, not to the ark's removal.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

S23: Where Uzzah died: Nacon or Chidon

The threshing floor where Uzzah touched the ark is "the threshing floor of Nacon" (2 Sam 6:6) and "Chidon's threshing floor" (1 Chr 13:9).  Threshing floors were named for owners, and a site can carry two names or have changed hands.  Nothing else in the accounts conflicts.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

S24: Amasa's father: an Israelite or an Ishmaelite

Amasa's father is "Ithra the Israelite" in the Hebrew of 2 Samuel 17:25 (יִתְרָ֣א הַיִּשְׂרְאֵלִ֔י) and "Jether the Ishmaelite" in 1 Chronicles 2:17.  Ithra and Jether are forms of one name.  "The Israelite" makes no sense as a distinguishing label in an Israelite story, and the two Hebrew words differ only in their middle letters (ישראלי against ישמעאלי).  The Greek of 2 Samuel follows the Hebrew.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  A copying slip is the likeliest explanation, but no witness checked for this article reads "Ishmaelite" in Samuel.

S25: David's last words

Second Samuel 23:1 introduces a poem:  "Now these are the last words of David" (2 Sam 23:1).  First Kings 2:1-9 records David's charge to Solomon on his deathbed.  "Last words" introduces David's final oracle as a psalmist, as the verse's titles make clear ("the sweet psalmist of Israel").  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

S26: Saul's age and reign in 1 Samuel 13:1 and Acts 13:21

The Hebrew of 1 Samuel 13:1 reads, literally, "Saul was a year old when he began to reign, and he reigned two years over Israel" (בֶּן־שָׁנָ֖ה שָׁא֣וּל בְּמָלְכ֑וֹ וּשְׁתֵּ֣י שָׁנִ֔ים מָלַ֖ךְ, 1 Sam 13:1).  Both numbers are impossible:  Saul has an adult son in the next verse.  The verse uses the standard formula for a king's age and length of reign with the numbers lost.  Paul, in Acts, says God gave Israel "Saul the son of Kish ... for forty years" (Acts 13:21), a figure the Old Testament never states.  There is no surviving biblical number for Acts to contradict.  Ishbosheth was forty when Saul died (2 Sam 2:10), which suits a long reign.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.  1 Samuel 13:1 is a copy problem in every surviving Hebrew manuscript.

Part 7: Kings and Chronicles

Thirty-four cases.  Most are numbers and names in Kings that Chronicles gives differently, or regnal dates that do not fit together.  Three patterns run through the whole part.

1. The Greek often agrees with Chronicles against the Hebrew of Kings, or the reverse. Where it does, the conflict is between manuscripts of one book, and the reading is documented, not guessed. This happens more often than either skeptics or defenders usually say.
2. Numbers are the most fragile thing in a copied text. John Haley argued in 1874 that many of these cases come from confusing similar numeral letters.²⁶ The surviving biblical manuscripts write numbers out as words, not signs, so that mechanism is not documented in Bible manuscripts; but the number-words of Hebrew are also easy to confuse, and the cases below with a Greek or Hebrew variant show copying changing numbers in fact.
3. The regnal chronology is the strongest evidence that Kings used older records, and also where its editor most clearly made mistakes. Edwin Thiele, whose work made the numbers of the Hebrew kings fit the Assyrian dates, explained most of the apparent conflicts by co-regencies and different ways of counting a king's first year. He also concluded that some synchronisms are wrong: "the final editor of Kings did not understand dual dating for Pekah," and the resulting synchronisms between Hezekiah and Hoshea are "late and artificial."³³ That judgment comes from the defender whose system most inerrantists use. Later defenders answer it with a fuller system of co-regencies, tested in K20.

K01: Solomon's 40,000 or 4,000 stalls

"Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots" (1 Kgs 4:26);  "Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots" (2 Chr 9:25).  Both books give him "one thousand four hundred chariots" (1 Kgs 10:26).  Four thousand stalls suits fourteen hundred chariots with two or three horses each;  forty thousand does not.  The Hebrew 4:26 (5:6 in Hebrew numbering) reads forty thousand (אַרְבָּעִ֥ים אֶ֛לֶף), and so does the Greek of Kings at the matching verse, which it places in an addition to chapter 2:  "forty thousand brood-mares for chariots" (τεσσαράκοντα χιλιάδες τοκάδες ἵπποι εἰς ἅρματα, 1 Kgs 2:46i LXX).  The Greek has "four thousand mares" only at 10:26 (τέσσαρες χιλιάδες θήλειαι ἵπποι, 1 Kgs 10:26 LXX), in a sentence that repeats 2 Chronicles 9:25 word for word and may have been taken from it.  So no witness of Kings reads four thousand at 4:26, and the case for a copying error rests on Chronicles and on the chariot arithmetic.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  A slip in a number word is the likeliest explanation, but it is unattested in Kings.

K02: Overseers 3,300 or 3,600; officers 550 or 250

Kings has "three thousand three hundred" overseers (1 Kgs 5:16) and "five hundred fifty chief officers" (1 Kgs 9:23).  Chronicles has "three thousand six hundred overseers" (2 Chr 2:18) and "two-hundred fifty" chief officers (2 Chr 8:10).  The two totals are identical:  3,300 + 550 = 3,850, and 3,600 + 250 = 3,850.  The books divide one body of supervisors at a different line, Kings perhaps counting 300 more men as senior.  The Greek of Kings also reads 3,600 at 5:16 (τρεῖς χιλιάδες καὶ ἑξακόσιοι, 1 Kgs 5:30 LXX in its numbering), and it has no counterpart to the 550 of 9:23, so the matching totals exist only in the Hebrew.  If the Greek preserves the original figure of Kings, the arithmetic argument fails;  if the Greek conformed Kings to Chronicles, it stands.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The equal totals of the Hebrew are a striking fit, but they depend on the Hebrew of Kings against its Greek.

K03: Solomon's payment to Hiram

Kings:  "Solomon gave Hiram twenty thousand cors of wheat for food to his household, and twenty cors of pure oil ... year by year" (1 Kgs 5:11).  Chronicles:  to "your servants, the cutters who cut timber, twenty thousand cors of beaten wheat, twenty thousand baths of barley, twenty thousand baths of wine, and twenty thousand baths of oil" (2 Chr 2:10).  Kings describes an annual payment for Hiram's household;  Chronicles describes provisions for the work crews.  The oil figure also differs inside the Kings tradition:  the Greek of Kings reads "twenty thousand baths of beaten oil" (εἴκοσι χιλιάδας βεθ ἐλαίου κεκομμένου, 1 Kgs 5:25 LXX), and Josephus has Solomon send "twenty thousand cori of wheat, and as many baths of oil."²¹  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Two different payments explain the main difference;  the oil quantity in the Hebrew of Kings is probably a copy problem.

K04: Gold from Ophir: 420 or 450 talents

The ships brought "four hundred and twenty talents" (1 Kgs 9:28) or "four hundred fifty talents" (2 Chr 8:18).  No variant was checked.  A difference of thirty talents may be gross against net (Chronicles adds that Huram supplied the ships and sailors) or a copying slip.  Verdict:  unresolved, minor.

K05: The bronze sea: 2,000 or 3,000 baths

"It held two thousand baths" (1 Kgs 7:26);  "It received and held three thousand baths" (2 Chr 4:5).  Josephus follows Chronicles:  "Now this sea contained three thousand baths."²¹  The Greek of Chronicles also has three thousand.  Some defenders suggest that Kings gives the normal working volume and Chronicles the full capacity, reading the Chronicles verb pair "received and held" as filled to the brim.  The size of the cubit and of the bath are both uncertain by tens of percent, so the vessel's dimensions (ten cubits across, five deep, 1 Kgs 7:23) cannot settle which figure is right.  Verdict:  unresolved.

K06: Pillar heights 18 or 35 cubits; capitals 3 or 5 cubits

Kings and Jeremiah give each pillar eighteen cubits (1 Kgs 7:15;  Jer 52:21);  Chronicles gives "two pillars thirty-five cubits high" (2 Chr 3:15).  The Hebrew word in Chronicles is orekh, "length," not "height," and thirty-five is close to two times eighteen less a cubit for joints or bases, so Chronicles may give the combined length of metal cast for both.  The capitals are five cubits in 1 Kings 7:16, Jeremiah 52:22 and 2 Chronicles 3:15, but three in 2 Kings 25:17.  First Kings 7:19 describes lily-work four cubits high on the capitals, so the capitals had parts that could be measured separately, and 2 Kings 25:17 may measure only the network section;  or "three" is a slip.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the pillars;  unresolved for the capitals.

K07: How many rows of pillars in Solomon's house

The House of the Forest of Lebanon stood "on four rows of cedar pillars" (1 Kgs 7:2), and "forty-five beams that were on the pillars, fifteen in a row" (1 Kgs 7:3).  Forty-five in rows of fifteen is three rows, but verse 3 counts beams, not pillars, and the architectural terms are uncertain;  the Greek of this chapter is rearranged and reads differently.  It is not clear what is being counted.  Verdict:  unresolved, as a question of an obscure building description rather than a contradiction.

K08: Solomon at Gibeon alone or with the assembly

"The king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there" (1 Kgs 3:4);  "Solomon, and all the assembly with him, went to the high place that was at Gibeon" (2 Chr 1:3).  Kings does not say he was alone;  a king's sacrifice of a thousand animals was a public event.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K09: 480 years from the Exodus to the temple, and Acts 13's 450

First Kings 6:1 dates the temple "In the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel had come out of the land of Egypt."  Paul's speech in Acts says God gave Israel the land "for about four hundred fifty years. After these things, he gave them judges until Samuel" (Acts 13:19-20).  In the Greek text of modern editions, which the WEB follows here, the 450 years come before the judges:  God "gave them their land for an inheritance for about four hundred fifty years. After these things, he gave them judges" (Acts 13:19-20), most naturally the sojourn in Egypt, the wilderness and the conquest.  The later Byzantine text, followed by the King James Version, attaches the 450 years to the judges:  "he gave unto them judges about the space of four hundred and fifty years" (Acts 13:20, KJV), which would conflict with 1 Kings 6:1.  The number is "about," and the speech is a summary.  The Greek Septuagint of 1 Kings 6:1 reads 440, not 480 (the sibling Dating the Exodus sets out the evidence).  Verdict:  well-supported explanation on the better-attested Greek text;  the King James wording reflects a later text that does conflict.

K10: Huram's mother from Naphtali or Dan

Hiram the bronze-worker was "the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali" (1 Kgs 7:14) or "the son of a woman of the daughters of Dan" (2 Chr 2:14).  A woman of the tribe of Dan who lived in Naphtali's territory, or a Danite who married into Naphtali, would fit both;  the tribe of Dan had moved north into the region next to Naphtali (Judg 18).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

K11: Heman's father and sons

"Ethan the Ezrahite, Heman, Calcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol" (1 Kgs 4:31) are wise men;  "The sons of Zerah:  Zimri, Ethan, Heman, Calcol, and Dara" (1 Chr 2:6);  and "Heman the singer, the son of Joel, the son of Samuel" was a Levite (1 Chr 6:33).  These are probably two different Hemans:  the sage of Zerah's line and the Levitical singer of David's court.  "Sons of Mahol" may mean "members of the dancers' guild."  The singer's sons are listed in 1 Chronicles 25:4;  "Jehuel and Shimei" (2 Chr 29:14) are later "sons of Heman," descendants.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

K12: Abijam's mother, and Abijam and Asa

Abijam's mother is "Maacah the daughter of Abishalom" (1 Kgs 15:2) and "Micaiah the daughter of Uriel of Gibeah" (2 Chr 13:2).  Asa, Abijam's son, also has "Maacah the daughter of Abishalom" as mother (1 Kgs 15:10).  The Greek of Chronicles reads "Maacha daughter of Ouriel" (Μααχα θυγάτηρ Ουριηλ, 2 Chr 13:2 LXX), so "Micaiah" is a variant spelling of Maacah.  Chronicles also says Rehoboam married "Maacah the daughter of Absalom" (2 Chr 11:20 in Hebrew;  the WEB translates "granddaughter").  Absalom's only named child was a daughter, Tamar (2 Sam 14:27);  if Tamar married Uriel of Gibeah, Maacah was Absalom's granddaughter and Uriel's daughter.  Asa's "mother" Maacah is then his grandmother, the queen mother, whom Asa later removed from that office (1 Kgs 15:13).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  It needs one unrecorded marriage, but every other piece is in the texts.

K13: Did Asa and Jehoshaphat remove the high places?

Of Asa, Kings says "the high places were not taken away" (1 Kgs 15:14);  Chronicles says "he took away the foreign altars and the high places" (2 Chr 14:3) and also "the high places were not taken away out of Israel" (2 Chr 15:17).  Of Jehoshaphat, Chronicles says "he took away the high places" (2 Chr 17:6) and "However the high places were not taken away" (2 Chr 20:33).  Chronicles contains both statements about each king, so its author knew both, and the text supplies a distinction itself:  "foreign altars" in 14:3 and "out of Israel" in 15:17.  The likely sense is that each king removed the high places of foreign gods ("foreign altars," 14:3), and those in Judah's cities early in his reign, but not all the local shrines where Yahweh was worshipped, or not permanently.  A related page asks whether Asa was "perfect."  Kings says "the heart of Asa was perfect with Yahweh all his days" (1 Kgs 15:14), while Chronicles reports his late failings:  he imprisoned the seer who rebuked him (2 Chr 16:7-10), and in his illness "he didn't seek Yahweh, but just the physicians" (2 Chr 16:12).  The Hebrew shalem means whole or undivided, here loyalty to Yahweh against other gods, which Kings goes on to illustrate by his removal of idols (15:12-13).  Chronicles' report of faults is not a report of idolatry.  But "all his days" sits uneasily beside Chronicles' last years, and Chronicles may be judging him more severely on purpose.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

K14: Baasha in Asa's thirty-sixth year

Baasha built Ramah "In the thirty-sixth year of Asa's reign" (2 Chr 16:1), but Baasha died in Asa's twenty-sixth year (1 Kgs 16:6-8).  Thiele explains:  the "thirty-sixth year" in Chronicles counts from the division of the kingdom, so that it is Asa's sixteenth year, and the same reckoning explains the "thirty-fifth year" of 2 Chronicles 15:19:  "Thirty-six years after 930 is 894, the year following Asa's defeat of Zerah in 895."³³  That makes Chronicles' source count by "the kingdom of Judah" while Chronicles itself labels the year as Asa's, so Thiele's answer concedes that the Chronicler, or his source, misread the figure.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved, with the residual error, on Thiele's own reading, belonging to the Chronicler's labeling.

K15: Ahaziah aged 22 or 42; his first year

Ahaziah was "twenty-two years old when he began to reign" (2 Kgs 8:26) or "forty-two years old" (2 Chr 22:2).  His father Jehoram began to reign at thirty-two and reigned eight years (2 Chr 21:20), so he died at forty.  A son of forty-two is impossible.  The Greek of Chronicles reads "twenty" (εἴκοσι ἐτῶν, 2 Chr 22:2 LXX), not forty-two, though not Kings' twenty-two either.  Copy problem, documented.  The same king began to reign "In the twelfth year of Joram" (2 Kgs 8:25) or "In the eleventh year of Joram" (2 Kgs 9:29), a one-year difference of the kind produced by counting a king's partial first year or not, which Thiele documents for this period.³³  Plausible but unproved.

K16: How and where Ahaziah of Judah died

Kings:  Jehu's men struck Ahaziah near Ibleam, "He fled to Megiddo, and died there," and was buried in Jerusalem (2 Kgs 9:27-28).  Chronicles:  "they caught him (now he was hiding in Samaria), and they brought him to Jehu and killed him; and they buried him" (2 Chr 22:9).  Chronicles is much shorter and differs in sequence and place.  Harmonizers place a flight to Samaria first, capture there, wounding near Ibleam, and death at Megiddo.  This takes every detail as a separate stage, without any hint in either text.  Verdict:  strained.  The two accounts preserve different reports of the death, and Chronicles may be summarizing loosely.

K17: Athaliah daughter of Omri or of Ahab

Athaliah is "the daughter of Omri" (2 Kgs 8:26) and Jehoram "married Ahab's daughter" (2 Kgs 8:18).  "Daughter" covers granddaughter, and Omri was the founder of the dynasty.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K18: Jehu son of Nimshi or of Jehoshaphat

"Jehu the son of Nimshi" (1 Kgs 19:16) and "Jehu the son of Jehoshaphat the son of Nimshi" (2 Kgs 9:2).  The second verse gives the full line;  the first names the better-known grandfather.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K19: Jehu's purge commended and condemned

God tells Jehu, "you have done well in executing that which is right in my eyes" (2 Kgs 10:30);  Hosea says "I will avenge the blood of Jezreel on the house of Jehu" (Hos 1:4).  This is a real tension of evaluation.  Interpreters reconcile it by Jehu's motive and excess:  he did God's sentence on Ahab's house but for his own ambition, and his massacre went beyond it (he also killed Ahaziah of Judah and his brothers), and "Jehu took no heed to walk in the law of Yahweh" (10:31).  The two prophets judge one act from two sides.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  It is a disagreement in moral assessment that the Old Testament leaves standing.

K20: Synchronisms of the divided kingdom (Jehoram, Jehoash, Jotham, Hezekiah)

Kings cross-dates each king of Israel and Judah to his counterpart, and several pairs do not agree with each other on simple arithmetic.

1. Jehoram of Israel began "in the second year of Jehoram ... king of Judah" (2 Kgs 1:17) and "in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat" (2 Kgs 3:1). Thiele resolves this by a co-regency of Jehoram of Judah with his father Jehoshaphat, with Jehoshaphat's eighteenth year falling in his son's second.³³ Well-supported on Thiele's system, which fits the Assyrian dates.
2. Jehoash of Israel. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets 2 Kings 13:1 against 13:10. Jehoahaz began in Joash of Judah's twenty-third year and reigned seventeen years (13:1); his son began in Joash's thirty-seventh (13:10). Twenty-three plus seventeen is forty, not thirty-seven. Differences of this size come from the Israelite non-accession counting and from co-regency, both documented by Thiele. Plausible but unproved.
3. Jotham and Hoshea. Hoshea killed Pekah "in the twentieth year of Jotham" (2 Kgs 15:30), but Jotham "reigned sixteen years" (2 Kgs 15:33), and Hoshea's accession is also dated "In the twelfth year of Ahaz" (2 Kgs 17:1), years later than 15:30 allows. Siegfried Horn argued from the text's own numbers that Jotham lived on after making Ahaz king: Ahaz began in Pekah's seventeenth year (16:1), Jotham's sixteen years end in that same year (15:32-33), yet Pekah died in Jotham's twentieth, "indicating that Jotham continued to live and reign" after Ahaz's accession.³⁴ That accounts for 15:30. For 17:1 Horn had no answer: "I have no better solution at the present time than to suggest that the figure 12 is a scribal error for three or four."³⁴ Leslie McFall and Rodger Young read 17:1 instead as the year Hoshea's reign ended, counted from the start of Ahaz's co-regency, 724/723 BC.³⁵³⁶ That fits the numbers, but the same formula opens a reign everywhere else in Kings. Thiele held that the final editor misunderstood Pekah's dates.³³ Plausible but unproved for 15:30; strained for 17:1.
4. Hezekiah. Hezekiah began "in the third year of Hoshea" (2 Kgs 18:1), Samaria fell in his sixth year (18:10), and Sennacherib invaded "in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah" (2 Kgs 18:13). The Assyrian records put the fall of Samaria in 722 and Sennacherib's campaign in 701. These cannot both be the sixth and the fourteenth year of one reign counted from one start. Thiele concluded that "the synchronisms between him and Hoshea" are "late and artificial," produced because "the final editor of Kings did not understand dual dating for Pekah."³³ Horn, followed by McFall and Young, proposed instead that Hezekiah reigned with his father Ahaz from 729/728 BC, that 18:1, 9 and 10 count from that co-regency, and that the twenty-nine years of 18:2 and the fourteenth year of 18:13 count from his sole reign, beginning 716/715.³⁴ On that reckoning every number in 2 Kings 18 fits the Assyrian dates; Horn adds that 701 "must have been the 14th year of Hezekiah" unless 18:13 itself is wrong.³⁴ The costs are real. No text mentions the co-regency, and 18:1-2 would date the start of the co-regency and then give the age and the length of the sole reign in one sentence. In its favor, co-regency itself is attested in Kings (Jotham governed while Uzziah was a leper, 15:5), and Thiele's own system, credited in items 1 and 2, also uses ways of counting that the text never announces. Critical scholars read the same numbers the other way. Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor's Anchor Bible commentary says "The three synchronisms between Hezekiah and Hoshea in vv. 1, 9, 10 are contradicted by fixed extrabiblical evidence," and explains them as a later chronographer's calculation: he "did not know that Hoshea's reign ended before the siege began."³⁷ Strained: a complete reconstruction exists, but it needs unstated conventions at exactly the points where the numbers clash, and its rivals explain the same numbers as an editor's arithmetic.
5. Ahaz's age. Ahaz "was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem" (2 Kgs 16:2), and his son Hezekiah "was twenty-five years old when he began to reign" (2 Kgs 18:2). If both figures count from one accession, Ahaz died at thirty-six and was eleven when Hezekiah was born (20 + 16 - 25 = 11). The Greek of 2 Kings 16:2 and 2 Chronicles 28:1 also reads twenty. On Horn's reckoning, with Ahaz's age counted from his co-regency with Jotham in 736/735 and Hezekiah's from his sole reign in 716/715, Ahaz was about fifteen. Plausible but unproved: fatherhood at fifteen is possible, and the reckoning that allows it is the same one item 4 needs.

The sibling How Were Joshua to Kings Put Together counts the synchronisms and their conflicts in full.

K21: Where Ahaz and Joash were buried

Ahaz "was buried with his fathers in David's city" (2 Kgs 16:20), but "they didn't bring him into the tombs of the kings of Israel" (2 Chr 28:27).  Joash was buried "with his fathers in David's city" (2 Kgs 12:21) "but they didn't bury him in the tombs of the kings" (2 Chr 24:25).  "Slept with his fathers ... buried with his fathers" is a formula for death and burial in the family city;  Chronicles adds a specific detail about the royal tombs, using burial as a judgment on bad kings (as with Jehoram, 21:20).  Both statements can be true:  buried in the city of David, not in the royal tomb.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

K22: Hezekiah or Josiah the best king

Of Hezekiah:  "He trusted in Yahweh ... after him was no one like him among all the kings of Judah" (2 Kgs 18:5).  Of Josiah:  "There was no king like him before him, who turned to Yahweh with all his heart ... according to all the law of Moses" (2 Kgs 23:25).  Each is unmatched in a named quality:  Hezekiah in trust, Josiah in turning to the law.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K23: Josiah "in peace" and Josiah killed at Megiddo

Huldah tells Josiah, "you will be gathered to your grave in peace. Your eyes will not see all the evil which I will bring on this place" (2 Kgs 22:20).  He is killed in battle by Pharaoh Necho (23:29).  The prophecy defines its own "peace" in the next clause:  Josiah would not see Jerusalem's destruction, and he did not.  Burial "in peace" is also a burial formula, and he was buried in his own tomb (23:30).  On where he died, Kings says "Pharaoh Necoh killed him at Megiddo" and "His servants carried him dead in a chariot" (2 Kgs 23:29-30);  Chronicles says they "brought him to Jerusalem; and he died" (2 Chr 35:24), after he cried that he was badly wounded (35:23).  The Hebrew sequence in Chronicles does not have to mean he died after arriving;  but read plainly, the two place the death differently.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation for "in peace";  plausible but unproved for the place of death.

K24: Jehoiakim's end and Jeremiah 36:30

Jeremiah says of Jehoiakim, "He will have no one to sit on David's throne. His dead body will be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost" (Jer 36:30), and "He will be buried with the burial of a donkey" (Jer 22:19).  Kings says "Jehoiakim slept with his fathers, and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his place" (2 Kgs 24:6).  Chronicles says Nebuchadnezzar "bound him in fetters to carry him to Babylon" (2 Chr 36:6).

1. The throne. Jehoiachin reigned three months (2 Kgs 24:8) and was taken captive. "Sit on David's throne" in Jeremiah likely means to reign as an established king; a three-month reign ended by deportation fits that judgment. Critics answer that the plain statement was not fulfilled.
2. The burial. "Slept with his fathers" is the regular death formula, and in every other case Kings adds a burial notice. For Jehoiakim it does not, which leaves room for Jeremiah's dishonored corpse.
3. Chronicles. It says Nebuchadnezzar bound him "to carry him to Babylon," not that he died there; the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's question "Babylon or near Jerusalem?" overreads the purpose clause.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

K25: Jehoiachin aged 8 or 18

"Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign" (2 Kgs 24:8);  "Jehoiachin was eight years old" (2 Chr 36:9).  The Greek of Chronicles reads "eighteen" (υἱὸς ὀκτωκαίδεκα ἐτῶν, 2 Chr 36:9 LXX).  Kings also says he had "wives" when deported (2 Kgs 24:15).  Verdict:  copy problem, documented.

K26: The fall of Jerusalem in Kings and Jeremiah

Second Kings 24-25 and Jeremiah 52 are two copies of one account, and they differ in small numbers.

1. The day the commander arrived. "on the seventh day of the month" (2 Kgs 25:8); "in the tenth day of the month" (Jer 52:12). One may record arrival and the other the burning, but both use the same verb, "came." Unresolved, probably a copying difference.
2. Men from the king's presence. "five men" (2 Kgs 25:19); "seven men" (Jer 52:25). Unresolved, likewise.
3. Jehoiachin's release. "on the twenty-seventh day" (2 Kgs 25:27); "in the twenty-fifth day" (Jer 52:31). An order on one day carried out on another is possible. Plausible but unproved.
4. Zedekiah's eyes. Jeremiah said "Your eyes will see the eyes of the king of Babylon" (Jer 34:3); Ezekiel said "I will bring him to Babylon ... yet he will not see it, though he will die there" (Ezek 12:13). Zedekiah was brought "to the king of Babylon to Riblah," judged, made to watch his sons killed, then blinded and taken to Babylon (2 Kgs 25:6-7). He saw the king and never saw Babylon. No actual conflict; the two prophecies fit the event exactly.
5. The deportation totals. Kings has "ten thousand captives" (2 Kgs 24:14), then seven thousand fighting men and a thousand craftsmen (24:16). Jeremiah 52:28-30 gives a separate tally: 3,023 in Nebuchadnezzar's seventh year, 832 in his eighteenth, 745 in his twenty-third, "All the people numbered four thousand six hundred" (Jer 52:30). Jeremiah's list counts different groups and years (and probably adult men of Judah only), and dates by a Babylonian year one off from Kings' "eighth year" (24:12). Plausible but unproved. The lists measure different things; neither says it is complete.

K27: How Jeroboam died

"Yahweh struck him, and he died" (2 Chr 13:20);  "then he slept with his fathers" (1 Kgs 14:20).  "Slept with his fathers" means died, without saying how.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K28: Gehazi leprous and later at court

Gehazi leaves Elisha "a leper, as white as snow" (2 Kgs 5:27), and later "the king was talking with Gehazi" (2 Kgs 8:4).  Lepers were kept outside towns but could still speak with others, and the Elisha stories are not in strict order:  2 Kings 8:1-6 looks back to the Shunammite woman of chapter 4.  The conversation may come before chapter 5.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

K29: Elijah's mantle

"Elijah went over to him and put his mantle on him" (1 Kgs 19:19), calling Elisha;  after Elijah is taken up, Elisha "took up Elijah's mantle that fell from him" (2 Kgs 2:13).  The cloak was thrown on Elisha as a sign of call and inherited when Elijah left.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K30: The sign of the shadow in Kings and Isaiah

In Kings, Isaiah orders the fig poultice (2 Kgs 20:7), Hezekiah asks for a sign (20:8), and Isaiah offers a choice:  "should the shadow go forward ten steps, or go back ten steps?" (2 Kgs 20:9).  In Isaiah 38, God offers the sign without a choice (38:7-8), and the poultice and Hezekiah's question appear at the end of the chapter:  "Now Isaiah had said, 'Let them take a cake of figs'" (Isa 38:21).  The "had said" marks an appended note, placed after Hezekiah's psalm.  This is arrangement and omission, not contradiction.  Chronicles shows the same freedom of arrangement:  it tells of Sennacherib's defeat (2 Chr 32:22) and then says "In those days Hezekiah was terminally ill" (2 Chr 32:24), although in Kings the illness comes while the Assyrian threat is still future (2 Kgs 20:6).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

K31: Disaster on Ahab postponed or delivered

Elijah tells Ahab, "In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, dogs will lick your blood" (1 Kgs 21:19).  When Ahab repents, God says "I will not bring the evil in his days; but I will bring the evil on his house in his son's day" (1 Kgs 21:29).  Ahab then dies in battle, and "the dogs licked up his blood" by "the pool of Samaria" (1 Kgs 22:38), though Naboth died at Jezreel.  The postponed "evil" of 21:29 is the destruction of the dynasty (21:21-22), carried out on Ahab's son Joram, whose body Jehu has thrown into "the plot of the field of Naboth the Jezreelite" (2 Kgs 9:25-26).  The dogs at Samaria fulfill the personal oracle in a looser sense than the place clause.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The place detail of 21:19 is fulfilled in Ahab's son, not in Ahab.

K32: Genealogical name conflicts in Chronicles

1. Zerubbabel's father. Zerubbabel is "the son of Shealtiel" in Ezra 3:2, Haggai 1:1, Matthew 1:12 and Luke 3:27, but a son of Pedaiah in the Hebrew of 1 Chronicles 3:19. The Greek of Chronicles reads "the sons of Salathiel: Zorobabel" (υἱοὶ Σαλαθιηλ Ζοροβαβελ, 1 Chr 3:19 LXX). A levirate marriage, Pedaiah raising a son for his dead brother Shealtiel, would also explain it. The Greek may preserve the original or may have corrected Chronicles from Ezra and Haggai, and the levirate explanation has no text behind it. Plausible but unproved, with a documented variant.
2. Zechariah son of Iddo. "Zechariah the son of Iddo" (Ezra 5:1) and "Zechariah the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo" (Zech 1:1). "Son" for grandson. No actual conflict.
3. Zelophehad. "Zelophehad, the son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Machir" (Num 27:1); 1 Chronicles 7:15 says "The name of the second was Zelophehad" in a garbled passage about Machir's family. The relationships in 1 Chronicles 7:14-15 are obscure, and a lost name or family link could explain them. But no earlier reading or specific copying mechanism has been established here, so that possibility does not earn a copy-problem label. Unresolved.
4. Libni. Libni is a son of Gershon (Exod 6:17); 1 Chronicles 6:29 lists "The sons of Merari: Mahli, Libni his son." Either a second Libni or a line that has lost its link. Unresolved, minor.
5. Mahli "the son of Levi." Ezra 8:18 calls Mahli "the son of Levi," who was his grandfather. No actual conflict.

K33: Jeremiah's dates and Daniel 1:1

Jeremiah puts the battle of Carchemish "in the fourth year of Jehoiakim" (Jer 46:2) and equates that year with "the first year of Nebuchadnezzar" (Jer 25:1).  Daniel says Nebuchadnezzar "came to Jerusalem and besieged it" "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim" (Dan 1:1).  Two calendars explain the one-year difference:  Babylon counted a king's accession year separately (year zero), while Judah, on one reckoning, counted it as year one, so a Babylonian writer's "third year" is a Judean "fourth."  Daniel, written as from Babylon, would use Babylonian counting.  That answer is coherent.  The harder question is the siege itself:  no Babylonian record mentions a siege of Jerusalem in 605, and critics take Dan 1:1 as a late writer's confusion.  D. J. Wiseman, the British Museum Assyriologist who first published the Babylonian chronicle for these years, judged that "The argument against a specific Babylonian siege rests on silence just as must, at present, any defence of it."³⁸  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the date;  the siege is an open historical question, not a contradiction with Jeremiah.

K34: How long the Babylonian exile lasted

Jeremiah prophesies "seventy years" (Jer 25:11, 29:10), and Chronicles and Daniel take it up (2 Chr 36:21;  Dan 9:2).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets this against the Letter of Jeremiah (Baruch 6), where the exiles will stay "for a long season, even for seven generations" (Bar 6:3).  Baruch is in the Catholic and Orthodox canons, not the Protestant one.  Seven "generations" in a sermon-letter is a loose figure for a long time, not a count to set against Jeremiah's seventy years, and the Letter itself says "many years."  Within the Hebrew canon, the seventy years are measured from different starting points (605, 597 or 586 to 538 or 516), which is a question of fulfillment, not of conflicting statements.  Verdict:  no actual conflict, classed as a deuterocanonical comparison.

Part 8: Ezra, Nehemiah, the Writings and the Prophets

Five cases.  The one serious case is a long list of numbers.

N01: The returnee lists of Ezra 2 and Nehemiah 7

The texts.  Ezra 2 and Nehemiah 7 give the same list of families and towns whose people returned from Babylon with Zerubbabel, line by line, and close with the same total:  "The whole assembly together was forty-two thousand three hundred sixty" (Ezra 2:64;  also Neh 7:66).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists seventeen of the lines as separate contradictions, plus the gifts.

The arithmetic.  The research folder's script research/returnees.ts reads both lists from the stored text, pairs the lines by name, and adds them up.³⁹

1. Of the forty-one paired lines, eighteen give different numbers. Some differ by one or a few (Adonikam 666 and 667; Bezai 323 and 324; Lod 725 and 721), some by a hundred (Zattu 945 and 845; Bethel and Ai 223 and 123), some by more (Azgad 1,222 and 2,322; Senaah 3,630 and 3,930). One line, Magbish (Ezra 2:30), has no partner in Nehemiah. The singers are "two hundred" in Ezra 2:65 and "two hundred forty-five" in Nehemiah 7:67.
2. The items sum to 29,818 in Ezra and 31,089 in Nehemiah. Neither equals the 42,360 that both books state.

The eighteen paired lines that differ, with the unpaired Magbish, are:

The answer.  Two different facts need two different explanations.

1. The line-by-line differences. Both books copy one register, and both agree in twenty-two lines exactly. Where they differ, the differences look like copying: one digit, or one hundred, or a thousand (the classic shapes of number corruption in a long list). A third ancient copy of the list, in the Greek book 1 Esdras, differs again: it gives the sons of Arah as 756 (1 Esdras 5:10), against 775 in Ezra and 652 in Nehemiah. Some differences may also reflect a register updated between Zerubbabel's return and Nehemiah's day. Nothing in either book claims the two copies were checked against each other. Copy problem, probable: 1 Esdras shows the list's numbers shifting in transmission, though no witness settles any single line.
2. The total. Both books give the same 42,360. That fits a total copied from a shared register before the lines diverged, but it fits equally well a total corrected in one book to match the other, or one book copied from the other (Nehemiah says he "found the book of the genealogy," Neh 7:5). On any of these, the gap of about 11,000 to 12,500 between the items and the total is shared by both books, not a conflict between them. The most likely explanation is that the total counts people the itemized lines do not: returnees of other tribes, or those who "could not show their fathers' houses" beyond the 652 (Ezra 2:59-60), or women. First Esdras gives its own description of the same total: "all those of Israel, from twelve years old and upward, beside menservants and women servants" (1 Esdras 5:41 in the WEB), which shows that at least one ancient editor thought the total counted a defined group rather than summing the lines. This is inference. Unresolved as to what the total counts; no actual conflict between the books on the total, which they share.

The gifts.  Ezra summarizes "sixty-one thousand darics of gold, five thousand minas of silver, and one hundred priests' garments" (Ezra 2:69).  Nehemiah itemizes the governor's, the heads' and the people's gifts:  1,000 + 20,000 + 20,000 darics of gold, 2,200 + 2,000 minas of silver, and 530 + 67 garments (Neh 7:70-72).  The totals do not match (41,000 against 61,000 darics).  Nehemiah's list is longer and more specific;  Ezra's looks like a rounded summary of a different or larger collection.  Unresolved.

W01: Who threw Jonah into the sea; a fish or a whale

"So they took up Jonah and threw him into the sea" (Jonah 1:15);  Jonah prays, "For you threw me into the depths" (Jonah 2:3).  In a prayer, Jonah ascribes to God what God's providence did through the sailors, who threw him only after Jonah said God required it (1:12).  This is the same dual agency as Joseph's "you meant evil ... God meant it for good."  On the second question:  Jonah has "a huge fish" (Jonah 1:17), and the King James Version of Matthew has "the whale's belly" (Matt 12:40, KJV).  The Greek word in Matthew is ketos (κήτους, Matt 12:40), "sea monster," the same word the Greek Jonah uses for the fish.  "Whale" is a translation.  Verdict:  no actual conflict in either.

W02: Will Ephraim return to Egypt?

Hosea says "They will return to Egypt" (Hos 8:13) and "Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria" (Hos 9:3), but "They won't return into the land of Egypt; but the Assyrian will be their king" (Hos 11:5).  In 8:13 and 9:3 "Egypt" stands beside Assyria as the old land of slavery, a figure for exile;  in 11:5 the point is that the actual captor will be Assyria.  The Hebrew of 11:5 is also uncertain:  the Greek translator read its first word not as "not" but as part of a statement, "Ephraim dwelt in Egypt" (κατῴκησεν Εφραιμ ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ, Hos 11:5 LXX), and some interpreters read the Hebrew as a question, "Will he not return to Egypt?"  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Prophetic poetry with a figure and a textual uncertainty.

W03: What the earth rests on

God "hangs the earth on nothing" (Job 26:7);  "the pillars of the earth are Yahweh's. He has set the world on them" (1 Sam 2:8);  "Its pillars tremble" (Job 9:6).  All three are poetry, and two are in the same book.  Job uses both images a few chapters apart, so the poet did not feel them as a contradiction.  That does not show that neither was meant as a picture of the world.  The two may fit one picture, with the earth's pillars set in the deep and the whole held over nothing, or each may be a figure for God's power.  The text does not say which.  Whether ancient Israelites pictured the earth on pillars is a question about their cosmology, handled in Ancient Cosmology and Genesis.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

W04: Nothing new under the sun, and new things

"There is no new thing under the sun" (Eccl 1:9);  "Behold, I will do a new thing" (Isa 43:19).  The two passages define "new" differently.  Ecclesiastes means a thing without precedent:  "Is there a thing of which it may be said, 'Behold, this is new'? It has been long ago, in the ages which were before us" (Eccl 1:10).  Isaiah's new thing is a new act of a kind God had done before:  the same speech introduces him as the one "who makes a way in the sea" (Isa 43:16), and promises "a way in the wilderness" (43:19), a second exodus.  A new event on an old pattern is exactly what Ecclesiastes says happens.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

Part 9: The birth of Jesus

Seven cases.  The two genealogies (B01) and Luke's census (B05) are the hard ones.  The census has its own full article, The Census of Quirinius;  the year of the birth is being settled in a separate chronology article, so this part judges the census conditionally and does not fix a year.

B01: Two genealogies of Jesus

The texts.  Matthew runs from Abraham through David and Solomon to "Jacob became the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary" (Matt 1:16).  Luke runs backward from Jesus, "being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph, the son of Heli" (Luke 3:23), through Nathan, another son of David, to Adam.  Between David and Joseph the two lists share only two names, Shealtiel and Zerubbabel.  Joseph's father is Jacob in Matthew and Heli in Luke.

The objection.  Bart Ehrman puts it simply:  "Who, in each genealogy, is Joseph's father, patrilineal grandfather, and great-grandfather? ... from David to Joseph, the lines are at odds."²

The answers.

1. Law and nature: Julius Africanus, about AD 220. The oldest surviving answer is a letter of Julius Africanus, quoted by Eusebius. Africanus says that Israel reckoned descent "either according to nature or according to law," legal descent arising "whenever another raised up a child to the name of a brother dying childless."⁴⁰ Matthan (in Matthew's line) and Melchi (in Luke's) married the same widow in turn; so Jacob and Heli were half-brothers by one mother. Heli died childless, and Jacob married his widow under the law of Deuteronomy 25:5-6: "Jacob raised up seed to him, begetting Joseph, his own son by nature, but by law the son of Eli. Thus Joseph was the son of both."⁴⁰ Africanus says this came from "the relatives of our Lord according to the flesh," the desposynoi, but he is candid about its status: "although we can urge no testimony in its support, we have nothing better or truer to offer."⁴⁰ The proposal fits a real Jewish institution (levirate marriage). Its weakness is that it requires one more step Africanus does not mention: in his version Heli is the son of Melchi, but Luke 3:24 has two more names, Matthat and Levi, between them. So Africanus' copy of Luke either lacked those names or he passed over them.
2. Luke gives Mary's line. A common modern answer reads Luke 3:23 as "the son (as was supposed of Joseph) of Heli," making Heli Mary's father. It rests on the observation that every name in Luke's list has the Greek article tou ("of the") except Joseph's. Marshall Johnson's study of the biblical genealogies traces this reading to Annius of Viterbo, about 1490, and Luther, and calls it "a rather forced exegesis of Luke 3: 23."⁴¹ The Greek evidence is against the article argument. The first name after "son" in a chain naturally lacks the article: Johnson cites a Palmyrene-Greek inscription whose chain begins the same way, and the New Testament twice calls Jesus "son of Joseph" without the article (Luke 4:22; John 6:42).⁴¹ Luke himself writes "Saul son of Kish" with no article before Kish (υἱὸν Κίς, Acts 13:21). Luke 3:24 also has another Joseph who does carry the article, because he is not first in the chain (τοῦ Ἰωσὴφ, Luke 3:24). Some defenders add that the Jewish Talmud calls Mary "the daughter of Heli." The passage meant is in the Jerusalem Talmud, which tells of a woman in hell called, in Hebrew, Miryam bat 'Alei Betzalim, which its English translator renders "Miriam, Onion-leaf's daughter."²⁷ The story is set in the time of Simeon ben Shetah, about 80 BC, and says nothing of Jesus. It is not evidence for Luke's line.
3. Royal line and natural line. Matthew traces the royal succession through Solomon, the line of legal heirs to the throne; Luke traces Joseph's physical descent through Nathan. This is a version of answer 1 without the specific levirate story, and the two lines would have crossed at Shealtiel and Zerubbabel and again at Joseph.

What remains.  Ehrman also presses a prior question:  "If Jesus is not a blood-relation to Joseph, why is it that Matthew and Luke trace Jesus' bloodline precisely through Joseph?"²  Both Gospels answer it in their own terms:  Joseph is the legal father who names the child (Matt 1:25) and is called "son of David" (Matt 1:20), and Luke marks the paternity "as was supposed."  In Jewish practice a son's lineage ran through his legal father (B04).

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Answer 1 is the oldest, uses a real institution, and claims family tradition;  it is also unverifiable, as Africanus said, and has to step over two of Luke's names.  Answer 2 is the weakest:  it is late, its grammatical argument fails against Luke's own usage, and its Talmud support is a misreading.  Without those it is a bare possibility, resting only on Luke's interest in Mary in his first two chapters.  A skeptic is entitled to say that two divergent genealogies are just what one would expect if two writers reconstructed a descent they did not have records for.

B02: Matthew's three fourteens, the missing kings and Jeconiah

Matthew says "all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; from David to the exile to Babylon fourteen generations; and from the carrying away to Babylon to the Christ, fourteen generations" (Matt 1:17).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible counts forty-one names, not forty-two, and notes that Matthew leaves out kings.

1. The count. Matthew's list works if David ends the first group and begins the second, and Jechoniah begins the third. Abraham to David is fourteen names; David, Solomon, Rehoboam, Abijah, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Joram, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon, Josiah is fourteen; Jechoniah, Shealtiel, Zerubbabel, Abiud, Eliakim, Azor, Zadok, Achim, Eliud, Eleazar, Matthan, Jacob, Joseph, Jesus is fourteen. David is counted twice and Jechoniah once. That is a way of counting, not a miscount; whether it is the way Matthew meant is not certain.
2. The missing kings. "Joram became the father of Uzziah" (Matt 1:8) skips Ahaziah, Joash and Amaziah (1 Chr 3:11-12), and "Josiah became the father of Jechoniah" (Matt 1:11) skips Jehoiakim. In Hebrew and Greek genealogies "father" and "son" cover ancestors and descendants (P11), and Matthew's own heading calls Jesus "son of David, son of Abraham" (1:1). The fourteens are a deliberate arrangement: Matthew selected names to make three equal groups. His statement "fourteen generations" is true of the list he gives, not of every generation that lived.
3. Uzziah's father, Jechoniah's father. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's separate pages on these two names are the same omission seen from the other end.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for the omitted kings, since the selection is visible and deliberate;  plausible but unproved for the count, which works only if David is counted in two groups and Jechoniah in one.  A reader who takes "fourteen generations" as a census of every generation will find Matthew wrong;  the text shows that he is counting his own list.

B03: The curse on Jeconiah's line

Jeremiah says of King Jeconiah (Coniah):  "Record this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his days; for no more will a man of his offspring prosper, sitting on David's throne and ruling in Judah" (Jer 22:30).  Matthew puts Jeconiah in Jesus' line (1:11-12), and Jeconiah had sons (1 Chr 3:17).  "Childless" is explained in the same sentence:  none of his descendants will reign.  None did;  his grandson Zerubbabel was a governor under Persia, not a king.  Christians answer the messianic question two ways.  Jesus was not physically descended from Jeconiah if Joseph was not his biological father, so the curse on Jeconiah's "offspring" does not reach him.  And the curse was reversed:  God says of Jeconiah "though Coniah ... were the signet on my right hand, I would still pluck you from there" (Jer 22:24), and later says to his grandson, "I will take you, Zerubbabel my servant ... and will make you like a signet ring" (Hag 2:23), the same image turned around.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  There is no contradiction between Jeremiah and Matthew's list;  the question is theological.

B04: Son of David by Joseph, and born of a virgin

Jesus is "son of David" (Matt 1:1;  Rom 1:3) through Joseph, yet born of a virgin (Matt 1:18-25;  Luke 1:34-35).  Both Gospels that tell of the virgin birth also trace Jesus' Davidic line through Joseph, so their authors did not think the two incompatible.  Matthew shows how:  the angel addresses Joseph as "Joseph, son of David" (Matt 1:20) and tells him to name the child, and Joseph "named him Jesus" (Matt 1:25), the act by which a father acknowledged a son.  Paul's "according to the flesh" (Rom 1:3) is sometimes read as a claim of physical descent, which would require Mary to be of David's line too;  Luke 1:32 promises Mary's son "the throne of his father David," but Luke 1:27 is ambiguous whether "of David's house" describes Joseph or Mary.  On Mark 12:35-37, where Jesus asks "How is it that the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?" (Mark 12:35):  the question is a riddle about David calling his descendant "Lord" (Ps 110:1), not a denial, and two chapters earlier Mark's Jesus accepts the cry "Jesus, you son of David, have mercy on me!" (Mark 10:47).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Legal descent is a real category;  physical Davidic descent for Jesus depends on Mary's ancestry, which the Gospels do not state plainly.

B05: Herod, Quirinius and the year of the birth

The texts.  Matthew dates the birth "in the days of King Herod" (Matt 2:1), and Luke begins his story "in the days of Herod, the king of Judea" (Luke 1:5).  Luke then dates the birth by a census:  "This was the first enrollment made when Quirinius was governor of Syria" (Luke 2:2).  Josephus says that Quirinius came to Syria after Herod's son Archelaus was deposed, and that the assessments ended "in the thirty-seventh year of Cæsar's victory over Antony at Actium," which is AD 6/7.²¹  Herod died about ten years before that on the usual date (4 BC), or about seven on the minority date (1 BC).

The objection.  Ehrman:  "If the Gospels are right that Jesus' birth occurred during Herod's reign, then Luke cannot also be right that it happened when Quirinius was the governor of Syria."²

The case for a conflict.  The only census under Quirinius that any source outside the Gospels dates is the AD 6 census of Judea.  Luke himself points to it:  in Acts 5:37 Gamaliel mentions "Judas of Galilee ... in the days of the enrollment."  And Luke's own chronology needs an earlier birth:  he puts John the Baptist's ministry in "the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius" (Luke 3:1), AD 28 or 29, and Jesus "about thirty years old" soon after (3:23).  A birth in AD 6 would make him about twenty-two.  So the conflict is partly inside Luke.

The reconciliations.  The sibling article tests them in detail.  In summary:

1. "Before Quirinius." The Greek prōtē ("first") with a genitive can, in some constructions, mean "before," giving "this enrollment happened before Quirinius governed Syria." The construction is attested but rare, and Luke's sentence reads more naturally as "first."
2. An earlier office of Quirinius. Quirinius held a command in the region before AD 6; a damaged inscription from Tibur, which names no one, may record a man governing Syria twice. No source dates a census under him then.
3. A later death for Herod. If Herod died in 1 BC, an earlier Syrian office around 3-2 BC could overlap with Herod's last years. This chronology has real defenders and real problems; it does not move the AD 6 census.
4. Luke conflated two events. Luke knew of a registration at the time of the birth and attached it to the famous census he knew from later.

Three further points cut in different directions.  Luke's own frame is looser than it looks:  Luke 1:5 dates the announcement to Zechariah under Herod, and on Luke alone the birth, some fifteen months later, could fall after Herod died;  it is Matthew 2 that puts the birth before his death.  Tertullian, writing about AD 207, says the census was held under Sentius Saturninus, governor of Syria in the last years before 6 BC, which may preserve information Luke lacked or may be a correction of Luke.  And the error account is itself a reconstruction:  it has Luke date under Herod a census he elsewhere ties to Judas the Galilean.  The sibling article weighs each of these from the primary sources;  this summary relays its reviewed findings rather than repeating that work.  Gamaliel's Theudas, in the same author's second book, has the same structure of problem (A04).

Verdict:  probable error, with moderate confidence.  The verdict is conditional on the record as it now stands:  an inscription or papyrus dating an enrollment in Judea under Herod, or a Quirinius office in Syria before 4 BC, would change it.  The sibling article reaches the same verdict and lists what would overturn it.  This is an independent historical claim that seems to be wrong, not a contradiction between two biblical passages, and it concerns a date, not whether Jesus was born or where.

B06: Bethlehem, Egypt and Nazareth

The texts.  In Matthew the family is in Bethlehem, where the wise men find "the young child with Mary, his mother" in "the house" (Matt 2:11);  they flee to Egypt;  after Herod's death Joseph is afraid to return to Judea, "withdrew into the region of Galilee, and came and lived in a city called Nazareth" (Matt 2:22-23).  In Luke the family lives in Nazareth, goes to Bethlehem for the census (2:4), lays the child in "a feeding trough" (Luke 2:7), presents him at the temple forty days later (2:22), and "When they had accomplished all things that were according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city, Nazareth" (Luke 2:39).

The objection.  Ehrman:  "If Matthew is right that the family escaped to Egypt, how can Luke be right that they returned directly to Nazareth?"²  Matthew also never says the family came from Nazareth;  he reads as if Bethlehem were home and Nazareth a new choice.

The answers.  The usual harmony puts Matthew's visit of the magi and the flight to Egypt after Luke's presentation in the temple, either before Luke's return to Nazareth (the family went back to Bethlehem first) or after it (the family returned to Bethlehem later).  Matthew's "house," and Herod killing boys "from two years old and under" (Matt 2:16), suggest the magi came months after the birth, which leaves room.  Luke 2:39 does not say "immediately."

What remains.  The texts can be fitted, but only by supplying a sequence neither writer gives:  Luke's "When they had accomplished all things ... they returned" reads as a direct return, and Matthew's narrative reads as if Nazareth were a new home.  Each account seems unaware of the other's central events.  That is consistent with two independent traditions that agree on the two points Ehrman himself says they share:  that Jesus' mother was a virgin and that he was born in Bethlehem.²  Both also end with the family in Nazareth.

Testing the whole sequence.  A harmony has to fit every step at once, not each step separately.  Luke has the family in Jerusalem for the purification forty days after the birth (Luke 2:22;  Lev 12:2-4), six miles from Bethlehem.  If the magi had already come, Herod would already be hunting the child, and the family would be in Egypt, so on the ordinary continuous reading of Matthew the magi come after the fortieth day.  Placing them earlier would require an additional delay before Joseph's warning or an interruption of the flight, neither of which Matthew describes.  That leaves two sequences.  Either the family stayed in Bethlehem after the presentation, received the magi, fled to Egypt and only then went to Nazareth, in which case Luke 2:39's "they returned into Galilee" passes over months or years without a word;  or they went home to Nazareth first and later moved back to Bethlehem, a move neither Gospel mentions, in which case Matthew 2:23 has them settle in Nazareth as if for the first time.  Herod's order to kill boys "from two years old and under" (Matt 2:16) fits a gap of up to two years in either sequence.  A smaller strain is Luke 2:41:  "His parents went every year to Jerusalem at the feast of the Passover" (Luke 2:41), while Matthew says Joseph was afraid to settle in Judea under Archelaus (Matt 2:22);  yearly visits to a festival and fear of living under a ruler are different things, so this point is weak.  Both sequences are coherent;  each needs one event or one long silence that neither writer supplies.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  There is no single statement that cannot be fitted, but the fit is supplied by the harmonizer.

B07: Emmanuel and Jesus

The angel says "You shall name him Jesus" (Matt 1:21), and Matthew quotes Isaiah:  "They shall call his name Immanuel" (Matt 1:23).  Matthew explains the second name, "which is, being interpreted, 'God with us'" (Matt 1:23).  In Hebrew idiom "his name shall be called" describes what a person is or will be called by others, as Isaiah 9:6 gives the child a string of names no one bore as a given name.  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's page on Jesus' "real name" also lists titles such as "Son of David" and "the Word."  A person can have one name and many titles.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

Part 10: The ministry of Jesus

Thirty-two cases.  Most of the differences between the Gospels' accounts of Jesus' ministry are of three kinds, and it helps to name them before the cases.

1. Literary dependence. Matthew and Luke used Mark, often word for word; the sibling article The Synoptic Problem measures the copying. So when Matthew or Luke differs from Mark inside a shared passage, the difference was made by a writer working from Mark's text, not by a separate witness remembering differently. That makes "two independent witnesses" explanations weak for those cases, and makes questions about each writer's editing method fair.
2. Arrangement. The Gospels do not all claim to narrate in order. Papias, writing early in the second century, reports that Mark "wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ,"⁴² and Augustine said of one such case that "we are certainly under no necessity of supposing that, because it is recorded after a certain event, it must also have happened in actual matter of fact after that event."³
3. Compression and abbreviation. Matthew regularly tells Mark's stories in fewer words. Michael Licona's survey shows this pattern clearly, and several of the hard cases below (the centurion, Jairus, the fig tree) are Matthean abbreviations.

The WEB's New Testament follows the Majority text, which in several cases below differs from the critical Greek text.  Where that matters, the Greek is quoted from the SBL edition.

M01: Did John the Baptist know who Jesus was? Was John Elijah? "This is" or "You are"?

1. The voice. Mark and Luke have the voice address Jesus: "You are my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Mark 1:11). Matthew has it speak about him: "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased" (Matt 3:17). Ehrman notes that some early manuscripts of Luke have the voice quote Psalm 2:7, "You are my son, today I have begotten you," which he takes as Luke's original.² The standard critical text prints the same words as Mark (Σὺ εἶ ὁ υἱός μου ὁ ἀγαπητός, Luke 3:22). Whatever was heard, Matthew's change of person is the kind of paraphrase every ancient historian practiced, and the Chicago Statement allows for it. Verdict: well-supported explanation (paraphrase in reported speech).
2. Did John recognize Jesus? In Matthew John protests, "I need to be baptized by you, and you come to me?" (Matt 3:14); in John he says "I didn't know him" until he saw the Spirit descend (John 1:31-34); later, from prison, he sends to ask "Are you he who comes, or should we look for another?" (Matt 11:3). John 1:33 says what John did not know: that this was the one who "baptizes in the Holy Spirit," until the sign. Knowing a relative as a righteous man (Matt 3:14) and knowing him as the Messiah are different. The prison question is doubt after events, not ignorance. Plausible but unproved.
3. Was John Elijah? Jesus says "this is Elijah, who is to come" (Matt 11:14); John says "I am not" (John 1:21). Luke defines the sense: John would go "in the spirit and power of Elijah" (Luke 1:17). John denies being the returned prophet in person, which his questioners meant; Jesus affirms that John fulfilled Elijah's role, adding "If you are willing to receive it." Well-supported explanation.

M02: After the baptism: the wilderness or the first disciples

"Immediately the Spirit drove him out into the wilderness" (Mark 1:12) for forty days.  In John, "the next day" after John's testimony, Jesus is at the Jordan gathering disciples (John 1:35, 43).  Ehrman:  "So where was Jesus the next day? It depends on which Gospel you read."²  John does not narrate the baptism itself:  John 1:32-34 has the Baptist recall the descent of the Spirit as something already past.  So John's "next day" can fall after the forty days, when Jesus returned to the Jordan.  This needs the reader to place the temptation before John 1:29, which John does not mention.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M03: The order of the temptations

Matthew orders the temptations bread, temple, mountain (Matt 4:1-11);  Luke orders them bread, mountain, temple (Luke 4:1-13).  Luke's connectives are loose (kai, "and"), while Matthew uses "then" (tote) and "again."  Luke ends at Jerusalem, a city that frames his whole Gospel.  This is arrangement, and Matthew's order is more likely the sequence.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

M04: The calling of Peter and Andrew, John's imprisonment, Peter's mother-in-law, Peter's town

1. The call. Mark has Jesus call Simon and Andrew from their nets by the Sea of Galilee (Mark 1:16-18); John has Andrew meet Jesus at the Jordan through the Baptist and bring Simon (John 1:40-42); Luke has a miraculous catch before the call (Luke 5:4-11). John's meeting is an introduction at the Jordan; Mark's is a call to follow, later, in Galilee; Luke's catch may be the same Galilean call told more fully. Meeting someone before he recruits you is not a contradiction. Plausible but unproved.
2. John's imprisonment. Mark has Jesus begin in Galilee "after John was taken into custody" (Mark 1:14); John narrates disciples gathering while "John was not yet thrown into prison" (John 3:24). John's narrator inserts that note as if he knew Mark's order and wanted to place his earlier events before it. Well-supported explanation.
3. Peter's mother-in-law is healed before Peter's call in Luke (4:38-39 before 5:1-11) and after it in Mark (1:16-18 before 1:29-31). Luke has already mentioned "Simon's" house, so Simon was known to Jesus; Luke does not claim that 5:1-11 is their first meeting. Plausible but unproved.
4. Peter's town. Peter and Andrew had a house in Capernaum (Mark 1:21, 29), and John says Philip "was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter" (John 1:44). People move: Bethsaida as a hometown and Capernaum as a later residence fit both. No actual conflict.
5. How Peter learned Jesus was the Messiah. Andrew told him, "We have found the Messiah!" (John 1:41); later Jesus says to Peter's confession, "flesh and blood has not revealed this to you" (Matt 16:17). Hearing a claim and coming to believe it are different events. No actual conflict.

M05: Where John baptized

John baptized in the Jordan (Matt 3:6;  Mark 1:5) and in "Bethany beyond the Jordan" (John 1:28), and also "in Enon near Salim" (John 3:23).  A Bethany east of the river is a place on the Jordan.  No actual conflict.

M06: A sermon on a mountain or on a level place

Jesus "went up onto the mountain" and taught sitting (Matt 5:1);  in Luke he "came down with them and stood on a level place" (Luke 6:17).  Luke's verse 6:12 has him go up the mountain to pray first.  A level place on a mountain, reached after descending from a peak, fits both;  so does the possibility that the teaching, much of which Matthew and Luke place differently, was given more than once.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M07: When Jesus cleared the temple

The texts.  John puts the temple cleansing at the first Passover of Jesus' ministry (John 2:13-22);  the Synoptics put it in the last week (Mark 11:15-17).

The answers.  Either there were two cleansings, or one writer moved the event.  Ehrman grants that two cleansings is possible and calls it "a bit far-fetched," asking "Why wasn't he arrested the first time?"²  In favor of two:  the wording differs (John has the whip and the cattle;  Mark the overturned seats of the dove-sellers), and John's account is tied to a datable remark:  "It took forty-six years to build this temple!" (John 2:20), which fits about AD 27-28 if counted from the work Josephus dates to "the eighteenth year of his reign," 20/19 BC, early in the ministry.²¹  In favor of one:  each Gospel has only one, each places it where it serves its structure (John's as an opening sign of the new temple, the Synoptics' as the provocation that led to the arrest), and the Synoptics have Jesus in Jerusalem only once.  Displacement of an event by an ancient biographer is documented:  Plutarch says outright that he told one story out of order "as I had mentioned the women of Cato's family."⁴  If John or the Synoptics displaced it, nothing in the text says so.

Within the Synoptics there is a smaller difference:  Matthew and Luke put the cleansing on the day of the entry (Matt 21:12;  Luke 19:45), Mark on the next day, after Jesus "looked around at everything" and left (Mark 11:11).  That is the same compression of Mark as M18.

Verdict:  unresolved.  Two cleansings is possible and has some textual support in the differences;  one cleansing moved for theme is the more economical explanation and has the ancient parallel.  Neither text claims chronological order at this point strongly enough to make a contradiction.

M08: The centurion and his messengers

The texts.  In Matthew "a centurion came to him, asking him for help" (Matt 8:5), and he and Jesus converse directly.  In Luke the centurion "sent to him elders of the Jews" (Luke 7:3), and later "sent friends to him" with the message "I didn't even think myself worthy to come to you" (Luke 7:6-7).  In Luke, he never meets Jesus.

The answer.  Licona:  "Matthew brushes out the elders and friends from his narrative and instead has the centurion go to Jesus in person," compressing the story and "transferring what a messenger had communicated to the literal mouth of the one who had sent the messenger."⁴  Ancient and modern speech both work this way:  a message delivered by an envoy is reported as the sender's own words ("the President told Congress").  Augustine gave the same answer about AD 400:  "Matthew has simply held by a very familiar mode of expression."³  What makes this harder than usual is that Matthew does not merely put the words in the centurion's mouth;  he narrates him coming (8:5) and Jesus answering him face to face (8:13).

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The agency idiom is real and the abbreviation habit is documented across Matthew.  A reader who expects a narrative to say who was physically present will judge Matthew's version inaccurate in that detail.

M09: Jairus's daughter, and the woman healed on the way

The texts.  In Mark Jairus says "My little daughter is at the point of death" (Mark 5:23), and messengers later report "Your daughter is dead" (Mark 5:35).  In Matthew he says from the start, "My daughter has just died" (Matt 9:18).  On the way a woman touches Jesus' garment;  in Mark "Immediately the flow of her blood was dried up" when she touched him (Mark 5:29), while in Matthew she "was made well from that hour" after Jesus speaks (Matt 9:22).

The answer.  Matthew tells the story in nine verses where Mark uses twenty-three.  Licona:  "Matthew compresses his account and narrates Jairus's daughter as already dead when Jairus comes to Jesus."⁴  Ehrman calls it one of the "minor, irreconcilable differences" and notes, rightly, that it matters to the story whether Jesus is asked to heal or to raise.²  (His book says "In Mark's version Jairus comes to Jesus because his daughter has already died," which is a slip for Matthew's.)  A defender can add that Matthew's Greek arti eteleutēsen can mean "is just now dying," but that is a stretch:  the aorist means "has died."

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Matthew's account is a compression that states the outcome at the start.  If a reader insists that reported words be what was said at that moment, Matthew's version is inaccurate in that detail;  compression of this kind is common in ancient narrative, and the healing of the woman shows the same habit (Matthew attaches the cure to Jesus' word rather than the touch).

M10: One demoniac or two, and where

The texts.  Mark and Luke tell of one man possessed by "Legion" in "the country of the Gerasenes" (τῶν Γερασηνῶν, Mark 5:1;  Luke 8:26);  Matthew has "two people possessed by demons" in "the country of the Gadarenes" (δύο δαιμονιζόμενοι ... τῶν Γαδαρηνῶν, Matt 8:28).  The WEB's place names follow later manuscripts (it prints "Gadarenes" in Mark and "Gergesenes" in Matthew).

1. The place. The manuscripts of all three Gospels vary among Gerasa, Gadara and Gergesa, because copyists were troubled by geography: Metzger notes that Gerasa was "located more than thirty miles to the southeast of the Sea of Galilee," and also that Gadara possessed territory "which lay on the frontiers of Tiberias," and that "ancient coins bearing the name Gadara often portray a ship."³² A district can be named for its region (Gerasa's) or its nearest city (Gadara's). Plausible but unproved.
2. The number. Matthew also has two blind men where Mark and Luke have one (M11), and two animals at the entry where they have one (M19). Licona lists the possibilities without choosing: a different source, a second demoniac created "to illustrate multiple demons," a conflation of two stories, or Mark spotlighting the one who spoke.⁴ Augustine's answer was that "one of these parties was a person of some kind of superior notability and repute," whom Mark and Luke alone named.³ The spotlight explanation is possible, but the pattern of Matthean doubling, three times, is real evidence that the doubling comes from Matthew's method rather than from the events.
3. Where the demons asked not to go. "out of the country" (Mark 5:10); "into the abyss" (Luke 8:31). Both can be part of a longer plea. No actual conflict.

Verdict:  unresolved for one or two.  A spotlight reconciliation is possible but would have to be invoked three times in one Gospel.

M11: Blind men at Jericho: one or two, coming or going

Mark:  "As he went out from Jericho ... the son of Timaeus, Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the road" (Mark 10:46).  Matthew:  "As they went out from Jericho ... two blind men" (Matt 20:29-30).  Luke:  "As he came near Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the road" (Luke 18:35), and then "He entered and was passing through Jericho" (Luke 19:1), where he meets Zacchaeus.

1. Coming or going. Luke may have placed the healing before the Zacchaeus story to keep his Jericho events together, using a loose "as he came near"; the Greek en tō engizein can mean "while he was near." Gleason Archer goes further: Bartimaeus called out as Jesus entered, was not heard, picked up a blind companion, and was healed as Jesus left.¹⁹ Every step of that is supplied by the harmonizer, and it moves Luke's healing to after the Zacchaeus visit, against Luke's own order. Plausible but unproved for arrangement by Luke; strained for Archer's scenario.
2. One or two. The same question as M10. Unresolved.

M12: Staff and sandals on the mission

Mark:  "take nothing for their journey, except a staff only ... but to wear sandals" (Mark 6:8-9).  Matthew:  "Don't take any gold ... nor sandals, nor staff" (Matt 10:9-10).  Luke:  "Take nothing for your journey—no staffs" (Luke 9:3).  Matthew's verb is different:  mē ktēsēsthe, "do not acquire" (μὴ κτήσησθε, Matt 10:9), which can mean "do not get an extra one for the trip";  Mark and Luke both use "take" (airō).  The "acquire" reading reconciles Matthew with Mark but not Luke with Mark, which say opposite things with the same verb.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for Matthew;  unresolved for Luke and Mark.  The point of all three, travel light and trust hospitality, is the same;  a detail of the instruction differs.

M13: The lists of the twelve; Levi and Matthew

The four lists agree on eleven men and differ on one name:  "Thaddaeus" in Mark 3:18 (and "Lebbaeus, who was also called Thaddaeus" in the WEB's Matthew 10:3), and "Judas the son of James" in Luke 6:16 and Acts 1:13.  Double names were common (Simon Peter, Levi Matthew), and a man called Judas had reason to use another name after Iscariot.  The tax collector is "Levi the son of Alphaeus" in Mark 2:14 and "a man called Matthew" in Matthew 9:9;  Matthew's own list calls Matthew "the tax collector" (10:3).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M14: When Nazareth rejected Jesus

Luke places a rejection at Nazareth at the start of the ministry (Luke 4:16-30);  Mark and Matthew place it later (Mark 6:1-6;  Matt 13:53-58).  Luke's account is programmatic, a story placed first to set out the themes of his Gospel, and it refers back to things Jesus had already done in Capernaum (4:23), which shows Luke knew it was not the first event.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation, from arrangement signaled in the text.

M15: Peter's confession: words and place

Peter says "You are the Christ" (Mark 8:29), "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matt 16:16), "The Christ of God" (Luke 9:20).  Mark and Matthew set it near Caesarea Philippi;  Luke does not name the place, and his preceding verse places the feeding near Bethsaida, but he does not say the confession happened there.  Paraphrase of reported speech, and omission of a place.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M16: The transfiguration after six days or about eight

"After six days" (Mark 9:2);  "About eight days after these sayings" (Luke 9:28).  Luke marks his figure as approximate, and inclusive counting (counting both end days) turns six intervening days into eight.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

M17: Who asked for the seats of honor

James and John ask (Mark 10:35);  "the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to him with her sons" and asks (Matt 20:20).  Jesus' reply in Matthew is addressed to the sons ("You don't know what you are asking," plural, 20:22).  The request came from the family:  the mother made it, with her sons, for her sons.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M18: The fig tree: withered at once or found next morning

In Mark, Jesus curses the fig tree (11:12-14), clears the temple, and the next morning the disciples see it "withered away from the roots" (Mark 11:20).  In Matthew, Jesus clears the temple on the day of entry (21:12), curses the tree the next morning, and "Immediately the fig tree withered away" (Matt 21:19).  Matthew has gathered the two fig-tree scenes into one and moved the cleansing earlier, consistent with his habit of compressing Mark.  Mark's account interleaves the tree and the temple deliberately (the "sandwich" is a known Markan technique).  Matthew's "immediately" is a compression of a process Mark spreads over two days.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Matthew's sequence differs from Mark's in a way only arrangement and compression explain.

M19: One animal or two at the entry

Mark, Luke and John have one young donkey (Mark 11:2;  John 12:14).  Matthew has the disciples bring "a donkey tied, and a colt with her" (ὄνον δεδεμένην καὶ πῶλον μετ' αὐτῆς, Matt 21:2), and they "brought the donkey and the colt and laid their clothes on them; and he sat on them" (Matt 21:7).  Critics say Matthew misread the parallelism of Zechariah 9:9, "riding on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey" (Zech 9:9), as two animals.  But a mother with an unbroken colt is natural:  the colt had never been ridden (Mark 11:2), and it would go more calmly with its mother.  "On them" (ἐπάνω αὐτῶν) can refer to the clothes.  Matthew does not say Jesus rode both.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Two animals present, one ridden, fits all four;  that Matthew was led to mention the mother by reading Zechariah is also likely.

M20: The woman who anointed Jesus

Luke tells of "a woman in the city who was a sinner" who wet Jesus' feet with tears in a Pharisee's house in Galilee (Luke 7:36-50).  Mark and Matthew tell of a woman who anoints his head in Bethany in the last week (Mark 14:3-9);  John says it was Mary of Bethany and she anointed his feet (John 12:1-8).  Luke's story is set earlier, in a different town and house, with a different point;  it is most likely a different event.  John's feet and Mark's head can both be true of a whole flask of nard.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M21: The Canaanite or Syrophoenician woman

"a Greek, a Syrophoenician by race" (Mark 7:26);  "a Canaanite woman" (Matt 15:22).  Matthew uses the old biblical name for the people of the Phoenician coast;  Mark the Roman-era term.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M22: Did Herod think Jesus was John?

Herod says "This is John, whom I beheaded. He has risen from the dead" (Mark 6:16);  in Luke, "I beheaded John, but who is this about whom I hear such things?" (Luke 9:9).  Luke records the question that preceded the conclusion Mark records;  Luke also says Herod "was much perplexed" because some said John had risen (9:7).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M23: Two healings of blind men with spittle

Mark 8:22-26 (at Bethsaida, spittle on the eyes, healing in two stages) and John 9:1-7 (in Jerusalem, mud of spittle, washing in Siloam) are two different stories in two places.  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible treats them as one event.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M24: Samaritans who did and did not receive Jesus

A Samaritan village "didn't receive him, because he was traveling with his face set toward Jerusalem" (Luke 9:53);  in Sychar "the Samaritans ... begged him to stay with them" (John 4:40).  Different villages, different years.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M25: Did the disciples understand the passion predictions?

Matthew says the disciples "were exceedingly sorry" (17:23) at the prediction;  Mark says "they didn't understand the saying" (Mark 9:32);  Luke, "They understood none of these things" (Luke 18:34);  John says that at the tomb "they didn't know the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead" (John 20:9).  Grief at a prediction of death is compatible with not understanding what it meant, especially the resurrection.  The repeated statement that the disciples did not understand is also one of the features scholars treat as embarrassing, and so likely historical.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M26: Sayings of Jesus set against each other

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists sixteen pairs of sayings.  Each is a case of a saying applied to a different situation or a different sense.

1. Witness. "If I testify about myself, my witness is not valid" (John 5:31); "Even if I testify about myself, my testimony is true" (John 8:14). In John 5 Jesus concedes the legal rule that self-testimony needs support, and calls other witnesses; in John 8 he claims that his testimony is true in fact, because he knows his origin. Well-supported explanation.
2. Judging. "the Father ... has given all judgment to the Son" (John 5:22); "I judge no one" (John 8:15). John 8:15 contrasts Jesus with those who judge "according to the flesh"; John 12:47 explains, "I came not to judge the world, but to save the world," speaking of his present mission against the final judgment. Well-supported explanation.
3. For and against. "He who is not with me is against me" (Matt 12:30); "whoever is not against us is on our side" (Mark 9:40). Ehrman asks, "How can both be true at once?"² The first is said of neutrality toward Jesus himself in a confrontation with opponents; the second of an exorcist who acted in Jesus' name but did not follow the Twelve. Proverbs are applied to cases. Plausible but unproved.
4. Secret teaching. Jesus explains parables privately (Mark 4:10-11) and tells disciples to keep silence (Mark 8:30), but says at his trial "I spoke openly to the world ... I said nothing in secret" (John 18:20). He means that his teaching was public, not a conspiracy; private explanation to students is not a secret doctrine. Plausible but unproved.
5. Parables only. "Without a parable he didn't speak to them" (Mark 4:34) describes his public teaching at that period, not his whole life. No actual conflict.
6. Telling everything. "everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you" (John 15:15); "I still have many things to tell you, but you can't bear them now" (John 16:12). Jesus has told them what he received to tell, and more will come through the Spirit (16:13). Plausible but unproved.
7. Did they ask where he was going? Peter asks "Lord, where are you going?" (John 13:36); Jesus later says "none of you asks me, 'Where are you going?'" (John 16:5). In context the complaint is that, now that he has told them he is going to the Father, they grieve instead of asking. Plausible but unproved.
8. Did Jesus baptize? "he stayed there with them and baptized" (John 3:22); "although Jesus himself didn't baptize, but his disciples" (John 4:2). The narrator corrects the report himself: baptism by Jesus' disciples under his authority. Well-supported explanation.
9. Were the Pharisees baptized by John? Matthew has John rebuke Pharisees "coming for his baptism" (Matt 3:7); Luke says the Pharisees "rejected the counsel of God, not being baptized by him" (Luke 7:30). Coming to see is not being baptized. No actual conflict.
10. Do what the Pharisees say? "All things therefore whatever they tell you to observe, observe and do" (Matt 23:3); "beware of ... the teaching of the Pharisees" (Matt 16:12). The first concerns their teaching of Moses' law ("sit on Moses' seat," 23:2); the second their own doctrine, which Matthew 23 goes on to attack. Plausible but unproved.
11. Was Jesus homeless? "the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head" (Matt 8:20) describes itinerant ministry; Mark 2:1 has him "in the house" at Capernaum, someone's house. No actual conflict.
12. Who sends the Spirit? The Father sends the Spirit (John 14:16, 26) and Jesus sends him from the Father (John 15:26). The same discourse says both. No actual conflict.
13. When was the Spirit given? "the Holy Spirit was not yet given" (John 7:39), yet John the Baptist is "filled with the Holy Spirit" (Luke 1:15). John 7:39 speaks of the general gift after Jesus' glorification; individual prophets were filled with the Spirit throughout the Old Testament. Well-supported explanation.
14. Casting out demons as a sign. "These signs will accompany those who believe ... they will cast out demons" (Mark 16:17); "Many will tell me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, didn't we prophesy in your name, in your name cast out demons ...?' ... 'I never knew you'" (Matt 7:22-23). Mark 16:17 is in the longer ending of Mark, probably not original (R17). Even taken as Scripture, a sign that can accompany believers is not said to prove its bearer a believer. No actual conflict.
15. Who can cast out demons in Jesus' name? The same pair, plus Mark 9:38-39, where Jesus tells the disciples not to stop an outsider who does it. No actual conflict.

M27: Quotations and attributions in the Gospels

1. Mark 1:2. "As it is written in Isaiah the prophet" (ἐν τῷ Ἠσαΐᾳ τῷ προφήτῃ, Mark 1:2) introduces a quotation of Malachi 3:1 followed by Isaiah 40:3. The WEB's "in the prophets" follows later manuscripts. Metzger explains: "The quotation in verses 2 and 3 is composite, the first part being from Mal 3.1 and the second part from Is 40.3. It is easy to see, therefore, why copyists would have altered the words 'in Isaiah the prophet.'"³² Mark names the more important of two prophets combined in one citation, a practice found elsewhere (Matthew 27:9, X05). Plausible but unproved. If citation by the main source is not accepted as an ancient convention, it is a misattribution.
2. Matthew 2:23. "that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets that he will be called a Nazarene" (Matt 2:23). No Old Testament verse says this. Matthew says "prophets," plural, and gives no formula of direct quotation. The likeliest source is a pun on netser, "branch," in Isaiah 11:1, a messianic title. This is not a contradiction but a loose citation. Plausible but unproved.
3. Matthew 23:35. Jesus speaks of the blood shed "from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom you killed between the sanctuary and the altar" (Matt 23:35). The Zechariah killed in the temple court was "Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest" (2 Chr 24:20-21). Zechariah son of Berechiah is the prophet of Zechariah 1:1. Luke's parallel has no patronymic (Luke 11:51). Explanations: Jehoiada was the grandfather and Barachiah the father; or Matthew confused the two Zechariahs, perhaps because both were remembered as martyred prophets; or the phrase was added by a copyist from Zechariah 1:1. No manuscript evidence for the last was checked for this article. Unresolved, leaning to a confusion of names by Matthew or his source.
4. Hebrews 8:9. Hebrews quotes Jeremiah's new covenant passage ending "and I disregarded them" (κἀγὼ ἠμέλησα αὐτῶν, Heb 8:9). The Hebrew of Jeremiah reads "although I was a husband to them" (וְאָנֹכִ֛י בָּעַ֥לְתִּי בָ֖ם, Jer 31:32). Hebrews quotes the Greek Septuagint exactly (καὶ ἐγὼ ἠμέλησα αὐτῶν, Jer 38:32 LXX). The Greek translator read a Hebrew word with one different letter: ga'alti, "I loathed," for ba'alti, "I was husband." Which reading Jeremiah wrote is a textual question. Hebrews quotes the Bible its readers used. No actual conflict within the New Testament; a documented Hebrew-Greek variant.

M28: Signs given and no sign given

"no sign will be given to this generation" (Mark 8:12);  "no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet" (Matt 12:39);  John lists many signs (John 20:30).  The refusal is to a demand for a proof-sign on command by opponents;  the "sign of Jonah" is the exception Mark omits;  John's "signs" are miracles Jesus did in his work, not tests performed for skeptics.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

M29: Jesus' list of commandments

Matthew's list adds "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Matt 19:19);  Mark's has "Do not defraud" (Mark 10:19).  Neither claims to give every commandment Jesus named.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M30: Luke's "all that Jesus began both to do and to teach" and John's untold books

Luke says his Gospel concerned "all that Jesus began both to do and to teach" (Acts 1:1);  John says many things "which Jesus did" are not written (John 21:25).  Luke's "all" summarizes the subject of his book;  he never claims to include every act.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M31: Mary "blessed among women," Jael "most blessed," and Luke 11:27-28

Elizabeth says to Mary, "Blessed are you among women" (Luke 1:42);  Deborah's song says "Jael shall be blessed above women" (Judg 5:24).  Both are the same Hebrew superlative idiom applied to two women in two songs of victory.  When a woman calls Jesus' mother blessed, Jesus answers, "On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God, and keep it" (Luke 11:28), which redirects the praise rather than denies Mary's;  Luke has already shown Mary as the model hearer (1:38, 2:19).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

M32: One year of ministry or three

Mark's Gospel mentions one Passover, at the end, and can be read as a ministry of a year or less.  John mentions three Passovers (2:13, 6:4, 11:55), implying at least two years.  Ehrman:  "I would say this is not technically a discrepancy, but it is hard to know what to make of all of Mark's 'immediately's' if he didn't really mean them."²  Mark never says the ministry lasted a year.  His grain-field Sabbath scene (2:23) is in spring, and the passion is at Passover, so Mark itself spans at least one spring before the final one.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

Part 11: The passion

Twenty cases.  The serious ones are the day and hour of the crucifixion (X01, X02), Judas' death (X05) and the raised saints (X18).  The chronology of the crucifixion week is the subject of a separate chronology article, so X01 judges whether the Gospels contradict each other, not what year or date Jesus died.

X01: The day of the Last Supper and the crucifixion

The texts.  In Mark the disciples prepare the Passover "On the first day of unleavened bread, when they sacrificed the Passover" (Mark 14:12), and the Last Supper is the Passover meal;  Jesus dies the next day.  In John the meal is "before the feast of the Passover" (John 13:1);  the next morning the priests will not enter Pilate's residence "that they might not be defiled, but might eat the Passover" (John 18:28);  and Pilate's judgment comes on "the Preparation Day of the Passover, at about the sixth hour" (John 19:14).

The objection.  Ehrman calls this a "textbook case":  in Mark, Jesus eats the Passover and dies the next day;  in John, he dies on the day the Passover lambs were killed, before the meal.  "I do not think this is a difference that can be reconciled."²  He argues that John changed the date to make a theological point:  "John has changed a historical datum in order to make a theological point: Jesus is the sacrificial lamb."²

The answers.

1. John's "Passover" means the festival week. The Passover festival ran seven days with the feast of unleavened bread, and the word "Passover" was used for the whole festival and its offerings. Luke writes, "Now the feast of unleavened bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching" (Luke 22:1). Josephus, describing an incident under the governor Coponius about AD 6-9, writes: "As the Jews were celebrating the feast of unleavened bread, which we call the Passover."²¹ John himself uses the word for the festival season when Pilate offers to release a prisoner "at the Passover" (John 18:39). The law also names more than the lamb as Passover sacrifice: "You shall sacrifice the Passover to Yahweh your God, of the flock and the herd" (Deut 16:2), while the lamb of Exodus 12 came "from the sheep or from the goats" (Exod 12:5). On this reading the priests in John 18:28 want to eat the festival sacrifices of the next days, not the lamb of the night before. Lydia McGrew states it plainly: "I do not take this to be a real contradiction between John and Mark, as the argument seems to me decisive that the meal the leaders would have been prevented from eating by ritual uncleanness ... was the chagigah in the middle of the day on Friday."⁵ "The Preparation Day of the Passover" (John 19:14) then means "the Friday of Passover week," since paraskeuē, "preparation," was the ordinary word for Friday, the day before the Sabbath. Mark uses it that way: "the Preparation Day, that is, the day before the Sabbath" (Mark 15:42). Ehrman's reply is about Mark: Mark "tells us what he means by this phrase: it is the Day of Preparation “for the Sabbath”," so that in Mark "this is not the day before the Passover meal was eaten but the day before Sabbath."² John ties the word to the Sabbath too, twice in the same chapter: the bodies had to come down "because it was the Preparation Day, so that the bodies wouldn’t remain on the cross on the Sabbath" (John 19:31), and Jesus was laid in the nearby tomb "because of the Jews’ Preparation Day" (John 19:42). The word had this meaning outside the Gospels. A decree of Augustus quoted by Josephus excuses Jews from court "on the sabbath day, nor on the day of the preparation to it, after the ninth hour,"⁴³ and the Didache, an early Christian church manual, tells Christians to fast "on Wednesdays and Fridays," where the Greek word for Friday is παρασκευή.⁴⁴ The limit: on John's own chronology that Friday was also the day before the Passover meal, so John 19:31 and 19:42 fit either reading of 19:14.
2. Two calendars. Groups in first-century Judaism followed different calendars; the Dead Sea Scrolls attest a solar calendar. Jesus may have kept Passover on one reckoning while the temple authorities kept it on another. This is possible, but no text says Jesus used a sectarian calendar, and the lambs were slaughtered at the temple on its date.
3. John changed the date for theology, as Ehrman argues.

What remains.  Answer 1 is grammatically sound and has support in the use of paraskeuē and of "Passover" for the festival, but it requires that "eat the Passover" in John 18:28 refer to something other than the Passover meal, which is its most natural sense.  That is the skeptic's best reply, because the Gospels use the same phrase for the meal itself:  "Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?" (Mark 14:14).  One outside witness bears on the date.  A teaching preserved in the Babylonian Talmud says, in David Instone-Brewer's translation, "On the Eve of Passover they hung Yeshu the Notzri" (b. Sanhedrin 43a).⁴⁵  That agrees with John's natural reading, a death on the day before the Passover meal, not with answer 1.  Instone-Brewer reports that most scholars explain the agreement as "dependence on Christian traditions—probably on the Gospel of John because this alone states that Jesus was killed on Passover Eve," while he argues that the tradition's core goes back to the time of Jesus.⁴⁵  If the teaching is independent, it tells against Ehrman's claim that John invented the date, and it makes the Synoptic Passover meal the harder text;  if it depends on John, it adds nothing.  John's symbolism of Jesus as the Passover lamb (1:29, 19:36) fits a lamb-time death, which supports Ehrman's reading but does not prove John invented the timing:  a writer can see symbolism in the true date.

Verdict:  unresolved.  Answer 1 is a real reconciliation, not an invented one, and many careful scholars hold it.  Answer 3 explains the theological pattern.  The evidence does not decide between them.

X02: The hour of the crucifixion

The texts.  "It was the third hour when they crucified him" (Mark 15:25), about 9 a.m.;  darkness at "the sixth hour" (Mark 15:33).  In John, Pilate is still judging "at about the sixth hour" (John 19:14), about noon.

The answers.

1. A copying error. Some ancient writers proposed that the Greek numerals for 3 (Γ) and 6 (Ϝ) were confused. The manuscripts do not support it for John: Bruce Metzger records that a few witnesses read "third hour" in John 19:14, "an obvious attempt to harmonize the chronology," and that "the manuscript evidence is overwhelmingly in support" of "sixth."³² A few witnesses of Mark read "sixth," likewise "In the interest of harmonization with Jn 19.14."³²
2. Approximate times. The day was commonly divided into watches of about three hours, and without clocks times were estimated from the sun. An event late in the morning could be "the third hour" to one witness and "about the sixth" to another. John marks his time as approximate ("about"), Mark does not. The New Testament's own hour references fit this picture. Of the 24 places where it names an hour of the day or night, 20 name the third, sixth or ninth hour. The exceptions are the eleventh hour in the parable of the vineyard workers (Matt 20:6, 9) and John's tenth and seventh hours (John 1:39; 4:52).⁴⁶ Mark names no other hours at all. If hours were usually reported in three-hour steps, Mark's "third hour" may name the stretch from about 9 a.m. toward noon rather than 9 a.m. exactly. The skeptic's reply is that John is the one evangelist who names hours outside those steps, so his "about the sixth hour" may be the closer estimate, and the two still point to different parts of the morning.
3. Augustine's answer. Augustine argued that Mark's third hour was when the crowd cried "Crucify him," so that the Jews crucified him with their tongues at the third hour, and the soldiers with their hands at the sixth.³ That reads Mark's plain "they crucified him" as a figure, which strains the sentence.
4. John used Roman midnight reckoning, making his sixth hour 6 a.m. John's other hours (1:39, 4:6, 4:52) read naturally on the usual sunrise reckoning, and 6 a.m. leaves no time for the night trial before the Sanhedrin and the morning before Pilate.

Verdict:  unresolved.  Answer 2 is the best:  it uses a real feature of ancient time-telling and John's own "about," and the New Testament's habit of naming hours in three-hour steps shows that it is not invented for this case.  But a three-hour gap stretches it, and a reader may reasonably think one of the times is wrong.

X03: The rooster crowing once or twice

Mark has Jesus say "before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times" (Mark 14:30), and narrates two crowings (14:68, 14:72).  Matthew, Luke and John have "before the rooster crows" (Matt 26:34).  Mark is more specific;  the others refer to cockcrow as the time marker at the end of the night, which the second crowing marks.  The manuscripts of Mark show that copyists felt the difference:  some omit "twice" in 14:30, which Metzger attributes to "scribal assimilation to the parallel accounts," and the first crowing in 14:68 is so uncertain that the editors bracketed it and rated the decision {D}.³²  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  If Matthew's "before the rooster crows" is pressed to mean "before any rooster crows at all," Mark's first crow would come before the third denial, and the two accounts would differ.

X04: Who challenged Peter

Peter is challenged three times.  In Mark by a servant girl, the same girl again, then bystanders (14:66-70);  in Matthew by a girl, "another" girl, then bystanders (26:69-73);  in Luke by a girl, "another" person (masculine), then another man (22:56-59);  in John by the doorkeeper girl, "they" (18:25), and a relative of Malchus (18:26).  In a crowded courtyard several people take up an accusation;  each Gospel names one speaker at each stage.  The core, three denials, each to people in the courtyard, is the same.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X05: Judas: his death, the field and the prophecy

The texts.  Matthew:  Judas threw the silver into the temple, "Then he went away and hanged himself" (Matt 27:5);  the priests "bought the potter's field with them to bury strangers in. Therefore that field has been called 'The Field of Blood' to this day" (Matt 27:7-8).  Acts:  "this man obtained a field with the reward for his wickedness; and falling headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines gushed out," and the field was called Akeldama, "The field of blood" (Acts 1:18-19).

The differences.  Ehrman lists them:  the manner of death, who bought the field, and why it was called the Field of Blood.²  Raymond Brown, the leading Catholic scholar of the passion narratives, sums up the state of the question:  faced with "two such different reports of Judas' death," some conservative scholars "have also been led to recognize that the descriptions of the death of Judas have been filled in from OT examples of the deaths of wicked men," while others have attempted "to defend the historicity of both the Matt and Acts accounts by harmonization or reinterpretation."⁴⁷

The harmonizations.

1. The death. He hanged himself, and the rope or branch broke, or the body later fell and burst. This is old: Brown cites an ancient form of it, and the Latin Vulgate renders Acts 1:18 "And having been hanged, he snapped in the middle."⁴⁷ It adds an event neither text mentions, but it contradicts neither. The Greek of Acts 1:18 (prēnēs genomenos), "becoming prostrate" or "falling headlong," is itself obscure.
2. The purchase. The priests bought the field with Judas' money, so Acts can say Judas "obtained" it. Acts uses ktaomai, "acquire," not "buy." Brown rejects this: "In my judgment such harmonization distorts the obvious meaning of the Acts text, written in complete ignorance of the Matt story."⁴⁷
3. The name. The field was "of blood" both because it was bought with blood money and because Judas died there. Matthew gives one reason and Acts the other.

The prophecy.  Matthew says the purchase fulfilled "that which was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet" (Matt 27:9), but the words about thirty pieces of silver thrown "to the potter" are from Zechariah 11:12-13.  Jeremiah does have a potter (Jer 18-19) and the purchase of a field (Jer 32:6-15), so Matthew's citation combines Zechariah's words with Jeremianic themes and names the more famous prophet, as Mark 1:2 names Isaiah for a Malachi-Isaiah composite (M27).  Ehrman calls it "a loose quotation of Zechariah 11:3" (his slip for 11:13) and asks "Why does Matthew quote the wrong prophet?"²

Verdict:  unresolved.  Each harmonization is possible.  Together they require Judas to have hanged and then fallen, the priests to have bought land in his name, and two reasons for one name, none stated in the other text.  Brown's judgment that the two accounts were written independently and do not know each other is the most natural reading of the evidence.  They agree on the core facts:  Judas died soon and violently, and a field in Jerusalem called the Field of Blood was linked to his betrayal money.  The citation of Jeremiah is a composite attribution, plausible but unproved.

X06: When Satan entered Judas; the kiss

"Satan entered into Judas" before the supper, when he arranged the betrayal (Luke 22:3);  "After the piece of bread, then Satan entered into him" (John 13:27).  Possession was not thought of as a single event:  the two texts describe influence at the decision and at the act.  On the kiss, Mark has Judas identify Jesus with a kiss (14:44-45);  John has Jesus step forward and say "I am he" (John 18:5) while "Judas also, who betrayed him, was standing with them."  John omits the kiss;  he does not deny it.  Verdict:  no actual conflict for the kiss;  plausible but unproved for Satan's entry.

X07: Annas or Caiaphas; Jesus' answer to the high priest; silence or speech before Pilate; false witnesses

1. Annas first. John says Jesus was led "to Annas first, for he was father-in-law to Caiaphas" (John 18:13), then "Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas, the high priest" (John 18:24). Mark says "They led Jesus away to the high priest" (Mark 14:53). Annas, the former high priest, held a preliminary hearing that Mark omits. No actual conflict.
2. "I am" or "You have said so." "I am" (Mark 14:62); "You have said so" (Matt 26:64); "You say it, because I am" (Luke 22:70). The idiom "you have said so" is an affirmation with reserve, and Luke's form shows the sense. Ehrman notes a different change: Mark has Jesus tell the high priest "You will see the Son of Man ... coming with the clouds," while Luke omits "you will see," perhaps because the high priest had died.² That is a difference of emphasis in a reported saying, of the kind the Chicago Statement calls "free citation." Well-supported explanation for the answer; plausible but unproved for the omitted clause.
3. Silent or speaking before Pilate. In Mark Jesus answers "So you say" (Mark 15:2) and then "made no further answer" to the accusers (15:5); in John he speaks at length to Pilate inside the residence (18:33-38). Silence before accusers and conversation with the judge in private are compatible. Plausible but unproved.
4. False witnesses and the temple saying. Mark calls the witnesses who said "I will destroy this temple" false (14:57-58); John reports Jesus saying "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19). Jesus said "Destroy" (an imperative to his hearers); the witnesses claimed he said "I will destroy." No actual conflict.

X08: The robe: scarlet or purple, Herod's or Pilate's soldiers

Matthew's soldiers "put a scarlet robe on him" (Matt 27:28);  Mark's "clothed him with purple" (Mark 15:17);  in Luke, Herod's soldiers dress him "in luxurious clothing" (Luke 23:11).  A soldier's scarlet cloak, faded or dyed with a cheap red, could be called purple in mockery of royal purple;  ancient color words were not precise.  Luke's scene before Herod is a separate episode.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

X09: Who carried the cross

"He went out, bearing his cross" (John 19:17);  the soldiers "compelled one passing by ... Simon of Cyrene ... that he might bear his cross" (Mark 15:21).  Jesus began carrying it and Simon was pressed into service on the way.  John's omission of Simon is consistent with his focus on Jesus' self-giving.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X10: What Jesus was offered to drink

Before the crucifixion:  "wine mixed with myrrh" (Mark 15:23) or "sour wine to drink mixed with gall" (Matt 27:34).  Cholē, "gall," is a word for any bitter substance, and Matthew's wording echoes Psalm 69:21.  Later, on the cross, "a sponge full of vinegar" (Mark 15:36;  John 19:29).  Two different drinks at two times, and two names for the same bitter additive.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

X11: The wording of the inscription

"THE KING OF THE JEWS" (Mark 15:26);  "THIS IS JESUS, THE KING OF THE JEWS" (Matt 27:37);  "THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS" (Luke 23:38);  "JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS" (John 19:19).  All four contain the charge, "the King of the Jews."  John says the notice was written in three languages (19:20), so slight differences in wording are expected;  the Gospels report its content.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

X12: Did both criminals mock Jesus?

"Those who were crucified with him also insulted him" (Mark 15:32);  in Luke "One of the criminals" insulted him and "the other answered, and rebuking him" defended him (Luke 23:39-40).  Both may have mocked at first and one changed;  or Mark speaks of the pair generally.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X13: The last words

Mark and Matthew give the cry "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mark 15:34) and then a loud cry without words (15:37);  Luke gives "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!" (Luke 23:46);  John gives "It is finished!" (John 19:30).  Mark's wordless final cry leaves room for words the others record.  Each Gospel reports a saying it chose;  none says "his only words were."  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X14: The curtain torn before or after the death; what the centurion said

1. The curtain. In Mark the curtain tears after Jesus breathes his last (15:37-38); in Luke it tears during the darkness, before his last words (23:44-46). Luke groups the signs (darkness, sun, curtain) together and then narrates the death; his sentence does not claim strict sequence. Ehrman notes that Luke places it "while Jesus is still alive" and ties this to Luke's theology.² Plausible but unproved.
2. The centurion. "Truly this man was the Son of God!" (Mark 15:39); "Certainly this was a righteous man" (Luke 23:47). Luke's word dikaios means "righteous" or "innocent." A Roman soldier's exclamation, reported in two forms, one in his likely pagan sense ("a son of a god") and one in the sense of the verdict on Jesus' innocence that runs through Luke's passion. Ehrman is right that the words differ in meaning. Plausible but unproved.

X15: Where the women stood

Mark has the women "watching from afar" (Mark 15:40);  John has Jesus' mother and others "standing by Jesus' cross" (John 19:25).  Over six hours, people move;  John's scene, where Jesus speaks to his mother, requires nearness at one moment.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X16: Who buried Jesus

The Gospels say Joseph of Arimathea buried Jesus (Mark 15:43-46), with Nicodemus in John (19:38-42).  Paul's speech in Acts says "they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb" (Acts 13:29), where "they" are "those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers" (13:27).  Joseph was "a prominent council member" (Mark 15:43), so the burial was done by a ruler of Jerusalem.  Paul compresses.  The sibling The Empty Tomb discusses whether Acts 13:29 preserves a different tradition.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

X17: Did Jesus pray to be spared?

In Gethsemane:  "Please remove this cup from me. However, not what I desire, but what you desire" (Mark 14:36).  In John:  "What shall I say? 'Father, save me from this time'? But I came to this time for this cause" (John 12:27).  John's saying is earlier and rhetorical;  Mark's is a prayer that submits the request to God's will.  Both show a real wish to be spared, yielded.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

X18: The darkness, the earthquake and the risen saints

The text.  Only Matthew reports that at Jesus' death "The earth quaked and the rocks were split. The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered into the holy city and appeared to many" (Matt 27:51-53).  Barker's Easter Challenge notes that this "amazing event" could "hardly escape the notice of the other Gospel writers, or any other historians," and adds that silence does not disprove it.¹³

Why it is a case.  This is not a contradiction between two texts.  No other Gospel denies it;  they are silent.  It is a question of historical credibility, and of internal coherence:  the bodies are raised at the death but come out "after his resurrection."

The answers.  Michael Licona, in his 2010 study of the resurrection, concluded that "an understanding of the language in Matthew 27:52-53 as 'special effects' with eschatological Jewish texts and thought in mind is most plausible."⁴⁸  That is, Matthew is using the symbolic language of Jewish apocalyptic, which describes cosmic signs at the death of a great figure.  Whether a passage is apocalyptic imagery or historical report is a question of genre, and no doctrine of inerrancy settles it in advance.  Others take the event as historical and the silence of other sources as unremarkable for a local event that did not leave public records.

Verdict:  unresolved.  There is no contradiction to resolve, and no way to test the report.  The darkness (Mark 15:33;  Luke 23:44) is in three Gospels and does not conflict among them.

X19: Three days and three nights

Jesus says "so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matt 12:40);  elsewhere "after three days rise again" (Mark 8:31) or "on the third day."  Jesus was buried on Friday evening and rose before dawn on Sunday, which is three days by inclusive counting (part of Friday, Saturday, part of Sunday) but only two nights.  Jewish usage counted a part of a day as a day:  the chief priests who quoted "After three days I will rise again" asked for a guard "until the third day" (Matt 27:63-64), treating the two expressions as the same.  The two disciples on Sunday say "it is now the third day since these things happened" (Luke 24:21).  "Three days and three nights" in Matthew 12:40 comes from the Jonah verse it quotes (Jonah 1:17) and is the strongest phrase;  read with Jewish inclusive reckoning it means three calendar days.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The New Testament's own usage shows the equivalence.

X20: Paradise "today" and "not yet ascended"; where Jesus went at death

Jesus tells the criminal, "today you will be with me in Paradise" (Luke 23:43);  on Sunday he tells Mary, "I haven't yet ascended to my Father" (John 20:17);  Peter says his soul "wasn't left in Hades" (Acts 2:31);  1 Peter says he "went and preached to the spirits in prison" (1 Pet 3:19).  "Paradise" in Jewish thought of the time was the place of the righteous dead, part of the realm of the dead (Hades), not the same as the Father's presence after the ascension.  John 20:17 speaks of the bodily ascension.  The 1 Peter passage is famously obscure.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The texts fit a view of the afterlife common in Jesus' day, but none of them sets out that view in full.

Part 12: The resurrection and the ascension

Nineteen cases.  Dan Barker's "Easter Challenge" asks Christians to write one narrative of the resurrection accounts "without omitting a single detail."¹³  His seventeen questions, and the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's pages on the same chapters, are answered here one by one.  Two points of method first.

1. What the accounts agree on. Ehrman, who thinks some differences irreconcilable, states the agreement: "All four Gospels agree that on the third day after Jesus' crucifixion and burial, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and found it empty. But on virtually every detail they disagree."² That is the shape of the evidence: a common core and divergent details. Whether the core is true is the subject of The Empty Tomb and the other resurrection articles; this part asks only whether the details contradict.
2. The strongest defender's own limit. Michael Licona, who argues that most Gospel differences are literary conventions, lists five resurrection differences "that leave us bewildered": where Mary Magdalene first met Jesus, his message to her, whether there were angels at the tomb on the women's first visit, how many male disciples were present at the first appearance, and "whether Jesus first appeared to the male disciples in Jerusalem or in Galilee." He concludes: "Therefore, the tensions remain."⁴ Any honest treatment has to reach these same five.

R01: The time the women came

Matthew:  "as it began to dawn" (Matt 28:1).  Mark:  "Very early on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen" (Mark 16:2).  Luke:  "at early dawn" (Luke 24:1).  John:  "while it was still dark" (John 20:1).  These describe a walk to the tomb around daybreak, beginning in darkness and arriving at sunrise.  Mark's own verse combines "very early" with sunrise.  John speaks of Mary leaving;  Mark of the women arriving.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

R02: Which women came

Matthew names "Mary Magdalene and the other Mary" (Matt 28:1);  Mark, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome (16:1);  Luke, "Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Mary the mother of James" and "The other women with them" (Luke 24:10);  John names Mary Magdalene alone, but she reports, "we don't know where they have laid him!" (John 20:2), plural.  Every list includes Mary Magdalene, none claims to be complete, and John's own "we" shows he knew she was not alone.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

R03: Why they came, if the body was already spiced

In Mark and Luke the women bring spices to anoint the body (Mark 16:1;  Luke 24:1);  in Matthew they come "to see the tomb" (Matt 28:1).  In John, Joseph and Nicodemus had already wrapped the body with about a hundred pounds of myrrh and aloes (John 19:39-40).  The women who watched the burial (Luke 23:55) may have seen only a hurried burial before the Sabbath and planned to finish it;  John's large quantity of spices is a burial honor, not necessarily the anointing women would do.  Raymond Brown, noted in The Empty Tomb, treats the anointing purpose as a real difference between Mark and John.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

R04: Was the stone already rolled away? The earthquake

The texts.  Matthew:  the women "came to see the tomb. Behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from the sky and came and rolled away the stone from the door and sat on it" (Matt 28:1-2).  Mark:  "Looking up, they saw that the stone was rolled back" (Mark 16:4);  Luke and John agree the stone was already moved.

The objection.  Barker:  Matthew "says that the stone was rolled away after the women arrived, in their presence," and defenders who read the verse as past-perfect ignore that "the entire passage is in the aorist (past) tense ... Matthew 28:2 begins, 'And, behold,' not 'For, behold.'"¹³

The answer.  The Greek aorist is the ordinary narrative tense and does not by itself mark sequence;  Greek has a pluperfect but often uses the aorist for an event earlier than the main narrative when the context shows it.  The question is what the context shows.  Matthew 28:1 says the women "came to see the tomb" (ἦλθεν ... θεωρῆσαι, Matt 28:1), which can describe their setting out.  Matthew 28:2 then explains with a "for" (γάρ) clause why there was an earthquake:  the angel had descended.  Matthew never says the women saw the stone move or the guards fall.  When the angel speaks to the women, he is already sitting on the stone (28:5).  Matthew's account is compressed;  read as a scene narrated in the order of events, it has the stone rolled while the women watch, and read as background, it fits the others.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved, at the weak end of that grade.  The verse does not say the women witnessed the rolling.  Barker is right that the most natural reading is sequential:  Matthew opens the earthquake with "And behold" (καὶ ἰδού), his usual way of moving the story to a new event (it opens the meeting with Jesus in 28:9 too), and the "for" (γάρ) explains why the earth shook, not when.  The background reading is grammatically possible, but it reads a sequence marker as a flashback.

R05: One messenger or two, inside or outside, sitting or standing

Matthew:  an angel sitting on the stone outside (28:2), who speaks to the women (28:5).  Mark:  "a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe" inside the tomb (Mark 16:5).  Luke:  "two men stood by them in dazzling clothing" (Luke 24:4), later called "a vision of angels" (24:23).  John:  "two angels in white sitting, one at the head and one at the feet" (John 20:12), seen by Mary on a later visit.

1. One or two. Mark and Matthew mention the one who spoke; Luke both. This is the same question as the demoniacs and blind men, but here the evangelist with one figure is Mark, whom Matthew follows. Augustine offered two answers: that Matthew's angel on the stone outside and Mark's inside were two different angels, each Gospel naming one, or that the space before the tomb was enclosed, so that "inside" and "on the stone" describe one place.³ Plausible but unproved.
2. Men or angels. Mark's "young man" in white and Luke's "two men" in dazzling clothing are angels described by appearance; Luke himself calls them angels in 24:23. No actual conflict.
3. Inside or outside, sitting or standing. The angel on the stone (Matthew) can have gone inside; sitting and standing describe different moments. John's two angels are seen later by Mary alone. Plausible but unproved, with Licona's caveat that whether the angels were present at the women's first visit is one of his five bewildering differences.

R06: What the messengers said

Mark:  "He has risen! He is not here ... go, tell his disciples and Peter, 'He goes before you into Galilee'" (Mark 16:6-7).  Matthew is close to Mark (28:5-7).  Luke:  "Why do you seek the living among the dead? He isn't here, but is risen. Remember what he told you when he was still in Galilee" (Luke 24:5-6).  John:  "Woman, why are you weeping?" (John 20:13), to Mary later.  Every version announces that Jesus is risen and not there.  Luke changes the Galilee reference from a command to go to Galilee into a reminder of what Jesus said in Galilee.  That change matters for R12;  as reported speech it is a summary with a different emphasis.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

R07: Did the women tell anyone? Mark 16:8

The texts.  Mark's oldest text ends:  "They went out, and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had come on them. They said nothing to anyone; for they were afraid" (Mark 16:8).  Matthew:  "They departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to bring his disciples word" (Matt 28:8).  Luke:  they "told all these things to the eleven" (Luke 24:9).

The objection.  Ehrman calls this the one point that "seems to be irreconcilable":  in Mark "out of fear they don't say a word to anyone," while in Matthew the disciples go to Galilee as told.²

The answers.  A common harmony limits "They said nothing to anyone" to the women's flight: they spoke to no one on the way.  Mark uses the same absolute form elsewhere for a temporary silence with a stated exception:  Jesus tells a healed leper "See that you say nothing to anybody, but go show yourself to the priest" (Mark 1:44).  The command to "go, tell his disciples" (16:7) and Jesus' prediction of a Galilean meeting (14:28) support expecting a later report.  They do not require it: an ending can emphasize a command left unfulfilled or an expectation left open.  If Mark ended at 16:8, as the oldest manuscripts suggest (R17), the narrative leaves that expectation unfulfilled at its close.  Restricting the silence to the journey is possible, but Mark does not expressly supply that limit.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Mark's sentence, read alone, says they told no one;  his Gospel creates an expectation of a later meeting but does not narrate the message being delivered.  The other Gospels supply it; whether Mark intended that continuation or an ending about failed discipleship remains disputed.

R08: Did Mary know he was risen when she ran to the disciples?

In John, Mary finds the stone moved and runs to Peter saying "They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb" (John 20:2):  she does not yet know of the resurrection.  In Matthew and Luke the women hear the angels before going to the disciples.  John describes Mary's first report, after seeing the stone and before seeing the angels;  the Synoptics describe the women's report after the angels.  If Mary ran ahead when she saw the open tomb while the others stayed, both are true.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

R09: Whom Jesus met first, and how Mary felt

In Matthew Jesus meets "them," Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, as they go to tell the disciples (Matt 28:9);  in John he meets Mary alone at the tomb (John 20:14-17);  in Luke the first narrated appearance is on the road to Emmaus, with an appearance to Simon reported (24:34);  Paul's list begins with Cephas (1 Cor 15:5).  Paul's list is of official witnesses and omits the women altogether.  Mary weeping (John 20:11) and the women going "with fear and great joy" (Matt 28:8) are different moments.  The hard point is the one Licona names:  Matthew's meeting is on the way from the tomb with two women;  John's is at the tomb with Mary alone.  If Mary returned to the tomb after reporting to Peter (John 20:2-11), and the other women had a separate encounter, both can be true;  but that is a reconstruction neither writer suggests.  Tested as one sequence, it also has a cost.  Matthew names Mary Magdalene among the women who leave the tomb "with fear and great joy" and whom "Jesus met" on the way (Matt 28:1, 28:8-9).  John has her run to Peter before she has seen any angel (John 20:1-2), come back, and meet Jesus alone at the tomb (20:11-17).  A single sequence must either leave Mary Magdalene out of Matthew's "them," against Matthew 28:1, or give her two first meetings with Jesus, a different one in each Gospel.  Verdict:  unresolved.

R10: Could the risen Jesus be touched?

"Don't hold me, for I haven't yet ascended to my Father" (John 20:17);  "They came and took hold of his feet" (Matt 28:9);  "Touch me and see" (Luke 24:39);  Thomas is invited to touch (John 20:27).  John's Greek, mē mou haptou (Μή μου ἅπτου, John 20:17), allows a reading about holding or clinging.  But a negative present imperative does not by itself establish that Mary had already begun holding him, or exclude an instruction not to touch.  The stronger contextual point is that this is a direction to Mary, followed by a commission to go to the disciples (20:17), while the same Gospel later invites Thomas to examine Jesus' wounds.  It does not state a general ban on anyone touching Jesus before the ascension.  Why Mary receives this particular direction while Matthew's women hold his feet remains an interpretive question.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

R11: Paul's list, "the twelve," and the Gospel appearances

Paul says Jesus "appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve" (1 Cor 15:5).  Judas was dead, and on the first evening Thomas was absent (John 20:24).  "The twelve" was the name of the group, used as "the Eleven" is used of the same group in Luke 24:33.  Paul's list also includes appearances the Gospels do not narrate (five hundred, James) and omits the women.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The sibling Paul's Letters as Historical Evidence discusses the list.

R12: Galilee or Jerusalem: where the disciples first saw him and where they were told to go

The texts.  In Mark and Matthew the message is "He goes before you into Galilee. There you will see him" (Mark 16:7), and Matthew narrates an appearance "into Galilee, to the mountain" (Matt 28:16).  Matthew reports no appearance to the disciples in Jerusalem, only to the women.  In Luke all the appearances are in and around Jerusalem the same day:  Emmaus, then the eleven (24:33-36);  Jesus tells them to "wait in the city of Jerusalem until you are clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:49), and Acts says "Don't depart from Jerusalem" (Acts 1:4).  In John, Jesus appears in Jerusalem twice (20:19-29) and then in Galilee (21:1).

The objection.  Barker:  Matthew means the Galilee appearance to be the first;  Luke and John "radically contradict" it.  "Could they all have traveled 150 miles that day, by foot ... for the first appearance, then back to Jerusalem for the evening meal?"¹³  Ehrman makes the same point.

The answers.

1. Matthew does not say Galilee was the first appearance. He reports the appointment at a Galilean mountain and narrates that meeting; he narrates no other appearance to the disciples, but he does not deny one. John narrates both Jerusalem and Galilee appearances, so at least one early account combines the two geographies, though its Galilee chapter (John 21) may be a later addition to the book. Barker's own question, "if Jesus had been seen before this time, why did some doubt?", has an answer in the text: Matthew 28:17 says "some doubted," but Matthew identifies those going to the mountain as the eleven (28:16). Identifying this with Paul's "over five hundred brothers at once" (1 Cor 15:6) would add a larger group Matthew does not name, and cannot serve as independent evidence for the harmony.
2. Luke's "wait in the city." Luke 24:49 belongs to the last meeting before the ascension, forty days later on Acts' chronology (Acts 1:3-4). Luke compresses the forty days of Acts into a single scene at the end of his Gospel. On common authorship, Acts shows that the author eventually presented a longer timeline. That supports reading a gap in the Gospel; it does not by itself prove that he held the same chronology when writing the earlier account, or deliberately signaled compression.
3. The angel's message in Luke. Luke turns "he goes before you into Galilee" into "Remember what he told you when he was still in Galilee." This is the hardest point. Luke has omitted the Galilee instruction, consistent with his plan to keep the story in Jerusalem (Luke 24, Acts 1), and has rephrased the angel's words.

Testing the whole sequence.  The proposal has to fit every text at once.

1. Day one, Jerusalem: the women at the tomb, Mary Magdalene, Peter (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor 15:5), the two on the Emmaus road, and that evening the disciples without Thomas (Luke 24:33-43; John 20:19-24).
2. Day eight, Jerusalem: the disciples with Thomas (John 20:26). Galilean pilgrims had a reason of their own to stay a week: the feast of unleavened bread ran seven days after Passover (Deut 16:3-8), though the law also let worshippers go home the morning after the Passover meal (Deut 16:7).
3. Then Galilee: the lake (John 21) and the appointed mountain (Matt 28:16-20), perhaps the five hundred (1 Cor 15:6).
4. Back in Jerusalem by the fortieth day: the last meeting, the command not to leave Jerusalem, and the ascension from Olivet (Acts 1:3-12).

Every step has a text behind it, and no text forbids any step.  The costs are three.  Luke's Gospel must compress forty days into what reads as one evening (24:36-53), a reading supported by Acts' longer chronology, assuming the two books preserve one intended timeline (R15).  Matthew's "go quickly" and "there you will see him" (28:7) must allow a week's stay in Jerusalem and two appearances there first;  the words do not exclude this, but Matthew gives no hint of it.  And Luke's angel no longer sends the disciples to Galilee at all:  "Remember what he told you when he was still in Galilee" (Luke 24:6) reshapes Mark's "He goes before you into Galilee" (Mark 16:7), keeping the word "Galilee" and changing what is said about it.

Dale Allison, a critical scholar who has written at length on the resurrection narratives, states the problem as it stands:  "we cannot even be sure where the event occurred. Mark and Matthew direct us to Galilee, Luke and John to Jerusalem."⁴⁹  In the same note he records the proposal of C. F. D. Moule that the disciples went home to Galilee and returned to Jerusalem for the next pilgrim feast, Pentecost, which is the shape of the sequence above.

Verdict:  unresolved.  As a sequence of appearances, the combined account is coherent, and its Luke compression has support from Acts.  What remains unresolved is the angel's message:  on the evidence of the shared wording, Luke rewrote the words of a speech his source reported, so the two Gospels do not report the same message.  Licona himself lists the Galilee question as unresolved.  The disagreement is about where and in what order, and about what the angel said, not about whether there were appearances.

R13: Did the eleven believe the two from Emmaus?

In Luke, when the two from Emmaus return, the eleven are already "saying, 'The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!'" (Luke 24:34).  In the longer ending of Mark, the two "told it to the rest. They didn't believe them, either" (Mark 16:13).  The longer ending of Mark is very probably not original to Mark (R17).  As texts, the two can both be true of a divided group:  some had begun to believe after Simon's report, others had not, and Luke itself says that at the appearance that followed "they still didn't believe for joy" (24:41).  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

R14: What happened at the first meeting: fear, joy, doubt, rebuke

Luke:  "they were terrified and filled with fear" (Luke 24:37), then "they still didn't believe for joy" (24:41).  John:  "The disciples therefore were glad when they saw the Lord" (John 20:20).  Matthew (in Galilee):  "some doubted."  Mark's longer ending:  Jesus "rebuked them for their unbelief."  Fear turning to joy within one meeting is natural, and Luke records both.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

R15: When and where Jesus ascended

Luke's Gospel seems to put the ascension on the evening of Easter day:  "He led them out as far as Bethany ... and was carried up into heaven" (Luke 24:50-51).  Acts, by the same author, says Jesus appeared "over a period of forty days" (Acts 1:3) and ascended from "the mountain called Olivet" (Acts 1:12).  John has appearances eight days later (20:26) and in Galilee (21).  The longer ending of Mark has the ascension follow the meal with the eleven (16:14-19).

1. When. On common authorship, Luke knew the forty days when he wrote Acts. The Gospel's "He led them out" (24:50) has no explicit time marker linking it to Easter evening, so a gap is possible. But the connected narrative reads naturally as continuing that day, and common authorship does not establish what chronology the author held at each stage of composition. Compression into one scene is a reasonable explanation rather than a demonstrated intention. Plausible but unproved.
2. Where. Bethany lies on the slope of the Mount of Olives. Licona: "This is not a discrepancy, since Bethany is located on the Mount of Olives."⁴ No actual conflict.
3. Matthew and John narrate no ascension; silence is not denial.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the timing; the geographical explanation is well supported.

R16: 120 believers or more than 500

Acts reports "about one hundred twenty" disciples gathered in Jerusalem (Acts 1:15);  Paul reports an appearance "to over five hundred brothers at once" (1 Cor 15:6).  The 120 are those gathered in one room in Jerusalem after the ascension;  the 500 saw Jesus at some point during the appearances, very possibly in Galilee, where most of his followers lived.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

R17: The endings of Mark

The Gospel of Mark ends in its oldest manuscripts at 16:8.  Bruce Metzger:  "The last twelve verses of the commonly received text of Mark are absent from the two oldest Greek manuscripts (ℵ and B)," and from early Latin, Syriac, Armenian and Georgian manuscripts.³²  A short ending and a longer one (16:9-20) are found in other manuscripts, and the committee judged that the longer ending, "though current in a variety of witnesses, some of them ancient, must also be judged by internal evidence to be secondary."³²  Ehrman states the scholarly consensus that the verses "were added by a scribe in a later generation."²  The problem was discussed in antiquity as a contradiction.  Eusebius, about AD 320, answering a correspondent who asked how the resurrection "late on the Sabbath," as his text of Matthew 28:1 read, fits Mark's "early on the first day of the week" (Mark 16:9), gives two answers.  The first is what "One who athetises that pericope would say":  that the passage is not in all copies, and "That is where the text does end, in almost all copies of the gospel according to Mark."⁵⁰  The second accepts both texts and repunctuates Mark's sentence so that "early in the morning" goes with the appearance, not with the rising.  The sibling How Textual Criticism Works treats the evidence in full.

This bears on contradictions in two ways.  Several alleged contradictions are only with the longer ending (R13, M26), so they are, at most, contradictions with a later addition.  Verdict:  copy problem, documented;  the longer ending is very probably not by Mark.

R18: Who raised Jesus: the Father, the Spirit or Jesus

"God raised him up" (Acts 2:24;  Gal 1:1);  "the Spirit of him who raised up Jesus" (Rom 8:11);  Jesus says "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19) and "I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again" (John 10:18).  For writers who held that Father, Son and Spirit act together, these are not rival claims;  for a reader who rejects that theology, the question is whether the writers themselves thought they were contradicting each other, and John 10:18 continues "I received this commandment from my Father," tying the Son's power to the Father's will.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

R19: Was Jesus the first to rise from the dead?

Paul calls Jesus "the first fruit of those who are asleep" (1 Cor 15:20), and in Acts says that Christ "should be the first that should rise from the dead" (Acts 26:23, KJV), but the Bible records earlier raisings:  by Elijah (1 Kgs 17:22), Elisha (2 Kgs 4:35, 13:21), and Jesus himself (Mark 5:41-42;  John 11:43-44).  Those raised returned to mortal life and died again.  Paul's claim, in the same chapter, is that Jesus rose to an imperishable life (1 Cor 15:42-54) as the first of a general resurrection.  "First fruits" names exactly that:  the first of a harvest of the same kind.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

Part 13: Acts and the letters

Nine cases.  The serious ones are the three accounts of Paul's conversion (A01), Paul's visits to Jerusalem (A02), Theudas (A04) and Paul's practice of the law in Acts (A05).  The relation of James to Paul on faith and works is in Part 14 (L01), with a link to the full sibling article.

A01: Paul's conversion: did his companions hear the voice, see the light, fall down?

The texts.  Acts tells the story three times.  In Acts 9 the narrator says Paul's companions "stood speechless, hearing the sound, but seeing no one" (Acts 9:7).  In Acts 22 Paul says "Those who were with me indeed saw the light and were afraid, but they didn't understand the voice of him who spoke to me" (Acts 22:9).  In Acts 26 he says "we had all fallen to the earth" (Acts 26:14), while in Acts 9 the companions "stood."

Translation hides the problem.  The WEB's "hearing the sound" and "didn't understand" are already interpretations.  The Greek says the companions were "hearing the voice" (ἀκούοντες μὲν τῆς φωνῆς, Acts 9:7) and "did not hear the voice" (τὴν δὲ φωνὴν οὐκ ἤκουσαν, Acts 22:9).  The same word, phōnē, is used in both.

The answers.

1. The case of the noun.  A common defense notes that 9:7 puts "voice" in the genitive and 22:9 in the accusative, and claims that the genitive means hearing a sound while the accusative means understanding it.  Luke's own usage refutes this.  When Paul himself hears and understands the words in Acts 22, the noun is genitive:  "I heard a voice saying to me" (ἤκουσα φωνῆς λεγούσης μοι, Acts 22:7);  in the parallel at 9:4 it is accusative (ἤκουσεν φωνὴν λέγουσαν, Acts 9:4).  The grammatical argument should be dropped.

2. "Hear" in the sense of understand.  The verb akouō can mean to hear with understanding, as in 1 Corinthians 14:2 where no one "understands" (literally "hears") a speaker in tongues.  Acts 22:9 adds "of him who spoke to me":  they did not hear the speaker's words.  Acts 9:7 says they heard the voice, which can mean the sound of it.  This reading uses an established sense of the verb, and the qualifying phrase in 22:9 supports it.

3. Standing and falling.  Acts 26:14 says all fell;  Acts 9:7 says they "stood speechless," and the verb (heistēkeisan) can mean "stood fixed" or "were rooted to the spot."  Falling at the first flash and standing afterward are compatible.

4. Seeing.  The companions "saw the light" (22:9) but saw "no one" (9:7).  Paul "saw no one" after he was blinded (9:8), and elsewhere says he had "seen Jesus Christ" (1 Cor 9:1).  Light and person, before and after blindness, are different things.

5. Who gave Paul his commission.  In Acts 9 and 22 Jesus tells Paul to go into the city, and the commission to the Gentiles comes through Ananias (9:15;  22:14-15).  In Acts 26 Paul gives the commission as Jesus' own words on the road (26:16-18) and does not mention Ananias.  Here compression is not a guess:  the same author narrated Ananias's part twice, so Acts 26 is demonstrably a telescoped retelling by an author who knew the fuller sequence.  Well-supported explanation.

What remains.  Luke wrote all three accounts and put them in one book a few chapters apart, so he knew all three.  That shows awareness, not agreement:  an author can vary a story on purpose, as Acts 26 shows, without thereby making the varied details compatible.  The verbal opposition "hearing the voice" / "did not hear the voice" is real in the Greek, and Luke left it standing.  Answer 2 resolves it with a sense of the verb that the qualifying phrase in 22:9 supports, which is evidence, but not proof, that this is what Luke meant.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

A02: Paul's visits to Jerusalem in Acts and Galatians

The texts.  Paul says that after his conversion "I didn't immediately confer with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem ... but I went away into Arabia. Then I returned to Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Peter, and stayed with him fifteen days. But of the other apostles I saw no one except James" (Gal 1:16-19).  He swears to it:  "behold, before God, I'm not lying" (Gal 1:20).  Then "after a period of fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas" (Gal 2:1).  Acts has Paul stay "several days" in Damascus (9:19), preach, and leave "When many days were fulfilled" (9:23) for Jerusalem, where "Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles" (Acts 9:27).  Acts then has a second visit with famine relief (11:30) and a third for the council (15).

The objections.  Acts does not mention Arabia or three years;  it says Paul met "the apostles," Paul says only Peter and James;  and Acts has a famine visit that Paul, under oath, seems to leave out.

The answers.

1. Arabia and "many days." Acts' "many days" (9:23) is vague enough to include three years with a trip to Arabia that Luke does not mention. Lydia McGrew notes that this is exactly the kind of loose connection that shows Acts was not written by copying Galatians: an author who used Galatians to make Acts look authentic "would almost certainly not have inserted Damascus into his narrative on the basis of Paul's passing remark while leaving out any reference to Paul's trip to Arabia or to the passing of three years."⁵ That is an argument for Acts' independence, not proof that the accounts fit, but it does show the gap is an omission.
2. "The apostles." Peter and James, the Lord's brother, were the leading apostles in Jerusalem; Acts' general phrase and Paul's precise one describe the same meeting.
3. The famine visit. Either Galatians 2 is the famine visit of Acts 11:30, in which case Paul omits nothing (this is the view of many who date Galatians before the council), or Galatians 2 is the council of Acts 15 and Paul's oath in Galatians 1:20 concerns his contacts with the apostles, not every trip to the city. The sibling James versus Paul finds this identification unresolved.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Acts and Galatians tell Paul's early years from different interests, and the differences are omissions and summaries.  The identification of Galatians 2 is a real open question;  on either identification a consistent sequence exists.

A03: Baptism in Jesus' name or the threefold name

Jesus commands baptism "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (Matt 28:19);  in Acts people are baptized "in the name of Jesus Christ" (Acts 2:38;  also 8:16, 10:48, 19:5).  "In the name of" in Acts identifies whose baptism it is, distinguishing it from John's baptism (Acts 19:3-5 makes exactly that contrast);  it is not a liturgical formula reported word for word.  Matthew's is the command.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

A04: Theudas in Acts 5:36

The text.  Gamaliel, speaking about AD 33-35, cites two failed movements:  "before these days Theudas rose up ... about four hundred, joined themselves," and "After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the enrollment" (Acts 5:36-37).  Judas' revolt was in AD 6.

The problem.  Josephus describes a Theudas who, "while Fadus was procurator of Judea," persuaded crowds to follow him to the Jordan, which he said he would divide, and who was taken and beheaded.²¹  Fadus governed about AD 44-46, a decade after Gamaliel's speech and forty years after Judas.  If Gamaliel meant Josephus' Theudas, his speech mentions an event that had not happened yet, in the wrong order.

The case for an error.  Josephus does more than date Theudas late.  He tells of Theudas under Fadus and then, in the next section, of the crucifixion of "the sons of Judas of Galilee ... that Judas who caused the people to revolt, when Cyrenius came to take an account of the estates of the Jews."²¹  Acts has the same two names in the same order, Theudas and then Judas "in the days of the enrollment."  Ernst Haenchen, in the standard critical commentary on Acts, states the dating plainly:  "In reality Theudas promised his followers under the Procurator Fadus, between 44 and 46 a.D.—hence some ten years after the presumptive date of Gamaliel's speech—that he would lead them dry-shod across the Jordan."⁵¹  He concludes that the transposition "proves that the traditions reaching him had left him in utter confusion where chronology was concerned."⁵¹

The answers.  Archer, following S. B. Hoenig, argues that "the Theudas mentioned by Gamaliel may have been an earlier rebel of the same name," who revolted about AD 6, when Archelaus was deposed.¹⁹  Archer adds that Gamaliel spoke about AD 31 "and therefore could not have referred to the same Theudas," which assumes the accuracy that is in question.  Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe's handbook makes the same move:  the two men differ, "We know this because Theudas preceded Judas of Galilee who arose during the days of the census."⁵²  Another candidate period is the unrest after Herod's death in 4 BC:  Josephus says that then "there were ten thousand other disorders in Judea," and names only a few of their leaders.²¹  Whiston's notes to Josephus suggest that Theudas led one of these, or was the Judas son of Ezekias whom Josephus does name.  One detail fits two men:  Luke's Theudas had "about four hundred" followers, while Josephus' Theudas persuaded "a great part of the people."  Haenchen counts this the other way, suggesting the figure "may derive from some historical writing."⁵¹  The name was uncommon.  Tal Ilan's lexicon of Jewish names in Palestine from 330 BC to AD 200 treats Theudas as a short form of Theodoros, because one ossuary gives a man both names:  "This inscription further consists of the form Θεόδωρος as parallel to the abbreviated Θευδᾶς."⁵³  It records the short form Theudas for only two real men:  the Theudas of Josephus and Acts, entered as one man of AD 45, and the father named on that ossuary.  Under Theodoros with all its forms it lists twelve men, one of them a figure from an apocryphal text, among about 3,000 Jewish men in the whole volume.⁵⁴  A second rebel with this rare name is less likely than a second Simon or Judas would be.  The argument from rarity is itself weak, because the lexicon holds only the names that happen to survive, and Josephus names few of the leaders of 4 BC.  Haenchen reports that by his time only F. F. Bruce among commentators still proposed a second Theudas.⁵¹

What remains.  The earlier Theudas is unattested;  the later one matches in name, in type of movement and in his position next to Judas in Josephus.  That is the same shape of evidence as the census of Quirinius (B05):  a dated outside record, and a rescue that needs an event no source records.  The sibling Ancient Historiography and Compositional Convention judges this a factual problem that no literary convention explains.

Verdict:  probable error in the speech as Luke composed it, with moderate confidence.  An independent record of an earlier Theudas would overturn it.  This is a historical claim tested against Josephus, not a contradiction between biblical texts, and it concerns the dating of a failed movement in a speech, not the events Acts narrates as its main subject.

A05: Paul and the law in Acts and the letters (Timothy, the vow, the decree)

The texts.  Paul writes, "if you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing" (Gal 5:2), and says that "not even Titus ... was compelled to be circumcised" (Gal 2:3).  In Acts, Paul "took and circumcised" Timothy "because of the Jews who were in those parts" (Acts 16:3), and later joins a temple vow to show that "you yourself also walk" keeping the law (Acts 21:23-24).  American Atheists set Genesis 17:10 against Galatians 5:2 under "Circumcision."¹²

The answers.

1. Paul states his own practice. "To the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law" (1 Cor 9:20). Galatians 5:2 is addressed to Gentiles who were being told they must be circumcised to be saved (Gal 5:4; 6:12-13). Timothy, with a Jewish mother (Acts 16:1), was circumcised for access to synagogues, not for salvation; Titus, a Gentile, was not, because the demand was being made as a condition. The distinction between practice as accommodation and practice as requirement is Paul's own.
2. The decree and idol meat. The Jerusalem decree asks Gentiles to "abstain from things sacrificed to idols" (Acts 15:29). Paul tells Corinthians "Whatever is sold in the butcher shop, eat, asking no question for the sake of conscience" (1 Cor 10:25), but not to eat if someone says "This was offered to idols" (1 Cor 10:28). Paul never cites the decree. Paul's rule avoids knowingly eating idol-offerings when it would signal participation, which is close to the decree's concern but not the same as its blanket abstention.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The circumcision cases are explained by Paul's own stated distinction, which is good evidence.  The decree is harder:  Paul's silence about it, and his more permissive rule, are a real tension that the sibling James versus Paul examines.

A06: Go only to Israel, or to all nations

"Don't go among the Gentiles ... go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Matt 10:5-6) is Jesus' instruction for one mission during his ministry;  "make disciples of all nations" (Matt 28:19) comes after the resurrection, in the same Gospel.  Matthew records the change himself.  Acts 16:6, where the Spirit forbids preaching in Asia, is a direction about one journey.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

A07: Who gave the law: God or angels

Exodus has God speak the law at Sinai;  Paul says the law "was ordained through angels by the hand of a mediator" (Gal 3:19), as do Stephen (Acts 7:53) and Hebrews (2:2).  The idea that angels attended or mediated the giving of the law is in the Greek of Deuteronomy:  at Sinai "on his right hand were angels with him" (ἐκ δεξιῶν αὐτοῦ ἄγγελοι μετ' αὐτοῦ, Deut 33:2 LXX).  God gave the law through angelic agents in that tradition.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

A08: "Not the Lord" and "every Scripture is God-breathed"

Paul writes "to the rest I—not the Lord—say" (1 Cor 7:12) and "I have no commandment from the Lord, but I give my judgment" (1 Cor 7:25).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets this against "Every Scripture is God-breathed" (2 Tim 3:16).  In 1 Corinthians 7 Paul distinguishes the sayings of Jesus that he can quote (7:10, on divorce) from his own apostolic ruling on cases Jesus did not address;  he then adds "I think that I also have God's Spirit" (1 Cor 7:40).  The distinction is between sources of instruction, not between inspired and uninspired parts of his letter.  Second Timothy 3:16 refers in the first place to the Jewish Scriptures Timothy knew "from infancy" (3:15).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

A09: Is the day of the Lord at hand?

Paul writes as if he might live to see the Lord's coming:  "we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord" (1 Thess 4:15).  In 2 Thessalonians the readers are told "not to be quickly shaken ... saying that the day of Christ has already come" (2 Thess 2:2), because "the rebellion comes first" (2:3).  The second letter corrects a claim that the day had already arrived, not the expectation that it could come soon.  Whether Paul wrote 2 Thessalonians is disputed;  the sibling The Authorship of Paul's Disputed Letters covers that.  The question whether early Christians expected the end too soon is taken up in L17.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

Part 14: Law, salvation and Christian conduct

Eighteen cases, which gather well over a hundred of the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's pages.  Most allegations in this part are of a different kind from those in Parts 2 to 13.  They set a command against a command, or a saying against a saying, rather than a report of an event against another report.  Four distinctions do most of the work, and each is used only where the text itself supplies it.

1. A changed command. The New Testament says the covenant changed, and gives reasons ("he has made the first obsolete," Heb 8:13). A Mosaic law and a Christian teaching that differ are then not a contradiction unless one text says the old law still binds in the same way. Whether the change is coherent with Jesus' own words is a real question (L02).
2. A general rule and its exceptions. Wisdom literature states general patterns. A proverb that is usually true is not contradicted by a case where it fails, and the Bible itself includes books (Job, Ecclesiastes) that argue with the proverbs.
3. Different senses of one word. "Righteous," "son of God," "father," "hate," "first," "good": where a passage defines its sense, the definition is used.
4. Hyperbole and idiom. Jesus' sayings use deliberate overstatement (telling disciples to "hate" father and mother, Luke 14:26). A parallel passage that states the same saying plainly is evidence of the idiom.

A moral objection, "this command is wrong," is real and is classed as such.  It is not answered by showing that two verses are logically consistent.

L01: Faith and works (Abraham, Rahab, faith alone, doers of the law, judged by words)

The texts.  Paul:  "We maintain therefore that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law" (Rom 3:28);  "if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not toward God" (Rom 4:2).  James:  "You see then that by works a man is justified, and not only by faith" (Jas 2:24);  "Wasn't Abraham our father justified by works, in that he offered up Isaac his son on the altar?" (Jas 2:21).  Rahab is commended for faith in Hebrews 11:31 and for works in James 2:25.  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible adds Romans 2:13 ("the doers of the law will be justified") and Matthew 12:37 ("by your words you will be justified").

The answer in brief.  The sibling James versus Paul examines this case at length and concludes that the texts are verbal opposites on Abraham, but that a compatible reading is plausible with moderate confidence:  James requires a faith that is completed in action, and Paul excludes works as the ground on which God accepts the ungodly, without excluding faith's necessary expression.  Two points are visible in the texts themselves.  Paul often specifies "works of the law" (Rom 3:28;  Gal 2:16), in arguments about Jewish law and Gentile membership; James names acts of mercy and obedience (2:15-16).  But that vocabulary difference alone does not resolve the problem: Paul also excludes works without that qualifier when discussing Abraham, and contrasts wages owed with a gift (Rom 4:2-5).  His argument cannot simply be reduced to circumcision or other identity markers.  And Paul too teaches judgment by deeds (Rom 2:6-13) and "faith working through love" (Gal 5:6).  Matthew 12:37 speaks of words as evidence of the heart (12:34-35), not as a way of earning acquittal.  Two related pages turn on a quotation.  "In your sight no man living is righteous" (Ps 143:2) is the psalm Paul echoes when he says no one is justified by works of the law (Rom 3:20;  Gal 2:16):  it describes anyone's standing before God's judgment apart from mercy, and does not deny that God justifies.  And the page asking whether those who obey the law are cursed misreads Galatians 3:10.  Paul writes "as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse," and gives his reason by quoting Deuteronomy 27:26:  "Cursed is everyone who doesn't continue in all things that are written in the book of the law, to do them" (Gal 3:10).  The curse falls on failing to keep all of it, which is Deuteronomy's own point;  Paul's claim is that no one relying on the law keeps all of it.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The tension is real at the level of vocabulary, and James appears to be answering some form of Paul's formula.  Whether they disagreed in substance is the subject of the sibling article.

L02: Are the laws of Moses still binding? (Sabbath, foods, blood, circumcision, images, retaliation, eunuchs, sacrifice, idol meat, intermarriage)

The central tension.  Jesus says "Don't think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn't come to destroy, but to fulfill. For most certainly, I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not even one smallest letter or one tiny pen stroke shall in any way pass away from the law, until all things are accomplished" (Matt 5:17-18).  Yet Mark interprets one of his sayings as "making all foods clean" (Mark 7:19);  Paul writes "One man esteems one day as more important. Another esteems every day alike" (Rom 14:5) and "Let no one therefore judge you ... with respect to a feast day or a new moon or a Sabbath day, which are a shadow of the things to come" (Col 2:16-17);  and Hebrews says the new covenant "has made the first obsolete" (Heb 8:13).  American Atheists set Exodus 20:8 against Romans 14:5.¹²

The answer.  Two phrases in Matthew 5:17-18 carry the defense:  "to fulfill" and "until all things are accomplished."  On the Christian reading, the law's purposes are completed in Christ, so that its ritual and national provisions (food, calendar, sacrifice) have reached their end, while its moral substance stands.  Jesus' own antitheses in the same chapter ("You have heard ... but I tell you," 5:21-48) intensify some commands and revise the application of others.  This is a theological interpretation, and early Christians argued about it (Acts 15;  Gal 2).  The objection that it is special pleading has some force:  Matthew 5:18's "not one ... pen stroke" is emphatic.  The New Testament authors who said the law's ritual provisions had ended present themselves as following Jesus, not correcting him, and Hebrews argues from Jeremiah's own promise of a "new covenant" (Jer 31:31) that the old one was temporary;  that shows their reading, though not that it is the right reading of Matthew 5:18.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the overall question.  The specific allegations are each of one of the kinds below.

1. Adding to the law. "You shall not add to the word which I command you" (Deut 4:2), yet Jesus says "but I tell you" (Matt 5:22). The prohibition is against human additions to a divine law; the New Testament claims Jesus speaks with divine authority. That claim is the issue, not a contradiction. No actual conflict.
2. The law perfect. "Yahweh's law is perfect" (Ps 19:7), yet "if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second" (Heb 8:7). Hebrews' next verse locates the fault: "For finding fault with them" (Heb 8:8), that is, with the people. Well-supported explanation.
3. Eye for eye. "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" (Exod 21:24) against "Don't resist him who is evil" (Matt 5:39). The Mosaic rule is a sentencing principle for courts: the case it belongs to is decided "as ... the judges allow" (Exod 21:22), and its repetition in Deuteronomy follows "the judges shall make diligent inquisition" (Deut 19:18). Jesus forbids personal retaliation. American Atheists list this under "Personal Injury."¹² Well-supported explanation.
4. Images. "You shall not make for yourselves an idol" (Exod 20:4), yet God commands cherubim on the ark (Exod 25:18-20) and a bronze serpent (Num 21:8). The command continues "you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them" (Exod 20:5): it forbids cult images. When Israel later burned incense to the bronze serpent, Hezekiah "broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made" (2 Kgs 18:4). Well-supported explanation.
5. Foods and blood. Genesis 1:29 gives plants for food; Genesis 9:3 adds animals; Leviticus 11 restricts Israel; Mark 7:19 and Acts 10 open all foods. These are successive rules, each said to be given at a stage. Jesus' "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood" (John 6:53) raises a separate interpretive question. A figurative reading connects eating with coming and believing (John 6:35); a sacramental reading connects the saying with the Eucharist. The hearers' shock does not decide between them. Whether this represents a changed covenant practice or figurative language depends on that interpretation. No actual conflict for successive food permissions; plausible but unproved for the interpretation of John 6.
6. Circumcision. Required as the sign of the covenant with Abraham (Gen 17:10), and declared of no value for justification for Gentiles (Gal 5:2). American Atheists list this pair.¹² The New Testament states the change (Acts 15; 1 Cor 7:18-19). No actual conflict, classed as a changed command; see also A05.
7. Eunuchs. A castrated man "shall not enter into Yahweh's assembly" (Deut 23:1), yet Isaiah promises eunuchs who keep the covenant "a memorial and a name better than of sons and of daughters" (Isa 56:5), and the Ethiopian eunuch is baptized (Acts 8:36-38). Isaiah announces a change explicitly. Jesus' saying about those who "made themselves eunuchs for the Kingdom" (Matt 19:12) is about celibacy. Well-supported explanation.
8. The "bastard" law and David's line. "A person born of a forbidden union shall not enter into Yahweh's assembly; even to the tenth generation" (Deut 23:2). David descends from Perez, born of Judah and Tamar, and David is exactly the tenth name from Perez in Ruth's genealogy (Ruth 4:18-22). The union of Judah and Tamar took place long before the law, and the Hebrew term (mamzer) is of uncertain meaning, later applied by the rabbis to the children of incest or adultery. Plausible but unproved.
9. Adultery's penalty. Leviticus prescribes death (Lev 20:10); in John 8 Jesus declines to condemn the woman taken in adultery. The story is missing from the earliest manuscripts of John and is printed in brackets in critical editions. Even taken as authentic, it shows Jesus exposing the accusers (8:7), not repealing the law. No actual conflict.
10. Did God command sacrifice? God commands burnt offerings (Exod 20:24, 29), yet Jeremiah says "I didn't speak to your fathers or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices" (Jer 7:22). The next verse gives what he did command: "Listen to my voice" (Jer 7:23). Hebrew often states a priority as a flat "not this but that": Hosea's "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice" is explained by its second line, "the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings" (Hos 6:6). Well-supported explanation.
11. Who may sacrifice, and childbirth. See E27 for the first. On childbirth: a mother brings a "sin offering" after giving birth (Lev 12:6-7), though fruitfulness is commanded (Gen 1:28). The offering (chatta't) is a purification offering, used even to purify the altar, which commits no sin: Moses "purified the altar ... to make atonement for it" (Lev 8:15). Well-supported explanation.
12. Sabbath-breakers. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's page on punishing Sabbath-breakers cites only Pentateuch verses that agree (Exod 31:14-15; 35:2; Num 15:32-36) and objects to the penalty. That is a moral objection, not a contradiction. No actual conflict.
13. Idol meat and intermarriage are treated at A05 and E25.

L03: Divorce and remarriage

The texts.  Moses permits a man to divorce his wife with a written certificate (Deut 24:1-2).  In Mark, Jesus says "Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her" (Mark 10:11), without exception;  Luke likewise (16:18).  In Matthew, "whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery" (Matt 19:9;  also 5:32).  Paul, after quoting the Lord, adds that if an unbelieving spouse leaves, "The brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases" (1 Cor 7:15).

The answer.  Jesus himself explains the change from Moses:  "For your hardness of heart, he wrote you this commandment" (Mark 10:5).  The harder question is Mark and Matthew.  Matthew's exception clause is either an addition by Matthew (or his tradition) to apply Jesus' teaching to cases of adultery, or a statement of what Mark's hearers took for granted:  under the law adultery was a capital crime (Lev 20:10), and a marriage already broken by it was not in view.  Paul distinguishes the Lord's command (7:10) from his own ruling on a case the Lord did not address (7:12-15).

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  Mark's absolute wording and Matthew's exception differ.  Whether Matthew states an implicit exception or adds one is not provable, and Christian churches have disagreed on divorce for this very reason.

L04: Marriage, celibacy and polygamy

Marriage is good (Gen 2:18-24;  Heb 13:4), and Paul says "it is good for them if they remain even as I am" (1 Cor 7:8), unmarried.  Paul gives his reason:  "the present distress" (7:26) and undivided service (7:32-35);  and he says that whoever marries "has not sinned" (7:28).  Preference for celibacy in a crisis is not condemnation of marriage, and 1 Timothy 4:3 condemns those who "forbid marriage."  On polygamy:  the patriarchs and kings practiced it;  the law regulated it and forbade kings to "multiply wives" (Deut 17:17);  and Genesis 2:24's "the two shall become one flesh," quoted by Jesus, sets the pattern of one man and one woman, which the New Testament requires of church leaders (1 Tim 3:2).  The Old Testament narrates polygamy without endorsing it and shows its consequences (Gen 16, 29-30;  1 Kgs 11).  Verdict:  no actual conflict for marriage and celibacy;  plausible but unproved for polygamy, which the Old Testament permits in practice and the New Testament does not.

L05: Oaths

The law requires oaths sworn by God's name to be kept (Deut 6:13;  Num 30:2), Paul swears ("before God, I'm not lying," Gal 1:20), and God swears (Heb 6:13-17).  Jesus says "don't swear at all" (Matt 5:34), and James repeats it (5:12).  Jesus' target is the system of evasive oaths he describes in Matthew 23:16-22, where swearing "by the temple" was held not to bind;  his point is that speech should be truthful without oaths ("Let your 'Yes' be 'Yes,'" 5:37).  Paul's solemn affirmations do not use the forbidden formulas.  The Quaker reading, that all oaths are forbidden, is also a fair reading of Jesus' absolute words.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

L06: Children punished for parents' sins, or each for his own

The texts.  God visits "the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me" (Exod 20:5).  The law also says "neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers" (Deut 24:16), and Ezekiel:  "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father" (Ezek 18:20).  American Atheists list this pair under "Punishing Crime."¹²

The answer.  The texts speak of different things.  Deuteronomy 24:16 is a rule for human courts, which 2 Kings 14:6 shows being applied.  Exodus 20:5 describes God's dealings with generations "of those who hate me," that is, descendants who continue in their fathers' sin.  Ezekiel 18 answers a proverb the exiles used to deny their own guilt ("The fathers have eaten sour grapes," 18:2):  each is judged for his own sin.  Original sin (Rom 5:12) concerns the inherited condition of death, not a court's verdict.  On who was to blame for the first sin, Romans 5:12 says sin entered "through one man," and 1 Timothy says "Adam wasn't deceived, but the woman, being deceived, has fallen into disobedience" (1 Tim 2:14).  Being deceived and being responsible are different:  Genesis has Adam eat knowingly and be judged for listening to his wife (Gen 3:6, 3:17).  Sirach 25:24, "The beginning of sin came from a woman" (Sir 25:24), is in the Catholic and Orthodox canons, not the Protestant one, and says the same as 1 Timothy about the order of events.

What remains.  Two narratives sit uneasily with Deuteronomy 24:16:  Achan's family is killed with him (Josh 7:24-25), and seven of Saul's descendants are executed for Saul's crime against the Gibeonites (2 Sam 21:1-9).  Neither was a court applying Deuteronomy, so Deuteronomy 24:16 does not cover them.  But they must be measured against Ezekiel 18:20, which states God's own principle, not a court's.  The two cases differ.  Achan's sentence is a divine command ("shall be burned with fire, he and all that he has," Josh 7:15), and the stolen goods were hidden in the family tent (7:21-22), so the text may assume the household's complicity, though it does not say so.  Saul's descendants were handed over by David at the Gibeonites' demand (2 Sam 21:3-9);  God does not command it, and the end of the famine afterward (21:14) is a report of what followed, which a reader may take as approval but which the text does not call approval.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for the statements;  the two narratives remain a real moral objection, and Achan's family is the sharper case because the order is God's.

L07: Who will be saved: God's desire, hardening, free will, perseverance, the unforgivable sin

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists thirteen pairs here.  Some are theological tensions that Christians themselves have debated for centuries;  others dissolve on reading.

1. Does God want all saved? God "desires all people to be saved" (1 Tim 2:4) and is "not wishing that anyone should perish" (2 Pet 3:9); yet "he has mercy on whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires" (Rom 9:18), and John quotes Isaiah on blinded eyes (12:40). This is the old question of predestination and free will (also "free," "force"). Paul raises the objection himself, "Why does he still find fault?" (Rom 9:19), and does not solve it in human terms. On who blinds unbelievers, God (John 12:40; 2 Thess 2:11) or "the god of this world" (2 Cor 4:4), the texts use the same double agency as Job and the census (D03, S05). The texts are not a contradiction in the sense of two incompatible reports; they are a theological tension the Bible states openly. Unresolved as theology.
2. A ransom for many or for all. "a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45); "a ransom for all" (1 Tim 2:6). Paul uses "the many" and "all" for the same group in one argument: "by the trespass of the one the many died" and "through one trespass, all men were condemned" (Rom 5:15, 5:18). "Many" contrasts with the one, not with all. Well-supported explanation.
3. Can one fall from grace? "You have fallen away from grace" (Gal 5:4) and the warnings of Hebrews 6:4-6, against "no one will snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:28). Christians divide on perseverance; the texts can be read as warnings that identify those who were never truly secure, or as real possibilities. Unresolved as theology.
4. The unforgivable sin. "the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven" (Matt 12:31), against forgiveness for all who confess (1 John 1:9). The context of Matthew 12 is attributing the Spirit's work to Satan, a settled refusal of the means of forgiveness; 1 John 1:9 promises forgiveness to those who confess. Plausible but unproved.
5. Calling on the Lord. "whoever will call on Yahweh's name shall be saved" (Joel 2:32), against "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter" (Matt 7:21). Sincere calling and empty profession. No actual conflict.
6. Thieves in heaven. The criminal on the cross is promised paradise (Luke 23:43), yet "thieves" will not inherit the kingdom (1 Cor 6:10). Paul's next verse: "Some of you were such, but you were washed" (1 Cor 6:11). No actual conflict.
7. Is the unbelieving spouse saved? The unbelieving husband "is sanctified" by the believing wife (1 Cor 7:14), yet "how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband?" (1 Cor 7:16). The same paragraph uses "sanctified," set apart, for a status that is not salvation. No actual conflict.
8. The Jews. "the children of the Kingdom will be thrown out" (Matt 8:12); "all Israel will be saved" (Rom 11:26). Matthew warns those who reject Jesus; Romans 11 speaks of a future turning of Israel as a people. Plausible but unproved.
9. Many descendants, or few left. Abraham's offspring will be as the stars (Gen 22:17); if Israel turns to idols "you will be left few in number" (Deut 4:27). A promise to Abraham and a conditional warning to a generation. No actual conflict.
10. Are confessors "of God"? Whoever confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh "is of God" (1 John 4:2), yet demons acknowledge Jesus (Mark 1:24). First John states a test for teachers in the church; the Gospels show demons recognizing Jesus in terror, which James says is not faith (Jas 2:19). No actual conflict.
11. The wicked as ransom. "The wicked is a ransom for the righteous" (Prov 21:18), against Christ the ransom. A proverb about the wicked suffering the disaster the righteous escape, and a doctrine of atonement, use one word in two senses. No actual conflict.

L08: Is anyone righteous? Do Christians sin?

"There is no one righteous; no, not one" (Rom 3:10, quoting Ps 14), yet Job is "blameless and upright" (Job 1:1), Zechariah and Elizabeth "were both righteous before God" (Luke 1:6), and Lot is "righteous Lot" (2 Pet 2:7).  Romans 3 speaks of standing before God's judgment without grace;  the others of a life of covenant faithfulness.  Luke 1:6 itself says they walked "blamelessly in all the commandments and ordinances," which included the sacrifices for sin.  First John says "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves" (1 John 1:8) and "Whoever is born of God doesn't commit sin" (1 John 3:9);  the Greek present in 3:9 (hamartian ou poiei) is often read as a continuing practice.  The tense alone does not establish that limit: 1:8 also uses a present, for having sin, and 3:9 adds that the person "can't sin."  The contextual support is the contrast between doing righteousness and doing sin (3:7-10), together with the provision for Christians who sin (2:1).  Reading 3:9 as a description of a life's allegiance is reasonable, but its absolute wording remains stronger than that paraphrase.  David "did that which was right ... except only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite" (1 Kgs 15:5), which states its own exception, though not every exception:  Samuel also records the census, after which David says "I have sinned greatly in that which I have done" (2 Sam 24:10).  The summary in Kings judges David's loyalty to Yahweh in the terms Kings uses for every king, chiefly worship;  as a list of David's sins it is incomplete, and a reader may fairly call it generous.  "Righteous Lot" (2 Pet 2:7) is set against Sodom, "very distressed by the lustful life of the wicked," and Genesis narrates without approval both his offer of his daughters to the mob (Gen 19:8) and his drunkenness (19:30-36).  "Righteous" there is a comparison with Sodom, not a claim that Lot was blameless;  the moral objection to Genesis 19:8 stands.  Jesus' "No one is good except one—God" (Mark 10:18) is a question to a man who called him good.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation for righteous people who still commit sins; plausible but unproved for the absolute claims in 1 John 3:6-9.

L09: Christology set against itself

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists eleven pairs on who Jesus is.

1. Is Jesus God? John's Gospel says "the Word was God" (John 1:1) and has Jesus say "the Father is greater than I" (John 14:28). The same author wrote both, and Christian doctrine (one God in three persons; the Son's full deity and full humanity) is an attempt to account for exactly these texts. A reader who rejects that doctrine sees a tension; the texts do not show the author contradicting himself in his own terms. Plausible but unproved.
2. His knowledge and power. Jesus does not know "that day or that hour" (Mark 13:32); "he could do no mighty work there" because of unbelief (Mark 6:5); after the resurrection "All authority has been given to me" (Matt 28:18). Limited knowledge in his earthly life is part of the New Testament's own account (Luke 2:52; Phil 2:7). Plausible but unproved.
3. "Why do you call me good?" Treated in L08. No actual conflict.
4. The only Son, and many sons of God. "his only born Son" (John 3:16) and the "sons of God" in Job, Adam called "the son of God" (Luke 3:38), Israel "my son" (Exod 4:22). John's monogenēs marks a unique relationship; the others use "son" for created or covenant relationships. No actual conflict.
5. Firstborn. Israel is God's firstborn (Exod 4:22), Ephraim is "my firstborn" (Jer 31:9), Jesus is "the firstborn of all creation" (Col 1:15). "Firstborn" is a title of rank: Ephraim was not Joseph's first son, and God says of David's heir, "I will also appoint him my firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth" (Ps 89:27). Well-supported explanation.
6. The first and the last. Yahweh says "I am the first. I am also the last" (Isa 48:12), and Jesus says it in Revelation 22:13. The New Testament is identifying Jesus with Yahweh, which is a claim, not an inconsistency. No actual conflict.
7. Who created? God creates (Gen 1:1); "All things were made through him" (John 1:3; Col 1:16). Agency "through" the Son is explicit. No actual conflict.
8. Only God is holy, yet be holy. "you only are holy" (Rev 15:4) and "be holy" (Lev 11:44). Holiness belongs to God and is derived by his people. No actual conflict.
9. Who is greatest? Solomon's wisdom (1 Kgs 3:12), John the Baptist among those "born of women" (Matt 11:11), and greater things said of Jesus, are superlatives in different respects. No actual conflict.
10. Are all God's children? All people are God's "offspring" (Acts 17:29) and believers become children of God "through faith" (Gal 3:26). Creation and adoption. No actual conflict.
11. Does Jesus judge? Treated in M26.

L10: Is death final? Is there a hell?

Job says "he who goes down to Sheol will come up no more" (Job 7:9), and Ecclesiastes says "the dead don't know anything" (Eccl 9:5);  Daniel and Jesus speak of resurrection and judgment (Dan 12:2;  John 5:28-29).  American Atheists set Job 7:9 against John 5:28-29.¹²  Job's line is a sufferer's lament within a debate, and Job later asks "If a man dies, will he live again?" (Job 14:14).  Ecclesiastes speaks of life "under the sun."  The Old Testament's hope of resurrection develops over time and is clearest late (Isa 26:19;  Dan 12:2).  A developing view is not two flat contradictions, but it is fair to say that Job 7:9, read alone, denies a return from the grave.  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's page on hell adds a harder question:  texts that speak of eternal punishment ("These will go away into eternal punishment," Matt 25:46), texts that say the wicked "shall perish" and "vanish like smoke" (Ps 37:20), and texts that speak of Christ's death "for the whole world" (1 John 2:2).  Christians themselves divide here.  Traditional teaching reads "perish" as ruin within endless punishment;  conditional immortality reads "eternal punishment" as a destruction that is final;  universalists read "the whole world" as the eventual scope of salvation, and others read 1 John 2:2 as the offer, not the outcome.  Each view must explain the texts emphasized by the others; that disagreement is not settled by choosing one English meaning for "perish" or "eternal."  Verdict:  plausible but unproved for Job and Ecclesiastes against the resurrection;  unresolved as to the nature of final punishment.

L11: Church order: women's speech and leadership, hair, tongues, the foundation, the word "father"

1. Women silent? "Let the wives be quiet in the assemblies" (1 Cor 14:34), yet in the same letter "every woman praying or prophesying with her head uncovered" (1 Cor 11:5) assumes that women prayed and prophesied aloud. Paul did not mean total silence, and the context of chapter 14 is orderly questioning (14:35). Some manuscripts place 14:34-35 after verse 40, which Bruce Metzger calls "attempts to find a more appropriate location in the context for Paul's directive concerning women."³² Plausible but unproved.
2. Women leaders. Phoebe is a "servant" or "deacon" (diakonos) of the church (Rom 16:1), Junia is "notable among the apostles" (Rom 16:7), and Priscilla instructs Apollos (Acts 18:26); 1 Timothy 2:12 says "I don't permit a woman to teach, nor to exercise authority over a man." Whether 1 Timothy is Paul's, and what its prohibition covers, are debated; the sibling The Authorship of Paul's Disputed Letters covers the first. Unresolved as a question of church order.
3. Long hair. A Nazirite lets his hair grow (Num 6:5), but "if a man has long hair, it is a dishonor to him" (1 Cor 11:14). The Nazirite's hair was a special sign, exceptional by design. No actual conflict.
4. Tongues. Paul wishes all spoke in tongues (1 Cor 14:5) and also limits tongues without interpretation (14:9, 27-28). Encouragement and regulation. No actual conflict.
5. The foundation. "no one can lay any other foundation than that which has been laid, which is Jesus Christ" (1 Cor 3:11); "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone" (Eph 2:20). One metaphor used two ways. No actual conflict.
6. Calling no one "father." "Call no man on the earth your father" (Matt 23:9), yet Paul says "I became your father through the Good News" (1 Cor 4:15). Jesus' saying is aimed at religious titles that set teachers above others (23:8-12). Plausible but unproved.

L12: Wisdom sayings and commands set against each other

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists thirty pages on maxims of conduct, and American Atheists add one pair.  Most are proverbs or exhortations aimed at different situations, which is how proverbs work.  The Bible itself places two opposite proverbs side by side to make the point:  "Don't answer a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes" (Prov 26:4-5).  Each item below gives the context that shows the two sides are about different things.

1. Believe everything?  Love "believes all things" (1 Cor 13:7) describes love's generosity toward people;  "test the spirits" (1 John 4:1) concerns teaching.

2. Bear others' burdens?  "Bear one another's burdens" (Gal 6:2) and "each man will bear his own burden" (Gal 6:5):  the first is help in trouble, the second is answerability before God, in one paragraph.

3. Childlike or not?  Become like children in humility and trust (Matt 18:3-4);  do not be children in understanding (1 Cor 14:20).

4. Foolish?  The cross looks foolish to the world (1 Cor 1:21);  do not walk as fools (Eph 5:15).

5. Calling someone a fool.  Jesus forbids contemptuous insult in anger (Matt 5:22) and himself calls the Pharisees "blind fools" (Matt 23:17) in prophetic rebuke.  Matthew 5:22 concerns anger and insult; chapter 23 is a public rebuke.  That supplies a possible distinction between contempt and warranted judgment, but both passages use the same Greek word for "fool," so vocabulary does not settle where the line lies.  Plausible but unproved.

6. Happiness.  "A cheerful heart makes good medicine" (Prov 17:22);  "Sorrow is better than laughter" (Eccl 7:3).  Different moods for different times (Eccl 3:4).

7. Following the heart.  "walk in the ways of your heart" (Eccl 11:9) continues "but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment."  The verse qualifies itself.

8. Money.  "money is the answer for all things" (Eccl 10:19) is a cynical observation;  "the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil" (1 Tim 6:10) is about love of money.

9. Material concerns.  "Don't be anxious" (Matt 6:31) is about worry;  providing for one's family (1 Tim 5:8) is duty.

10. Pleasing people.  Please your neighbor for his good (Rom 15:2);  do not seek human approval in place of God's (Gal 1:10).

11. Public prayer.  Do not pray to be seen (Matt 6:5-6);  pray everywhere (1 Tim 2:8).  Motive, not place.

12. Good works seen.  Let your light shine "that they may see your good works and glorify your Father" (Matt 5:16);  do not do righteousness "to be seen by them" (Matt 6:1).  Motive again, in the same sermon.

13. Thinking for oneself.  "Test all things" (1 Thess 5:21) and "don't lean on your own understanding" (Prov 3:5) concern different things:  examination of claims and self-reliance against God.

14. Unseen things.  Faith is about things not seen (Heb 11:1);  Colossians 2:18 warns against someone "dwelling in the things which he has not seen," visionary claims.  Different targets.

15. Is wisdom good, and does it make one happy?  Proverbs praises wisdom (Prov 4:7;  3:13);  Ecclesiastes says "in much wisdom is much grief" (Eccl 1:18);  Paul says God will destroy "the wisdom of the wise" (1 Cor 1:19), meaning worldly wisdom opposed to God.  Ecclesiastes is a book-length argument about the limits of wisdom "under the sun."

16. Who is wiser?  The children of this world are "wiser" in their own generation (Luke 16:8):  shrewder in worldly affairs, as the parable of the dishonest manager shows.

17. Discussing faith.  Be ready to give an answer (1 Pet 3:15);  do not welcome a false teacher who comes to spread his doctrine (2 John 10).

18. Rejoicing over enemies.  "The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance" (Ps 58:10), against "Don't rejoice when your enemy falls" (Prov 24:17).  The psalm rejoices in justice done;  the proverb forbids gloating over personal enemies.  The proposed distinction is reasonable, but the psalm does not expressly limit its rejoicing in that way.  Plausible but unproved; see L13.

19. Tearing clothes.  Mourning by tearing clothes (2 Kgs 22:19) and "Tear your heart and not your garments" (Joel 2:13):  Joel calls for inward repentance over outward show, the same "not this but that" idiom as Hosea 6:6.

20. Serving God alone.  "You shall worship the Lord your God, and you shall serve him only" (Matt 4:10) concerns worship;  slaves serving masters (Eph 6:5) is labor, "as to Christ."

21. Usury.  The law forbids charging interest to the poor of Israel (Exod 22:25);  in a parable the master says his servant should at least have deposited his money with bankers (Matt 25:27).  A parable's character is not an endorsement, and the law concerned loans to needy fellow Israelites (Deut 23:20 allowed interest from foreigners).

22. Perfume.  Perfume is praised (Prov 27:9), but the holy incense recipe was not to be copied for personal use (Exod 30:37), and the adulteress's perfumed bed (Prov 7:17) is a scene of seduction.  The use, not the substance, is judged.

23. Dancing.  Israel danced in worship (Exod 15:20;  2 Sam 6:14);  dancing at the golden calf (Exod 32:19) and Herodias' daughter's dance (Mark 6:22) appear in sinful contexts.  No text forbids dancing.

24. Gambling.  Casting lots to discern God's will (Josh 18:6;  Acts 1:26) is not gambling for gain.  The Bible's warnings about hasty riches (Prov 13:11) concern greed.  It does not mention gambling directly.

25. Astrology.  Divination by stars is condemned (Isa 47:13);  the heavenly lights are for "signs to mark seasons" (Gen 1:14), and the wise men followed a star (Matt 2).  Signs in the sky as God's acts are not astrology as a practice of divination.  The Matthew story is about Gentile astrologers being led to Jesus, not about approving their art.

26. Magic.  Moses' signs (Exod 4) and the bronze serpent are presented as God's acts, not as techniques;  sorcery is forbidden (Deut 18:10-12).  The distinction between miracle and magic is the Bible's own, though a skeptic may reject it.

27. Coveting.  "covet earnestly the best gifts" (1 Cor 12:31, KJV) uses zēloō, while the Greek commandment uses epithymeō.  Different words alone would not settle the moral question: Jesus uses epithymeō for his own desire to share the Passover (Luke 22:15).  The objects of desire distinguish the cases: the commandment forbids desiring another person's spouse or possessions, while Paul urges desire for gifts that benefit the church (1 Cor 14:1-5).

28. Stealing.  The Israelites "asked" the Egyptians for silver and gold (Exod 12:35-36) and the narrative says the Egyptians granted their request (Exod 12:36).  Reading the gifts as compensation for slavery is an interpretation, not what those verses explicitly call them.  Numbers 31 separately presents war plunder as divinely allotted, rather than as prohibited theft.  Rachel's theft of the teraphim (Gen 31:19) is narrated, not approved.  The moral question about plunder is real;  the commandment against theft is not contradicted.

29. Alcohol.  Wine is a gift (Ps 104:15) and Jesus made it (John 2);  drunkenness is condemned (Prov 23:29-35);  priests on duty and Nazirites abstained (Lev 10:9;  Num 6:3).  Rules for special roles, a warning against excess, and a general permission.

30. Signs in the heavens.  Jesus foretells signs in the sky (Luke 21:11);  Jeremiah says "don't be dismayed at the signs of the sky" (Jer 10:2), as the nations are.  The first predicts portents;  the second forbids fearing pagan omens.

31. Joy or detachment.  American Atheists set "eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart" (Eccl 9:7) against "those who rejoice, as though they didn't rejoice" (1 Cor 7:30).¹²  Paul gives his reason two verses earlier, "the time is short" (1 Cor 7:29), and his point is that no earthly good should hold a believer, "for the mode of this world passes away" (1 Cor 7:31).  Enjoyment and detachment from enjoyment are compatible.

Verdict:  no actual conflict for the other twenty-nine; plausible but unproved for items 5 and 18, where the proposed distinctions need interpretation.

L13: Lying, killing, enemies, love and hate, parents

1. Lying. The Hebrew midwives deceived Pharaoh (Exod 1:19), and "Because the midwives feared God, he gave them families" (Exod 1:21); Rahab hid the spies (Josh 2:4-6) and is commended by James for receiving them (Jas 2:25). The texts commend their fear of God and their protection of the innocent; they do not commend lying as such, though they do not condemn it either. The commandment forbids "false testimony against your neighbor" (Exod 20:16), testimony in court. Whether lying to a murderer is wrong is a real moral question on which Christians disagree. On Jesus: in the critical Greek text he says "I am not going up to this feast" (ἐγὼ οὐκ ἀναβαίνω, John 7:8) and then goes up secretly (7:10). Metzger reports that the reading "not yet" "was introduced at an early date ... in order to alleviate the inconsistency between ver. 8 and ver. 10."³² The context gives the sense: his brothers urged him to go and "reveal yourself to the world" (7:4); he refuses to go up in that way, "because my time is not yet fulfilled," and then goes "not publicly, but as it were in secret" (John 7:10). Plausible but unproved.
2. Killing. "You shall not murder" (Exod 20:13) uses ratsach. That word is not restricted to intentional murder: the same root describes accidental killing in Deuteronomy 4:42 and the manslayer in Numbers 35:11. The contextual reason the commandment does not prohibit all killing is that the same law code prescribes death penalties in the next chapter (Exod 21:12). That the law permits execution and war is a moral question (L18, D14), not a contradiction. No actual conflict.
3. Enemies. Love your enemy (Matt 5:44; Prov 25:21), against the imprecatory psalms that ask God to destroy the psalmist's enemies (Ps 109; 139:21-22). The psalms are prayers handing vengeance to God (Rom 12:19 quotes the principle), not instructions for personal action; but their spirit is hard to square with Jesus' teaching, as many Christian readers have felt. Plausible but unproved.
4. Love and hate. "If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother ... he cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26, KJV). The Greek verb is μισεῖ, "hates"; the World English Bible softens it to "disregard." Matthew's parallel gives the sense: "He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me" (Matt 10:37). American Atheists set this verse against "Honor your father and your mother" (Exod 20:12).¹² Genesis supplies a clearer parallel for the idiom: Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah (Gen 29:30), and the next verse calls Leah "hated" (29:31). That supports a comparative reading without requiring every biblical use of "hate," including judgments on Edom, to mean only "love less." Well-supported explanation. The same applies to the page on honoring parents: Jesus' sharp words to his mother (John 2:4) and his teaching that disciples come before family do not deny the commandment, which he upheld (Mark 7:10-13).
5. Nonbelievers. Deuteronomy commands death for a family member who entices to idolatry (Deut 13:6-10); the New Testament commands love of neighbor. The first is a law for Israel as a nation under God's direct rule; the New Testament church has no such law. Changed command, and a moral objection. No actual conflict.
6. Marrying unbelievers. Stay married to an unbelieving spouse (1 Cor 7:12-14); "Don't be unequally yoked with unbelievers" (2 Cor 6:14). Remaining in an existing marriage and entering new partnerships are different. No actual conflict.
7. Cursing. "Bless those who persecute you; bless, and don't curse" (Rom 12:14); "let him be cursed" of anyone preaching a false gospel (Gal 1:8). Personal retaliation against persecutors, and a solemn judgment on false teaching. Plausible but unproved.
8. Tax collectors. Jesus ate with tax collectors (Mark 2:15-16) and said an unrepentant brother should be treated "as a Gentile or a tax collector" (Matt 18:17). Outside the fellowship, and so a person to be sought, as Jesus sought tax collectors. Plausible but unproved.
9. God's law or human law. "We must obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29) and "be in subjection to the higher authorities" (Rom 13:1). A general duty with an exception when the two conflict. No actual conflict.

L14: Do the righteous prosper and the wicked perish?

Proverbs promises long life to the righteous and short life to the wicked (Prov 10:27;  12:21);  Job asks "Why do the wicked live, become old, yes, and grow mighty in power?" (Job 21:7), and says God "destroys the blameless and the wicked" (Job 9:22);  Psalm 73 complains of the prosperity of the wicked;  Ecclesiastes sees a righteous man perish in his righteousness (Eccl 7:15).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists six pages on this, and American Atheists set "A good man shall obtain favor from Yahweh" (Prov 12:2) against God's words about Job, "you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause" (Job 2:3).¹²  These are not contradictory reports but a debate the Bible stages on purpose.  Proverbs states general patterns of a well-ordered life.  Job and Ecclesiastes challenge their use as a rule, and the book of Job ends with God rebuking Job's friends, who had defended the rule:  "you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has" (Job 42:7).  Psalm 73 resolves the complaint by looking to the end (73:17).  Proverbs 16:7 ("When a man's ways please Yahweh, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him") against 2 Timothy 3:12 ("all who desire to live godly ... will suffer persecution") is the same pattern.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.  The Bible contains the disagreement and marks which side it endorses.

L15: Riches: blessing or danger

Wealth is a blessing to the righteous (Ps 112:1-3;  Prov 10:22), and "it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter into God's Kingdom" (Matt 19:24).  Both are true in their contexts:  wealth as a gift, and wealth as a snare.  Jesus' saying is followed by "with God all things are possible" (19:26), and rich disciples appear in the Gospels (Joseph of Arimathea, Matt 27:57).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

L16: Prayer: asked and not given; prayed for and forbidden

"Ask, and it will be given you" (Matt 7:7) and "All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive" (Matt 21:22) are absolute in form.  Elsewhere the New Testament states conditions:  "if we ask anything according to his will" (1 John 5:14);  "You ask, and don't receive, because you ask with wrong motives" (Jas 4:3).  Paul prayed three times for relief and was refused (2 Cor 12:8-9).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible also sets "I exhort ... that petitions ... be made for all men" (1 Tim 2:1) against God's command to Jeremiah, "Therefore don't pray for this people" (Jer 7:16), which is a specific prophetic sign of coming judgment.  Its page on whether Christians know how to pray sets the Lord's Prayer against "we don't know how to pray as we ought" (Rom 8:26):  a form of words given, and an admission of weakness in praying.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The promise texts are absolute in their wording, and the conditions come from other texts;  a reader who takes Matthew 21:22 literally will find it false in experience, which the New Testament itself acknowledges in Paul's case.

L17: When will the end come, and will all see it?

The texts.  Jesus says "there are some standing here who will in no way taste death until they see God's Kingdom come with power" (Mark 9:1) and, after describing the Son of Man "coming in clouds" (13:26), "this generation will not pass away until all these things happen" (Mark 13:30).  He adds, "But of that day or that hour no one knows" (Mark 13:32).  The letters speak of the end as near:  "the coming of the Lord is at hand" (Jas 5:8);  "it is the final hour" (1 John 2:18);  "The end of all things is near" (1 Pet 4:7).  American Atheists list these under "The End of the World" and call the passages contradictions because the world did not end.¹²

Why it is a case.  This is less a contradiction between texts than a charge of failed prediction.  The texts do contain an internal tension:  a coming within "this generation," and an unknown day.

The answers.

1. "These things" are the fall of Jerusalem. Mark 13 begins with the disciples asking when the temple will be destroyed (13:1-4). The temple fell in AD 70, within a generation. On this reading "this generation" refers to the events of the siege, and "that day" in 13:32 to the final coming. The difficulty is that 13:24-27, the coming of the Son of Man, stands between them.
2. The kingdom "come with power." Mark 9:1 is followed immediately by the transfiguration (9:2), and early interpreters read it as its fulfillment; others point to the resurrection or Pentecost.
3. Imminence without a date. The letters' "near" expresses readiness, not a calendar, and 2 Peter addresses the delay directly: "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow concerning his promise" (2 Pet 3:8-9). That letter shows that early Christians noticed the problem.
4. A failed expectation. On the critical reading, Jesus expected the end within his hearers' lifetimes and was mistaken.

A sharper verse belongs here too.  Sending out the Twelve, Jesus says "you will not have gone through the cities of Israel until the Son of Man has come" (Matt 10:23);  later, "This Good News of the Kingdom will be preached in the whole world for a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come" (Matt 24:14).  Readings that keep it true take the coming as the resurrection, as judgment on Jerusalem in AD 70, or as a saying about the continuing mission to Israel up to the end;  each fits some of Matthew's usage and none is forced by the verse.  Matthew 24:14 and 10:23 can both be true if "the coming" in 10:23 is not the end in 24:14, which is the point in dispute.

Verdict:  unresolved.  Answers 1 and 2 have real textual footholds, and answer 3 fits the letters.  Mark 13:30 remains the hardest single verse in the register for the view that Jesus made no dated prediction.  The sibling Eschatology and Israel treats Mark 13 in detail, including the nineteen uses of "this generation" in the first three Gospels.  On "Will all see it?":  "every eye will see him" (Rev 1:7) and "the world will see me no more" (John 14:19) refer to different times, the second to the period after the resurrection;  no actual conflict.  On the earth's permanence:  "the earth remains forever" (Eccl 1:4) is a contrast with passing generations, and "the elements will be dissolved with fervent heat" (2 Pet 3:10), listed by American Atheists, is a prophecy of renewal ("new heavens and a new earth," 3:13);  plausible but unproved.

L18: Slavery, capital punishment, homosexual acts, strangers and other moral-law objections

These pages object to what the law commands rather than to inconsistency.

1. Slavery. The law regulated slavery, including permanent slavery of foreigners (Lev 25:44-46), while forbidding kidnapping (Exod 21:16) and the return of runaway slaves (Deut 23:15-16). The New Testament instructs slaves and masters (Eph 6:5-9), lists "slave-traders" among sinners (1 Tim 1:10), and asks Philemon to receive Onesimus "no longer as a slave, but more than a slave, a beloved brother" (Phlm 16). There is no logical contradiction, and the moral objection is real. The sibling Slavery in Ancient Israel treats it.
2. Capital punishment. The law commands it for many crimes; the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's page lists them without a counter-text, except the story of the adulteress in John 8 (L02, item 9).
3. Homosexual acts. Leviticus 20:13 prescribes death; King Asa "put away the sodomites out of the land" (1 Kgs 15:12), the cult prostitutes (Hebrew qedeshim, "consecrated ones"), expelling rather than executing them. The second is a king's act against a cultic practice, narrated with approval, not a law that replaces the first. No actual conflict.
4. Strangers. Love the resident foreigner (Lev 19:34) is set against the treatment of foreign nations in war; different categories (E25). The page also cites "The stranger who comes near shall be put to death" (Num 1:51). The Hebrew there is zar, an outsider to the tabernacle service, meaning any non-Levite who handles the sanctuary, not ger, the resident foreigner of Leviticus 19:34. No actual conflict.
5. Fruit trees in war. Deuteronomy forbids cutting down fruit trees in a siege (Deut 20:19), yet Elisha tells Israel's kings that in Moab "shall fell every good tree" (2 Kgs 3:19). Deuteronomy 20's siege laws concern cities Israel would besiege and hold; the Moabite campaign was a punitive war against a rebel vassal, and Elisha's word is an oracle. Plausible but unproved. A reader may fairly see a prophet commanding what the law forbade.
6. Sex outside marriage. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's page sets the many condemnations of sexual immorality against passages where captive women were taken as wives (Num 31:18; Deut 21:10-14). Those passages describe marriage under the law of war, which is a moral objection, not a contradiction of the rule against sex outside marriage.

Verdict:  no actual conflict as statements;  classed as moral objections.

Part 15: God, angels and the devil

Twenty-one cases on what the Bible says about God himself.  They come almost entirely from the Skeptic's Annotated Bible, with two headings from American Atheists.  Nearly all of them set a statement about God's nature (he does not change, does not tire, knows all things) against a narrative in which God is described in human terms (he regrets, rests, comes down to see).

Two observations help assess these cases.

1. The same authors wrote both kinds of statement, often side by side. The clearest example is 1 Samuel 15, which says in verse 29 that God "will not lie nor repent," and in verses 11 and 35 that he regretted making Saul king. The Hebrew verb is the same, nicham, in all three verses. Their proximity gives a reason to examine whether the writer intended different senses. Noticing is not the same as reconciling: he may have used the verb in two senses, kept two traditions side by side, or left a tension standing on purpose. Each case below has to show which.
2. The Bible states a rule for reading some of the human-like language. "God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should repent" (Num 23:19). A skeptic may reply that the rule is a later theological filter. It is at least part of the same body of books as the narratives it governs, since Numbers 23:19 is in the Pentateuch, but whether it is older or younger than a given narrative is a question critical scholars answer differently.

Neither fact makes a moral objection go away.  The hardest cases in this part, Jephthah's daughter and the commands of war (D14), are moral objections, and they are classed as such.

D01: Does God change his mind?

The texts.  "God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should repent" (Num 23:19);  "For I, Yahweh, don't change" (Mal 3:6).  Against these:  "Yahweh was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him in his heart" (Gen 6:6), set by the Skeptic's Annotated Bible against "God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good" (Gen 1:31);  "Yahweh turned away from the evil which he said he would do to his people" (Exod 32:14);  "God relented of the disaster which he said he would do to them, and he didn't do it" (Jonah 3:10);  and Hezekiah, told "you will die, and not live" (Isa 38:1), then given fifteen more years (Isa 38:5).

The answer.  Jeremiah states a principle that explains several of these narratives:  "if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do to them" and, in reverse, "if they do that which is evil in my sight ... then I will repent of the good with which I said I would benefit them" (Jer 18:8-10).  On this principle a warning of judgment carries an unstated condition, and God's "repenting" is his consistent response to a change in people.  What does not change is his character and his unconditional promises, which is the context of both Numbers 23:19 (a blessing on Israel Balaam cannot reverse) and 1 Samuel 15:29 (the kingdom will not return to Saul).  Genesis 6:6 does not say the creation was not good when made;  it says God grieved over what people had made of it (6:5).

What remains.  Jeremiah's principle covers threats that are withdrawn when people change:  Exodus 32, Jonah 3 and Hezekiah.  It does not cover the passages where God regrets something he has already done.  Genesis 6:6 grieves over having made humankind, and 1 Samuel 15:11 and 15:35 regret having made Saul king, beside 15:29's "he is not a man, that he should repent."  In 1 Samuel 15 the context supplies a distinction:  verse 29 follows Samuel's announcement that the kingdom is torn from Saul and pairs "repent" with "lie," so it says that God will not take back that sentence, while verses 11 and 35 speak of grief over what Saul had become.  That reading uses the context, but it gives one verb two senses within a few verses.  Readers who take the regret passages literally get a God who learns and reconsiders, the view of "open theism," a minority position among Christian theologians;  classical theism reads them as accommodation to human understanding.  The texts do not settle which reading is right.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for withdrawn threats (Jeremiah 18 states the rule);  plausible but unproved for God's regret in Genesis 6:6 and 1 Samuel 15.

D02: Does God tempt or test? May God be tested?

The texts.  "God can't be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one" (Jas 1:13).  Against this:  "God tested Abraham" (Gen 22:1);  Yahweh "moved David against them" to take the census (2 Sam 24:1);  and Jesus teaches his disciples to pray "Bring us not into temptation" (Matt 6:13).  American Atheists set James 1:13 against Genesis 22:1 in the King James wording, "God did tempt Abraham."¹²  On God being tempted, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets James 1:13 against "You shall not tempt Yahweh your God, as you tempted him in Massah" (Deut 6:16) and against Jesus' temptation in the wilderness;  on whether testing God is allowed, it sets Deuteronomy 6:16 against Gideon's fleece (Judg 6:36-40) and Elijah's contest (1 Kgs 18).

The answer.  The Hebrew of Genesis 22:1 is nissah, "tested," which the World English Bible translates correctly;  the King James "tempt" meant "test" in 1611 English.  The Greek word in James, peirazō, also means both "test" and "tempt," and James uses it in both senses in one chapter:  "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations" (Jas 1:2), that is, trials, and "he himself tempts no one" (1:13), that is, entices to sin, as 1:14 explains ("each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust").  A test that proves faith and a temptation that solicits evil are different acts.  The census is treated at S05.

Testing God in Deuteronomy 6:16 is defined by the event it names:  at Massah, the people "tested Yahweh, saying, 'Is Yahweh among us, or not?'" (Exod 17:7), demanding proof in unbelief.  Gideon asked for a sign in fear and with apology ("Don't let your anger be kindled against me," Judg 6:39);  Elijah acted at God's command (1 Kgs 18:36).  Ahaz refused a sign God offered, saying "I won't tempt Yahweh" (Isa 7:12), and was rebuked for it (7:13), which shows that the Bible's line runs between demanding proof and accepting it.  "God can't be tempted by evil" means that evil holds no attraction for God, which is compatible with people "testing" his patience.  Jesus' temptation by the devil concerns his human nature (Heb 4:15), the same tension as L09.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for testing and temptation, the case turning on a word with two senses that James himself uses both ways.

D03: Is God the author of evil? (Isaiah 45:7, Amos 3:6, Job's afflictions, deafness and blindness)

The texts.  "I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create calamity" (Isa 45:7), which the King James renders "create evil."  "Does evil happen to a city, and Yahweh hasn't done it?" (Amos 3:6).  "Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?" (Job 2:10).  Against these, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets "God is love" (1 John 4:8) and Psalm 5:4, that God takes no pleasure in wickedness.

The answer.  The Hebrew word ra' covers both moral evil and disaster.  In Isaiah 45:7 its pair is shalom, "peace," so the contrast is peace and calamity, not goodness and sin;  the World English Bible translates accordingly.  Amos 3:6 speaks of a disaster befalling a city, in a passage about judgment.  So these verses say that God sends disasters as judgments, which is a claim about providence, not about God doing wrong.

The book of Job is the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's other example:  who brought evil on Job, Satan (Job 2:7) or God ("all the evil that Yahweh had brought on him," Job 42:11)?  The book answers both:  God gives Satan permission ("all that he has is in your power," Job 1:12) and then speaks of Satan having "incited me against him, to ruin him without cause" (Job 2:3).  Satan acts, by God's permission, and the narrator calls the result something God brought.  The same pattern explains the page on who makes people deaf and blind:  God says he "makes one mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind" (Exod 4:11), and Jesus rebukes a "mute and deaf spirit" (Mark 9:25).  A cause under God's rule and God's rule over it are both affirmed.

What remains.  This is the problem of evil, which is a real philosophical objection to theism, but not a contradiction between texts.  The texts consistently affirm that God rules over disaster and that he is good;  how both are true is the question the book of Job itself raises and does not answer in human terms.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation as a textual matter.

D04: Does God lie or send lying spirits?

The texts.  God does not lie (Num 23:19;  Titus 1:2);  "it is impossible for God to lie" (Heb 6:18).  Against these:  Micaiah's vision, in which a spirit volunteers to "be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets," and God says "You will entice him, and will also prevail. Go out and do so" (1 Kgs 22:22);  "If the prophet is deceived and speaks a word, I, Yahweh, have deceived that prophet" (Ezek 14:9);  "God sends them a powerful delusion, that they should believe a lie" (2 Thess 2:11);  Jeremiah's complaints, "Surely you have greatly deceived this people" (Jer 4:10) and "Yahweh, you have persuaded me, and I was persuaded" (Jer 20:7);  and John 7:8-10 (L13, item 1).

The answers.

1. Judicial deception. Each of the main texts is about people who have already rejected the truth. Ezekiel 14 concerns an Israelite who "takes his idols into his heart" and then consults a prophet (Ezek 14:7). Second Thessalonians gives the reason: "because they didn't receive the love of the truth" (2 Thess 2:10). Ahab had already rejected Micaiah's warnings (1 Kgs 22:8). The texts present God giving people over to the falsehood they chose.
2. The truth told openly. In 1 Kings 22, Micaiah tells Ahab the whole vision, including the lying spirit: "Yahweh has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and Yahweh has spoken evil concerning you" (1 Kgs 22:23). Ahab is told the truth and goes to battle anyway.
3. A prophet's complaint. Jeremiah 4:10 and 20:7 are prayers of protest. The verb in 20:7 (pittitani) can mean "persuaded" or "enticed, deceived"; in context Jeremiah complains that God's call overpowered him, not that God told him a falsehood. Jeremiah 4:10 complains about the false prophets' message of peace (Jer 14:13-14), which God had not sent.

What remains.  Answer 1 explains why God might permit or send deception, but the texts still describe God as the source of deceiving spirits or delusions, and "God cannot lie" sits uneasily beside "I, Yahweh, have deceived that prophet."  The distinction between God speaking falsely and God sending judgment through others' falsehood is real, but a reader may think it too fine.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

D05: Does God know everything?

The texts.  "God is greater than our heart, and knows all things" (1 John 3:20);  "there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, Yahweh, you know it altogether" (Ps 139:4);  "Don't I fill heaven and earth?" (Jer 23:24).  Against these, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists seventeen passages, including:  "Where are you?" (Gen 3:9);  Yahweh coming down to see the tower (Gen 11:5) and Sodom, "I will go down now, and see whether their deeds are as bad as the reports which have come to me. If not, I will know" (Gen 18:21);  "now I know that you fear God" (Gen 22:12);  and God testing Israel in the wilderness "to know what was in your heart" (Deut 8:2;  also 13:3;  2 Chr 32:31).

The answer.  On the proposed reading, the questions in Genesis are those of a judge who already knows:  "Where are you?" is followed by "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree ...?" (Gen 3:11), a cross-examination that presumes the answer.  The descent to Babel and to Sodom can similarly be read as a narrative way of saying that God judges on evidence, not hearsay, and Genesis 18 itself makes God disclose his plan before the "investigation" begins (18:17-20).  "Now I know" (Gen 22:12) and "to know what was in your heart" (Deut 8:2) can describe a test that brings out what was hidden in the person, a knowing demonstrated by action; the question is whether that is their sense here.  The same authors make God know the future in detail, as when he tells Abraham his descendants will be enslaved four hundred years (Gen 15:13).

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.  The same books make God foretell events centuries away (Gen 15:13) and know Israel's present inclinations before bringing the people into the land (Deut 31:21).  Those are positive reasons to consider a judicial or demonstrative reading of the questions and tests.  But knowledge of some future events does not itself prove knowledge of everything, and an announced investigation in Genesis 18:20-21 still reads naturally as acquiring information.  The proposed distinction between displaying knowledge and gaining it is an interpretation, not something the verb alone establishes.

D06: Where God dwells; whether God has a body; light or darkness

1. A body? "God is spirit" (John 4:24), against God walking in the garden (Gen 3:8), speaking to Moses "face to face" (Exod 33:11), showing Moses his back (Exod 33:23), and seen by the elders, "Under his feet was like a paved work of sapphire stone" (Exod 24:10). The same chapter that says Moses spoke with God "face to face" says "man may not see me and live" (Exod 33:20), so "face to face" there means direct speech, as Numbers puts it: "mouth to mouth, even plainly, and not in riddles" (Num 12:8). What Israel's leaders and prophets "saw" was a visible manifestation; E02 treats this case in full. Well-supported explanation.
2. Light or darkness? "Yahweh has said that he would dwell in the thick darkness" (1 Kgs 8:12); God dwells "in unapproachable light" (1 Tim 6:16). Both describe God hidden from sight: the cloud on Sinai and in the temple ("Moses came near to the thick darkness where God was," Exod 20:21), and light too bright to approach. No actual conflict.
3. Temples? God chooses the temple for his name (1 Kgs 8:13; 2 Chr 7:12, 16) and "doesn't dwell in temples made with hands" (Acts 17:24). Solomon says the same in his dedication prayer: "heaven and the heaven of heavens can't contain you; how much less this house that I have built!" (1 Kgs 8:27). The temple was where God promised to meet Israel, not a container. No actual conflict.
4. Zion or heaven? "Yahweh has chosen Zion. He has desired it for his habitation" (Ps 132:13), and "you who sit in the heavens" (Ps 123:1). One psalm can say both: "Yahweh is in his holy temple. Yahweh is on his throne in heaven" (Ps 11:4). No actual conflict.

D07: Is God (or Jesus) a God of war or of peace?

The texts.  "Yahweh is a man of war" (Exod 15:3), "who trains my hands to war" (Ps 144:1);  and "the God of peace" (Rom 15:33).  Jesus says "Blessed are the peacemakers" (Matt 5:9) and "Put your sword back into its place" (Matt 26:52), but also "I didn't come to send peace, but a sword" (Matt 10:34), and at the Last Supper "Whoever has none, let him sell his cloak, and buy a sword" (Luke 22:36).

The answer.  "The God of peace" and "a man of war" describe one God who gives peace to his people and fights their enemies;  the Song of the Sea (Exod 15) celebrates deliverance.  Matthew 10:34 explains itself in the next verse:  "For I came to set a man at odds against his father" (Matt 10:35), and Luke's parallel says "division" (Luke 12:51).  The "sword" is the division his message causes in families.  Luke 22:36 is harder.  When the disciples produce two swords, Jesus says "That is enough" (Luke 22:38), which can mean that two are enough for the purpose of fulfilling "He was counted with transgressors" (22:37), or "enough of this talk."  When a disciple uses one that night, Jesus stops him (Luke 22:51) and, in Matthew, says "all those who take the sword will die by the sword" (Matt 26:52).  Most interpreters take the command figuratively, of the hostility the disciples will now face;  but it is an obscure saying.

Verdict:  well-supported explanation for Exodus 15 and Matthew 10;  plausible but unproved for Luke 22:36.

D08: Is God's anger brief or everlasting? Does God love all, hate some, delight in death?

1. How long is God's anger? "his anger is but for a moment. His favor is for a lifetime" (Ps 30:5); "He doesn't retain his anger forever" (Mic 7:18); Israel wandered forty years under God's anger (Num 32:13); and the wicked go "into eternal punishment" (Matt 25:46). Psalm 30 and Micah 7 speak of God's anger toward his own people who return, the subject of both passages; Matthew 25 of final judgment on the unrepentant. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible's first column, "God doesn't get angry," rests on Judith 8:15, which is not in the Protestant canon and in the World English Bible's text says only that God may help or destroy "in such time as he will." No actual conflict.
2. Is God ever furious? "Wrath is not in me" (Isa 27:4), against many verses of wrath. The next words are "but if I should find briers and thorns, I would do battle!" Isaiah 27:2-5 is a song about God's vineyard, Israel, toward which he now has no anger. Well-supported explanation.
3. Does God delight in death? "Yahweh will rejoice over you to cause you to perish and to destroy you" (Deut 28:63), against "Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked?" (Ezek 18:23) and "I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live" (Ezek 33:11). Deuteronomy 28 is the curse section of a covenant and uses the form "as ... so": the certainty of judgment will match the certainty of blessing. Ezekiel speaks of God's desire. A real difference of tone, but not two answers to one question. Plausible but unproved.
4. Does God love everyone? "God so loved the world" (John 3:16) and "God is love" (1 John 4:8), against "You hate all workers of iniquity" (Ps 5:5) and "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated" (Rom 9:13), quoting Malachi 1:2-3. Malachi's "hated" concerns the nations Edom and Israel and contrasts their treatment, including actual judgment on Edom (Mal 1:3-4). The comparison with Luke 14:26 (L13, item 4) cannot reduce this passage to mere preference. Psalm 5:5 is stronger, and the psalms' language of God hating evildoers is not idiom of preference. Christian theology has held that God loves sinners and hates sin, which Psalm 5:5 does not say in those terms. Plausible but unproved.
5. Should we fear God? Dozens of verses command fear of God; "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear" (1 John 4:18). First John speaks of fear of punishment ("because fear has punishment") in one who is secure in God's love; the Old Testament's "fear of Yahweh" is reverence, which the New Testament also commands (1 Pet 2:17), and Jesus says "fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna" (Matt 10:28). Well-supported explanation.
6. Is God merciful? The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets dozens of verses on God's mercy (Exod 34:6; Ps 145:9) against dozens of judgments (1 Sam 15:2-3; Ezek 9:5-6). Exodus 34:6-7 contains both in one sentence: "merciful and gracious ... and he will by no means clear the guilty." The page is a moral objection to the judgments, treated at D14. No actual conflict.

D09: Does God tire, sleep or rest?

"The everlasting God ... doesn't faint. He isn't weary" (Isa 40:28), against "on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed" (Exod 31:17) and "You have wearied me with your iniquities" (Isa 43:24).  Isaiah 43:24 is the same book as Isaiah 40:28 and is plainly figurative:  God is "wearied" in the sense of burdened by Israel's sin, the same verb (yaga') the passage has just used of Israel, "you have been weary of me" (Isa 43:22), and of God, who has not "wearied you with frankincense" (Isa 43:23).  Exodus 31:17's "rested" is shabat, "ceased," and "was refreshed" (vayinnafash) is a figure from human Sabbath rest.  Genesis 2:2's "rested" is the same shabat.  On sleep:  "he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep" (Ps 121:4), against a psalmist's cry, "Wake up! Why do you sleep, Lord?" (Ps 44:23).  The cry is a complaint about God's apparent inaction, in a lament.  On work on the Sabbath:  "My Father is still working, so I am working, too" (John 5:17).  God's "rest" in Genesis 2 is from creating, not from sustaining what he made.  Verdict:  well-supported explanation.

D10: Does God show favoritism?

"God doesn't show favoritism" (Acts 10:34) and "there is no ... respect of persons" with Yahweh (2 Chr 19:7), against "Yahweh respected Abel and his offering" (Gen 4:4) and other cases where God "respects" someone.  The two expressions are different:  "respect of persons" (Hebrew masso panim, 2 Chr 19:7;  Greek prosōpolēmptēs, Acts 10:34) is a legal idiom for partiality in judgment, literally "lifting the face" of a party to a case, as the bribe in 2 Chronicles 19:7 shows.  God's regard for Abel's offering is acceptance of a person on the merits.  The King James Version's "respect" for both misleads English readers.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D11: Is God the author of confusion?

"God is not a God of confusion but of peace" (1 Cor 14:33), against Babel, "there confuse their language" (Gen 11:7), and "God chose the foolish things of the world that he might put to shame those who are wise" (1 Cor 1:27).  First Corinthians 14:33 is about disorder in worship, "as in all the assemblies of the saints";  Genesis 11 is a judgment.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D12: Can God be found? Does God help? Does God forgive?

1. Found? "He who seeks finds" (Matt 7:8), against "They will seek me diligently, but they will not find me" (Prov 1:28). The proverb gives its reason four verses earlier: "Because I have called, and you have refused" (Prov 1:24). Seeking in crisis after refusing wisdom is the case Proverbs describes. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible adds Luke 13:24, "many ... will seek to enter in and will not be able," which concerns those who come too late (13:25). No actual conflict.
2. Help? "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble" (Ps 46:1), against "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Ps 22:1), "You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through" (Lam 3:44), and Isaiah's "I will not hear" (Isa 1:15). Isaiah gives his reason: "Your hands are full of blood." Psalm 22 begins in abandonment and ends saying God "has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted ... but when he cried to him, he heard" (Ps 22:24). The laments describe experience, honestly recorded; they do not deny that God helps, and several of them end by affirming it. Plausible but unproved, since the experience of unanswered prayer is real and the Bible records it without explaining every case.
3. Majesty seen by all? "all flesh shall see it together" (Isa 40:5), against the wicked who "will not see Yahweh's majesty" (Isa 26:10). Isaiah 26:10 speaks of the wicked who, even when shown favor, do not recognize it. No actual conflict.
4. Forgiveness? God forgives those who turn (2 Chr 7:14; 1 John 1:9); Joshua tells Israel "You can't serve Yahweh ... He will not forgive your disobedience nor your sins" (Josh 24:19); Jesus says "if you don't forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses" (Matt 6:15). Joshua's next sentence gives the condition: "If you forsake Yahweh, and serve foreign gods" (Josh 24:20). He is warning a people who say too easily that they will serve God. Matthew 6:15 adds a condition to forgiveness, not a denial of it. Well-supported explanation.

D13: How many gods are there?

The texts.  "Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God. Yahweh is one" (Deut 6:4);  "There is no one else besides him" (Deut 4:35).  Against these, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists about forty texts that mention other "gods":  "God presides in the great assembly. He judges among the gods" (Ps 82:1);  "I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt" (Exod 12:12);  "Let's make man in our image" (Gen 1:26);  "the man has become like one of us" (Gen 3:22);  "You shall have no other gods before me" (Exod 20:3).

The answers.

1. "Gods" as others call them. Paul gives the biblical position in one sentence: "though there are things that are called 'gods' ... yet to us there is one God, the Father" (1 Cor 8:5-6). Deuteronomy itself calls the gods of other nations "demons, not God" (Deut 32:17), so a text can mention "gods" while denying they are God.
2. "Gods" as created spiritual beings or judges. Psalm 82's "gods" (elohim) are rulers or heavenly beings whom God judges and who will "die like men" (82:7). Jesus quotes the psalm, "I said, you are gods" (John 10:34), to argue that the word can be used of those to whom God's word came.
3. The plural of Genesis 1:26. Jewish interpreters read it as God addressing his heavenly court, Christian interpreters as a hint of the Trinity, and others as a plural of majesty. None of these readings requires several creators, and the next verse says "God created man in his own image" (1:27) in the singular.

What remains.  Many critical scholars hold that Israel's religion developed from the worship of one God among others (monolatry) to the claim that no other god exists (monotheism), and that texts like Psalm 82 and Deuteronomy 32:8-9 preserve the older stage.  The sibling Did Israelite Monotheism Evolve? weighs that model against the texts, with Deuteronomy 32:8-9 as "the critics' best verse."  The canonical texts as they stand can all be read within answer 1 or 2, but the developmental reading is a fair one.

Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

D14: Human sacrifice, Jephthah, war on Canaan, and ripped-open women

The texts.  The law forbids human sacrifice:  "You shall not give any of your children as a sacrifice to Molech" (Lev 18:21);  the nations "even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods" (Deut 12:31), which God "hates";  and of the child sacrifices at Topheth, God says it was something "which I didn't command, nor did it come into my mind" (Jer 7:31).  Against these, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists thirteen passages, and American Atheists give Jephthah's vow.¹²

Each passage.

1. Isaac. God commands Abraham to "Offer him there as a burnt offering" (Gen 22:2), and then stops him: "Don't lay your hand on the boy" (Gen 22:12). The narrative is called a test (22:1), and its outcome is that God does not take the child. Many readers find the command itself the moral problem.
2. Firstborn sons. "You shall give the firstborn of your sons to me" (Exod 22:29) is defined in the same book: "You shall redeem all the firstborn of your sons" (Exod 34:20), with an animal or payment (Num 18:15-16).
3. Things devoted. "No one devoted to destruction ... shall be ransomed. He shall surely be put to death" (Lev 27:29). The "devoted" (cherem) person is one placed under the ban of destruction in holy war or as a penalty, not a sacrifice on an altar. This is a moral objection to the ban.
4. The Midianite captives. Of the 16,000 captive women and girls, "Yahweh's tribute was thirty-two persons" (Num 31:40), and Moses "gave the tribute ... to Eleazar the priest" (Num 31:41). The text says they were given to the priest, not killed; service under priestly authority is a natural inference, though their subsequent duties are not described. The Levites also receive persons as their share (31:47). The war itself is a moral objection (L18 item 6).
5. Jephthah's daughter. Jephthah vows that "whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me ... shall be Yahweh's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering" (Judg 11:31), his daughter meets him, and he "did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. She was a virgin" (Judg 11:39). American Atheists argue that God accepted the vow and gave the victory knowing what would follow.¹² Three facts matter. The text does not say God accepted the vow, and "Yahweh's Spirit came on Jephthah" before he made it (Judg 11:29). The narrator never approves the vow. And the reading that Jephthah did not kill her is old: David Kimhi, around AD 1200, citing his father, read the vow as "it shall be Yahweh's, or I will offer it up," and argued from her mourning for her virginity and the words "She was a virgin" that she was kept unmarried, dedicated to God.²⁷ Kimhi acknowledges that "the opinion of our sages" was the other way: the earlier rabbis held that Jephthah did sacrifice her. On the reading that he killed her, the narrative reports a rash vow kept by a man in a lawless era ("In those days there was no king in Israel," Judg 17:6; 21:25), not a command of God. On either reading the law against human sacrifice stands. Plausible but unproved as to what happened; no actual conflict with the law.
6. The seven sons of Saul. See L06. The Gibeonites executed them "before Yahweh" (2 Sam 21:9), and the famine ended afterward (21:14). The text presents a blood-guilt judgment, not a sacrifice, but it is one of the hardest moral narratives in Samuel.
7. Josiah and the priests. Josiah "killed all the priests of the high places that were there, on the altars, and burned men's bones on them" (2 Kgs 23:20), fulfilling the prophecy of 1 Kings 13:2. This is desecration of pagan altars by executing their priests on them, under the law against idolatrous priests (Deut 13; 17:2-7), not an offering to God. A moral objection.
8. Christ's death. The New Testament calls Christ's death a sacrifice (1 Cor 5:7; Heb 9-10). Christians hold that it was a voluntary self-offering, not one human sacrificing another to God, and that it ended sacrifice (Heb 10:10-18). A theological claim the skeptic may reject; not a contradiction of Leviticus 18:21, which forbids parents sacrificing children to Molech.
9. Ezekiel 20:25-26. Not on the Skeptic's Annotated Bible's list, but the hardest text for this case: "I gave them statutes that were not good ... I polluted them in their own gifts, in that they caused all that opens the womb to pass through the fire" (Ezek 20:25-26). Interpreters read it as God handing Israel over to the pagan practices they chose (as in Rom 1:24-28), or, with some critical scholars, as evidence that some Israelites believed the law of the firstborn required child sacrifice. Jeremiah 7:31, "which I didn't command," denies that God commanded it. Unresolved.
10. Pregnant women ripped open. The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets Hosea 13:16 ("their pregnant women will be ripped open") and 2 Kings 15:16 (Menahem "ripped up all their women who were with child") against Amos 1:13, where God condemns the Ammonites "because they have ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead." (The page cites Amos 1:3, but the passage is 1:13.) Hosea 13:16 is a prophecy of what Assyria will do to Samaria, not a command; 2 Kings 15:16 narrates the crime of a king the same chapter calls evil ("He did that which was evil in Yahweh's sight," 2 Kgs 15:18); and Elisha weeps when he foresees that Hazael will "rip up their pregnant women" (2 Kgs 8:12). The Bible condemns this act every time it describes humans doing it. Hosea's prophecy presents it as judgment that God will allow, which is a moral objection. No actual conflict.

Verdict:  no actual conflict between the law against human sacrifice and the narratives, except unresolved for Ezekiel 20:25-26.  The war commands and the ban are a moral objection, and the strongest one in this register;  the planned sibling War and the Canaanite Conquest is to treat them.

D15: Who owns and rules the world: God or Satan?

"The earth is Yahweh's, with its fullness" (Ps 24:1), against the devil's claim, "I will give you all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me" (Luke 4:6), Jesus' "the prince of this world" (John 12:31), and Paul's "the god of this world" (2 Cor 4:4);  and the Skeptic's Annotated Bible adds "he has given the earth to the children of men" (Ps 115:16).  The New Testament describes a usurper's power exercised under God's rule:  the devil's claim is made by the devil, and Jesus says the "prince of this world will be cast out."  Psalm 115:16 describes human stewardship (Gen 1:28).  Ownership, stewardship and rebellion are three different relationships.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D16: The devil bound or roaming

"God didn't spare angels when they sinned, but cast them down to Tartarus, and committed them to pits of darkness" (2 Pet 2:4), against "Your adversary, the devil, walks around like a roaring lion" (1 Pet 5:8) and Satan "going back and forth on the earth" (Job 1:7).  Second Peter and Jude 6 speak of certain angels who sinned, which Jude ties to the angels who "deserted their own dwelling place," a reference most interpreters take to Genesis 6:1-4.  They do not say Satan is among them.  Revelation 20:2 depicts a separate binding of Satan in a dated sequence of visions; Christians disagree over its relation to the present.  The distinction between Satan and the imprisoned angels does not depend on settling that chronology.  The second page, "Can the devil be resisted?", sets captives "taken captive by him to do his will" (2 Tim 2:26) against "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you" (Jas 4:7):  the first describes opponents of the gospel, the second believers who submit to God.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D17: Is God's will done in heaven?

"Let your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" (Matt 6:10), against "There was war in the sky. Michael and his angels made war on the dragon" (Rev 12:7).  The war ends with the dragon thrown out (12:8-9), which is God's will being done.  The Greek ouranos means both "sky" and "heaven," and Revelation's vision is symbolic.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D18: Do angels marry?

"God's sons saw that men's daughters were beautiful, and they took any that they wanted for themselves as wives" (Gen 6:2), against "when they will rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven" (Mark 12:25).  The identity of "God's sons" in Genesis 6 is disputed:  angels (the view of 1 Enoch, which Jude quotes by name in Jude 14-15, and which Jude 6 and 2 Peter 2:4 seem to follow), the line of Seth, or human rulers.  Jesus' saying concerns angels "in heaven," that is, as they are in God's presence;  on the angel reading of Genesis 6, those angels "deserted their own dwelling place" (Jude 1:6) and sinned.  The men of Sodom who wanted to "have sex with" Lot's visitors (Gen 19:5) thought they were men.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

D19: Only God works wonders

God "alone does great wonders" (Ps 136:4), against the lawless one's "power and signs and lying wonders" (2 Thess 2:9) and Pharaoh's magicians, who "did the same thing with their enchantments" (Exod 7:11).  The psalm says God alone does great wonders, in a hymn about creation and the exodus;  Paul calls the lawless one's wonders "lying," that is, deceptive;  and Exodus shows the magicians failing at the third plague, "This is God's finger" (Exod 8:19).  Calling the other signs deceptive does not prove they are mere tricks: Exodus says the magicians' rods became serpents, although Aaron's swallowed theirs (Exod 7:12).  The strongest answer reads Psalm 136 as praise of God's unmatched creative and saving acts, not a denial that subordinate agents perform signs.  The hymn's examples support that reading, but the scope of "alone" still needs interpretation.  Verdict:  plausible but unproved.

D20: Is every word of God pure?

"Yahweh's words are flawless words, as silver refined in a clay furnace" (Ps 12:6);  "Every word of God is flawless" (Prov 30:5).  The Skeptic's Annotated Bible sets these against crude passages:  Rabshakeh's threat that the defenders will "eat their own dung, and ... drink their own urine" (2 Kgs 18:27);  Ezekiel's description of Oholibah, who "lusted after their lovers, whose flesh is as the flesh of donkeys" (Ezek 23:20);  and Malachi 2:3.  "Pure" in Psalm 12:6 is the purity of refined silver, meaning true and reliable, set against the "flattering lips" of 12:2-3.  It is not a claim about refinement of language.  Rabshakeh's words are an enemy's taunt that Scripture reports, and Ezekiel's coarse imagery is deliberate, meant to shock Israel with the ugliness of its idolatry.  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

D21: Is God known by reason?

"For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made" (Rom 1:20), against "Can you fathom the mystery of God? Or can you probe the limits of the Almighty?" (Job 11:7).  Paul speaks of God's "everlasting power and divinity," that God exists and is powerful;  Zophar, in Job 11, speaks of the depths of God's purposes.  Knowing that God is and comprehending him fully are different.  And Zophar is one of the friends whom God rebukes at the end of Job (42:7).  Verdict:  no actual conflict.

Objections and responses

Objections come from both sides.  Skeptics say the article excuses too much;  defenders of strict inerrancy say it concedes too much.  Each objection below is stated in its strongest form.

1. "Given enough ingenuity, any two texts can be harmonized, so a harmonization proves nothing." This is true, and the article does not treat a possible harmonization as a solution. Bart Ehrman makes the same point fairly: of the temple cleansing he says "if you are creative enough, you can figure out a plausible explanation for both accounts being right," and still judges the two-cleansings answer far-fetched.² That is why the verdict scale separates "well-supported explanation" (the explanation has its own evidence, usually from the texts themselves) from "plausible but unproved" (it is reasonable but not positively confirmed over the alternatives) and "strained" (it needs facts no text supplies). Forty-one cases end at strained, unresolved or probable error, and in many of the 113 "plausible" cases the entry says where the natural reading favors the critic. A reader who thinks a "plausible" verdict is too generous can see the explanation and its evidence in each entry and judge it.
2. "The sheer number of contradictions shows the Bible is unreliable." The Skeptic's Annotated Bible says plainly why it lists them: "I include them for just one purpose: it shows that the Bible, whatever else it may be, is not inerrant."¹¹ The register shows what the number is made of. The 629 allegations reduce to 266 distinct cases. In 77 of those, reading the verses in context removes the conflict, and in 32 more the explanation is supported by the texts themselves; 113 have a possible answer that is not proved, and 41 are hard. A list's length measures how much its compiler collected, not how consistent the Bible is, and the right test is the hardest cases, which the Verdict lists. The same caution applies to this article's own counts, which describe these lists and are not a rate of error.
3. "One error disproves inerrancy, so the unresolved cases settle the question." An unresolved case is one where the evidence does not decide. It is not an error shown to exist. But the reverse also holds: "unresolved" is not "resolved," and the three probable errors in the register (P02, B05, A04) are real difficulties for strict inerrancy, as are the strained synchronisms of Kings (K20). The Chicago Statement limits inspiration to the original text and says inerrancy is not negated by "a lack of modern technical precision" or by "the reporting of falsehoods";⁷⁷ those provisions can cover some of these cases, as an error in a speech that Acts reports as given, if Acts is read as reporting Stephen rather than endorsing him. For Quirinius and Theudas they help less: the first is in Luke's own narrative, the second in a speech whose wording is generally thought to be Luke's, and no manuscript reads otherwise in either.
4. "Appealing to lost original manuscripts makes inerrancy unfalsifiable." The objection has force when the appeal is to an error nobody can see. This article labels a copy problem only where there is evidence that the transmitted text is damaged: a witness with another reading, as the Greek of 2 Samuel 24:13 has three years of famine where the Hebrew has seven (S07), or a reading impossible in its own context, as Hebrew Chronicles makes Ahaziah forty-two when his father died at forty (K15). Where the only support is the conflict itself, as with Elhanan and Goliath (S03) or Solomon's forty thousand stalls, which the Greek of Kings also has at the matching verse (K01), the proposed slip is graded as a conjecture. Ten cases carry the label. That shows that copying errors are real and checkable, which is the strongest form of the defender's appeal; it also shows that the appeal cannot be made where the evidence is missing, and that even a documented variant does not by itself tell which reading is original.
5. "The article concedes too much. 'Unresolved' only means the answer has not been found yet." That may be so in some cases, and the Issues section lists what evidence would change specific verdicts. The Chicago Statement says as much: it denies "that alleged errors and discrepancies that have not yet been resolved vitiate the truth claims of the Bible."⁷ But an argument that every unresolved case will one day be resolved is a prediction, not evidence. The article's verdicts describe the evidence as it now stands. Augustine set the standard: when a text "appears to me opposed to truth," he would "suppose that either the manuscript is faulty, or the translator has not caught the meaning of what was said, or I myself have failed to understand it."¹ The article tests those three explanations case by case; it does not assume one of them must always hold.
6. "Harmonizing is anachronistic. The Gospels are ancient biographies whose authors changed details freely, so the differences are not errors but they are not history either." Michael Licona argues that the evangelists used the compositional devices of Greco-Roman biography, such as displacement, compression and spotlighting.⁴ The article uses those devices where the texts show them at work, as in the centurion's servant (M08). Licona himself names cases they do not resolve.⁴ Lydia McGrew argues from the other direction that small, unplanned agreements between the Gospels show their authors to be truthful reporters close to the facts,⁵ and she rejects devices that would knowingly change a fact.⁶ Neither approach shows that a given difference is not an error; each has to be tested on the case. The clearest control in this article is Acts 26, where Paul's commission is put in Jesus' mouth after the same author has twice told it through Ananias (A01): there compression is shown, not assumed.
7. "Differences among the Gospels show they are unreliable." Ehrman, who thinks many differences are irreconcilable, also notes what the accounts share: "All four Gospels agree that on the third day after Jesus' crucifixion and burial, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and found it empty."² Augustine argued that reporters who "fail to follow the very same plan, or to use the very same words" while describing the same fact are not thereby unreliable.³ But difference in detail does not by itself show that the Gospels are independent. Matthew and Luke used Mark, often word for word, so many of their differences from Mark are edits of a shared text, not separate memories (Part 10). Independence has to be argued case by case: John's passion and resurrection narratives share little wording with the Synoptics, and some features of Luke's and Matthew's birth stories have no common source that anyone has identified, while the Synoptic healing stories plainly do. Where accounts are independent, agreement on a core with differing details is good evidence for the core; where one writer reworked another, the agreement is evidence about the source, and the differences are evidence about the editor. Either way, a shared core with compatible details supports the core events without proving every detail accurate.
8. "The moral objections are the real contradictions: a God of love who commands the destruction of whole peoples." This is the strongest objection in the register, and it is not answered here by showing that two verses are logically consistent. The article classes moral objections apart (L18, D14), because a command can be consistent with the rest of the Bible and still be judged wrong.
9. "The article is written from a Christian standpoint, so its verdicts are biased." The verdict categories, the symmetry rule and the treatment of copy problems are stated in Part 1 before any case. The register, the coverage matrix and the scripts that check them are in the research folder, so every assignment and every verdict can be checked. The article states unresolved cases and probable errors plainly and gives the evidence a reader needs to disagree.
10. "Christians disagree among themselves about inerrancy, so the question is meaningless." Christians do disagree. The Chicago Statement holds that Scripture is without error in all it affirms; the Catholic Church's Dei Verbum speaks of the truth God wanted put into Scripture "for the sake of salvation";⁹ Peter Enns argues that insisting Samuel-Kings and Chronicles "must say the same thing about the same event tells us more about the modern interpreter than it does about the biblical texts."¹⁰ The case verdicts do not depend on which view is right. They report whether the texts conflict. What follows for doctrine is the subject of the parent article, Inerrancy and the Missing Autographs.

Issues and unanswered questions

Evidence that would change a verdict

1. Quirinius (B05). An inscription or papyrus dating a Roman enrollment in Judea under Herod, or one placing Quirinius in an office in Syria before 4 BC, would move the case from probable error toward resolved. None is known.
2. Theudas (A04). An independent record of a Theudas active before Judas the Galilean, around AD 6 or 4 BC, would remove the case. Josephus names only the Theudas of about AD 45.
3. Samuel's text (S02, S03, S09). The Qumran Samuel scrolls are fragmentary, and they do not preserve 2 Samuel 21:19 or the numeral of 2 Samuel 10:18. A new manuscript of either verse could settle whether "the brother of Goliath" or "seven thousand" is original.
4. The kings' chronology (K20). A dated Judean or Assyrian record of a Hezekiah co-regency would support the defenders who propose one; a record dating Hezekiah's accession to 715 BC without one would support Thiele and the critics.
5. The Septuagint and Cainan (G19). Whether the Greek Genesis with its second Cainan preserves an older Hebrew text, or added the name, is undecided. A Hebrew witness to Genesis 11:12-13 with the extra generation would decide it.

Limits of this article

1. The denominator is three lists and the scholarship read. It is not every objection ever made, and its counts are not a rate of error. Other lists exist, and a reader who knows an allegation that the register does not contain will find the case it belongs to, if any, from the Case index.
2. Coverage was checked by passage, then by hand. A script checks that each Skeptic's Annotated Bible page's passages are named in the case it is assigned to; the pages it flagged were read and answered or given a written reason. That shows the passages were addressed, not that every reader will find each answer adequate.
3. Short entries are short. Many of the 266 cases receive a paragraph. A short entry can miss a point that a full commentary would raise. The serious cases have long entries, and the siblings named in each entry treat several of them in more depth.
4. Verdicts are judgments. The scale is stated in advance and the evidence is given, but where a case sits between "plausible" and "strained," or "unresolved" and "probable error," readers will reasonably differ.
5. Many cases turn on the meaning of a Hebrew or Greek word. The article checks those words in the Hebrew and Greek texts, but it does not reproduce the full lexical evidence. Readers should treat a word-sense argument as only as strong as the parallel uses quoted for it.
6. Translations differ, and the World English Bible sometimes harmonizes. The article quotes the World English Bible except where marked, and notes where its translation hides a difficulty, as with "brother of" in 2 Samuel 21:19, "sound" and "understand" in Acts 9:7 and 22:9, and "disregard" for "hate" in Luke 14:26.

Sources not read directly

These works bear on cases in the register and were not read for this article.  Where the article relies on a point from them, it says so and names the work that relays it.

1. Raymond Brown, The Birth of the Messiah (1977), on the infancy narratives and Quirinius. The article relies instead on the sibling article on the census, which read Brown, and on Josephus and Ehrman.
2. Craig Blomberg, The Historical Reliability of the Gospels (1987), a defender's survey. Archer, Haley and Geisler and Howe serve as the article's main sources for defenders' answers.
3. Robert Gundry, The Use of the Old Testament in St. Matthew's Gospel (1967), on Matthew 27:9. For that case the article relies on Raymond Brown's The Death of the Messiah.

Errors noticed in the sources

These are small, and they are listed so that readers who check the sources will not be confused.

1. Gordon Wenham, commenting on Genesis 6:3, writes that after Jacob "Only Aaron (123, Num 33:39) exceeds 120" (Genesis 1-15, p. 142), but 2 Chronicles 24:15 says Jehoiada the priest died at "one hundred thirty years old." The point does not affect Wenham's argument about Genesis 6:3, which concerns the patriarchs.
2. Bart Ehrman's Jesus, Interrupted has several slips in its references: "Luke 1:23" for Luke 3:23 (p. 37); "Mark's version" for Matthew's in the Jairus story (p. 41); "Matthew 20:9" for Matthew 27:9 (p. 49); "Zechariah 11:3" for 11:12-13 (p. 51); and "16:9-21" for 16:9-20 (p. 48). None changes his argument.
3. Geisler and Howe's answer on Theudas speaks of "the Judas of A.D. 44 mentioned by Josephus" (When Critics Ask, p. 432); Josephus dates Judas the Galilean's revolt to the census of AD 6 and the execution of his sons to the later 40s.

Verdict

Many alleged Bible contradictions are not contradictions, many others have answers that fit but are not proved, and a minority are real difficulties, three of them probably errors in the text as it now stands.  That is the result of judging all 629 allegations in three skeptical lists and the scholarship read for this article, merged into 266 distinct cases, by one scale applied in both directions.

What the register shows

Counting each case once, by the most serious verdict anywhere in it:

Ten cases, counted across all the rows, carry a copy-problem label.

1. In 109 of 266 cases, the texts do not conflict once read in context, or the explanation has positive support from the texts themselves. Most are cases where a list set two verses side by side without reading the verses around them, or where an English translation used one word for two Hebrew or Greek words.
2. In 113 cases, an explanation fits the texts but is not confirmed. This is the largest group, and it is not a group of solved cases. It includes most of the differences among the Gospels, where the evangelists selected, compressed and arranged their material and Matthew and Luke reworked Mark, and many of the Old Testament's parallel histories. In some, such as the centurion who comes in person in Matthew and sends messengers in Luke (M08), the natural reading of one account is less exact than the other, and the answer depends on how much compression a reader allows an ancient author.
3. Forty-one cases are hard: four strained, thirty-four unresolved, three probable errors. These are the cases that skeptics and believers should be arguing about.
4. Ten cases carry a copy-problem label, where a surviving witness or an impossible reading shows that the transmitted text is damaged: numbers above all, as with Ahaziah's age, 22 or 42, and Jehoiachin's, 8 or 18. These show that the present texts contain copying errors. In several the other reading may itself be a later correction, and none of them shows what the original said or that an author erred. Where the only evidence for a slip is the conflict itself, as with Goliath's killer or Solomon's stalls, the case is graded on the conflict.

The strongest cases against the texts

1. Stephen's tomb (P02). Acts 7:16 credits Abraham with buying the tomb at Shechem from the sons of Hamor, which Genesis says Jacob bought; the older Jewish tradition puts the brothers' bones at Hebron. The speech telescopes elsewhere too (Acts 7:7), which explains the shape of the sentence but not its accuracy. Probable error in the speech as reported; whether it counts against Luke depends on whether Acts endorses every detail of a speech it records.
2. Quirinius (B05). Luke dates the birth to a census under Quirinius, which on all known evidence took place in AD 6, about ten years after Herod's death on the usual date. Probable error, with moderate confidence and conditional on the present evidence; this article fixes no year for the birth.
3. Theudas (A04). Gamaliel's speech places Theudas before Judas the Galilean; Josephus dates him about forty years after Judas and names him next to Judas's sons. The rescue needs a second Theudas no source records. Probable error, with moderate confidence.
4. The kings' synchronisms (K20). The cross-dates of 2 Kings 15-18 fit the Assyrian dates only with an unrecorded co-regency of Hezekiah, changes of reckoning inside one sentence, and an unusual reading of 2 Kings 17:1, which Horn himself could only emend. Strained; Thiele and the critical commentators judge them an editor's mistakes.
5. Goliath (S03), Saul and David (S02), and Abiathar (S11). Each has a serious explanation, a copying error, a combined source, or a loose reference to a priest's era, but none has the evidence that would settle it.
6. The passion chronology (X01, X02), Judas's death (X05) and the resurrection appearances (R09, R12). Reconciliations exist for each, and none is decisive. Tested as complete sequences, the resurrection accounts fit together as a series of places, but not as a series of first meetings for Mary Magdalene, and Luke's angel does not say what Mark's angel says. These are the differences Ehrman and Barker press hardest, and the article agrees that they are unresolved.

The strongest findings for the texts

1. Many allegations fail on the texts themselves. In 109 cases the passages, read in context, do not conflict, or the text supplies its own explanation: a definition two verses later, a different Hebrew word, a stated change of law, a date that already does the arithmetic. The Flood chronology, the 400 and 430 years with Paul's Greek text, Moses' "go out and come in," the twelve stones at Gilgal and the "first fruits" of 1 Corinthians 15 are examples.
2. Several answers rest on evidence a skeptic can check. Stephen's seventy-five souls are the reading of the Septuagint and of a Hebrew scroll from Qumran. Paul's 430 years from Abraham are the Septuagint's and Josephus'. Acts 26 shows by its own author's fuller accounts that it compresses. The Greek and Samaritan texts sometimes preserve the reading that removes a conflict.
3. The authors and their first readers knew the tensions. The same chapter of 1 Samuel uses "repent" of God in two senses, and Joshua sets its sweeping summaries beside lists of unconquered cities. That proves awareness, not agreement, but in several cases the context shows the sense the writer meant (Jeremiah 18's rule for withdrawn threats; Joshua 13:1's "there remains yet very much land"). Augustine and the rabbis debated many of the same questions long before the modern lists.
4. The length of the lists is not the measure. The 569 index entries of the Skeptic's Annotated Bible fall into 254 distinct cases, because one question is often listed several times. Of the 569, 152 belong to cases with no actual conflict or a well-supported explanation, 297 to cases where an explanation is plausible but unproved, 2 to cases of a copying difference only, and 118 to the hard cases. Many of those 118 pages sit in grouped cases where most items are easily answered and one item is not, as in L07.
5. The Gospels agree on the core and differ in details. All four agree that Jesus died under Pilate, was buried, and that women found his tomb empty on the first day of the week. Where their accounts are independent, as John's passion account largely is of the Synoptics', that pattern counts as evidence for the core. Where Matthew and Luke reworked Mark, the differences tell us about the editors, not about separate memories, and agreement there is not independent confirmation.

What follows

1. For a skeptic. The case that "the Bible is full of contradictions" is much weaker than the length of the lists suggests. The case that the Bible contains no error of any kind, in any detail, cannot be shown from the present texts, which contain copying errors and a few probable errors.
2. For a believer who holds strict inerrancy. The doctrine applies to the original texts, and the documented copying errors show why that distinction matters. But three cases are probable errors, four are strained and thirty-four are unresolved, and in none of the three probable errors does a manuscript offer another reading. The honest position is that these cases are open, not that they have been answered.
3. For every reader. The right test of any list of contradictions is its hardest cases, read in the original languages, with the manuscript evidence, against the same standard used for other ancient texts. A probable error in a date or a speech does not show that the central events did not happen, and a natural answer to one case does not show that the whole Bible is free of error. The register and its evidence are here for that purpose.

Case index

The main passages recorded for each case, by book and chapter, with links to the case discussions.  Supplementary comparison passages in the body are not all indexed.  Use it to find a verse you have seen cited as a contradiction.

1. Genesis: 1 (G01, G02, G03, G04, G05, G06, L09, L12, D01); 2 (G01, G04, G06, G07, L04, D09); 3 (D05, D06); 4 (G08, P03, E01, D10); 5 (G07, G10, G11, G15); 6 (G09, G12, G13, G16, L08, D01, D18); 7 (G12, G13, G14, G16); 8 (G14, G16, G20); 9 (G15, G16, G20, L18); 10 (G15, G17, G18); 11 (G09, G17, G19, P01, D11); 12 (P01); 14 (P12); 15 (P04, E23); 16 (P05, P09, L04); 18 (P17, D05); 19 (P16, D18); 20 (G17, P06); 21 (P09, P10); 22 (P05, E01, D02, D05, D14); 23 (P02); 24 (P11); 25 (G18, P05); 26 (P07, P10); 28 (P07, P10, P11, E01); 29 (P06, P11); 31 (G17); 32 (P15, E02); 33 (P02); 35 (P10); 36 (P07, P18); 37 (P08); 39 (P08); 42 (P14); 43 (P14); 44 (P13); 46 (P03, P13); 49 (E26); 50 (P02)
2. Exodus: 1 (P03, L13); 2 (E04, E06, D10); 3 (E04, E05); 4 (E03, E07, L09, D03); 6 (P04, E01); 7 (E03, D19); 8 (E03); 9 (E03, E08); 10 (E03); 12 (P04, E08, E22, E28); 14 (E03); 15 (D07, D13); 16 (E11); 17 (E12); 19 (E09, A07, D15); 20 (E09, A07, L02, L06, L12, L13, D13); 21 (L02, L13, L18); 22 (L12, D14); 23 (E23); 24 (E02); 25 (L02); 29 (E22); 30 (E11); 31 (D09); 32 (D01); 33 (E02, D06); 34 (E10, L06, D08); 37 (E10)
3. Leviticus: 4 (E22); 11 (E22, L02); 15 (E22); 17 (E27, L02); 18 (P06, D14); 19 (L13, L18); 20 (E22, L18); 25 (L18); 26 (D10); 27 (D14)
4. Numbers: 1 (E26, E28); 2 (E28); 3 (E18, E28); 4 (E18); 6 (L11); 8 (E18); 9 (E22); 10 (E04); 12 (E02, E16); 13 (G12, E19); 14 (E19); 15 (E22, L12); 16 (E20); 17 (E11); 18 (E27); 20 (E12, E13, E14); 21 (L02); 23 (E21, D01, D04); 24 (E21); 25 (E17); 26 (P13, E19, E20); 27 (K32); 28 (E22); 30 (L05); 31 (E16, E24); 33 (E13); 34 (E23)
5. Deuteronomy: 1 (E14); 2 (E25); 3 (E14); 4 (E02, D13); 5 (E02, E09); 6 (L05, L09, D02, D13); 7 (E25); 8 (D02, D05); 10 (P03, E10, E13, D10); 12 (E27, D14); 13 (L13, D05); 14 (E22); 16 (E22); 17 (L04); 18 (L12); 20 (E25, L18, D14); 23 (E21, E25, L02, L18); 24 (L03, L06); 27 (P06, L01); 28 (D08); 29 (E09); 30 (L07); 31 (E15); 32 (E14); 33 (E26); 34 (E15, E16)
6. Joshua: 2 (L13); 4 (J03); 7 (J05, L06); 10 (J02, J09); 11 (J02); 13 (J02); 15 (J02, J04); 16 (J02); 17 (J01); 19 (J04); 21 (J02, J04); 22 (J05); 24 (P02, E21, D12)
7. Judges: 1 (J01, J02); 4 (E04, J01, J02, J06); 5 (J06, M31); 6 (E24, D02); 8 (J07); 9 (J07); 11 (E21, D14); 18 (P12)
8. Ruth: 4 (E25)
9. 1 Samuel: 1 (S16); 2 (W03); 7 (E27, S19, S22); 8 (S16); 9 (S15); 10 (S18); 13 (S17, S19, S20, S26); 14 (S15, S20); 15 (J08, S17, S18, D01); 16 (S02, S12); 17 (S02, S03, S12); 18 (S02, S04, S21); 19 (S18); 21 (S11); 22 (S11); 27 (J08); 28 (S01); 30 (J08); 31 (S01)
10. 2 Samuel: 1 (J08, S01); 3 (S13, S21); 5 (S13); 6 (S04, S22, S23); 8 (S09, S11); 10 (S09); 12 (L04); 14 (S14); 15 (S14); 17 (S24); 18 (S14); 21 (S01, S03, S04, L06, D14); 23 (S10, S25); 24 (S05, S06, S07, S08, D02)
11. 1 Kings: 2 (S25); 3 (K08); 4 (K01, K11); 5 (K02, K03); 6 (K09); 7 (K05, K06, K07, K10); 8 (E11, D06); 9 (K02, K04); 10 (K01); 14 (K27); 15 (K12, K13, K14, L08, L18); 16 (K14); 17 (R19); 18 (E27); 19 (K18, K29); 21 (K31); 22 (K13, K31, D04)
12. 2 Kings: 1 (K20); 2 (G11, K29); 3 (K20, L18); 4 (R19); 5 (K28); 8 (K15, K17, K20, K28, B02); 9 (K15, K16, K18, B02); 10 (K19, B02); 11 (B02); 12 (K21, B02); 13 (K20, B02, R19); 14 (B02, L06); 15 (K20, B02, D14); 16 (K21); 17 (K20); 18 (K20, K22, D20); 20 (J09, K30); 22 (K23); 23 (K22, K23); 24 (K24, K25, K26); 25 (K06, K26)
13. 1 Chronicles: 1 (G18, P07); 2 (S12, S24, K11); 3 (S13, K32, B02); 4 (J08); 6 (J04, S16, K11, K32); 7 (P13, K32); 8 (P13, S15); 9 (S15); 10 (S01); 11 (S10); 13 (S23); 14 (S13); 15 (K11); 18 (S09, S11); 19 (S09); 20 (S03); 21 (S05, S06, S07, S08); 23 (E18); 24 (S11); 25 (K11); 27 (S06); 29 (D15)
14. 2 Chronicles: 1 (K01, K08); 2 (K02, K03, K10); 3 (K06); 4 (K05); 6 (D06); 8 (K02, K04); 9 (K01); 11 (K12); 13 (K12, K27); 14 (K13); 15 (K13); 16 (K14); 17 (K13); 20 (K13); 21 (K15, K17); 22 (K15, K16, K17); 24 (K21, M27); 28 (K21); 29 (K11); 32 (D05); 35 (K23); 36 (K24, K25, K34)
15. Ezra: 2 (N01); 3 (E18, K32); 5 (K32); 8 (K32); 9 (E25)
16. Nehemiah: 7 (J02, N01); 13 (E21, E25)
17. Esther: 3 (J08)
18. Job: 1 (L08, D16); 2 (D03); 7 (L10); 9 (W03, L14); 11 (D21); 14 (L10); 21 (L14); 26 (W03); 38 (G03); 42 (D03)
19. Psalms: 5 (D03, D08); 6 (L10); 11 (D08); 12 (D20); 14 (L08); 18 (D06, D12); 22 (D12); 24 (D15); 30 (D08); 37 (L14); 44 (D09); 46 (D12); 58 (L12); 72 (D19); 73 (L14); 82 (L09, D13); 86 (D13); 90 (G09); 92 (L14); 97 (D06); 102 (L17); 103 (D08); 104 (L12, L17); 112 (L15); 121 (D09); 132 (D06); 136 (D19); 138 (D10); 139 (L13, D05); 144 (D07)
20. Proverbs: 1 (D12); 3 (L12); 8 (D12); 10 (L14, L15); 12 (L14); 13 (L15); 16 (L14); 20 (L12); 24 (L12); 26 (L12); 30 (D20)
21. Ecclesiastes: 1 (W04, L17); 3 (L13); 7 (L08, L12, L14); 8 (L12); 9 (L10); 10 (L12); 11 (L12)
22. Isaiah: 1 (D12); 7 (B07, D02); 24 (G20); 26 (L10, D12); 27 (D08); 38 (J09, K30); 40 (M27, D09, D12, D21); 43 (W04, D09); 44 (L09); 45 (D03, D13); 56 (L02); 57 (L14)
23. Jeremiah: 4 (D04); 7 (L02, L16); 11 (L16); 12 (L14); 17 (D08); 18 (X05, D01); 19 (X05); 20 (D04); 22 (K24, B03); 25 (K33, K34); 29 (K34, D12); 31 (M27, L06); 32 (X05); 34 (K26); 36 (K24); 46 (K33); 52 (K06, K26)
24. Lamentations: 3 (D03, D12)
25. Ezekiel: 12 (K26); 14 (D04); 16 (P16); 18 (L06, D08); 23 (D20); 33 (D08); 46 (E22); 47 (E23); 48 (E26)
26. Daniel: 1 (K33); 9 (K34); 12 (L10)
27. Hosea: 1 (K19); 8 (W02); 9 (W02, D08); 11 (W02); 12 (P15); 13 (D14)
28. Joel: 2 (L07, L12)
29. Amos: 1 (D14); 3 (D03)
30. Jonah: 1 (W01); 2 (W01); 3 (D01)
31. Micah: 7 (D08)
32. Nahum: 1 (G20, D08)
33. Habakkuk: 1 (L14, D03)
34. Haggai: 2 (B03)
35. Zechariah: 1 (K32, M27); 9 (M19); 11 (X05)
36. Malachi: 1 (D08); 2 (L03, D20); 3 (M27, D01, D02); 4 (G20)
37. Matthew: 1 (B01, B02, B03, B04, B07); 2 (B05, B06, M27); 3 (M01, M05, M26); 4 (M03, M04, L12, D02); 5 (M06, L02, L03, L05, L12, L13, D07); 6 (L12, L15, L16, D02, D12, D17); 7 (L07, L16, D12); 8 (M04, M08, M10, M26, L07); 9 (M09, M13); 10 (M12, M13, A06, L13, L17, D07); 11 (M01); 12 (S11, W01, M26, M28, X19, L01, L07); 13 (M14); 14 (M22); 15 (M21, A06); 16 (M15, M26, X19, L17); 17 (M16, M25); 18 (L12); 19 (G01, J01, M29, L03, L15); 20 (M11, M17); 21 (M07, M18, M19, L16); 22 (D18); 23 (M26, M27, L11, L12); 24 (L17, D19); 25 (G05, L10, L12, D08); 26 (M20, X01, X03, X04, X07, D07); 27 (X05, X08, X09, X10, X11, X12, X13, X14, X15, X18, X19); 28 (R01, R02, R03, R04, R05, R06, R07, R08, R09, R10, R11, R12, R14, A03, A06, L09)
38. Mark: 1 (M01, M02, M04, M05, M27); 2 (S11, M13, M32); 3 (M13); 4 (M26); 5 (M09, M10, R19); 6 (M12, M14, M22, L09); 7 (M21, L02); 8 (M15, M23, M28, X19); 9 (M16, M25, M26, L17, D03); 10 (M11, M17, M29, L03, L07, L08, L09); 11 (M07, M18, M19); 12 (E05, B04, D18); 13 (L09, L17); 14 (M20, M32, X01, X03, X04, X06, X07, X17, R12); 15 (X02, X07, X08, X09, X10, X11, X12, X13, X14, X15, X16, X18); 16 (R01, R02, R03, R04, R05, R06, R07, R09, R11, R12, R13, R14, R15, R17)
39. Luke: 1 (B04, B05, M01, M26, M31, L08); 2 (B05, B06); 3 (G19, B01, B05, M01, L09); 4 (M03, M04, M14); 5 (M04); 6 (S11, M06, M13, L15); 7 (M08, M20, M26); 8 (M09, M10); 9 (M12, M15, M16, M22, M24, M25); 10 (M12); 11 (M31); 14 (L13); 16 (L03); 18 (M11, M25, M29); 19 (M07, M19); 21 (L17); 22 (X01, X03, X04, X06, X07, D07); 23 (X08, X09, X10, X11, X12, X13, X14, X15, X18, X20, R03, L07); 24 (X19, R01, R02, R03, R04, R05, R06, R07, R08, R09, R10, R11, R12, R13, R14, R15)
40. John: 1 (E02, M01, M02, M04, M05, M15, L09); 2 (M07, M32, X07, R18, L12); 3 (G11, M04, M05, M26, L09, D08); 4 (M24, M26, D06); 5 (M26, M32, L09, L10, D09); 6 (M32); 7 (M26, L13); 8 (M26, L09, L18); 9 (M23); 10 (R18, L07, L09); 11 (M32, R19); 12 (M19, M20, X17, L07, D15); 13 (M26, X01, X03, X06); 14 (G05, M26, L09, L16, L17, D07, D15); 15 (M26); 16 (M26); 18 (M26, X01, X03, X04, X06, X07, D07); 19 (X01, X02, X08, X09, X10, X11, X13, X15, X16, R03); 20 (M25, M28, X20, R01, R02, R04, R05, R06, R07, R08, R09, R10, R11, R12, R14, R15); 21 (M30, R12, R15)
41. Acts: 1 (M13, M30, X05, R12, R15, R16, A06); 2 (X20, R18, A03); 5 (A04); 7 (P01, P02, P03, P04, E05, E07, A07, D06); 8 (A03); 9 (A01, A02); 10 (A03, L02, D10); 11 (A02); 13 (S26, K09, X16); 15 (A02, A05, L02); 16 (A05, A06); 17 (D06); 18 (L11); 19 (A03); 21 (A05, L11); 22 (A01); 26 (R19, A01)
42. Romans: 1 (B04, L05, D21); 2 (L01, D10); 3 (L01, L08); 4 (L01); 5 (L06); 8 (R18, L16); 9 (L07, D08); 11 (L07); 13 (L17); 14 (L02); 15 (L12, D07); 16 (L11)
43. 1 Corinthians: 1 (D11); 3 (L11); 4 (L11); 6 (L07); 7 (A08, L03, L04, L07); 8 (A05, L09, D13); 9 (A01, A05); 10 (E17, A05); 11 (L11); 12 (L12); 13 (L12); 14 (L11, L12, D07, D11); 15 (R09, R11, R16, R19, A01)
44. 2 Corinthians: 4 (L12, D13, D15); 6 (L13); 12 (L16)
45. Galatians: 1 (R18, A02, L05, L12); 2 (A02, A05, L01); 3 (P04, A07, L01); 4 (P05); 5 (A05, L02); 6 (L12)
46. Ephesians: 2 (L11); 4 (X20); 6 (L12, L18)
47. Colossians: 1 (L09); 2 (L02, L12)
48. 1 Thessalonians: 4 (A09); 5 (L12)
49. 2 Thessalonians: 2 (A09, L07, D04, D19)
50. 1 Timothy: 1 (L18); 2 (L07, L11, L12, L16); 3 (L04); 4 (L04); 5 (L15); 6 (E02, L12, D06)
51. 2 Timothy: 2 (D16); 3 (A08, L14)
52. Titus: 1 (D04)
53. Philemon: 16 (L18)
54. Hebrews: 2 (A07); 4 (D05); 6 (L05, L07, D04); 8 (M27, L02); 9 (G11, E11); 11 (G11, P05, P17, E06, L01); 13 (L04)
55. James: 1 (S05, D01, D02); 2 (L01, L13); 4 (L16, D16); 5 (L05, L15, L17)
56. 1 Peter: 3 (X20, L12); 4 (L17); 5 (D16)
57. 2 Peter: 2 (G16, D16); 3 (L07, L17)
58. 1 John: 1 (L07, L08, D03, D12); 2 (L17); 3 (L08, D05); 4 (L12, D08); 5 (L16, D15)
59. 2 John: 10 (L12)
60. Jude: 6 (D16); 7 (P16); 14 (G10)
61. Revelation: 1 (L17); 7 (E26); 12 (D17); 21 (W04); 22 (L09)
62. Baruch: 6 (K34)

Sources