Christian Apologetics Free Course 12, Lesson 05
Analyzing Bible Difficulties 05
Common Sense About Difficulties In The Bible Part 2
5–The Apparent Problems In The Bible Become Negligible When They Are Honestly Compared With The Incomparable Excellencies Of The Bible: We have pointed out several times in this book that a few problems are definitely to be expected in the Bible. Even the most committed believers may not find answers to all the questions that come to mind. This is because of the divine nature of the Book, and also because of the prejudices and limitations of human understanding. However, no honest person can ignore the unusual power of this Book to change human lives.
Uncountable wretched and wicked persons have been touched by this Book, and in an instant became new persons. There is no other book in the world which has infused or inspired people with new life or hope like this. This fact must always be given due weight when problems and difficulties in the Bible are considered. This in itself is enough to point out that the seeming problem might not be a problem at all if all the facts are available. If people are determined to spend all their time, energy and intelligence only to criticise the seeming difficulties in the Bible, many of which are trivial, while at the same time they overlook the incomparable life-giving aspects of this Book, it is more a deliberate or prejudiced attempt to distort the message of the Bible than a sincere doubt.
6–History Is Our Witness That The Alleged Difficulties Are Given Much More Weight By Superficial Readers Than By Serious Students Of Any Type: A careful examination of the output of people who speak and write frequently against the Bible shows that a good number of them know the Bible only superficially. Most of them have never read the Book even once in its entirety, and they do not have any idea of the history, geography, culture, language, or customs of Bible times and lands. Neither do many of them exhibit, in their studies, a desire to delve deeper. Interestingly, there are many people everywhere who show a greater respect for this Book simply because of the depth of their knowledge. These people are not all believers in the Bible, but they are serious students of the sciences, arts or humanities, and the depth that they have acquired in their respective subjects makes them recognise the manifold character and depth of the Bible. Serious students of any subject will know the value of depth in any kind of studies, and they will avoid occasions to criticise subjects about which they are ignorant.
In the past there have been many occasions when critics tried to study either the whole Bible, or parts of it, in more depth. Interestingly, in most cases those critics turned into strong believers in the Bible. The story behind the novel BEN HUR should be known to every Christian. Its author was an infidel, who was challenged to disprove the historicity of the Lord Jesus and His miracles. This man was a genius, and he put all his talent into achieving this end. Gradually the undeniable truth of it all started to dawn on him, and eventually he became a believer in the Lord Jesus. BEN HUR is the story in which he gives expression to his discovery — that Lord Jesus was a historical person !! Shallow people always give great weight to supposed problems whereas well-informed people tend to be cautious in alleging that the Bible contains errors.
7–Many Problems Are Artificially Created By Propagandists And Do Not Have Their Origin In The Scriptures: From time to time every society goes through periods of hostility against and opposition to biblical truths. At such times forceful writers and speakers are able to influence people heavily against the Bible. They successfully sway people against the Bible through the weight of sheer propaganda. Effective propaganda bypasses all that really matters — truth, facts, analysis and rationality — by making a strong appeal to emotions. They manipulate people by playing upon human needs, interests, curiosities, loves, hates, prejudices, fears, lusts, cupidities and amusements. When these techniques are used to attack Biblical faith, the real issues are overlooked while non-issues dominate the air. The tone is emotional, not rational. Unless people understand this strategy of attack, they will not be able to see how propagandists devalue the Bible without any foundation. This subject is quite specialized and vast, and therefore it has elsewhere been treated in detail by the author.
8–Careful And Prayerful Study Will Resolve Many Difficulties: If people try to raise problems against the Bible merely with the aim of discrediting it, they will never arrive at a proper solution. They are already prejudiced against this Book and will not be able to see anything that opposes their own bias. But if a person approaches the Bible with the proper spirit, then many of the apparent difficulties will vanish one by one. However, NOT all the difficulties will ever disappear because humans are finite and limited creatures, while the Bible is the word of the infinite God. Also, our knowledge of the world is incomplete, and therefore some difficulties are bound to continue in those topics which touch upon history, geography, culture etc. However, for sincere seekers, a sufficient number of problems will be solved for them to trust the Bible confidently.
CONCLUSION: No one can solve all the problems in the Bible. But the way in which the alleged problems raised by one generation do become solved in the following generations shows that the Bible is an amazing book. Most of the problems and difficulties arise either because of human ignorance or rebellion. An honest inquirer has to accept that this Book has an amazing integrity which no one has ever been able to discredit. Serious study and investigation of any subject is bound to give rise to some problems and difficulties. In the case of Bible, the presence of difficulties is only natural because it is a divine Book which requires spiritual insight for a proper understanding. When finite humans try to understand the infinite God and His deeds, difficulties are bound to arise. Further, many of the people who study the Bible do so with motives of attacking it and it is natural for such people to come up with a good number of presumed or real difficulties. The presence of difficulties should not surprise anyone. On the contrary, the serious Bible student must be prepared to face the issues honestly.
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Synopsis:
The Categories Of Difficulties In The Bible after which careful analysis shows that these difficulties fall into certain categories, the total of which is not more than about two dozen.
Difficulties, problems, and apparent contradictions arise because of the following reasons: 1–Difficulties Arising From The Original Text:Today we do not have the original autographs with us. What we have are copies.
2–Difficulties Arising Out Of Translation Problems: The problems faced by Bible translators are beyond imagination, and these difficulties will automatically introduce many unknown errors into the translated text.
Every translation has to depend upon numerous carefully weighed compromises
Even the most faithful translation of the Bible contains some paraphrases, biases of the translators, wrong equivalents, and also archaisms.
3–Difficulties Arising Out Of False Interpretation Of The Bible
4–Difficulties Arising Out Of A Wrong Conception Of The Bible
Technical books are written for a limited readership, and they become outdated very soon, but the Bible was written for every person ever to be born, to serve generation after generation without ever becoming outdated.
6–Difficulties Arising Out Of Our Incomplete Knowledge Of The Customs, History, Geography And The Society Of Bible Times
7–Difficulties Arising Out Of Our Ignorance Of The Conditions Under Which A Certain Book Was Written Or A Certain Commandment Was Given
8–Difficulties Arising Out Of The Many-Sidedness Of The Bible
9–The Infiniteness Of God And The Finiteness Of Our Understanding
10–Difficulties Arising Out Of Fallacies Of Logic
For an example let us look at the following statements:
(A)–All dogs have four legs
(B)–All tables have four legs
Though both the statements above are true in themselves, it is wrong to conclude that since both objects have the same number of legs, all dogs are tables. In the same way, it is wrong to put two statements from the Bible together to arrive at conclusions that are not intended by the writer/speaker.
11–Difficulties Which Arise When The Precise Nature Of A Statement Is Not Understood
12–Difficulties Of Numbers: Numbers have been used throughout the Bible in connection with money, measurement, age, the number of people in a group, or the number of things, etc.
The figures given in the Bible (I Kings 7:23-26) are so exact that they can be used to calculate the value of ‘pi’ (circumference/diameter) accurately up to two decimal places (i.e.3.14).
13–Problems Related To The Dullness Of Our Spiritual Perception
13–Problems Related To The Dullness Of Our Spiritual Perception
Even in mature people, spiritual perception still remains so dull that it can be compared to seeing an image in smoked or ground glass or mirror.
There are many people all around us who would like to discredit the Bible somehow or other. One standard tactic of such people is to raise many ‘difficulties’ in the Bible. They argue that if the Bible is the Word of God then there should not be any difficulties. Such assersions are naive.
Common Sense About Difficulties In The Bible
Difficulties are bound to arise whenever a difficult subject is discussed. Since the Bible discusses numerous topics, many of which require spiritual discernment for proper understanding, difficulties are to be expected.
We shall list some commonsense observations on difficulties in the Bible.
1–When Finite Humans Try To Understand The Infinite God And His Actions, Difficulties Are Bound To Arise
2–The Presence Of Difficulties Or Objections Does Not In Any Way Prove The Bible Untrue
(I)–Numerous objections have, from time to time, been raised against the Bible, and they seemed to completely destroy the credibility of this Book that disappear with comprehension
(II)–The problems which have vanished from the scene had been there due more to the misunderstanding or distortion of science than to the Biblical narratives.
3–All Views On Origin Present Problems And Difficulties: There are many views on the origins question, but ultimately all of them fall into two categories: supernatural and natural.
Scientific studies during the past century have demonstrated that most of the fundamental laws of physics and chemistry preclude the possibility of natural evolution
4–Human Inability To Solve A Difficulty Does Not Imply That The Problem Is Unsolvable
5–The Apparent Problems In The Bible Become Negligible When They Are Honestly Compared With The Incomparable Excellencies Of The Bible
There is no other book in the world which has infused or inspired people with new life or hope like this.
6–History Is Our Witness That The Alleged Difficulties Are Given Much More Weight By Superficial Readers Than By Serious Students Of Any Type
7–Many Problems Are Artificially Created By Propagandists And Do Not Have Their Origin In The Scriptures
Effective propaganda bypasses all that really matters — truth, facts, analysis and rationality — by making a strong appeal to emotions. They manipulate people by playing upon human needs, interests, curiosities, loves, hates, prejudices, fears, lusts, cupidities and amusements.
8–Careful And Prayerful Study Will Resolve Many Difficulties
No one can solve all the problems in the Bible. Most of the problems and difficulties arise either because of human ignorance or rebellion. An honest inquirer has to accept that this Book has an amazing integrity which no one has ever been able to discredit.
Well said.
The battle lines have been drawn!!!
BE BLESSED.