Are there historical errors in the Deuterocanonical Books?

[Mystophilus]

Although, if both witnesses are exactly correct, then we could surmise that a tall man wearing a black and brown shirt with dress blue jeans possessing two weapons – and automatic and a revolver – robbed the bank.

We certainly could; historical records and reports can never be exhaustive. However, if both witnesses remember only one weapon, but disagree about its nature, that represents good support for the claim that he used a weapon, fairly good support for the claim that there was only one weapon, and no support for a claim as to the exact type of weapon.

Of course, if one of the witnesses pointed out the accused in the court room and said, “It was him,” and his name just happened to be Abiathar, but another witness selected Ahimelech out of a line-up, you can bet that the defense would point that out.

This is absolutely true, and I would hope that, in the absence of other evidence, both would walk free. In such a case, the two witnesses disagree about a critical matter: the identity of the criminal. If they cannot agree upon that, it would be unjust to condemn either of the men merely upon those witnesses’ statements.

Returning to the texts at hand, the Gospels differ upon the colour of the cloak which the soldiers gave to Jesus, the animal(s) which he rode into Jerusalem, the number of angels at the empty tomb, when the stone was removed from the tomb, and even on which day Jesus was crucified.

However, they agree that he was beaten by the soldiers, that he did ride some kind of donkey(s) into Jerusalem, that there were angels at the tomb, that the stone was removed, and that he was crucified. They also agree that his life was saintly, his actions miraculous, his death unjust and his return unmistakable.

Your question to which I responded was, “If the Gospels are wrong, then how can they be a trustworthy authority?”

As regards the tiny details, such as occasional colours or numbers, they are not absolutely trustworthy. As our two witnesses cannot be trusted to identify the weapon which the robber used. As regards the general events of Jesus’ life, the Gospels are impressively consistent, and are by far the most reliable historical sources which we have.

They do not constitute ‘proof’, but history has never been about ‘proof’, or about ‘facts’: it is about what we believe to have most probably happened, based upon the consistencies of the inevitably limited data which we have available.

 

[irenaeus1]

We certainly could; historical records and reports can never be exhaustive. However, if both witnesses remember only one weapon, but disagree about its nature, that represents good support for the claim that he used a weapon, fairly good support for the claim that there was only one weapon, and no support for a claim as to the exact type of weapon.

This is absolutely true, and I would hope that, in the absence of other evidence, both would walk free. In such a case, the two witnesses disagree about a critical matter: the identity of the criminal. If they cannot agree upon that, it would be unjust to condemn either of the men merely upon those witnesses’ statements.

Returning to the texts at hand, the Gospels differ upon the colour of the cloak which the soldiers gave to Jesus, the animal(s) which he rode into Jerusalem, the number of angels at the empty tomb, when the stone was removed from the tomb, and even on which day Jesus was crucified.

However, they agree that he was beaten by the soldiers, that he did ride some kind of donkey(s) into Jerusalem, that there were angels at the tomb, that the stone was removed, and that he was crucified. They also agree that his life was saintly, his actions miraculous, his death unjust and his return unmistakable.

Your question to which I responded was, “If the Gospels are wrong, then how can they be a trustworthy authority?”

As regards the tiny details, such as occasional colours or numbers, they are not absolutely trustworthy. As our two witnesses cannot be trusted to identify the weapon which the robber used. As regards the general events of Jesus’ life, the Gospels are impressively consistent, and are by far the most reliable historical sources which we have.

They do not constitute ‘proof’, but history has never been about ‘proof’, or about ‘facts’: it is about what we believe to have most probably happened, based upon the consistencies of the inevitably limited data which we have available.

This does not answer the question of why are the authors of scripture are inspired in their writings. It seems to me that inspiration is not needed to guarantee corroboration on ‘major’ issues; i.e., what do we mean by inspiration of scripture? And why cannot the Holy Spirit protect the sacred writers from errors in detail? Why wouldn’t He protect the writers from errors in details? Seems a rather minor feat.

Yes, I acknowledge that there are differences in the details in the Gospels, but I do not then jump to the conclusion that therefore the inspired authors must have erred. Difference does not equal contradiction. A contradiction would be if one author claimed that there were not two angels and another did. The mere mention of an angel does not necessarily imply one and only one angel present. If I tell a coworker that my wife and I went to the mall and I tell him that we stopped by the sporting goods store to pick up some fishing lures and a new reel, this would probably differ from my wife’s version of our trip to the mall to her girlfriend at lunch. She may mention that we stopped at Bath and Body to pick up some bath beads and then to the maternity store to get some more maternity clothes for our expected baby and never even mention the sporting goods store (which of course does not mean that we didn’t go there). The stories differ. I failed to mention that I met her at the mall because I left work late, therefore, we were in two different cars. I failed to mention that our two daughters were with us. I failed to mention many other details that if I retold the story to someone else mentioning my daughters, someone could conclude that I am contradicting myself merely for the fact that I didn’t mention my daughters being present in the original story.

In Christ,
Irenaeus

 

[Mystophilus]

This does not answer the question of why are the authors of scripture are inspired in their writings. It seems to me that inspiration is not needed to guarantee corroboration on ‘major’ issues; i.e., what do we mean by inspiration of scripture? And why cannot the Holy Spirit protect the sacred writers from errors in detail? Why wouldn’t He protect the writers from errors in details? Seems a rather minor feat.

It does, but it begs the complementary question: why would the Holy Spirit need to protect them at all? On what basis do we assume that any such intervention was necessary, let alone that it occurred?

Yes, I acknowledge that there are differences in the details in the Gospels, but I do not then jump to the conclusion that therefore the inspired authors must have erred. Difference does not equal contradiction. A contradiction would be if one author claimed that there were not two angels and another did.

Forgive me; I should have sourced those comments.

Matthew 27:28 and Mark 15:17 contradict one another on the colour of the cloak given to Jesus.

In Matthew 21:2, Jesus tells his disciples that they will find a donkey and a colt, which he then rides into Jerusalem. In Mark 10: 2 and Luke 19:30, he tells them that they will find a colt, which he then rides into Jerusalem. Even if a reader wished to say that Mark’s and Luke’s accounts omit the donkey but do not deny it, the Gospels’ representations of Jesus’ words remain contradictory.

In Matthew 26:17, Mark 14:12, and Luke 22:7, the Lord’s Supper is arranged on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, also known as the Day of Preparation of the Passover. He is crucified the following day: at the third hour, according to Mark15:25. In John 19:14, he is being tried before Pilate at the sixth hour on the Day of Preparation.

In Matthew 28:2, an angel (and the Greek is singular), rolls away the stone and speaks to them (plural). (I do not know whether you read Greek, so, if you do not, you can also open the Unbound Bible site, put up the whole passage in parallel English and Greek, and then click on the words of the Perseus site W-H text and a pop-up will tell you the root and form of each.) They leave the tomb, and then Jesus appears to them (plural).
In Mark 16:4, there is only one angel again, but, when they arrive, the stone has already been rolled away (perfect form, indicating an action previously completed). Jesus appears to Mary of Magdala, alone.
In Luke 24:2, the stone has already been rolled away, but, in 24:4, there are two angels, and so they (plural verb form) speak. Mention of the appearance of the resurrected Christ, surely a significant event from anyone’s perspective, is entirely omitted from the narrative of the women.
In John 20:2, the stone has already been rolled away, but Mary of Magdala has gone there alone. She returns to tell the disciples, as in the other Gospels, but before she has seen any angels. When she returns, alone, two angels appear and speak to her (singular), and then Jesus appears. All four accounts also differ as to which women were there, although all agree that Mary of Magdala was one.

Having been a fundamentalist myself, I have seen a few attempts to ‘reconcile’ these contradictions, but all of them require a priori judgements as to its meaning.

 

[Angelos]

Unfortunately, most of the comments posted here remind me of Thomas Paine, an ardent agnostic who dedicated one volume of his work entitled “Age of Reason” to the satirical critique of the innumerable discrepancies and patent contradictions in the Gospels. For ages Biblical scholars have done their best to find convincing answers and solutions to most of the questions and problems posed by non-Christian critics. According to one theory, the differences between the Gospels – even the Synoptic ones that follow almost the identical pattern in the narration of Jesus’ mission – stem from the evangelists’ zeal to avoid the accusations of plagiarism. A priest whom I once asked the reason for the alleged contradictions between the Gospels told me that the variations in certain narratives mirrored the Gospel writer’s aim to be different from others and indirectly proved that the same Spirit worked in four witnesses in four different ways. Although one might be easily delighted with this answer; some might be subsequently bothered with another question begotten by the same answer. If the evangelists applied deliberate variations to their accounts for the sake of authenticity and the refusal of the blames for plagiarism, why did they make changes in the narration of certain events rather than of every single event? Despite major variations, why do the Gospels (Synoptic ones, at least) sometimes seem to be a copy of each other in every respect? There are many sayings and accounts in one Gospel, the same of which we can readily find in another. How come this word-by-word copying goes hand in hand with a Gospel’s authenticity?

It must be born in mind that Evangelists presumably knew who was writing, what one was writing, and how one was writing. They likewise knew that a writer was authorized by the Spirit to give testimony to Jesus and write on the basis of the oral tradition entrusted to them by Christ himself. Nevertheless, what an evangelist was primarily concerned with was the consistency of the text within itself rather than its harmony with the other similar texts. As a result, integrity and coherence of a written text gained more significance than its compatibility with the way the same ideas were expressed in a different text. Definitely, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit an evangelist wrote the same basic truth through a literary style peculiar to oneself. Consider the following example: Mark is the only evangelist to combine the two Old Testament prophecies in the opening verses of His Gospel: “As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, ‘Look, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way, the voice of one shouting in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make his paths straight.’” (1:2-3)

Although the way Mark refers to the prophecy found in Malachi 3:1 as a prophecy in Isaiah seems problematic, it by no means reflects the evangelist’s ignorance of the Judaic Scriptures. Actually, the fact that he deliberately uses a different literary style can be inferred from the other evangelists’ reference to the same prophecy in a slightly different way. Both Matthew and Luke state that Jesus Himself gave testimony to John the Baptist after John had been imprisoned (Matthew 11:2-15; Luke 7:18-35). Rather interestingly, the way Jesus talks in Matthew and Luke of John and his mission along with a direct reference to a prophecy bears similarities to John’s depiction in Mark’s first chapter. A comparative study gives us the clue that Mark at the very beginning of His Gospel knew the two prophecies in question pointed at John as well as at two occasional testimonies about him. Thus, Mark equated the number of prophecies about John with the number of the testimonies in his Gospel. Since he made the two prophecies into a single one in a single chapter, he deliberately omitted the other account present in Matthew & Luke.

Another striking parallelism in Luke: In Matthew & Mark we read that Jesus sent some of His disciples ahead of him to go and prepare the Passover meal (Matthew 26:17-18; Mark 14:12-13). Unlike Matthew, Mark gives the exact number of the disciples sent by the Lord: “He sent two of His disciples and told them”. In Luke, we find out the names of these two disciples: “ Then the day for the feast of Unleavened Bread came, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and prepare the Passover for us to eat.” (22:7-8). This looks like a story unfolding, but one might ask why it is Luke who gives the names of the two disciples and why Peter and John? The answer can be found in the Acts of the Apostles, which is another book of testimony written by Luke the evangelist. According to Luke, when Peter performed his first official miracle after the descent of the Holy Spirit, only John was with him (3: 1-10). In the same way, Peter and John were the first disciples to be arrested and tried (4:1-22). (Compare these with what is written in John’s Gospel about the relation between “Peter” and “the disciple the Lord loved” to identify that beloved disciple as John the Evangelist! )

I’ll be giving more interesting examples soon.

 

[Angelos]

Of the four evangelists, Matthew is the only one to relate why and how Jesus’ tomb was sealed and what happened to the soldiers (probably Roman) that guarded the tomb at the time of Jesus’ resurrection. Accordingly, in Matthew alone can we find an answer to the crucial question “who rolled the stone away from the entrance to the Lord’s burial place?”. The way Matthew describes Jesus’ resurrection signals his aim to maintain the textual coherence throughout the Gospel in accordance with the fact that Jesus’ adversaries were aware of His claims to bodily resurrection: “The next day (which is after the day of preparation) the chief priests and the Pharisees assembled before Pilate and said, “Sir, we remember that while that deceiver was still alive he said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ (27:62-63). In Matthew, Jesus’ words that impelled the Pharisees to seal and guard Jesus’ tomb were linked to the comparison Jesus had previously made between Himself and Jonah the prophet: “Then some of the experts in the law along with some Pharisees answered him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.” But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was in the belly of the huge fish for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.” (12:38-40). Even though Jesus refers to Jonah’s sign in Luke too, the major element of the comparison is drastically modified: “As the crowds were increasing, Jesus began to say, “This generation is a wicked generation; it looks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so the Son of Man will be a sign to this generation.” (11:29-30). As it is clear, Jesus in Luke avoids revealing the similarities between the time Jonah spent in the belly of a huge fish and the time He Himself will spend in the tomb before the resurrection. This is absolutely because none of Jesus’ adversaries in Luke happen to know about His promise to rise again, less they should try to seal the tomb for the fear that the disciples will steal the body. As a result, in Luke the point of comparison between Jesus and Jonah shifts from the concept of a miraculous return to both persons’ ability to convert sinners despite the lack of a strong miraculous act. Interestingly, Luke employs twice the theme of Jesus’ becoming a sign for many people in the infancy narrative. First, the angel declaring the birth of the Savior to the shepherds talks of Jesus lying in a manger as the only sign endorsing the reliability of the message: “Today your Savior is born in the city of David. He is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign for you: You will find a baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger.” (2:11-12). Second, Simeon reiterates Jesus’ becoming a sign for many people when he prophecies Jesus’ passion to His holy mother Mary: “Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary, “Listen carefully: This child is destined to be the cause of the falling and rising of many in Israel and to be a sign that will be rejected. Indeed, as a result of him the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed – and a sword will pierce your own soul as well!” (2:34-35). (Note that Simeon uses the word “sign” in the same context as Jesus’ passion).

.

 

[Angelos]

If we get back to the alleged contradictions, we see that most people reading these accounts generally fail to detect the amazing harmony of the Gospels that come out of the meticulous analysis of the variations and contrasts. First of all, Matthew is the only evangelist that lays emphasis in the narrative peculiar to him on the idea of a metaphoric clash between the forces of this world and those sent from above. Thus, for Matthew the divine authority and ultimate victory of Jesus’ resurrection is expressed through the descent of a heavenly being (an angel) and the defeat of the Roman soldiers who think they can resist God and His heavenly host. This is why Matthew stresses that it was no human being, but an angel that rolled the stone and dispersed the guard. Besides, Matthew points out that only one angel (although he uses indefinite article and says “an” angel in the sense of “any certain angel”) was sufficient to beat an earthly army of many soldiers. All the other evangelists, on the other hand, depict the events that occur after Jesus’ resurrection with no reference to the guard or the descent of an angel. Although there are many apparent differences in the resurrection narratives of all the Gospels, they are compatible with one another in at least one aspect.

Matthew is the primary source since he alone describes in many details the setting and incidents occurring prior to the women’s arrival at Jesus’ tomb. Mark says that women saw a young man in white robes when they entered the tomb. Luke says women did not see a stranger sitting in the tomb, but that two men appeared to them when they went in to see Jesus’ body (so the notion of apparition is more important in Luke). John says only Mary Magdalene (actually she was the representative of all the women as the central figure in the narratives) entered the tomb and saw “two angels in white clothes”! Rather than focusing on contrastive elements, let’s find out the elements that are identically present in all the Gospels: In Mark the number of the person proclaiming Jesus’ resurrection is the same as in Matthew (one), the word “angel” is replaced with “ a man looking like an angel” as in Luke, and the women see and hear someone inside the tomb as in John.

In Luke the word angel is not used like in Mark, the men suddenly appear like the angel in Matthew, and there are two men like in John. Furthermore, there are great similarities between Luke’s accounts of Jesus’ resurrection and His ascension with regard to the apparition of angels, the time of their apparition, and the tone of their messages: “While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men stood beside them in dazzling attire. The women were terribly frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has been raised!” (Luke 24: 4-7) and “After he had said this, while they were watching, he was lifted up and a cloud hid him from their sight. As they were still staring into the sky while he was going, suddenly two men in white clothing stood near them and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand here looking up into the sky? This same Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will come back in the same way you saw him go into heaven.” (Acts 1:9-11).

John uses the word “angel” like Matthew, follows Mark when he describes the angels as sitting inside the tomb, and agrees with Luke on the number of the people talking to the women. Another interesting point in John’s narrative is that the word “angel” is used along with the common portrayal of angels by human beings, which indirectly designates the men women saw in Mark and Luke as angels even though these two evangelists do not overtly use the same word. “And she saw two angels in white sitting where Jesus’ body had been lying, one at the head and one at the feet” (20:12) Finally, John contrasts the scenery of crucifixion with that of the tomb after Jesus’ resurrection when he says there were two angels sitting on the right and left of the place where Jesus had been laid. Mark, however, focuses on the angel sitting on the right side alone due to the significance of the “right” side in Judaic culture and symbolism.

 

[runandsew]

envoymagazine.com/backissues/1.2/marapril_story2.html
This link has an article by Mark Shea titled 5 myths about 7 books.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

This does not answer the question of why are the authors of scripture are inspired in their writings. It seems to me that inspiration is not needed to guarantee corroboration on ‘major’ issues; i.e., what do we mean by inspiration of scripture? And why cannot the Holy Spirit protect the sacred writers from errors in detail? Why wouldn’t He protect the writers from errors in details? Seems a rather minor feat.

Yes, I acknowledge that there are differences in the details in the Gospels, but I do not then jump to the conclusion that therefore the inspired authors must have erred. Difference does not equal contradiction. A contradiction would be if one author claimed that there were not two angels and another did. The mere mention of an angel does not necessarily imply one and only one angel present. If I tell a coworker that my wife and I went to the mall and I tell him that we stopped by the sporting goods store to pick up some fishing lures and a new reel, this would probably differ from my wife’s version of our trip to the mall to her girlfriend at lunch. She may mention that we stopped at Bath and Body to pick up some bath beads and then to the maternity store to get some more maternity clothes for our expected baby and never even mention the sporting goods store (which of course does not mean that we didn’t go there). The stories differ. I failed to mention that I met her at the mall because I left work late, therefore, we were in two different cars. I failed to mention that our two daughters were with us. I failed to mention many other details that if I retold the story to someone else mentioning my daughters, someone could conclude that I am contradicting myself merely for the fact that I didn’t mention my daughters being present in the original story.

In Christ,
Irenaeus

The problem with the doctrine of inerrancy is that it has not had to reckon with the facts of Hebrew. Magisterial documents issued by the Papacy have hardly ever required even a working knowledge of Hebrew - they’ve spoken of the Hebrew Bible as though it were written in the Latin alphabet. It wasn’t - as a result, the vowel points in Hebrew (which did not exist in the OT period) have been ignored: yet their presence or absence affects the how the consonants are read & so, affects the meaning of the text; which in turn affects the notion of inerrancy. So if a word is read as meaning “Syrians” rather than “Edomites”, an account of a Biblical featuring either, changes its meaning & thus, the judgements of the truthfulness of statements about the battle change.​

Besides, how can a corrupt or uncertain text be inerrant ? It communicates no certain meaning - so it is not errant or inerrant, merely unmeaning. There are quite a few uncertainties & corruptions in the text of the OT books - very naturally, given their age.

Exegesis also changes meaning - which statement is the inerrant truth:

• that the Flood covered all the earth
  or:
• that the Flood covered some of the earth, but not all of it
  It’s not likely any Catholic bishop, cardinal, theologian or exegete believes that the Flood covered the whole earth - 250 years ago, the geographical universality of the Flood caused few problems if any. Believing in a geographically universal Flood, is not the same as believing in a purely local Flood. Even if the interpretation of the text changes, & the text does not, the judgement as to what it means has changed, & is not what it was - so an unchanged text is no use for preserving meaning if it is no longer judged to mean what it was believed to mean. A text which is inerrantly referring to a limited Flood is not inerrantly referring to a universal Flood - IOW, inerrancy in such an example does nothing whatever to preserve the meaning of the text.

If people insist on upholding or a doctrine - they are responsible for whatever difficulties there may be in it. By maintaining it, they make themselves responsible for it. It is inerrantists who are responsible for the manure in Noah’s Ark, for the absolute accuracy of the numbers of chariots in battles, for the number of years between Abraham & the Exodus, for the quotation of Enoch by Jude, & a host of other tiny details. If they don’t want to be bothered with the manure in the Ark, or with the years in the life of the Patriarchs, or the genealogies of the descendants of Judah - they shouldn’t insist on their doctrine. They are the ones who insist that it is true, so they are landed with it, until they face the problems that it raises. Unless & until statements that the Bible is totally inerrant reckon with difficulties of this kind, they will deserve very little respect.

 

[NotWorthy]

Jimmy Akin yells: PARABLE!

I’m sorry, I couldn’t help but comment on this passage:

Every Jew back then knew perfectly well that Nebuchadnezzar was the king of the Babylonians, not the Assyrians, just as every American today knows that Adolph Hitler was the German Fuehrer, not the Premier of the Soviet Union.

Evidently, Jimmy Akin has more faith in the American Education System than I do!!!

But, back to Jimmy’s point, that is a very good analysis of Judith. I did not know this.

 

[TheMese]

All this stinks of evangelical duplicity.

Evangelicals oppose the conclusions of biblical higher criticism claiming it’s the product of a godless liberal conspiracy.

Evangelicals accept all the conclusions of higher criticism concerning the Apocrypha because it suits their agenda.

Pathetic!

 

[ryanoneil]

I got this from catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0120.html Myth 3

Both Judith and Tobit have a number of historical and geographical errors, not because they’re presenting bad history and erroneous geography, but because they’re first-rate pious stories that don’t pretend to be remotely interested with teaching history or geography, any more than the Resurrection narratives in the Gospels are interested in astronomy. Indeed, the author of Tobit goes out of his way to make clear that his hero is fictional. He makes Tobit the uncle of Ahiqar, a figure in ancient Semitic folklore like “Jack the Giant Killer” or “Aladdin.” Just as one wouldn’t wave a medieval history textbook around and complain about a tale that begins “once upon a time when King Arthur ruled the land,” so Catholics are not reading Tobit and Judith to get a history lesson.

Peace,

Ryan

 

[inthecloud]

The Apocrypha contains historical errors. Scholars have noted that, unlike the canonical Scriptures, which have consistently proven to be historically accurate, the Apocrypha contains obvious historical and geographical errors. For example, Tobit contains historical errors-- including the idea that Sennacherib was the sone of Shalmaneser (1:15 – he was actually the son of Sargon.) Second Maccabees likewise contains numerous discrepancies in chronological, historical, and numerical matters"

The hole OT and part of the NT are full of contradictions, historical errors and scientific errors.
It seems that the fundangelicals are playing their pick a choose games as usual.
Tell them that bearing false wittness is a sin.

 

[Pwrlftr]

The hole OT and part of the NT are full of contradictions, historical errors and scientific errors.
It seems that the fundangelicals are playing their pick a choose games as usual.
Tell them that bearing false wittness is a sin.

What are some examples of historical errors?

 

[NotWorthy]

What are some examples of historical errors?

Who came first. The birds or Adam? It depends on which Creation account you read.

 

[The_Truthinator]

Are there historical errors in the Deuterocanonical Books?

A resounding YES! But to be fair, they are in the other parts of Scripture too.

For instance, you might want to mention to your Protestant friend who gave you the book that Moses didn’t write Torah, that the city of Ai was destroyed long before Joshua’s time, that Esther didn’t exist (Xerxes was coupled with Amestris at the time and widespread plans of genocide usually get marked in history), that the Synoptics say the Last Supper was on a different day than John does, that Nebuchadnezzar didn’t know nor befriend any Jewish boy named Daniel, that the people of Ninevah never experienced a widespread conversion like that described in Jonah, that Joseph’s story is unfounded in history, and is most likely a moral tale, etc., etc.

Unless, of course, you value your friendship, in which case you keep these things to yourself.

The Bible is neither a history book nor a science book. It is a book of religious truths, a guide for the soul, and should not be reduced to anything less. If someone wants to argue about this, let them alone; if they are sincere in their concerns, point out that the fact that none of Jesus’ parables actually happened does not detract from their message–which is spiritual, not historical, in nature.

 

[Church_Militant]

What are some examples of historical errors?

Then you can ask around as to which creation account they want to go with. Shepherd’s Chapel cultists will tell you that there were two different creations of the Earth based on all this.

I’m like

 

[Wolseley]

“The Apocrypha contains historical errors. Scholars have noted that, unlike the canonical Scriptures, which have consistently proven to be historically accurate, the Apocrypha contains obvious historical and geographical errors. For example, Tobit contains historical errors-- including the idea that Sennacherib was the sone of Shalmaneser (1:15 – he was actually the son of Sargon.) Second Maccabees likewise contains numerous discrepancies in chronological, historical, and numerical matters”

The Deuterocanonical Scriptures (what Protestants call the “Apocrypha”) do not contain any more historical errors than the other Scriptures do. The example I always use is Luke 2:1-3, which has a number of discrepancies. For example:

Luke tells us that Caesar Augustus enacts a universal Roman census, and that this was done while Quirinius was governor of Syria.

That’s fine, except that none of it fits with the existing Roman records, which we still have. Roman enrollments are recorded for 28 BC, 6 BC, and 14 AD; most scholars suggest that Jesus was probably born in 4 BC, but there was no census during 4 BC. We could then say, “Okay, so we shift it back two years to 6 BC”, but that still doesn’t solve a further problem, that of the governor of Syria.

According to existing Roman records, Publius Sulpicius Quirinius was the legate (or governor) of Syria from 6 to 7 AD, when Judea was annexed to Syria. There was a provincial census at that time, but not “the whole world” as Luke tells us. If Quirinius had a prior governorship of Syria, it would have had to have been before 10 BC, because we have a Roman list of the governors of Syria from 10 BC to 4 BC, and Quirinius isn’t one of them. If Quirinius was governor after 7 AD, Jesus’ birth still doesn’t fit during his reign, because Matthew tells us in Matt. 2:1 that Jesus was born “in the days of Herod”, and Herod died in 4 BC.

I have seen Protestants go into the most convoluted paroxysms of torturous reasoning to try to explain these discrepancies, but the facts cannot be avoided: the Scripture and the official Roman records about the time of Jesus’ birth simply do not jibe.

This is just one example, but there are others. I merely go into this to point out that if Protestants are trying to discredit the Deuterocanon because of historical inaccuracies, then they’ll need to discredit everything else in the Bible as well.

J_Chrysostomos:

The one that gets me is Judith. Judith asserts that Nebuchadnezzar reigned over the Assyrians in Nineveh (he was king over the Chaldeans in Babylon) and that he ruled after the exile! (Judith 4.3). Can someone help me here?

Judith is a religious novel, written to prove a didactic point. So is Tobit. So, for that matter, is Daniel. None of them were meant to be strictly accurate historically.

 

[inthecloud]

Jonah, Daniel, Esther, Judit, Tobit were all devotional NOVELS not history books. They never happened and they were allways undestood as novels. But tell that to a fundie protestant.
And the two stories of creation, Jesus genealogies, well do not get me started.