by Jon Eccles

Created on: July 26, 2007

Why the Bible isn't 100% true

Listen up all you fundamentalists. When I say fundamentalists, I mean people who believe every word in the Bible is true. It also works for people who think the Old Testament is questionable, but everything in the New Testament is true.

Here's the easiest demonstration I know that the Bible isn't entirely true.

Got your Bible? Good. The King James one, obviously. We don't want any of your trendy nonsense about relevance and accessibility in here. Turn to Matthew Chapter 1 verses 1 to 17. It's easy to find, it's right at the beginning of the New Testament.

You'll find a list of Jesus' ancestors, stretching back to Abraham. They actually count the other way, each venerable patriarch begetting the next in the traditional manner. There are forty generations back to Abraham.

But anyway, now turn to Luke, Chapter 3 verses 23 to 38. You'll see another genealogy from Jesus. This time it's backwards, and stretches back beyond Abraham, another 20 generations back to Adam. Let's just concentrate on the bit back to Abraham though.

It's a very different list. Strange that. Still, maybe it's the same people, but they're giving their first name rather than their last name. Or something.

There's more of them, though. 55 to be precise. Two thoroughly different lists, with a different number of male links in the chain.

It's odd, really. You'd think someone would have noticed. In the fourth century AD, when they were deciding which scrolls to put in the Bible and which to leave out (oh, sorry, didn't you know they'd done that?), you'd think some learned bishop would have said "hang on, we're going to have to edit one of these".

Actually, I've often wondered whether they enjoyed it. "Let's leave both of them in", you can imagine them saying, "then we can make them believe they're both true. We're so powerful, we can do what we like, and if anyone argues we can just send some soldiers to kill them".

And for this they come round and wake us up on Saturday mornings when we're trying to nurse our hangovers. Honestly, the cheek of it.

Here is a short response to Ivan Sugarwood, who says that one list is just more detailed than the other. The problem here is that there is nothing in the text to indicate that. Matthew and Luke simply list sons (or fathers), with no indication from either that anyone has been left out. If K has been left out of the chain, the statement that J is L's son (or father) isn't a deliberate simplification, it is a mistake.

He goes on to say that this discrepancy "actually proves that it is perfect". If a series of glaring errors can be considered proof of perfection, it is unclear what evidence Mr Sugarwood would ever accept.

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