On the Reliability of the Bible

Those of us who deal in matters that intersect with Christianity and the word of the Bible often find ourselves in a position where the Bible is cited as a credible, even infallible source. However, with a little observation, it becomes clear that this is simply not the case. In this essay, I will outline various errors which refute the Bible as a whole, such as its various contradictions, historical inaccuracy, and how it has changed over time.

The Bible contradicts itself. Let us take, for instance, the story of Noah’s Ark. Genesis 6:19 reads: “And of every living thing, of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female”. But then in Genesis 7:1-2, God says to Noah “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you alone are righteous before me in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and its mate; and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and its mate”. These two verses, only a page apart, paint two entirely separate pictures of this most well-known story. But why? The leading theory among bible scholars is that this and other inconsistencies in the bible are a result of two stories combined at one point to create what became the current version of the bible. This is evidenced not only in the story of Noah’s Ark but throughout both the New and Old Testaments of the Bible, meaning that the entire bible could be a combination of different sources and versions of the same events.

The Bible is historically inaccurate. The verse 1 Kings 6:1 says that “In the four hundred eightieth year after the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel…”. In other words, the fourth year of Solomon’s reign was 480 years after the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. that Solomon began his reign in 963 BCE, which places the exodus around 1447 BCE.  , Exodus 1:11 reads “Therefore they set taskmasters over [the Israelites] to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh.”, this suggests that the Israelites were forced to assist in the building of the city of Rameses, which was constructed during the reign of Rameses the Great (Rameses II). Rameses the Great ruled between 1279 and 1213 BCE. This is clearly problematic, as, since both of the bible’s suggestions for the time of the exodus foil each other, we have no real clue as to when, or even if the exodus occurred.

Lastly, and most importantly, the Bible does not meet common standards indicating a reliable source. We can not say with even a modest degree of certainty who wrote most of the Bible, nor can we know whether the author or authors actually witnessed the events depicted, and in some cases such as the creation story, we know that they could not have. Many claim that Moses wrote the first five books of the bible, but how could Moses have written of his own death in Deuteronomy? It is possible that another finished Moses’ writings after his death, but there is still not nearly enough evidence that Moses wrote the books in the first place. There is also much debate over who wrote the gospels, with some claiming that they were authored by the apostles they were named after, and others claiming they are second or even third-hand accounts of the life of Christ. We cannot be sure if any of these theories are correct, much less which theory. Even if we did know who wrote the Bible, we cannot know their motives, nor can we assume that they experienced the events they wrote about firsthand, meaning the stories in the bible may be muddled by years of oral tradition. On top of all of this the Bible has gone through innumerable translations, and each of those translations has likely changed the meaning in some way, sometimes majorly and intentionally. We simply cannot know whether the bible today, would resemble the original text in the slightest.

To summarize, after examining the various and widespread errors in the Bible, from contradictions to historical impossibilities, and our complete lack of background knowledge on its authors, the sheer quantity of blatant fallacies within the text proves that it would be immensely irresponsible to take the Bible as the infallible and inerrant text that many fundamentalists make it out to be, for it is clearly neither.

Bibliography

Bible Study Tools. “Read the New Revised Standard Free Online.” Bible Study Tools, biblestudytools.com/nrs/. Accessed 28 December 2022.

Dorman, Peter F. “Ramses II | Biography, Accomplishments, Tomb, Mummy, Death, & Facts.” Britannica, britannica.com/biography/Ramses-II-king-of-Egypt. Accessed 28 December 2022.

Dospěl, Marek. “The Exodus: Fact or Fiction?” Biblical Archaeology Society, 10 April 2016, biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/exodus/exodus-fact-or-fiction/. Accessed 28 December 2022.

Pruitt, Sarah. “Who Wrote the Bible? - HISTORY.” History Channel, 23 March 2021, history.com/news/who-wrote-the-bible. Accessed 28 December 2022.