And all the angels stood round about the throne (Isaiah 6)

Isaiah chapter six is a well-known chapter for this interesting vision that Isaiah has of God in Heaven (or is it the Temple in Jerusalem? I'm not sure...). I answered whether God can be seen in Genesis chapter twelve, and probably expanded on it elsewhere; the answer is no, but sometimes sort of. Isaiah is having a vision, and it may be not literally what God would look like, but how God allowed Isaiah to imagine him.

There is a lot of stuff that the SAB marks as absurd in this chapter, which is probably par for the course when it comes to supernatural visions. There's usually going to be strange things, and things not meant to be taken literally. While it's stated several times in the Bible that God has a throne in Heaven, since God doesn't have a physical body, it's not really clear what it means to see him sitting on it. Likewise, he doesn't likely have a robe with an enormous train as described here; it's probably simply symbolic of God's majesticness. Meanwhile, there are seraphim present ("seraphim" is already plural, so I sort of question "seraphims") which are a kind of angel, the Hebrew word meaning literally "fiery ones"; it's actually the same word translated as "fiery serpent" in Numbers 21:8! The seraphim have six wings, which, as stated, absurd or not, they only use one pair to fly with, while another pair covers their faces and the third covers their feet. This is an indication of how holy God is, as even angels hesitate to look directly at him. Also of course, as I mentioned a couple chapters back, they describe God as "Holy, holy, holy," the only instance of a word being repeated three times in the Bible other than the similar verse in Revelation. The seraphim are apparently shouting this so loudly the doorposts are shaking.

Isaiah is overwhelmed by all this glory and holiness, and expresses his unworthiness as "a man of unclean lips". This leads to an interesting moment where one of the seraphim brings a live coal and places it in Isaiah's mouth to cleanse him, and tells him his sin is gone (probably one of the oddest ways in the Bible of dealing with sin; does the SAB have a page on that?). Then God asks who he should send, which once again (although the SAB doesn't mark it here) doesn't mean God isn't omniscient, he already knows the answer, but is giving Isaiah a chance to volunteer, which he does. God tells Isaiah to tell the people of Judah that they hear but don't understand and see but don't perceive, and therefore God is going to shut their ears and eyes, and make their hearts not understand. The SAB marks this as unjust, but the idea here is that the people of Judah have been refusing to hear God for so long that he's going to let them continue to not hear to the point of destruction; this is a result of their own choices. Isaiah asks how long this will be, and God says it will be until Judah is desolate, but he will leave a tenth (I assume a tenth of the people, but it's not completely clear), which will also be somewhat desolate, but like a tree that loses its leaves, there will still be life there.

Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven (John 14)

John chapter 14 continues Jesus's parting message to the Apostles. He talks a lot about Heaven and the Holy Ghost. Speaking of Heaven, When was heaven created? The verses on this page are talking about different things. "In the beginning" and "when the earth was created" are the same time. As I'm pretty sure I mentioned in Genesis somewhere, the Jews believed in three "heavens": the atmosphere, outer space, and the dwelling place of God (in 2Corinthians 12:2 Paul talks about being "caught up to the third heaven"). Now here in John 14, Jesus is not talking about creating Heaven, but essentially preparing it for guests in some way. Theologically, up until now, nobody has been in Heaven but God and his angels.

I just talked about the disciples asking where Jesus was going in the previous chapter. The SAB marks Jesus's claim to be the only way to Heaven as intolerant, and while I suppose it may be, if it's the truth, it's the truth. Now of course there are Christians who believe in universal salvation, and they would say everyone gets to Heaven because Jesus died for the sin of the world, which is certainly possible, but seems unlikely given other things Jesus says. Jesus says, "if you have seen me you have seen the Father," prompting the SAB to ask, "Can God be seen?" (which I answered in John chapter one) and "Is Jesus God?" (which I answered in another post in John one).

Jesus says, "whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do." This the SAB calls, "The greatest lie ever told." Now I understand why someone would think that, because on the straightforward fully literal sense, it's not true. Once again, I don't think it's saying what the SAB thinks it's saying. The phrase "in my name" doesn't mean, "If you tack the name Jesus onto the end of any prayer, your wish will be magically granted." Rather, as I've discussed before, a person's "name" is like their reputation, and in Jesus's case--and here in this verse--it means the essence of who Jesus is. The point here, and I know skeptics are going to call it a cop-out, is that if you ask for something that aligns with God's will, you will see your prayer answered.

Will Jesus's second coming be visible to all? I don't think this is really a contradiction. Once again, this is a matter of taking "no more" to be a more absolute statement than Jesus is meaning it to be. I think it suffices to say that nobody living at the time Jesus spoke those words would see Jesus again on earth after his ascension. Who sent the Holy Ghost? Again, not a contradiction; both Jesus and the Father sent him.

Is Jesus peaceful? I'm sure I covered this somewhere in one of the other gospels, but yes, these verses can be confusing. Let me clear up a handful that don't really belong here. The Matthew 26 and Luke 22 passages are not about peace or war, but are simply about self-defense; in the Luke passage, Jesus suggests the Apostles should arm themselves, because they will likely find themselves in danger after Jesus is gone, and in Matthew, Jesus is just telling Peter to let things unfold as peacefully as possible rather than starting a fight he can't win. As for the rest, the peace that Jesus brought to earth was peace between man and God by taking away the sin of the world. However people who accept this peace will often find themselves in struggle against those who do not accept it. And of course, in the Revelation passage, there is a literal war, with Jesus as the commander-in-chief of one side.

"Is Jesus God?" and "Who is the Lord of the earth?" are questions I answered in John chapter one and John chapter 12 respectively.

I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren (John 5:19-47)

The rest of John chapter five is a big flowery speech by Jesus about himself, which is what a lot of the book of John is comprised of.

Does Jesus judge people? This is going to be a very complicated answer to what is honestly a very straightforward question. Jesus, in his time on earth living as a human prophet and Messiah, didn't come to judge; nonetheless, after Jesus's death on the cross and ascension, he was put into a place of authority to judge the dead. So, when it says that the Father gave Jesus authority to judge, this is what it is referring to: that Jesus, having been judged on behalf of humanity for their sin, is in a special position to judge. When Jesus says, "For judgment I am come into this world," he is talking about how his ultimate purpose in life was to be sacrificed to attain that position. So, Jesus doesn't judge people in his life, but in his death.

Is death final? Well, in the sense of whether one comes back to life after dying, yes, there are very few exceptions. But in the sense of whether bodily death means the end of an individual's experience, the answer is no, there is an afterlife. So, to address the verses that say yes... Joshua 23:14 isn't making a claim about the finality of death, only that everyone dies. All of the verses from Job are just Job's personal reflection from a limited point of view; Job is neither a prophet nor a theologian. Psalm 6:5 needs context, as in reading it alone, I misunderstood what it was talking about, which is the suggestion that after one dies, one has no relationship with God. While David was considered a prophet, that doesn't mean he understood everything, and the Old Testament doesn't talk much on the afterlife, so David had no solid basis to believe in one (although 2Samuel 12:23 "I shall go to him [my dead son]" is somewhat suggestive). Psalm 31:17, while also written by David, and thus could be dismissed likewise, doesn't say anything about the afterlife, but simply states that dead people don't talk to the living. Psalm 39:13 is also David talking about death, and not knowing what may come after. Psalm 88 as a whole is about death generally, but once again, Heman the Ezrahite simply doesn't know what may be after death. Psalm 115:17 is a strange statement; I could say what I've already said about David saying pretty much the same thing as the first part, but the second part is quizzical. What could be meant by "neither any that go down into silence"? I mean, it sounds like they are talking about the dead, but then, why "neither," like this is a second category of people? Strange. Ecclesiastes was written by Solomon, when he was very old, and apparently more than a little depressed; like his father David, he had little evidence to believe in an afterlife. Isaiah is tricky, because not only is he a prophet, but his book of prophecy has verses that the SAB puts on either side of this apparent dilemma; so what does Isaiah really believe about the afterlife? It's worth noting that two of these verses that seem to contradict each other come right after one another in chapter 26, which would suggest it's not an accident, but a purposeful juxtaposition; Isaiah is making a bold statement about coming back from the dead. I believe in verse 14, "They are dead," refers to the wicked, while in verse 19, "Thy dead men shall live," refers to the righteous men of Israel; Isaiah is talking in the middle of this very long passage (chapters 24-27) about a coming prophetic event where the righteous will be raised from the dead. Isaiah 38:18 however is a bit of a stumper, as Isaiah has already said there is a day coming when the dead shall rise; it's possible that he's referring to the state that the dead are in temporarily between the day of death and the day of resurrection, which is a bit of a sticky point theologically. There is definitely some discussion among theologians as to whether a person goes immediately to the afterlife upon dying or whether there is a waiting period much like sleeping; there's scripture that seems to support either side, and the book of Revelation does seem to have different moments where different classes of people are given a bodily resurrection (see Revelation 20:13 for instance).

"How are people judged by God?" was answered in John chapter three (where it specifically asked about being "born again"), as was "Is salvation by faith alone?", but in the second part of that chapter; they're closely related questions.

Does Hell exist? This is a big question, and there are important related questions that the SAB seems to have rolled up into one page. That's to say that whether Hell exists is really a separate question from (assuming it exists) who goes there. First of all, I think it's worth reflecting on whether "Hell" even exists as a word in the Bible; the King James Version certainly has the word "hell" 23 times in the New Testament, but I don't believe it's a Greek word. "Hell" is translated 13 times from "Gehenna", 10 times from "Hades", and once from "Tartarus"; "Gehenna" (from Hebrew "ge Hinnom") is a valley in Israel where pagan sacrifices used to be made and in Jesus's time was a burning trash dump, "Hades" is a Greek word signifying the place where the dead go, "Tartarus" is the lowest level of the underworld where the enemies of the Greek gods were imprisoned. So...there are three separate concepts that sort of come together to form the Christian doctrine of "a fiery place where dead people are imprisoned," and you could ask whether they really belong together like that, but for now, since the KJV treats them all the same, we'll say they are. (sigh This is really going to be a long post...)

So does a place exist where all three of these concepts are true? Yes. I take Luke 16:22-24 as the prime example:

And it came to pass, that the beggar [Lazarus] died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried; And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.

Here we have a description of a place where the dead go, they seem to be imprisoned there, and there is a fire tormenting them (Jesus uses "Hades" in this discussion). However, there are also people separate from the fire being comforted. So what does that mean? Ephesians 4:8-10 suggests a doctrine that everyone who died before the crucifixion would go to Hell and wait for sin to be paid for:

Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)

So, assuming that is saying that Jesus went to Hell and staged a massive spiritual prison break, there are at least some people who went to Hell temporarily.

It is possible that this jailbreak involved every human soul and Hell essentially closed up shop (excepting the fallen angels mentioned in 2Peter 2:4 imprisoned in Hell (Tartarus) who are waiting for a final judgment), and there are many Christians who believe this based on (among others) 1Corinthians 15:22. I personally believe that the other two verses in the "everyone goes to Heaven" section don't necessarily mean that, however. Note that 1Timothy 4:10 says, "...specially of those that believe," suggesting the criteria for going to Heaven still includes belief. As for 1John 2:2, yes, Jesus died for the sin of the world, but it's like a blank check given to you, and even if a billionaire gave you a blank check, you don't get anything unless you believe that the check is real, so you sign the back and bring it to the bank!

So, seeing as all of the verses in the "no Heaven or Hell" category were addressed in the "Is death final?" question above, that leaves the "No, those that don't go to heaven, just die." category. Actually, once again, there are Christians who believe this doctrine. Supposedly, while the fires of Hell are never extinguished, the souls that they burn do eventually get destroyed. Those who don't believe in this doctrine explain away these verses in various ways. First of all, most of these verses that talk about death, are actually referring to death, no metaphor. Everyone is a sinner, so everyone dies. Revelation 20:14-15--which I'm surprised the SAB didn't put in this category--is the metaphorical death: "the second death." This, and the New Testament verses in this category discussing destruction, corruption, and perishing, are describing an ongoing eternal process of these things. Yes, morbid, but that's the doctrine. And Jesus seems to be supporting that view in Matthew 7:13-14:

Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

I don't think I have anything to add to the What the Bible says about Hell page.

Does anyone ever do anything good? I've answered a lot of similar questions in the past, and I think they're all listed at the bottom of the linked page. Once again, this is slightly different, and deserves its own answer. Without even looking, the answer is "yes", but what about the verses that the SAB groups under "no"? In Psalm 14:3, I think David is using a bit of hyperbole, because obviously he thinks he himself does good, more often than bad, at least. When Paul quotes David in the book of Romans, he is trying to make the point that all people are sinners. I think that's what most of these verses are saying, particularly clear in the Ecclesiastes verse, that there is nobody who does good all the time. The verse from Isaiah doesn't really belong here at all, but is saying in a hyperbolic way that human righteousness is like "filthy rags" (I've been told the Hebrew here actually says "used menstrual cloths"! Yes, the word translated "filthy" is "עִדִּים" which pertains to menstrual issue) when compared to the righteousness of God.

Did Jesus bear witness of himself? and Is Jesus's witness of himself true? are both closely related questions, and the SAB seems to be using the same verses for both. The verse for "no" on the first page simply doesn't say that, so there's no contradiction there. The answer to the second question is "yes" as well, as John 5:31 is not Jesus admitting that he's lying or anything like that; he's just pointing out that when he speaks for himself, the Pharisees aren't going to simply take him at his word. The question Can God be seen? was answered in John chapter one, among other places.

The SAB notes on verse 46 that although Jesus says Moses wrote about him, he doesn't specify where. His listeners would probably think of Deuteronomy 18:15-19 where Moses is directly talking about Jesus, but there are other things in the books of Moses that point to Jesus. Genesis 3:15 is consideredby many to be the first prophecy of Jesus:

And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

While a lot of people take this verse to mean that people generally won't like snakes, some have suggested it's talking about the crucifixion. Genesis 18 has three men appearing before Abraham, where the first verse says, "And the LORD appeared unto him..." A few Christian scholars have suggested that this is Jesus with two angels, while some have even suggested that this is an embodiment of the Trinity! Verse 18 in particular of that chapter says, "...all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in [Abraham]," which many have suggested is talking about his descendant, Jesus. (Several times in Genesis, God refers to Abraham and his descendants as being a blessing to all nations, the first being in chapter 12) Abraham's (attempted) sacrifice of Isaac in Genesis 22 is considered by many to be a prefiguring of Jesus's death on the cross; in fact, some have suggested that "Moriah" was the place where Jesus's crucifixion would later take place. Genesis 49:8-12 is Jacob's special blessing on his son, Judah who, despite not being the firstborn, is described in words suggesting a role as the royal tribe of Israel; the Talmud actually suggests that "until Shiloh come" is a Messianic prophecy, and of course Jesus was from the tribe of Judah, in the line of King David. Leviticus 25:47ff talks about the kinsman redeemer, which is also discussed further in Deuteronomy 25, and as I explored in Ruth chapter four, Jesus is the kinsman redeemer of both Israel and the entire world. In general, there are a lot of parallels between Moses and Jesus that I won't go into details with, but I did find this article very interesting (and it was also a help for some of my verses here).

And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night (John 3:1-15)

John chapter three is mostly the story of Jesus having a conversation with Nicodemus. This conversation and Nicodemus himself are noteworthy, because in much of the Gospels, Jesus is seen in situations being in opposition to the Pharisees, but Nicodemus is "a man of the Pharisees". It's not commonly noted, but not all of the Pharisees were against Jesus, and at least two of them (Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea) performed actions indicating that they believed in him to some extent.

Did Jesus perform many signs and wonders? Yes, Jesus performed a lot of signs and wonders, he just refused to do any just for the sake of showing off. All of Jesus's miracles were performed because there was a need for them, but there were a few times when the Pharisees demanded that he do something on the spot to prove himself, and he refused. Of course, it's understood that the "sign of Jonas" was a reference to the prophet Jonah being three days in the belly of a whale; similarly Jesus would be three days in the grave. (Yes the latter "three days" is questionable, but I don't think this is the place for that subject.)

Must someone be born again to be saved? These discussions are always convoluted because there's a lot the Bible says on this subject, and a lot of subjects that are closely related. The specific issue of being "born again" is a particularly sticky point because John 3:3 is the only place in the Bible where the term appears, at which point it's not very well explained, and yet you'll find a lot of Christians who are very hung up on it. (Ask a Christian like that what it means, and they'll probably say something like, "If you are, you just know!") Nonetheless, how I would respond to what is touched on on the contradiction page is that being born again is believing in Jesus, and the SAB seems to understand that the point here is belief, as they group it together. The thing that seems like a sticking point is when the Bible talks about salvation through words and deeds; the solution to the confusion is understanding that if you have the right beliefs, you will speak the right words and perform the right deeds. A pastor friend of mine told me he teaches this subject with an illustration of a coin, where faith and beliefs are on one side, and good words and deeds are on the other; while they are two different things, they are just two aspects of the same state of being. This does open up a whole can of worms theologically with the question of which may be more important, and there are scriptures that seem to support either side, but I'm not going to get that deep here.

The SAB makes an interesting note on verse 8 about Jesus's statement "The wind bloeth where it listeth, and thou ... canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth." I suppose in a scientific note, the SAB points out that it is quite possible to measure the wind. This is true, but I think what Jesus is saying still stands, even without the fact that methods of measuring the wind didn't exist in first century Palestine. Yes, you can tell what the wind is doing at a specific point in space and time, but just because that's possible, can you really tell where it's coming from or where it's going? Wind is very chaotic, and it's not visible, so you can't really have full knowledge of what the wind is doing in general. This article, which I just Googled and is very recent, talks about the technology used to measure wind, and how difficult it is.

"It's a demonstration of the feasibility for our future satellite mission we are pursuing where we hope to provide the 10-kilometer resolution," Zeng said.

The SAB has a lot to say about verse 12 in the footnote. it's a lot of science stuff linked to on other pages. Let's gather it up:

Jesus believed that Adam and Eve were created "from the beginning." But the universe is 13.8 billion years old, the earth 4.6 billion, and humans (depending on how you define "human") for a couple million years.

This comment is on a passage where Jesus is making a point about divorce by essentially quoting from Genesis 1. So, I'm guessing that the SAB is implying that Jesus is a young-earth creationist, which goes against modern science. Maybe, but just because Jesus is quoting Genesis doesn't mean you know what his view on creation is; Christians all accept Genesis as part of the Bible, but views on what it means vary greatly. Some believe in a literal seven-day creation that happened about 6,000 years ago; some believe that the seven days represent indefinite amounts of time that may be billions of years; some believe that Adam and Eve were not the first human beings, but the first ones to have a special relationship with God. I have a particular view that may not be widespread, but didn't originate with me, that I went over in Genesis 2. The point here is that I think the SAB is reading too much into Jesus quoting Genesis, and nonetheless, the first human beings in fact were male and female, which is what Jesus actually said in that passage.

Jesus believed the story of Noah's ark. He thought it really happened and had no problem with the idea of God drowning everything and everybody.

This is actually a pet peeve of mine. I hear a lot of Christians say, "Jesus says Jonah really happened!" just because Jesus mentioned Jonah being swallowed by a fish. Jesus knows his audience is familiar with the Old Testament, so it makes sense to use it as a common cultural reference; this doesn't mean that Jesus is necessarily saying it's all true. The SAB is doing the same thing here: if Jesus mentions Noah, he has to be signing off on the complete veracity of every single aspect of the complete story of Noah's flood! Again, this is a leap of logic that I don't think is warranted; at most, I'd say you can probably say that Jesus recognizes that Noah was a real historical person. It was my view going through that part of Genesis that the story is problematic scientifically and narratively; does that mean that Jesus, when making a point illustrated by the person of Noah, needs to pause to untangle all the problems of that story? Why would he? Jesus is making a point about urgency and danger, and illustrating it with the story of the flood; discussion of physics and meteorology would be a distraction.

Jesus is incorrect when he says that the mustard seed is the smallest seed. (Orchids have the smallest seeds.) And there are no trees in the mustard family (Brassicaceae).

The SAB is completely missing the point on two levels. Jesus's parable of the mustard seed is trying to make a point about something spiritual. His use of the mustard seed as "the smallest seed" is not intended as a scientific statement of fact, but simply that the mustard seed was likely the smallest seed any of his audience would have been familiar with. And it's important that his audience is familiar with the mustard seed, because they would have known that the idea of a mustard seed growing into a huge tree was absolutely ridiculous! Jesus doesn't think this is normal, he's implying that the kingdom of heaven defies expectations! So to sum up the footnote on verse 12, Jesus is only wrong about those things if you make entirely unwarranted leaps of logic based on things he said in passing in various places in the Gospels.

Has anyone ever ascended into heaven? You know, I'm inclined to give this one to the SAB. I mean, I could be nitpicky about the stories of Enoch and Elijah (the Bible doesn't actually say Enoch went to heaven, but if he didn't, then what the heck is the Bible trying to say?) and try to weasel out of this, but honestly, I'm at a bit of a loss as to why Jesus overlooked these two men. I guess I can say that Jesus is making a generalized statement that he failed to mention the odd exceptions to, but it feels like the wording should be different; it just feels so absolute. It's probable that his point is that no man has ascended into heaven and come back to talk about it, because that's certainly true, but his wording is technically a contradiction with other parts of scripture as the SAB notes.

This is getting long, so I'll break it at the famous verse 16, and finish this post with the footnote on verse 14. I'll say once again that just because Jesus uses an illustration out of the Old Testament, it doesn't necessarily follow that he takes the referenced story literally, however in this case, I don't see a reason why he shouldn't. The SAB marks the story in Numbers 21 as both absurd and having scientific issues, but we're talking about two miracles, so to a nonbeliever, any miracle is going to seem absurd and nonscientific. I suppose there is the issue of God making a miracle that hurts people and following it by a second miracle to fix the first; yes, that seems absurd, but I think the reason for what happened was to teach the Israelites something about faith. The snakes came because of lack of faith, and they needed to have faith in God's strange cure to deal with it. (The story has more issues, but I'll save them for whenever I get around to blogging Numbers.) The important thing here is that Jesus is comparing himself to the bronze serpent of Numbers 21, because like the issue of faith I described above, people of the world are subject to the effects of Original Sin because of the lack of faith of Adam, and need to be cured by faith in looking to Jesus lifted up on the cross to pay the price for sin. More on this in verse 16 next post.

And king Herod heard of him (Luke 23)

The first question the SAB brings up on Luke 23 is Who put the robe on Jesus? This is a fascinating question because it highlights an even bigger question that the SAB fails to ask. Why is Luke's gospel the only one that mentions Jesus making a trip to see Herod? It's funny because the idea that Herod and his men put the robe on Jesus almost makes a sort of twisted sense--at least I can't see why the Romans would bother. Luke's gospel as a whole has a number of interesting little vignettes that are missing from the other three, and you end up wondering where Luke got his information. Perhaps as the only non-Jewish writer, he was able to get inside information from the Romans, but that's only speculation on my part.

Who carried Jesus' cross? This one is pretty simple: Jesus carried his own cross part of the way, and Simon of Cyrene carried it for the other part.

What did the soldiers give Jesus to drink? I think there were two points in time that the soldiers offered Jesus a drink. First, they offered him wine, which he refused, and the second time they offered him vinegar, which he took a little bit of.

What did the sign over Jesus say? Yes, it's very interesting that all four gospels get the sign different, but the essential message is the same.

Did both thieves revile Jesus? The general understanding of this supposed contradiction is that while both of the thieves reviled Jesus at first, one of them was moved for unknown reason to repent and defend Jesus. The SAB has a side-note on verse 43 that is worth addressing, even though I'm not a Jehovah's Witness. The thing is, there's a lot of speculation theologically as to what went on between the time Jesus died and the time he was resurrected. Some believe, and with fairly good reason, that when Jesus died, he didn't go to heaven, but rather went to a place known as Sheol where he preached the Gospel to all dead people who were waiting to go to the afterlife. This is more than I really want to go into here, but I do believe that it's written about in one of the later epistles. Actually, I guess the SAB talks a bit about it on the page for Did Jesus go to heaven after he died but before his ascension? Jesus seems to be saying to Mary Magdalene that he hasn't been to heaven, but he could simply mean that he hasn't made his final ascension yet. I'm almost babbling here, but the point in the end is I'm just not sure, so let's move on to a simpler question.

Can thieves go to heaven? I can answer this one! The contradiction page quotes 1 Cor. 6:9-10, which is a verse I have a love/hate relationship with. Yes, Paul mentions a whole list of sorts of people who can't go to heaven, but then in verse 11, he says, "And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." The important takeaway? Sin will keep us from heaven, but Jesus is in the business of forgiving sin. There will be no thieves in heaven, but there will be a whole lot of ex-thieves.

When did the Temple curtain rip? I don't think that any of these verses are trying to nail down an exact time; the idea is that the curtain ripped when Jesus died.(See comments for more musing on this topic.)

What were the last words of Jesus? I don't know.

What did the Centurion call Jesus when he died? The accepted understanding is that there were two centurions at Jesus' crucifixion, and they each had something to say when Jesus died.

From where were the women watching? I think that there was more than one group of women at Jesus' crucifixion, and while most watched from afar, a small group, along with the Apostle John, was much closer to the cross.

Who buried Jesus? The thing to understand here is that Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were members of the Sanhedrin who happened to be sympathetic to Jesus, so there is no contradiction here.

I will not keep anger for ever (Matthew 25)

Matthew 25 opens with the parable of the ten virgins. I've dealt with the issue of polygamy before, but let me take a moment to reiterate the important misunderstanding involved in this passage: the ten virgins are not brides, they're bridesmaids. The man in the parable isn't coming to marry them, they're just the welcoming committee to lead him to the party. (Although polygamy was probably still pretty prevalent in Jesus' day, I think men still married one woman at a time.) This parable is about being ready for the second coming, but once again, I'm not real clear on what the oil represents.

The next parable is of a businessman with some servants. The SAB thinks it's strange that the master was glad that the servants invested the money, but I think it's loosely implied that that is what they were meant to do. The SAB marks the parable as cruel and violent, and honestly, I've tended to feel the same; why punish someone for not investing? At least he didn't lose it, right? This is a troubling parable, as most people have, as far as I've heard, interpreted this as being about Jesus entrusting his followers with the Gospel. If you don't share the Gospel, are you going to go to Hell, then? Parables like this one and the previous really can be confusing and troubling, I'll readily admit.

Then Jesus goes on to describe the manner in which judgment is going to come at the second coming. In this case, while most of the time there does seem to be the sentiment that salvation comes by faith, here the judgment seems clearly to be based on how people treated those less fortunate than themselves (something which the SAB marks "Good stuff"). All of this leads to a lot of questions. One thing that may explain discrepancies with other concepts of eternal judgment is that it is said here that Jesus is judging nations rather than individual people. It's always been my understanding that God deals with people not just on an individual level, but in groups; what this means for said groups is a bit hard to say. If a nation was made up of mainly cruel people, but there were a few good people mixed in, then how does the judging go? I assume that the good people get accepted, but if the nation as a whole is rejected, then who or what gets judged? In case I wasn't making it clear, I'm saying that I'm a bit fuzzy on this event overall, but I'm going to go to the individual questions that the SAB raises.

When was Heaven created? I'm going with Heaven being created when (or even slightly before) the earth was created. While the verse in John says Jesus is going "to prepare a place for you" that doesn't mean that Heaven does not exist, it means that Jesus has work to do to get Heaven ready for everyone coming there. (It was probably spiritual work, not actually physically making rooms or whatever.)

How should strangers be treated? I'm going to go with "Be kind to them." I think the verses in the second column are meant for a special purpose, and that there are certain situations that were particular to the early Israelites that required them to deal mercilessly with strangers, but those were not general rules.

"What must you do to be saved?" is a question I keep glossing over because the way the SAB puts it, it's a big question to tackle, so I'm honestly procrastinating on it. However, "Has there ever been a righteous person?" is one I addressed back in Genesis.

"How long does God's anger last?" is a good question, and I see the page there has a lot of food for thought. I think there needs to be a few things said that clears away some, but not all of the issues here. First of all, not all of these verses are intended as general statements, but rather some of them may pertain to particular incidents. Secondly, "how long" is a rather subjective matter, especially when you're dealing with a being like God who is eternal; being angry for forty years might be to his mind "but a moment". Thirdly, the length of God's anger may not be commensurate with the length of the punishment. (Maybe God was angry just for a moment, but they had to wander for forty years anyway?) Just because there's an everlasting punishment doesn't mean that there was an everlasting anger to go with it. So all that being said, I would say that the only verse on this page that clearly states God will be angry at someone forever is Malachi 1:4. Does that still leave a contradiction? Maybe, but I think the rest of these verses are more vague than the SAB makes them out to be.

"Does Hell exist?" I addressed here, and while I didn't have a good definitive answer for it in the end, I think, "Is death final?" was an issue I addressed back in Joshua.

Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? (Matthew 6)

So, continuing the sermon in chapter 6, we come on a number of similar issues to what we had last chapter. In fact, I'm pretty sure we just covered the first issue, and I think the SAB is tracking with my explanation, since it marks the first several verses as "good stuff". Generally when it comes to doing good works and praying, it's good to make it a thing you aren't doing to show off. The SAB mentions school prayer and the National Day of Prayer in their note on verse 5, and I actually agree. It should be noted that prayer in public schools is not illegal, so long as one keeps it to oneself, which is the way it should be in my opinion.

On verse 9, the SAB asks the interesting question "Do Christians know how to pray?" which is another one of those odd moments when I feel it's really reaching for a contradiction, but okay. I don't think either verse is saying what the SAB is purporting it to say. The verse here in Matthew is, I suppose being an instance of instruction in how to pray, but I don't think that necessarily means that Jesus wants Christians to pray these exact words, nor does it mean that, having read this passage, one will automatically know how prayer works. On the other hand, I don't think the Romans passage is saying that people don't know how to pray, only that sometimes the exact words to say may escape someone, but that's okay, as the Holy Spirit knows what we really need even if we can't put it in words.

So, feeling a little more fresh than I was when finishing up the last chapter, I'll try to address the question of whether we are all God's children. This is a tricky one actually, as I think the Bible can play pretty loose with this issue. Let me dispense with a few of these by noting that some of these verses may say "X are the children of God" but that may not imply that "not X are not the children of God". Also, there are a lot of issues being made separate here that are not actually separate, e.g. one might want to assume that "them that believe on [Jesus'] name" and "As many as are led by the Spirit of God" refer to the same group of people. Still, there is a sense in which we are all children of God because God created the human race, as I think I touched on for a similar issue in Genesis 6, and that wasn't much clearer. I think in most of these verses, the sentiment is that spiritually you are the "children of" whatever or whomever you do the will of.

Is God's will always done in heaven? I have to hand it to the SAB for catching these slightly less-than-obvious details, but I don't think this will float. Verse 10 doesn't say "always", and while I don't think it would be wrong to assume that it's generally the case that God's will is done in heaven, the fact there was an exception to the rule doesn't make the rule wrong.

While I understand that the wording of verse 13 might lead one to question whether God tempts people, I don't think this verse in particular is meant to say that. I think the idea here is asking God to keep us from temptation, not that God would tempt us if we failed to ask, but that we may ask God for further protection from temptation that might come from other sources.

I find it interesting that the SAB marks verse 15 with "injustice" and then comments "Fair is fair!" I'm not sure what point was being made there, but yes, it does seem rather fair, and I think it's a principle that some Christians have lost sight of: if God has forgiven our sins, then what place do we have to be unforgiving?

Verse 23 is marked as absurdity, and I'll have to admit here I don't know what this verse means; it does sound rather odd.

In verse 26, Jesus makes an odd comparison between people and birds. The SAB points out that birds don't have it quite so good as Jesus seems to be making it out to be. While I suppose it's technically right about this, there's something to be said (for better or worse) about how bad people have it anyway. Back in the first century, the life expectancy was pretty low, and this was largely due to infant mortality. I suppose the real point here is that the average human doesn't live as carefree a life as a bird, but even though, birds that do manage to live a good healthy life do so without having struggles that people do. And I don't think Jesus is saying that birds don't matter, he's just saying that they matter considerably less than humans do.

I don't think that the last few verses are Jesus saying that one should simply not care in any way about material things. In fact, I don't think I even need to appeal to hyperbole as I did in most of the points earlier to say that this is merely a matter of comparison, that is, Jesus is saying that material things should be less of a consideration than spiritual matters.

So man lieth down, and riseth not (Joshua 23)

In Joshua 23, apparently the fighting is over, and Joshua calls the tribes together to give them a speech. The main purpose of the speech seems to be pretty plain: he's giving a review of what the fighting was all about. He reminds them of their victories (and not their failures, perhaps hypocritical, but I'd like to think he was just aiming for a positive note) and admonishes them to stay faithful to God and the law that was given to them by Moses.

The SAB notes that verse ten is both absurd and unjust. I don't know if I've said it before, but sometimes I don't understand such a juxtaposition: how can something be both at the same time? Absurd seems to me to imply that it's just not going to happen, but if it's not happening, how is it unjust? Anyway, I don't think it goes against justice or practicality to have a righteous few overpower an unrighteous multitude. Aside from the Biblical example of Gideon, who defeated 120,000 Midianites with an army of 300 (not 1,000 to one, but 400 to one; still impressive), America has a police force that is about one in 400, and they do manage. Still, I think it's more than likely that we're talking hyperbole here. "One man of you shall chase a thousand" sounds a lot cooler than "One man of you shall chase a lot more than one." If the unjust part is that God is on their side, consider that Joshua is telling them this as a conditional thing. Too many people, especially today, are willing to go to battle in the belief that God is on their side. God doesn't take sides, the best you can do is to join God's side.

The second point brought up by the SAB is a real meaty one, perhaps one of the best questions I've come across yet in the SAB. Is death final? This is a key point in understanding what the Bible teaches, and a difficult one to deal with because admittedly, there truly is contradictory accounting of this matter to be found in the Bible. Yes, this is one of the biggest issues in the Bible that I will readily admit has contradiction behind it, and won't claim to not exist. The real manner in which one addresses this contradiction is not to ignore it, but analyze what's really going on here, as this is a key question that most religions ask.

One very notable thing that most people realize without having to delve too deeply is that the majority of scripture that talks about the afterlife is found in the New Testament, not the Old. Even the earliest citations given by the SAB in the "No" column are really not addressing the issue of an afterlife or "resurrection", but the issue of coming back from the dead or "revivication". Everyone today knows that the latter is a possibility. Most of us in fact probably know someone who was temporarily dead and came back to life after CPR or application of a defibrillator. When it comes to the concept of an afterlife, the first very solid mention of such a thing is probably Daniel 12:2, where the phrase "everlasting life" is used. There are actually some who will tell you that only Christians have the promise of "everlasting life", and Jews just have an outdated moral system that was only created as a foundation on which to build Christianity, but I think that's a seriously flawed theological position. I'm not sure I even fully buy the slightly less offensive position some have that Judaism is just slightly lesser and was meant to come to full understanding with the coming of Christ. No, even as a Christian who believes that full revelation did not come until the advent of Christ, I don't believe that Judaism was in any way inferior; after all, God invented it, didn't He? One way or another, I do believe God gives all people, in one way or another, a path to salvation and everlasting life. This certainly includes God's Chosen.

So why does the general Old Testament view of death seem to be at odds with the Christian one? First of all, I'd like to say that in many places, there can be a danger of overstating the case. In our Joshua passage, I think there is too much being read into Joshua's statement. When Joshua says, "This day I am going the way of all the earth," does it truly imply that Joshua believed there was no afterlife? After all, whether there is an afterlife or not, the statement is true, and it lines up fine with the New Testament view of death which, although not thinking it final, agrees that all living things die. Also, one should note that even with consideration of the afterlife in the mix, death is still final in a sense. Even though Christians look forward to a resurrection, there is understanding that once a person has passed from this life to the next, there is a true dividing point, and there is no natural method of turning back. The Christian who dies will leave their family with an understanding that they will be reunited in Heaven, but most assuredly not on this earth.

More problematic are verses like the one in Psalm 6, which claim that once a person is dead, there is no more knowledge, and no more chance of praising God. While the passages quoted from Job are more like the Joshua passage, and merely state the fact that death is inevitable, the Psalms, Ecclesiastes and Isaiah passages have a lot more to to say about the nature of a person's awareness being snuffed out after life has passed. It's really quite likely that many if not all of these passages are truly contradictory to the point of view of there being an afterlife. It's a difficult thing to deal with that not necessarily everything that is said in the Bible has the same force of truth behind it. As I have said before, and will revisit in my next post, Stephen gave a farewell speech in the book of Acts that is full of technical errors. I don't think everyone expects that every person who ever spoke in the Bible spoke without error. (In fact, the first instance of someone misquoting information is back in Genesis 3!) While Stephen makes factual errors and/or takes certain liberties in his storytelling, the Psalmists may make errors and/or take some poetic license. I personally find it more than a little shaky when somebody bases a doctrine on a verse in the Psalms. For instance, David wrote Psalm 6, which suggests that he doesn't believe in an afterlife. At the same time, David says of his dead child in 2Samuel 12:23, "I shall go to him," prompting some to claim that the Bible is saying here that all children go to Heaven. While I believe this to be true, I don't base a doctrine on an offhand remark by David, especially when he's not consistent in this matter.

So, to sum up, I do think this is a contradiction. It is however a contradiction only in that not every person who follows God in the Bible has uniformity in their belief in the nature of the afterlife. For the definitive answer, I look to the words of Jesus, which seem to me to point to a definitive "Yes, there is an afterlife."

Hast thou with Him spread out the sky? (Gen 1:14-19)

Remember analogies? If you took the SATs in high school like I and so many others did, you had to go through a whole series of these odd little things that were supposed to say something about how well-suited you were for college somehow. Do they still have those on the SAT today? You know, those things:

1) FOOT : SOCK :: HAND :
a. tool
b. finger
c. shoe
d. glove
e. mouth

Of course, the answer is (d). That's easy. Here's a really tough one:

2) DAY : SUN :: NIGHT :

No multiple choice, I'd just like you to mull it over. I'd be willing to bet that a strong majority of the people presented with this would immediately know that the answer was "MOON". Okay, the fun quiz time is over. (It wasn't that much fun, anyway.) Let's look at the SAB, which has three points to bring up about verse 16.

First, "the moon is not a light; it only reflects light from the sun." Granted, but I think that's a technicality. I would say that light's light, whether directly radiating from an object or reflecting off of it. When the moon's out at night, it lights up the place, and the fact that it's just reflected light doesn't change that fact. If I said, "Boy, the moon sure is bright tonight, isn't it?" would you really sound thoughtful to respond, "No it isn't; it's the sun that's bright, and the moon just happens to reflect that brightness," or would you sound like a jerk? I mean, in the morning, the sun will come up and the moon will go down, right? Wrong, the sun doesn't "come up"; the earth rotates until your perspective causes the sun to appear to be relatively positioned above the horizon line, foolish person! Ugh, that would be annoying to talk like that all the time, wouldn't it? I'm moving on.

Second point: "why, if God made the moon to 'rule the night', does it spend half of its time moving through the daytime sky?" Okay, I hope you all saw that the analogy thing up above was intended to respond to this point. The sun "rules the day" because it's the brightest object in the sky during the day, and the moon "rules the night" because...(can you feel the tension?)...it's the brightest object in the sky during the night, even if it is only reflected light. If a person is going to insist on such an over-literal interpretation of the Bible, then they're missing out on another golden opportunity like yesterday.

The moon is a big hunk of rock. The sun is a huge ball of glowing gas. Usually when we talk about something "ruling" something, the thing doing the ruling is either a person, group of people, or a set of laws created by a person or group of people. If I walked in on President Bush with a big chunk of moon rock, put it on his desk in the oval office and said, "This rock is hereby placed upon this desk by me to rule over the nation," they'd cart me away and lock me in a rubber room. (Although I'm sure many are convinced that the rock would do a better job...) Why don't skeptics ever point out this absurdity? It seems obvious that it's because they know "rule over" is just a poetic expression in this passage.

Last point on this passage: "almost as an afterthought, he makes the trillions of stars." I've heard Stephen Hawking himself has pointed this out as a reason to be an atheist. Maybe someone can find the quote; it's an interesting one about how God made too many stars. I'm going to guess Steve Wells is saying the same thing, as he doesn't actually seem to explain why he views this as a problem. Why trillions of stars? Why not a few hundred? Why not a dozen or so? Why any stars at all other than the sun? As for myself, I can imagine God creating a world with just the sun and the moon, and the moon is always full and out at night. On the surface of the planet, instead of thousands or perhaps millions of kinds of animals, just human beings, and the only plant would be a tree that has a terrific-tasting fruit that is perfectly nutritionally balanced for human needs. No harsh weather, no high mountains, no deep waters. Essentially very, very boring.

Now, I'm not the kind of guy who says, "Look at the world, and how complex and beautiful everything is; there must be a God!" But I grew up largely in the country, and late at night, you could lie on your back in a field among the grass and the weeds, and smell the pine trees, and hear the sounds of grasshoppers, wolves, a babbling stream nearby, and on a clear night, you could look up and feel like you could see every one of those trillions of stars scattered across the blackness of the sky. If you could imagine yourself there with me, both of us kids staring up at those stars, and I ask you, which of those stars are the unneccesary ones? The beauty of the universe doesn't tell me that there must be a God, but it does make me think often that if indeed there is a God, He made something beautiful that I wouldn't change in the least. Sure, they're not all visible from the ground, but have you seen images from the Hubble telescope? What if we'd put that thing up there, and there was nothing to see? All those stars don't necessarily serve a practical purpose, but do they really need to?

Final note, I notice that Wells also has a note on verse 14, and you may have noticed I didn't address it. That's because I have no answer for that one. (But I picked it up at a later date.) It might be a grammatical problem with the KJV, I don't know.

(See the comments for more musings on the nature of language.)

Let there be a firmament (Gen 1:6-8)

Okay, those skeptical readers that believe that all Christians are wing nuts are in for a treat today, because day two of creation is where my personal beliefs are, I realize, more than a bit out there. Of course, my personal beliefs do not reflect the whole of Christendom, but I didn't come up with this stuff on my own, and when you get to an odd passage like this, you have to develop some sort of understanding.

The SAB lists this passage as an "absurdity", and I'll be the first to agree, but once again, we're talking about the miraculous, and the stuff that happens during the first few chapters here is largely outside of the norm for the whole of natural history. Many translations find different ways to fit an English term to this "firmament", but the essence of the idea apparently is that the Hebrew word raqiya in this context denotes the idea of a large solid object that's holding up a sky full of water. Yes, the world as described by these three verses is a big underwater dome. The atmosphere is made by creating an air bubble in an endless sea, held open by this undescribed structure.

My belief? There's a theory about the antediluvian age among many Bible believers known as the "water canopy" theory. The idea here is that God originally created the world with the ocean waters suspended in the air, holding in a warm, moist atmosphere. Supposedly, this accounts for a number of things which come to their end in the flood of Noah's day. People living long, healthy lives due to a clean, oxygen-rich atmosphere and lack of cosmic radiation; largely unchanging weather conditions (it may have never rained before Noah's day!); and, some believe, the coexistence of dinosaurs with humanity. While a lot of this sounds pretty bizarre and silly, suspending your disbelief regarding this suspension of water you can see solves many other Biblical dilemmas, thus its appeal.

For probably most people, however, this passage is taken to be poetic in nature. While the sky is most certainly not a solid object as far as we know (and given that we have traveled into space in modern times, it seems we can rest pretty sure about that) the concept of haraqiya as a "bowl" shape still has some appeal. After all, even after the flood the term is still used to describe the sky numerous times; and really, isn't the sky shaped like a bowl wherever you look at it from the ground? There's a reason observatories and planetariums are domed: it's the essential shape of the sky.

And what of the "waters above the firmament"? Well, those would just be clouds. If this explanation doesn't suffice to fit your concept of "above", then I would say wait for the fourth day, I'm going to take some time to talk about translation and prepositions. It should either clear things up immensely or convince you more than ever that I'm a crackpot. Either should be entertaining.

Remember also that when God calls the firmament "Heaven", that there is some vagueness to that word. In the NT, the Apostle Paul refers to the "third heaven", and is clearly talking about what we tend to think of in reference to the word "Heaven". However, this concept of "third" is important, as there were three heavens. The first heaven is the atmosphere, the second heaven is outer space, and the third heaven is beyond space, the place where God lives. Many translations render "Heaven" in verse eight as "sky", because the Bible seems to clearly be talking about the atmosphere.

The SAB makes an interesting note that God doesn't call the second day "good." No explanation is given. I don't find this troubling, only thought-provoking. One possibility that I like, being a believer in the "water canopy" theory, is that when God creates the world with this form, He's looking ahead to the day when all this water He has put in reserve will be used to wipe clean the face of the earth. He's not happy about it, but He foresees it coming, so He makes this water canopy with a heavy heart, so to speak. Who knows?