Philosophy 1600 - Honors Seminar

Answers for Exercise 1: Fundamentalism and the Bible

Answers for Exercise 1: Fundamentalism and the Bible

I. The Fundamentalist View of the Bible

According to the Fundamentalist view, the Bible, interpreted literally, is free of all error: every assertion made in the Bible, interpreted in the natural way, is true.

When the question of whether everything in the Bible is literally true is raised, many people think immediately of the conflict between the theory of evolution and the account of creation in chapter 1 of Genesis. For many people seem to believe that a literal interpretation of Genesis was plausible enough until Charles Darwin, and the theory of evolution, appeared on the scene. In fact, however, many people who had thought about the matter in a serious way had concluded, much earlier, that it was very unlikely that Genesis was literally true. This conclusion was based upon a number of points, but perhaps the two difficulties that people noticed most two that were connected with the story of Noah's ark. First, there was the problem of the number of animals there would have to be on the ark. For while it had never been especially easy to believe that at least a pair of every kind of animal could be crammed into the ark, the difficulty became even more severe as explorers travelled to new lands, and brought back reports of animals that had never been seen before. It became clear that the number of different species was far greater than anyone had imagined. It therefore seemed quite incredible that all of those different species of animals should have been present on the ark.

A second problem was even more serious:

"Ever more and more difficult, too, became the question of the geographical distribution of animals. As new explorations were made in various parts of the world, this danger to the theological view went on increasing. The sloths in South America suggested painful questions: How could animals so sluggish have got away from the neighborhood of Mount Ararat so completely and have travelled so far?

"The explorations in Australia and neighboring islands made matters still worse, for there was found in those regions a whole realm of animals differing widely from those in other parts of the world.

"The problem before the strict theologian became, for example, how to explain the fact that the kangaroo can have been in the ark and be now found in Australia: his saltatory powers are indeed great, but how could he by any series of leaps have sprung across the intervening mountains, plains, and oceans to that remote continent? And, if the theory were adopted that at some period a causeway extended across the vast chasm separating Australia from the nearest mainland, why did not lions, tigers, camels, and camelopards force or find their way across it?"

(A.D. White, A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology, page 48.)

The two points just mentioned - the number of animals on the ark, and the problem of explaining the later distribution over the earth of different species - were the two considerations that before the advent of the theory of evolution most impressed people who had given some serious thought to the question of whether Genesis was literally true. But if one reads Genesis carefully, one notices that there are, in fact, a number of passages that seem to count heavily against the view that everything in Genesis, interpreted literally, is true. For, in the first place, there are passages which certainly appear to contradict one another. And in the second place, there are passages which advance beliefs which seem highly implausible, and which, in some cases, one has very strong evidence against.

II. Some Implausible Beliefs in Genesis

A careful reading of Genesis turns up a number of implausible propositions, ranging from ones that are at least mildly unlikely, to ones that are indeed extraordinary. Here is a list of some of the beliefs that most people would, I think, view as very unlikely to be true:

1. Day and night were created before the sun was created. (1:3-5 and 1:16-19)

2. Light was created before the sun and the stars were created. (1:3-5 and 1:16-19)

3. The sky is a firmament in which the sun, the moon, and the stars are embedded. (1:6-8 and 1:14-18)

4. Given that God told Adam and Eve that they could eat any plants that bear seed, and the fruit of any seed-bearing tree, it is reasonable to conclude that the Bible is implying that no things of these sorts are such that eating them is harmful. But some berries are poisonous. (1:29)

5. All animals were originally herbivorous. (1:30)

6. There once was a type of tree whose fruit was such that if one ate it, one would acquire knowledge of good and evil. (2:9)

7. Adam gave names to all of the birds and beasts that God created. (2:19-20)

8. Serpents once were able to think and to talk. (3:1ff.)

9. It's sometimes possible to hide successfully from God. (3:8-9)

10. The creator apparently has a body, since Adam and Eve hear him walking in the garden. (3:8-9)

11. The pain of childbirth is a result of divine decree. (3:16)

12. God ordained that husbands should rule over their wives. (3:16)

13. God fashioned skins into clothes for Adam and Eve. (3:21)

14. There once was a type of tree whose fruit was such that if one ate it, one would live for ever. (3:22)

15. God was happy with Abel's offering of "the first-born of his flock", but not with Cain's offering of "produce of the soil". (4:3-5)

16. Though Cain was the son of the first two humans, he set about "building a city". (4:17)

17. Jubal was the ancestor of (all?) who play the harp and the pipe. (4:21)

18. By the time of Tubal-cain, who belonged to the seventh generation after Adam, there were blacksmiths. (4:22) But a blacksmith is "an artisan who works in iron" (American College Dictionary), and the iron age did not begin until about 1400 B.C.

19. Men in those days often had sons at a rather advanced age. Noah was especially striking in this regard, since he was 500 years old when he had three sons - Shem, Ham, and Japeth! (5:32)

20. There were divine beings - "sons of God" - who had intercourse with human women, thereby producing the mighty men of old. (6:1-4)

21. God said that humans would live no more than 120 years. (6:3)

22. God saw that "the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." (6:5)

23. Noah, together with his wife, his sons, and his sons' wives, were the only people who deserved not to be destroyed. (6:8-18)

24. Noah and his family succeeded in collecting together at least a pair of every living bird and animal on the face of the earth. (6-19-22)

25. Noah lived to an age of more than 600 years. (7:6 and 7:11)

26. Even when he was 600 years old, Noah's three married sons appear not to have had any children at all. (7:6 and 7:13)

27. An ark measuring 300 cubits by 50 cubits by 30 cubits - i.e., about 450 feet by 75 feet by 45 feet - was able to hold at least two members of every sort of living thing, along with sufficient food for a trip that lasted about a year. (6:15, 7:11, 7:15, and 6:13)

28. Noah and his family were able to construct this very large boat. (6:16-22)

29. God said that he would destroy all living things - except for those on Noah's ark - by means of a flood: "I will send rain over the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe off the face of the earth every living thing that I have made. (7:4) But a flood would not destroy aquatic animals.

30. There was so much water on the earth that the tops of even the highest mountains were under water. (7:19-20)

31. A dove is described as returning with "a freshly plucked olive leaf". (8:11) But how could that be possible, given how long the earth was covered with water?

32. In spite of the depth of the water, the water had dried up in a matter of - it appears - about two or three months. For it was in the tenth month that the tops of the mountains could first be seen, and by the first day of the first month of the next year, the ground is completely dry. (8:5 and 8:13)

33. Living things managed to travel from the mountains of Ararat - where the ark came to rest - to all other parts of the globe, however remote and isolated. (7:21-3 and 8:4)

34. The animals that were on the ark survived, but what could they have eaten, given the length of time that everything was under water? (7:11-8:19)

35. Noah offered burnt offerings, indicating that the human race managed to discover fire very quickly indeed. (8:20)

Finally, here is a claim that, interpreted in one, very natural way, is also very implausible, but where the interpretation might be disputed:

36. The moon is a light. (1:15-16)

III. Inconsistencies in Genesis

Part IIIA

The following contradictions are pointed out in The New Oxford Annotated Bible:

1. When was Adam created relative to plants and animals?

(a) According to the familiar story set out in chapter 1 and the first three verses of chapter 2 of Genesis, Adam was created after plants and animals were created. Genesis 1:11-27)

(b) But there is quite a different story of creation to be found in Genesis 2:4-24, according to which Adam is created before God has created plants and animals. (Genesis 2:4-9 and 2:18-19)

2. Were Adam and Eve created at the same time?

(a) According to Genesis 1:26-7, the first man and woman were created at the same time.

(b) But according to the creation story in Genesis 2, man was created first, and then, some time later, woman was created, using as material a rib that had been taken from Adam. (Genesis 2:7 and 2:18-22)

3. How many pairs of animals of each kind went into the ark?

(a) According to Genesis 6:19-20, God commanded Noah to take one pair of each living thing - birds as well animals - onto the ark, and Genesis 6:22 says that Noah did as God had commanded him. Similarly, Genesis 7:8-9 asserts that a pair of each living thing - birds and animals, both clean and unclean - went onto the ark.

(b) In Genesis 7:2-3, however, God is commanded to take one pair of each kind of unclean animal onto the ark, but seven pairs of each kind of clean animal, and seven pairs of each sort of bird, and Genesis 7:5 then adds that Noah did as God had commanded him.

In addition to the above three apparent contradictions, The New Oxford Annotated Bible mentions some other apparent contradictions, but some of those strike me as less clear cut, and as possibly depending upon scholarly theories concerning the composition of the text. But there are some other apparent inconsistencies that strike me as almost as plausible as those listed above.

4. How did God create things?

(a) In the story of creation in Genesis 1, it appears that creation occurs by divine decree. Thus, for example, Genesis 1:3 says, "God said, 'Let there be light', and there was light."

(b) But in the story of creation in Genesis 2, by contrast, it appears that creation occurs not simply by divine decree, but by God's working on pre-existing matter. Thus, for example, Genesis 2:7 says, "Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." Similarly, Genesis 2:22 says "The Lord God then built up the rib, which he had taken out of the man, into a woman."5. How many people were on earth at the time of Cain?

(a) According to Genesis 4:1, Cain certainly appears to have been Adam and Eve's first child. In any case, there couldn't have been a large number of people around in Cain's lifetime, if Adam and Eve were the first humans.

(b) But Cain, after he has killed his brother, Abel, says that he will now be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth and expresses a fear that as he wanders about, someone will kill him (Genesis 4:14). Then, a bit later, we are told that Cain "built a city" (Genesis 4:17). These passages certainly suggest that there were a significant number of people around.

6. What were Adam and Eve allowed to eat?

(a) According to Genesis 1:29, God said that Adam and Eve could eat the fruit of any seed-bearing tree: "I give you all plants that bear seed everywhere on earth, and every tree bearing fruit which yields seed: they may be yours for food."

(b) But according to Genesis 2:16-17, there is one tree - which given that it has fruit, is presumably seed-bearing - whose fruit Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat, since God says "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die."

7. What will happen if one eats the forbidden fruit?

(a) According to Genesis 2:16-17, God says "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die."

(b) But Adam and Eve did not die upon eating the fruit of the tree in question. Indeed, according to Genesis 5:5, Adam lived to be 930 years old!

Comment

These two passages are not formally contradictory. They are inconsistent only if interprets the term "God" in such a way that it is an analytic truth that God is omniscient and honest.

Finally, here are two pairs of passages that seem somewhat more problematic:

7. The creation of day and night versus the creation of the sun

(a) According to Genesis 1:3-5, day and night were created on the first day.

(b) According to Genesis 1:16-19, the sun was created on the fourth day.

Comment

To get a strict contradiction, one needs to add the further proposition that the existence of the day is, as a matter of fact, dependent on the existence of the sun.

So what these two passages provide, strictly speaking, is not a contradiction, but a very implausible belief, to the effect that the existence of daytime does not depend, as matter of fact, upon the existence of the sun.

8. The creation of light versus the creation of the sun, the moon, and the stars.

(a) According to Genesis 1:3-5, light was created on the first day.

(b) According to Genesis 1:16-19, the sun, the moon, and the stars were created on the fourth day.

Comment

To get a strict contradiction, one needs to add the further proposition that the light that one finds throughout the universe originates, as a matter of fact, from stars, including the sun. So what these two passages provide, strictly speaking, is not a contradiction, but a very implausible belief, to the effect that the existence of light is not, as a matter of fact, dependent upon the existence of the sun and the stars.

IV. Contradictions that Are Relevant to Part IIA of the Exercise

The two most obvious inconsistencies involving the two accounts of creation are:

1. When was Adam created relative to plants and animals?

(a) According to the familiar story set out in chapter 1 and the first three verses of chapter 2 of Genesis, Adam was created after plants and animals were created. Genesis 1:11-27)

(b) But there is quite a different story of creation to be found in Genesis 2:4-24, according to which Adam is created before God has created plants and animals. (Genesis 2:4-9 and 2:18-19)

2. Were Adam and Eve created at the same time?

(a) According to Genesis 1:26-7, the first man and woman were created at the same time.

(b) But according to the creation story in Genesis 2, man was created first, and then, some time later, woman was created, using as material a rib that had been taken from Adam. (Genesis 2:7 and 2:18-22)

In addition, the accounts offered in the two different creation stories as to how God created things are inconsistent:

3. How did God create things?

(a) In the story of creation in Genesis 1, it appears that creation occurs by divine decree. Thus, for example, Genesis 1:3 says, "God said, 'Let there be light', and there was light."

(b) But in the story of creation in Genesis 2, by contrast, it appears that creation occurs not simply by divine decree, but by God's working on pre-existing matter. Thus, for example, Genesis 2:7 says, "Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." Similarly, Genesis 2:22 says "The Lord God then built up the rib, which he had taken out of the man, into a woman."

Finally, a rather less significant conflict, perhaps - but still a literal contradiction - concerns what mankind were allowed to eat:

4. What were Adam and Eve allowed to eat?

(a) According to Genesis 1:29, God said that Adam and Eve could eat the fruit of any seed-bearing tree: "I give you all plants that bear seed everywhere on earth, and every tree bearing fruit which yields seed: they may be yours for food."

(b) But according to Genesis 2:16-17, there is one tree - which given that it has fruit, is presumably seed-bearing - whose fruit Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat, since God says "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die."

III. Inconsistencies in Genesis that Are Relevant to Part IIB of the Exercise

In part IIB, the students are asked to find a contradiction involving God's instructions to Noah. That contradiction is as follows:

1 How many pairs of animals of each kind went into the ark?

(a) According to Genesis 6:19-20, God commanded Noah to take one pair of each living thing - birds as well animals - onto the ark, and Genesis 6:22 says that Noah did as God had commanded him. Similarly, Genesis 7:8-9 asserts that a pair of each living thing - birds and animals, both clean and unclean - went onto the ark.

(b) In Genesis 7:2-3, however, God is commanded to take one pair of each kind of unclean animal onto the ark, but seven pairs of each kind of clean animal, and seven pairs of each sort of bird, and Genesis 7:5 then adds that Noah did as God had commanded him.

V. An Explanation of the Presence of Contradictions in Genesis

Once one is acquainted with the case against the Fundamentalist hypothesis concerning the nature of the Bible, and one has abandoned the idea that the Bible can be viewed as resulting from divine dictation, infallibly recorded by human writers, there is nothing surprising in the fact that Genesis contains a number of implausible claims. Such implausible beliefs about the world, and about human history, are commonplaces in ancient documents. But what about the presence of contradictions? Wouldn't one expect even a purely human document to be internally consistent?

The explanation of the fact that there are contradictions in Genesis is, however, straightforward. The reason is described by Sir James George Frazer, in his discussion of the contradictions involved in the two accounts of creation in chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis:

"The flagrant contradiction between the two accounts is explained very simply by the circumstances that they are derived from two very different and originally independent documents, which were afterwards combined into a single book by an editor, who pieced the two narratives together without always taking pains to soften or harmonize their discrepancies." (Folk-Lore in the Old Testament, page 4)

Frazer then goes on to describe the grounds for holding that Genesis involves a combination of two earlier documents. The evidence is of two sorts. The first consists of verbal differences:

"... To take the verbal differences first, the most striking is that in the Hebrew original the deity is uniformly designated in the Jehovistic document by the name of Jehovah (Jahweh), and in the Priestly document by the name of Elohim, which in the English version are rendered respectively by the words 'Lord' and 'God'. In representing the Hebrew Jehovah (Jahweh) by 'Lord', the English translators follow the practice of the Jews, who, in reading the Scriptures aloud, uniformly substitute the title Adonai or 'Lord' for the sacred name of Jehovah, wherever they find the latter written in the text. Hence the English reader may assume as a general rule that in the passages of the English version, where the title 'Lord' is applied to the deity, the name Jehovah stands for it in the written or printed text. But in the narrative of the flood and throughout Genesis the Priestly writer avoids the use of the name Jehovah and substitutes for it the term Elohim, which is the ordinary Hebrew word for God; and his reason for doing so is that according to him the divine name Jehovah was first revealed by God to Moses, and therefore could not have been applied to him in the earlier ages of the world. On the other hand, the Jehovistic writer has no such theory as to the revelation of the name Jehovah; hence he bestows it on the deity without scruple from the creation onwards." (Folk-Lore in the Old Testament, pages 136-7)

Thus, if one compares the two accounts of creation in chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis, one can see that in the first one the word used in the English translation to refer to the creator is the word 'God', whereas in the second account it is "Lord God". Similarly, if one examines the story of Noah, one can see, first, that sometimes the term "Lord" is used, and sometimes the term "God", and secondly, that if one divides the account up into passages that involve the term "Lord", and those that involve the term "God", then one has two accounts, each of which is consistent within itself, but which contradicts the other account.

The second reason for holding that there were originally two independent documents is, of course, the contradictions themselves:

"But the material differences between the Jehovistic and the Priestly narratives are still more remarkable, and as they amount in some cases to positive contradictions, the proof that they emanate from separate documents may be regarded as complete. Thus in the Jehovistic narrative the clean animals are distinguished from the unclean, and while seven of every sort of clean animal are admitted to the ark, only a pair of each sort of unclean animal is suffered to enter. On the other hand, the Priestly writer make no such invidious distinction between the animals, but admits them to the ark on a footing of perfect equality, though at the same time he impartially limits them all alike to a single couple of each sort. The explanation of this discrepancy is that in the view of the Priestly writer the distinction between clean and unclean animals was first revealed by God to Moses, and could not therefore have been known to his predecessor Noah; whereas the Jehovistic writer, untroubled by any such theory, naively assumes the distinction between clean and unclean animals to have been familiar to mankind from the earliest times, as if it rested on a natural difference too obvious to be overlooked by anybody." (Folk-Lore in the Old Testament, pages 137-8)