First, if we accept Mark with Q that appears to be a Q statement copied independently by Matthew and Luke boosting its credibility. If we dismiss Q in favor of Farrer-Goulder then that passage in Matthew is embedded in some late, post easter material (fig tree and temple destruction) and is historicity is in question.
Second, given the mistaken eschatology and expected imminent return of Jesus in the early church, some exegetes have instead attributed such sayings to Christian prophets in the early church rather than Jesus.
Third, the essential point of Jesusâ statement has nothing to do with the historicity of Noah or the Flood account. He is using a story that was background knowledge at the time to warn people to repent an to always be on guard and prepared to face Godâs judgment. Good advice whether or not Noah was literal.
Fourth, I am not thrilled Jesus uses such a story rather than critique it.
Fifth, Jesus wasnât omniscient. If he thought the flood account was genuine history he was incorrect on that point. I guess when you âempty yourselfâ and enter the world as a full human you will be forced to work with the scientific literacy of your times.
In fact, if we are allowed to proof-text hunt like you, that verse in Matthew you are referencing demonstrates his lack of omniscience.
36 âBut about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.
Godâs grief was over the wickedness of mankind and that He had made them.
Now you, a sinner, is going to judge God on what He does with the gift of life that He has loaned to mankind.
Gen 6:5 The Lord saw how great manâs wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain. 7 So the Lord said, âI will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth â men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air â for I am grieved that I have made them.â
Prov 1:20-33
20 Wisdom calls aloud in the street,
she raises her voice in the public squares;
21 at the head of the noisy streets she cries out,
in the gateways of the city she makes her speech:
22 "How long will you simple ones love your simple ways? How long will mockers delight in mockery and fools hate knowledge?
23 If you had responded to my rebuke, I would have poured out my heart to you and made my thoughts known to you.
24 But since you rejected me when I called and no one gave heed when I stretched out my hand,
25 since you ignored all my advice and would not accept my rebuke,
26 I in turn will laugh at your disaster; I will mock when calamity overtakes you â
27 when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when disaster sweeps over you like a whirlwind, when distress and trouble overwhelm you.
28 âThen they will call to me but I will not answer;
they will look for me but will not find me.
29 Since they hated knowledge
and did not choose to fear the Lord,
30 since they would not accept my advice
and spurned my rebuke,
31 they will eat the fruit of their ways
and be filled with the fruit of their schemes.
32 For the waywardness of the simple will kill them,
and the complacency of fools will destroy them;
33 but whoever listens to me will live in safety
and be at ease, without fear of harm.â
Get to know the true God, for there is a day when you will see Him and Jesus and will be judged. You will not judge them.
I donât know what half of that means or why you are talking about football or the Gospel of Luke. Stop deflecting and come back to the essential issue: flood accounts in the ancient world.
You misunderstand the point and background the flood story is told in and its parallels to other older accounts. It canât just retell them verbatim. The changes it makes are significant.It told its version of the flood story in distinction and competition with the other versions. Story-telling 101.
You can see this so clearly in first creation story in Genesis if it helps. The second reverts back to primitive ideology.
I know thatâs what you believe. Thatâs fine. Obviously, it makes sense to you. I just look at this account differently.
I mention Luke because his gospel is different than Johnâs. It just is. They were different people, whoever wrote John and Luke. Lombardi and Walsh were very different people, both coached football at the highest level, both extraordinarily successful and very different. Thatâs all. Thatâs as far as it goes. What was included in the Genesis account can be compared with other similar stories, but it doesnât necessarily follow that they are connected in any way, does it? At least, I donât think it does.
I donât mean this to be a back and forth battle and see who wins an argument.
It is meant to put on display who God is, using the Word of God, spoken by the Spirit through the prophets, apostles and the Lord Jesus. The more we know Him in His fullness, the more we can become like Him and love Him.
Is that what they call disagreeing with your understanding of the Bible nowadays?
Not judging anyone. Pointing out a simple corollary of what it means to be human and possessing omniscience doesnât make the cut. Not to mention two extremely explicitly proof-text huntable verses under conservative models of inspiration that show Jesus was not omniscient (doesnât know the day or hour and asks who touched his robe).
I donât see the central issue here as flood accounts in the ancient world, per se. Maybe I got off track. I thought we were exploring whether or not the account of the flood in the bible was historically feasible.
I donât know if I should respond to you like this, three times in a row. Can we message each other?
It pleased the Father that all His fullness dwelt in the Son.
Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit. He said the words that He spoke were not His but the Fatherâs. He only did and said what He saw the Father doing and saying. He was the exact representation of the Father.
The Father said, Matt 17:5 While he was still speaking, a bright cloud enveloped them, and a voice from the cloud said, âThis is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!â
Now will a puny creature tell the Father that His son was wrong? Not if he has any wisdom.
Good point. He wasnât omnipresent, either. Yet, even devout Jews worshipped him as their messiah. God is more than the âomnisâ. He is who He is. Whether in the form of a tiny baby or bleeding to death as an accused criminal or moving through walls or taken to heaven by a couple of angels or resisting Maryâs affection, there He is. No one like him who ever lived. No one spoke like He did, ever, in all of historyâno one. Not even close.
âI have called you my friendsâŚâ
(I think He knew who touched him. Afterall, He was being mobbed but someone needed the healing force within him and she tapped into it and He felt it flow out of his body. That He knew, no doubt.)
Iâm not sure what the fuss is about correcting Jesus on scientific issues.
When the Devil took Jesus up to a high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms or the world, did Jesus correct him saying âThese are not all the kingdom of the world, the earth isnât flatâ?
No Jesus, the angels wonât go to the four corners of the earth. An oblate spheroid doesnât have corners.
No Jesus, the mustard seed is not the smallest of all seeds. Not even close.
No Jesus, the sun doesnât exactly rise. The earth rotates as it revolves around the sun.
No Jesus, the moon doesnât give off light. It reflects sunlight.
No Jesus, heaven is not in the clouds which are just the result of air riding and water vapor condensing. But we will still look for your coming from there when you return.
No Jesus, hell is not in the middle of the earth. There is just iron and nickel in there though it is probably hot enough to qualify.
No Jesus, Jonah was not 3 days in the belly of a whale either. Their esophagusâs arenât big enough to swallow a human and even if we assume it was a sperm whale which theoretically could swallow a human, he would have even crushed by one of the chambered stomachs, not to mention suffocating.
No Jesus, God doesnât make it rain each time opening the heavens. Differential heating, global circulation patterns, and local topography influence thatâŚ
Itâs clear that even by your own scriptural metric, Jesus was not omnipotent. I have no need to try to protect him from these types of errors or claim he was just accommodating his audience at the time. Theses are not moral issues. There we can defer to the life and teachings of one without sin and very much in tune with the Father.
The text makes it clear Jesus not know who did it. Mark gives away his narrative hand here. Jesus is pressed in on all sides (even the disciples think his question is silly as many people are touching Jesus). He clearly doesnât know who touched him from behind:
Mark 5:32 He looked all around to see who had done it.
So Jesus is being touched by a lot of people, doesnât know who touched him to draw the power but somehow manages to know the person touched his robe only but not his body to draw power. The author of Mark slipped up here and showed his cards.
Several thoughts:
I question if we must view The Biblical Flood in that manner? I donât think it is a prerequisite to understand this account.
Wasnât the mustard seed size a figure of speech? Do you think He intended to be taken literally when He said that? Jesus knew He was tapped into, didnât He, whether it was on or in his body or robe? His energy was made available.
I think Christ plays dumb at times. He is not a stiff, wooden, robot. He can be subtle and goofy and fun and nuanced I would imagine. "13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles[a] from Jerusalem. 14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.
17 He asked them, âWhat are you discussing together as you walk along?â
They stood still, their faces downcast. 18 One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, âAre you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?â
19 âWhat things?â he asked. (Like He doesnât know!?)
âAbout Jesus of Nazareth,â they replied. âHe was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. 20 The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. 22 In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning 23 but didnât find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. 24 Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.
âHe saw the apostles in places He couldnât see. If He set aside his ability to know all things while in human form, canât He still be God? Ascribing infinite attributes to describe God is our way of defining God isnât it? I think his nature remained God. He, him, his true nature, his core, was God? Just a thought. I donât think I can understand all these mysteries, but I think He grants me enough light to assure me He is I AM that I AM. IOW, I donât think the challenges we find in the NT automatically disqualify the account we have of his life.
Remember, too, that this singular person, based on the description we have of him, is responsible for much of the development of Western Civilization in addition to the impact Heâs had throughout the rest of the world. What has been accomplished is not just a function of recorded words, either. There is testimony from millions of people for two thousand years with nothing to gain, that He himself manifested his presence to them individually and changed them fundamentally, inside their hearts, and minds, and lives.
That says something. We need to look closer at that phenomenon. It is substantial.
Can I interest you in taking a hard look at John 14-17?
Gilgamesh and Atrahasis are the context. They are both older than the Biblical version and there are many parallels between all three. In some ways the Biblical version is more advanced: God wipes the earth clean because of the wickedness of humans and possibly because of heavenly and earthly âinterspecies cohabitationâ (to use Enns terminology) referenced in Genesis 6:1-4 (the Nephilim). In Atrahasis human population increased so much the gods couldnât sleep due to the noise so they sent the flood. These gods are even scared by the flood in the other accounts. God in the Bible is in control at all times. He is not scared.
The Genesis flood narrative is a theological retelling of these epics or at least the shared understanding of them. Its Israelâs version. The differences between the accounts are significant because it is there we find what the narrative actually means.
That isnât a lie the way I see it. Heâs allowed to change his mind, I would think, no? Iâm not going. Ok, Iâll go. He was a human being. Humans change their plans. What He said was true when He said it. Then, He decided to go.
He pretended He didnât know what the guys were discussing in the example I gave. He was a man. He had a personality. He bled. He cried. He cared. He got furious. He got hungry and thirsty, impatient, disappointed, delighted, amused, impressed, on and on. That is why He is so unbelievable, so remarkable, so relatable, so lovable, so sympathetic, so fascinating, because He was God, too. GOD.
I like that line from Suzanne, âHe sank beneath your wisdom like a stone.â
âTruly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewiseâ (John 5:19).
âI can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent meâ (John 5:30).
âI have come in my Fatherâs name, and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?â (John 5:43â44).
âMy teaching is not mine, but his who sent meâ (John 7:16).
âThe one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehoodâ (John 7:18).
âI do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the Father taught meâ (John 8:28).
Vinnie, where did they find these ideas? Who, who could have conceived of the things He said?
Anyone? This mystifies me. I canât imagine someone developing the expressions attributed to Christ, except Him. Many find questionable features in and about the bible. What if we started in John chapters 14 -17 to try to figure out Who said the words handed down to us we find there? I think that would be an interesting place to begin an examination of his life.
âI am the true vine and my father is the gardenerâ
He is âtheâ vine. What vine? Who in his right mind ever described himself as a vine? What is He trying to say? His father is a gardener? So? Makes no sense at all, unless Heâs describing a role He plays along with his father. What role? What point is He trying to make? Thereâs a million questions here.
Throughout the Old Testament one can find numerous instances of persons with two names. It was a very common practice insomuch that even Solomon is called Yedidyah, in 2 Sam 12:25. Abiathar is called Ahimelech in 1Sa 21:1; 1Sa 22:9, 1Sa 22:11, 1Sa 22:20; and Ahiah in 1Sa 14:3.
Serious study of the Hebrew text shows us that both the father and the son had two names. In 2Sa 8:17, and 1Ch 18:16, we have Ahimelech the son of Abiathar; and in 1Sa 22:20 Abiathar the son of Abimelech (who was the son of Ahitub). There is no âconfusion in the Hebrew textâ.
The Lordâs enemies are the best witnesses of this, for they would not have missed such an opportunity of effective reply . They knew what modern critics do not know.
Who are these vague enemies of the Lord that you speak of? What percentage of their writings survive to us?
Your statement is factually incorrect. The first two witnesses we know of to the Gospel of Mark are Matthew and Luke. Most suspect they wrote within 1-2 decades after Mark was completed and BOTH of them who copied Markâs Gospel extensively omit the reference to Abiathar while including the rest. Not only that but there are several examples of textual corruptions where some scribes removed Abiathar matching Mark more closely with Matthew and Luke, thus removing the potential error. There are also an abundance of textual witnesses where an article was added to make the timeframe more general, thus removing the potential error. To this end, some apologists online speculate that maybe these corruptions are the original and textual criticism can eliminate the problem.
On top of that Daniel Wallace points out this is an old problem with many patristic writers commenting on it: âThis is an old view, with a long list of patristic writers and later authorities embracing some spin on it. Chrysostom, Victor of Antioch, Euthymius Zigabenus, Theophylact, Beza, Heumann, Kuinoel, Garland, Hurtado, Guelich, and many others mention it.â
When the problem was recognized within a decade or two after Mark wrote, around nineteen-hundred and forty years ago, its a bit odd that you can state, âThey knew what modern critics do not know.â Instead, countless pious Christians spanning the last 1900 years have all recognized what some apologists are now dubiously asserting is a modern problem.
In the case of Solomon the text explicitly tells us the the prophet gave him a second name:
2 Sa 12:24-25 24 Then David consoled his wife Bathsheba, and went to her, and lay with her; and she bore a son, and he named him Solomon. The Lord loved him, 25 and sent a message by the prophet Nathan; so he named him Jedidiah, because of the Lord.
Because Solomon has two names does not mean everyone has two names or that the OT cannot mix up names in a listing. That lapse in memory happens often enough to virtually everyone on the planet.
Some of your references like 1 Sa 21:1 assume what you are saying is true already. In the incident Mark has Jesus recall, of which Jesus adds all sorts of details not actually in the account to justify the early Churchâs behavior (hint hint), David comes to Nob to Ahimelech. That is not a clear reference to the Bible calling Abiathar by Ahimelech that can be used to justify your exegesis. The real issue seems to be 2Sa 8, 1 Ch 16 and 1 Sa:22.
2 Sam 8 15 So David reigned over all Israel; and David administered justice and equity to all his people. 16 Joab son of Zeruiah was over the army; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was recorder; 17 Zadok son of Ahitub and Ahimelech son of Abiathar were priests**; Seraiah was secretary; 18 Benaiah son of Jehoiada was over the Cherethites and the Pelethites; and Davidâs sons were priests.
1 Samuel 22: 20 But one of the sons of Ahimelech son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped and fled after David.
Serious study does not demonstrate what you think it does. Unless we believe on a priori grounds that the Old Testament cannot be in error on any issue, this looks more like a mixing up of names. If we are just believing both must have two names (three now for Abiathar = Ahimelech and Ahiah) because OT lists include them mixed up and cannot err, you are offering an assumption, not an argument. Serious study involves critical thinking, not creative thinking and pious imagination.
I already linked the article by the conservative evangelical Daniel B. Wallace on this issue from an evangelical theological society meeting (@Ralphie this should provide a potential answer to what you asked but it involves midrash).
His fifth solution that he prefers, in my mind, is just another âwhat if,â so common to inerrancy advocates, but it is better than using pious imagination on an Old Testament that makes errors and mixes up names to fix an error in the New Testament. Nothing about the incident is sound. Jesus essentially concedes the Pharisees point. This is probably why Matthew adds to it, he tries to fix it. It exists within a largely chiastic structure (Mark 2:1-3:6) and that sort of literary device does not occur by accident. Mark took four pre-existing controversy stories (possibly written or told orally as a unit) and added some theological and literary spice to them. In doing so he botched a couple of points but his overall message in this section about Jesus is wonderfully made.
There is a lot of speculation and an abundance of potential solutions to this error. This shows how vexing the issue is and how creative apologists can be when they are unwilling to admit the obvious. Wallaceâs article is fair and balanced as is his final conclusion, which appears far less certain than some solutions claim to be:
âIn 1883, Thomas M. Lindsay could write about the Abiathar problem: âVarious explanations of the difficulty have been given, none very satisfactory.â38 Itâs one hundred and twenty-one years later and you may feel, as do I, that if Lindsay were to rise from the dead heâd repeat his complaint verbatim!â
I think it is possible they shared their names. (People used to call my dad by name all the time when I gained a little notoriety on the gridiron. He loved it!) Jesus answered him, âTruly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.â Tough to do, I imagine, when Jesus wonât get there for three days himself. (SpaceTime/eternity/fabric/worm holes/gravitational waves from black holes munching down neutron stars), it is all breathtaking and beyond my comprehension.
The bible contains many promises that the word of God is perfect. It is natural to try to defend its inerrancy.
To paraphrase, there are those who believe Christ is found to be in error when He promised some who were standing there that they wouldnât taste death until they saw him returning. He also said, those who believe in him shall never die. If errors were made in copying the original texts, if Christ had a memory lapse, or scribes copied incorrectly on purpose from the copies they used, He was still God. I bet He missed a nail, hammering his thumb instead on occasion. Bet He had gas, couldnât pay attention perfectly, snored, had a crush or two, tripped, laughed a bit too loud. But then, look what He did for Bob Dylan and Brian The Head Welch, Dr. Bart, Chuck Colson, Jimmy Carter, Reggie White, hundreds of people I know, me. I bet He even sneezed.
His âfabricâ, his nature, his Person, even though in a human body limited and as imperfect as it was, was God, IMO.
There wasnât a conspiracy to alter the texts to produce someone like Christ, IMO. That is too creative for my taste. No. I think we have a very close description of Christ as He was. Iâve met him. Heâs my best friend. Has been for a long time. What He is alleged to have done in the lives of countless millions is not a function of the power of suggestion, mass hypnosis, or something other âreligionsâ can match. An open invitation to all: Find the testimonies from followers of other âfaithsâ and compare them.
I wish Dr. Michael Brown and Bart would debate again. Michael is a most remarkable force in the modern day defense of Christianity.