The Randy White Guide to Hermeneutics

Session 13 | Dealing With Contradictions, Part 2

The Lesson, In a Nutshell

What To Do With A Contradiction

• Is it a textual issue?

• Is it a contextual issue?

• Is it a translational issue?

• Is it a dispensational issue?

  
  To this, we add two more

• Is it a Doctrinal Issue?

  • “doctrinal issue" is really an issue with hermeneutics. Nonetheless, we will treat doctrine as if it were separate from hermeneutics for the moment.

  • For example, a person may have been raised with a dispensational eschatology (which is virtually always built upon a pre-tribulational rapture of the church) and a Calvinist soteriology (which insists that believers are the elect“contradiction" in Scripture at Matthew 24:22, which teaches that the tribulation is cut short for the elect's sake. If Christians (saved by grace through faith) are the elect, then a pre-tribulational rapture is absolutely a contradiction with Matthew 24:22.

    
    When confronted with a Scripture that contradicts your theology, you must be careful in how you handle the conflict. It could be that your doctrine is simply wrong, and that the passage proves you as wrong. But you must be very careful in analyzing the issues. For example, in the Matthew 24:22 conflict, one could either drop Calvinism or *drop the Pre-trib rapture*“battle of the wills," and the doctrine most engrained in your history becomes the winner, regardless of which is Biblically accurate.

  • If you have encountered a contradiction in Scripture with your doctrine, then consider whether the doctrine is wrong (it may be), or the passage is being misinterpreted (it may be). Both often take considerable time to work through. Consider all the issues and proceed with caution.

    
    

    Is It A Presuppositional Issue?

    
    

• A presupposition is closely related to the doctrinal issues above but may be broader that doctrinal issues. The presupposition (which is to pre-suppose) is often contextual rather than doctrinal. In one sense, the Matthew 24:22 passage above can also be considered a presuppositional issue in which a person has pre-supposed that the elect are those in the body of Christ. But what if these elect are actually the chosen nation of Israel?

• Presuppositional issues are very hard to recognize, especially until you train your mind to watch for them. They are often unstated presuppositions, or commonly held presuppositions (even so commonly held that few question their validity). Presuppositions may be denominationally held, and thus everyone in your community is teaching them.

• An example of a contextual presuppositional issue can be found in 1 Corinthians 11. Verse 5 teaches that every woman that prayeth or prophesieth her head uncovered dishonoureth her head. From this many presuppose that a woman should put a shawl or other head covering on while praying. Few actually do so, often claiming another presupposition, that this was a cultural command. In presuppositional issues the challenge is spotting the presupposition, and this takes practice. In this passage, the presupposition is that the verses are talking about a woman's head. And such a presupposition seems all but obvious. But when considered closely you can see that the key or legend is given by Paul in verse 3:

  • Christ is the head of every man.

  • The head of the woman is the man.

  • The head of Christ is God.

    
    

• From this simple legend, the following verses make sense. However, if you do not use this key, then the following verses require a woman to have a piece of cloth on their head when praying. In this passage, the head is not the part of anatomy that sits upon a person's shoulders. Paul has defined the head perfectly clearly in verse 3.

  
  
  

  A few Examples

  
  “Biblical Contradictions" found at the American Athiests website.

• Ecclesiastes 1:4 vs 2 Peter 3:10.

  • The word for ever in Ecclesiastes 1:4 is translated of old time in verse 10 of the same chapter. This is clearly a translational and contextual issue.

    
    

• Genesis 32:30 vs John 1:18

  • This was a manifestation of the pre-incarnate Christ. This is a doctrinal issue.

    
    

• Matthew 19:26 vs Judges 1:19

  • This is a presuppositional or translational issue. One can presuppose that the pronoun he refers to God, or to Judah. Good grammar requires Judah (so much so that the one modern Hebrew translation to English says“they drove out," referring to Judah as the nation or tribe.

    
    

• Exodus 21:23-25 vs Matthew 8:39

  • This is a contextual issue. Consider Exodus 21:23-25 in light of verse 22, and consider Matthew 8:39 in context of the arrival of the Kingdom.

    
    

• Genesis 17:10 vs Galatians 5:2

• This is both a doctrinal issue of progressive revelation and a contextual issue of Abraham's descendants compared to the Body of Christ, which have different instructions for living faithfully.