Does the Bible contradict itself?

What the Bible says

The Bible does not hide that it contains different testimonies. Luke begins his Gospel by noting that "many have undertaken to compose an account" (Luke 1:1-2), and then says how he went about his own.

Therefore, having carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you

Luke 1:3-4

The same story therefore reaches us in slightly different forms. Ancient writers also rounded numbers and summarised speeches. Whether that is a real contradiction can be known only from particular texts. Let us look honestly at two.

The death of Judas. Matthew says that Judas, filled with remorse, returned the money:

So Judas threw the silver into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.

Matt 27:5

The chief priests then used the money to buy the potter's field, which is why it is called the Field of Blood (Matt 27:6-8). Acts, reporting Peter's words, tells it differently.

Now with the reward for his wickedness Judas bought a field; there he fell headlong and burst open in the middle, and all his intestines spilled out.

Acts 1:18

The gap looks large: hanging against bursting open, the priests buying the field against Judas buying it. Christians have suggested explanations. Judas hanged himself, and later the rope or branch gave way, so that the body fell and burst. And since the money was Judas's, the field the priests bought with it could be spoken of as his purchase. Both accounts agree that the betrayal money led to the field, that it was called the Field of Blood, and that Judas ended wretchedly. But these explanations are possibilities, not what the texts say. Many scholars think the two reflect different early traditions about Judas's end that agree on the main lines.

The morning of the resurrection. All four Gospels say women found the tomb empty at dawn on the first day of the week. The details differ. Matthew says Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went, and an angel rolled the stone away (Matt 28:1-2). Mark says Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome went and saw "a young man dressed in a white robe" (Mark 16:1-5). Luke says "two men in radiant apparel" stood beside them (Luke 24:4). John tells first of Mary Magdalene alone coming to the tomb and seeing the stone removed (John 20:1).

If this were a contradiction, the heart of the story would be split. But in all four the stone was moved, the tomb was empty, women were the first witnesses, and angels appear at the tomb. A book that mentions one person has not said that no one else was there. John's Mary says "we do not know where they have put Him," in the plural (John 20:2), which hints that others were with her. Luke 24:24 says some of the disciples went to the tomb and checked, which fits John's account of Peter's visit. This does not dissolve every question. Some scholars think such details can never be fully matched, yet judge the core testimony trustworthy; others take the differences as signs that the stories grew in the telling.

The church's witness

This problem is not new. Augustine wrote The Harmony of the Gospels to answer critics who said the Gospels disagreed Augustine, The Harmony of the Gospels. He held that the evangelists remembered and summarised the same events in different orders and ways, and did not lie. In that book he explains how Matthew ordered chapter 27: he "then turned back to relate Peter’s denial, after which he returned to the morning to continue the course of events" Augustine.

It is worth noticing that the church did not merge the differences into one Gospel. In the second century Tatian wove the four Gospels into a single narrative, but the church in the end chose to read the four side by side. Erasing the differences was not the goal.

On the question of inerrancy, Christians themselves speak differently. Some hold that in its original writings Scripture is without error in all it affirms, read with attention to genre, round numbers and summary; the methods above have long been used by those who hold it. Others say Scripture is without error in what God intended it to teach, namely salvation, faith and life, and leave the wording of details more open. Both confess that Scripture is God's word.

In the original languages

"Hanged himself" in Matthew 27:5 is apagcho (ἀπάγχω), which means to choke or strangle. "Fell headlong" in Acts 1:18 is prenes (πρηνής), a rare word found only here in the New Testament. It is usually translated "headlong," though some suggest "swollen," so its exact sense is uncertain. So we should be careful both about calling the texts contradictory too quickly and about claiming they fit easily.

Common objections

"If there is a single error, the whole Bible cannot be trusted." This objection is not trivial. A book that claims to be God's word is reasonably expected to lose that claim if it contains errors. But it depends on what the Bible claims. It does not claim to be written with photographic precision; it gives, in Luke's word, the purpose of "certainty." In a courtroom, if every witness agreed on every detail, we would suspect collusion. Testimonies that differ in detail yet agree on the centre are what real witnesses produce, not a script, though the first three Gospels also share much material. This is not proof that no contradiction can exist. Some Christians conclude that certain details do not fit, yet the centre of faith stands; others hold that, rightly understood, they do fit. The cross and the resurrection do not depend on such details.

"Harmonising is special pleading. The rope breaking is a story made up beyond the text." There is truth here. A story added to make two texts fit does not come from the text and cannot be proved. Such an explanation says "this could be," not "this was." But to call two accounts contradictory, one must show that they cannot both be true, and if a plausible explanation exists, strict contradiction is not proven, though readers will weigh how plausible each explanation is. The one who asserts a contradiction also carries a burden of proof.

"Manuscripts differ, so the text itself cannot be trusted." Some differences may well have arisen in copying, especially in numbers. Second Samuel 24:24 says David bought the threshing floor and oxen for fifty shekels of silver, while 1 Chronicles 21:25 says he paid six hundred shekels of gold for the site. One may be the price of the threshing floor and oxen and the other of the whole site, or a number may have changed in transmission. Mark 16 is another case: the oldest manuscripts end at verse 8 and lack verses 9-20. Modern translations flag such places rather than hide them, and scholars generally judge that none of these variants changes a central teaching. See also How did we get the Bible?

Going further

When we meet a difficult passage in the Bible there are two easy roads. One is to hurry past, saying there is no problem; the other is to throw the whole book away because one is found. Scripture's own way lies between them: to admit that the testimonies are many, to look honestly at the differences, and to look at the one they point to. As the resurrection morning shows, four testimonies that differ in detail all point to an empty tomb and a living Lord.

Ask yourself: what passage in the Bible troubles me, and is it troubling because of the evidence or because it differs from the Bible I expected? When different testimonies point to the same event, do I see in them a weakness, or the mark of real witnesses?

To read further, see Can the Bible be trusted? and Did Jesus really rise from the dead?.