In the manner in which you answered, you have indicated that you wish to talk for a long period

of time. I do not
mind this endeavor at all, but only wish that one understands what he or she must show in order to reveal a
contradiction. In this letter, I will comment on a few things said, and again explain Genesis 1 and 2 in another
way. Note that I have already shown that – in ancient literature – this double narrative occurs in ancient literature
and that it is always taken as the same story, as the author intended. The “Author” intended this with Genesis 1
and 2, as again I will show.

You made mention of the book Faith On Trial, did you read this book from cover to cover? I would be somewhat
surprised and elated at the same time. What did you think when she mentioned the older account of Simon
Greenleaf’s endeavor in the same area? I would be surprised if you actually read some positive evidence. You say
I am biased, which is true, but I have many books written by skeptics of Christianity that “disprove” my faith. I
wonder if you actually are un-biased enough to spend some time answering the hard questions from the other
side? Say… the following two books (one of which I have the on order for you, so it will be free, the later you
will have to buy): 1) The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, by Josh McDowell; and 2) Unshakable
Foundations: Contemporary Answers to Crucial Questions About the Christian Faith, by Norman Geisler and
Peter Bocchino.

I won’t take what you said in order, but I will respond to some thoughts or statements you had about what I wrote.
The idea for me answering one minor part of your response is to make sure that we are clear that any apparent
discrepancy (which you haven’t shown yet) could be enlightened by further archaeological evidence. But as you
read, you will see that the major critics of the twentieth century became “believers” because this light, was in fact,
shed. I will include a small bibliography at the end of where I got some of this info from and some other books
that would allow you to authoritatively answer my arguments (as referenced in my first major quote).

You made mention of the circular reasoning of the Bible calling itself divine. This would be true if all we had was
the Bible saying what it is. This is merely a part of the internal evidence… let me explain. The Scriptures should
be tested by the same criteria by which all historical documents are tested.

Tests of all Literature

[Take note that I am not trying to defend the “Divine Nature” of the Bible, only showing that there are no
historical boo boos or contradictions.] C. Sanders, a famous military historian, in Introduction to Research in
English Literary History, lists and explains the three basic principles of historiography. These are the
bibliographical test, the internal evidence test, and the external evidence test.

Bibliographical Test
The bibliographical test is an examination of the textual transmission by which documents reach us. In other
words, since we do not have the original documents, how reliable are the copies we have in regard to the number
of manuscripts (MSS and the time interval between the original and the extant (currently existing) copies?

Internal Evidence
Internal Evidence, of which John Warwick Montgomery writes that literary critics still follow Aristotle’s dictum
that “the benefit of the doubt is to be given to the document itself, not arrogated by the critic to himself.”
therefore, one must listen to the claims of the document under analysis, and do not assume fraud or error unless
the author disqualified himself by contradictions or known factual inaccuracies. As Dr. Horn continues:

“Think for a moment about what needs to be demonstrated concerning a ‘difficulty’ in order to
transfer it into the category of a valid argument against doctrine. Certainly much more is
required than the mere appearance of a contradiction. First, we must be certain that we have
correctly understood the passage, the sense in which it uses words or numbers. Second, that we
possess all available knowledge in this matter. Third, that no further light can possibly be thrown
on it by advancing knowledge, textual research, archaeology, etc…. Difficulties do not constitute
objections. Un resolved problems are not of necessity errors. This is not to minimize the area of
difficulty; it is to see it in perspective. Difficulties are to be grappled with and problems are to
drive us to seek clearer light; but until such time as we have total and final light on any issue we
are in no position to affirm, ‘Here is a proven error, an unquestionable objection to an infallible
 Bible.’ It is common knowledge that countless ‘objections’ have fully been resolved since this
century began.”

External Evidence
Do other historical materials confirm or deny the internal testimony provided by the documents themselves? In
other words, what sources are there – apart from the literature under analysis – that substantiate its accuracy,
reliability, and authenticity?

To Clarify the Above Clarification

When the above author is speaking of “since this century,” he is speaking of examples like the Hittites, who were
thought to be a mythical – moral – story in the Bible. Much like the fables of Aesop. Until, that is, archaeology
proved their existence. William F. Albright, arguably one of the greatest archaeologists of this century, thought the
stories of the patriarchs were mythical at best. The Documentary Hypothesis (which is where you draw most of
your arguments, and which was shown to be deficient over 70 years ago) taught that most of the Old Testament’s
“history” before the Israelite monarchy was simply legend, invented about a thousand years after the supposed
events. According to this approach, stories about patriarchs like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob could not have been
preserved from as early as the Bronze Age. Moreover, in 1918, Albright wrote an article “proving” such!

Citing the Genesis 14 account of Abraham’s military campaign, Albright concluded that the story was actually
written as a political tract to rally support for the Jewish cause against the Persians, over a thousand years after the
events portrayed. The Documentary Hypothesis was based on presumption, and not archaeology whatsoever. Dr.
Albright discovered and excavated a line of mounds – Bronze Age cities – forming a route for military campaign
as described in the Bible. The cities along this route, later called “The Way of the King,” were no longer
inhabited later, in the Iron Age. “Experts” had written that the entire region described had not yet been inhabited
at all. Albright later admitted that the evidence caused him to go from atheist to believer, of which the following
comments from past skeptics and archaeologists are from. Keep in mind that even though the following doesn’t
necessarily deal with the Old Testament, it deals with the presupposed ideas of how history “was” and how
further knowledge shed light on the true history.

Sir Frederic Kenyon, former director and principle librarian of the British Museum, was possibly the most
respected New Testament textual scholar in our century. Shortly before his death he commented on the
significance of the fact that the evidence is overwhelming that the Gospels were composed shortly after the events
of Christ’s life and that the early church widely distributed them within its congregations within a relatively short
period of time is significant. Kenyon wrote:

“The interval, then, between the dates of the original composition and the earliest extant evidence
becomes so small as to be in fact negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the
Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both
the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as
finally established.”

After a lifetime of in-depth review of the New Testament manuscripts, Kenyon concluded that the present text in
our Bible is absolutely reliable. He wrote: “It is reassuring at the end to find that the general result of all these
discoveries and all this study is to strengthen the proof of the authenticity of the Scriptures, and our conviction that
we have in our hands, in substantial integrity, the veritable Word of God.”

Dr William F. Albright was unquestionably one of the world’s most brilliant Biblical archaeologists. In 1955 he
wrote: “We can already say emphatically that there is no longer any solid bases for dating any book of the New
Testament after circa A.D.80.”

He was a skeptic! However, over the next several decades of discoveries, he was convinced enough to pen this time
period for the New Testament: “probably sometime between circa A.D.50 and 75.” [This destroys all the theories
by “liberal” “scholars” dating the New Testament to later and having the New Testament authors using the
Gnostic gospels… when in fact the Gnostics were the ones who later took the original writings and corrupted
them.] Albright concluded, from the evidence, that the writing of the New Testament was within a few years of the
events of Christ’s life and that the writing was “too slight [in time between the events and the writing of the
gospels] to permit any appreciable corruption of the essential center and even of the specific wording of the
sayings of Christ.” In other words, Professor Albright, one of the greatest minds in the field of archaeology and
ancient texts, concluded (via evidence) that the New Testament records the truth about Jesus Christ and His
statements.

Dr. John A. T. Robinson was a distinguished lecturer at Trinity College, Cambridge and developed a reputation as
a great scholar. Naturally, he accepted the academic consensus universally held since 1900, that denied the
disciples and Paul wrote the New Testament and concluded that it was written up to a hundred years after Christ.
However, an article in Time magazine, March 21, 1977, reported that Robinson decided to personally investigate
for himself the arguments behind this scholarly “consensus” against the New Testament’s reliability because he
realized that very little original research had been completed in this field in this century. He was shocked to
discover that much of past scholarship against the New Testament was untenable because it was based on a
“tyranny of unexamined assumptions” and what he felt must have been an “almost willful blindness.”

To the amazement of his university colleagues, Robinson concluded that the apostles must have been the genuine
writers of the New Testament books in the years prior to A.D.64. He also noted that if you were to reject the
evidence of the before mentioned research (internal, external, and the bibliographical tests) and throw out the
conclusions of original authorship of the New Testament. You would also have to throw out every ancient writing
of antiquity as well as historical writings of recent and ancient origin.

Some Archaeological Facts

Dr. Nelson Gleuck, president of Hebrew Union College and the leading Palestinian archaeologist of the twentieth
century said: “it may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever controverted a Biblical
reference. Scores of archaeological findings have been made which confirm in clear outline or in exact detail
historical statements in the Bible.”

William Ramsay, the English scholar, traveled as a young man to Asia Minor over a century ago for the sole
purpose of disproving the Bible’s history as described by Luke in his Gospel and in the book of Acts. Ramsey and
is professors were convinced that the New Testament record must be terribly inaccurate. He believed that Luke
could not be correct in his history of Christ or in his account about the growth of the Church during the first
decades following Christ. Dr. Ramsay began digging in the ancient ruins of sites throughout Greece and Asia
Minor, searching for ancient names, boundary markers, and other archaeological finds that would conclusively
prove that Luke had invented his history Christ and His Church.

To his amazement and dismay, William Ramsay discovered that the statements of the New Testament Scriptures
were accurate in the smallest detail. Finally, Dr. Ramsay was convinced by the overwhelming evidence proving the
Bible’s accuracy. Consequently, he accepted Jesus Christ as his personal Savior (based on the evidence alone).

A. N. Sherwin-White, was a great classical historical scholar at Oxford University who studied the extensive
evidence for and against the historical accuracy of the Book of Acts. Sherwin-White wrote his conclusion after
studying the evidence: “For Acts the confirmation of historicity is overwhelming… any attempt to reject its basic
historicity even in matters of detail must now appear absurd.”

Talking Snakes?
I have to throw this one in, you said: “You also state, "A good rule for interpretation is, “If the literal sense makes
good sense, seek no other sense lest you come up with nonsense."" I agree. Talking snakes make no sense. It must
be figurative.”

It “must be figurative” for someone who doesn’t believe in the theistic God. Your pre-supposition demands your
conclusion! The ancient Hebrew word used for “subtil” (KJV) is “nachash” (which means shining, upright
creature). So scripture notes that the snake could stand prior to the curse. This doesn’t make sense, a snake that
can stand? Scripture also says to the snake, “…And dust shalt thou eat all the days of your life.” Snakes in fact do
eat dust (a recent discovery) as part of tasting or feeling their environment and territory. This was meant to be
taken as a literal statement too. Balaam’s ass spoke in Numbers 22:28, but in order for you to say this didn’t
happen, you are merely proclaiming a theological statement. Because, if it is true that the theistic understanding of
God closest to reality (Islam, Judaism, Christianity), then God “intervening” in a miraculous way is possible. I am
not introducing a God-of-the-gaps, but merely challenging you to investigate the theistic claims of God’s existence.

Gospel of Thomas
You made mention of the Gospel of Thomas, I will be more than happy to discuss this topic at a later date (when
we finish the current three question topic of contradictions in the Bible). But when the internal, external, and
bibliographical tests are applied in like manner, as with the New Testament, Homer, Herodotus, Plato, Caesar,
Tacitus, etc., the Gospel of Thomas falls very short of the mark. The Gospel of Thomas is best dated to the fourth
century when the style of grammar is looked at. This “gospel” has no reference of any historical event, place, or
person that can verify when it was in fact written, unlike the Bible. Even if it were written in the late second
century, as some would say, other gospels pre-date it by 150 years. All it shows is that you had some New Age
people in the second century (Gnostics) who took here and there from the already existing gospel documents that
had spread all over the empire by about A.D. 60. As well as Jesus clearly stating in the Bible that he said nothing
in secret. Most of the information you are putting forward on this subject is from the Jesus Seminar/John Dominic
Crossan. All of the books below deal with the Gospel of Thomas and the Jesus Seminar.

Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus, edited by Michael Wilkins and J. P.
Moreland; Cynic Sage or Son of God? by Gregory A. Boyd; The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of
Christ, by Gary R. Habermas; Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics, by Norman Geisler; The Conspiracy
to Silence the Son of God, by Tal Brooke (had to get a title with C-O-N-spiracy in it); The New Testament
Document: Its Background, Growth, and Content, by Bruce M. Metzger; Jesus: The Evidence, by Ian Wilson.

Genesis 1 and 2 Revisited

Excerpted from the book I have on order for you
2B. Documentary Assumption
Since no author would have reason to repeat the same story twice, the repetition of certain
narratives (parallel accounts) indicates more than one author at work. Also, since one author
could hardly be charged with giving us obviously contradictory details, those stories in which such
discrepancies occur are the work of a redactor or editor who wove together two different accounts
of the same story (interwoven accounts).

Rollin Walker speaks for this view (A Study of Genesis and Exodus, p. 24), as cited by O. T. Allis:
“Toward the question of the precise historical accuracy of the stories of the book of Genesis and
Exodus we ought to take somewhat the same attitude that the editor of the books took when he
gave us parallel and conflicting accounts of the same event, and thereby confessed that he was not
sure which of the two was exactly right.” Otto Eissfeldt lists no less that nineteen allegedly
repetitious or contradictory accounts.

3B. Basic Answer

Supposed double and triple accounts of the same story are actually different stories with similar
details. Concerning the dual accounts of certain stories in the Pentateuch, Raven notes that “these
accounts are not really parallel. Some of them are merely similar events, as the two instances in
which Abraham lied concerning his wife and the same action taken later by Isaac. The redactor
must have considered these quite distinct. In other cases there is a repetition from a different
standpoint, as the account of the creation in Genesis 2 is from the standpoint of the God of
revelation and providence. Sometimes the repetition is characteristic of Hebrew style, which
often makes a general statement by way of introduction and then enlarges upon it.”…

1C. The Creation Story

…Kitchen continues [I will list kitchen main writings at the end of paper]: “The same may be said
of the order of events. In Genesis 2:19, there is no explicit warrant in the text assuming that the
creation of animals here happened immediately before their naming (i.e., after mans creation);
this is eisegesis, not exegesis. The proper equivalent in English for the first verb in Genesis 2:19
is the pluperfect (“…had formed…”). Thus the artificial difficulty over the order of event
disappears.”
 An essential difference in the two accounts must be appreciated: Genesis 1 describes the creation
of the world, while Genesis 2 details and further describes the specific creation of Adam and of his
immediate environment in the Garden of Eden. This is highlighted by the introductory phrase in
Genesis 2:4, “These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created,
in the day that Yahweh Elohim made the earth and the heavens.” Throughout Genesis the phrase
“these are the generations” occurs nine other times, each time introducing an account of the
offspring descended from a specific ancestor. This would then indicate that in the verses
following Genesis 2:4, we will find an account of the offspring of the heavens and earth after the
initial creation has taken place. And that is just what we find here in the case of Adam and Eve.

[If this phrase means one thing nine other different times in Genesis, then exegesis would
extrapolate that onto the tenth one. Eisegesis would ignore the nine other occurrences of the
meaning of that phrase, and would extrapolate a differing opinion of what it means. The Bible, by
internal evidence, interprets itself. There is no contradiction here!] …It must be emphasized that
we do not have here an example of incompatible repetition. We have an example of a skeletal
outline of creation as a whole, followed by a detailed focus on the final point of the outline – man.
Lack of recognition of this common Hebrew literary device, in the words of Kitchen, “borders on
obscurantism.”

Kitchen then shows how archaeology has brought this type of literary pattern to light. Just such a
literary pattern is commonplace in other texts of the ancient Near East. On the Karnak Poetical
Stela from Egypt, the address of Amun to King Tuthmosis III, etc., as well as ancient Hebrew
style.

…Just as an assignment of the various portions of these Egyptian texts to different documents is
unheard of in scholarly circles, so is it absurd to practice a dissection of sources in their
contemporary literature found in Genesis one and two.

To Conclude
Archaeological discoveries dealing with Hebrew cultural literature and their surrounding neighbor’s literature style
confirm the story of creation in Genesis chapters one and two as being one and the same, and not contradictory.
Also, the exegesis of scripture showing that nine other uses of the introductory phrase confirms that this account is
non-contradictory. Allowing for accurate translation from the Hebrew into the English shows that the proper
equivalent “…had formed…” does away with the misunderstanding that one would want to read into the text if his
or her pre-supposition demanded them to do.

On to Noah? And let me confirm, you are worried about the contradictory numbers of animals mentioned as being
called to the ark, correct?

Books I Used for Biographical Information and Evidentiary Statements

“In order of most info used”

• The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict;

• Show Me God: What the Message from Space is Telling Us About God;
• Archaeology & the Old Testament;
• History and Christianity: A Vigorous, Convincing Presentation of the Evidence for a Historical Jesus;
• The Stones Cry Out: What Archaeology Reveals About the Truth of the Bible;
• Is the Bible True? How Modern Debates and Discoveries Affirm the Essence of the Scriptures;
• The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ;
• Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus;
• The Origin of the Bible;
• A General Introduction to the Bible;
• The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated: The Qumran Texts in English.
 Kitchens Works
Notes & Comments - Ramesses II, Royal Inscriptions. Vol. II 01/1999 Blackwell Publishers. Series: Ramesside
Inscriptions Ser. $ 150.00 (Publisher)

Ramesside, Inscriptions, Translations, Vol. II: Ramesses II, Royal Inscriptions. 03/1996 Blackwell Publishers.
$ 184.95 (Publisher)

The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt, 1100-650 BC. Incl. suppl. 10/1996 2nd ed. Aris & Phillips. $ 60.00
Distributor (Publisher)

Catalogue of the Ancient Egyptian Collection in the National Museum, Rio de Janeiro. 2 vols. 1990 Aris &
Phillips. $ 199.00 Distributor (Publisher)

Ramesside Inscriptions. 02/1994 Blackwell Publishers. $ 184.95 (Publisher)