For today’s post we will tackle the question the Skeptic Annotated Bible asked: Should you pray for everyone?
Here are the two answers which the skeptic believes indicate a Bible contradiction:
Yes, you should pray for everyone.
“First of all, then, I urge that requests, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made in behalf of all people,” (1 Timothy 2:1)
No, there are some people you shouldn’t pray for.
“So as for you, do not pray for this people, nor lift up a cry or prayer for them; for I will not listen when they call to Me because of their disaster.” ( Jeremiah 7:16)
“So as for you, do not pray for this people, nor lift up a cry or prayer for them; for I will not listen when they call to Me because of their disaster.” (Jeremiah 11:14)
“So the Lord said to me, “Do not pray for a good outcome on behalf of this people.” (Jeremiah 14:11)
(All Scriptural quotation comes from the New American Standard Bible)
Here’s a closer look at whether or not there is a contradiction:
- When dealing with skeptics’ claim of Bible contradictions it seems one can never be reminded enough of what exactly is a contradiction. A contradiction occurs when two or more claims conflict with one another so that they cannot simultaneously be true in the same sense and at the same time. To put it another way, a Bible contradiction exists when there are claims within the Bible that are mutually exclusive in the same sense and at the same time.
- One should be skeptical of whether this is a Bible contradiction given the Skeptic Annotated Bible’s track record of inaccurately handling the Bible. See the many examples of their error which we have responded to in this post: Collection of Posts Responding to Bible Contradictions. Of course that does not take away the need to respond to this claim of a contradiction, which is what the remainder of this post will do. But this observation should caution us to slow down and look more closely at the passages cited by the Skeptic Annotated Bible to see if they interpreted the passages properly to support their conclusion that it is a Bible contradiction.
- The skeptic tries to pit 1 Timothy 2:1 as affirming the claim “you should pray for everyone” against three passages of Jeremiah 7:16, Jeremiah 11:14 and Jeremiah 14:11 as affirming “there are some people you shouldn’t pray for.”
- We must examine if the skeptics cited the verses properly for their claims.
- The skeptic cited Jeremiah 7:16, Jeremiah 11:14 and Jeremiah 14:11 correctly as affirming “there are some people you shouldn’t pray for.” Both Jeremiah 7:16 and Jeremiah 11:14 state “do not pray for this people.” Jeremiah 14:11 states “Do not pray…on behalf of this people.” So we see all three verses does show some people are not being prayed for.
- 1 Timothy 2:1 does affirm the claim “you should pray for everyone” since among the things done on “behalf of all people” is prayers and intercessions. What “all” means will be discussed below.
- It is also important to know who it is that is that is being told to pray and not to pray.
- The three verses of Jeremiah 7:16, Jeremiah 11:14 and Jeremiah 14:11 all are addressed to Jeremiah concerning his prayers. We know this because the verb “pray” in the Hebrew is third person masculine singular plus God is the One doing the addressing as seen directly in Jeremiah 14:11 that mentioned “the Lord said to me” while in Jeremiah 7:16 and Jeremiah 11:14 the first verse of their respective chapter mentioned “The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying” (Jeremiah 7:1 and Jeremiah 11:1).
- In 1 Timothy 2:1 Paul is the one who is writing according to the first verse (1 Timothy 1:1). Paul is writing this letter to his associate Timothy according to 1 Timothy 1:2.
- Knowing the context of who is being addressed is important because logically speaking it is not a contradiction if someone tells one person to do something and another person to do something else. For instance it is not a contradiction for a restaurant owner telling one person to cook and another to take orders of customers; they are commands given that are different, but they are not a contradiction because its given to different individuals (the cook versus the waiter). Likewise we have the same thing here with two different individuals being given different commands.
- Also the time of when God addressed both Timothy and Jeremiah as to pray or not to pray was different and therefore with different circumstances.
- Paul was writing to Timothy during the church age as the Gospel was advancing in the Roman Empire.
- Jeremiah was told not to pray anymore for His ethnic Jews since God was tired of the sins of HIs people and was going to judge them which was a prophetic truth Jeremiah already knew so there’s no point to pray contrary to God’s will when its clear what God wanted. Jeremiah being told not to pray for others is not arbitrary.
- Also the purpose of God telling Timothy and Jeremiah what to do and not to do with prayers for others are different.
- 1 Timothy 2:2b tells us that Timothy is to pray “so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.“
- Jeremiah’s case was because God already reveal He was going to judge the nation for their sins.
- Taken together the different individuals being addressed in different time, circumstances, with different commands or prohibition for different reasons is far from being a contradiction and any skeptics who think there is a contradiction here needs to revisit the definition of what’s a contradiction from above.
- 1 Timothy 2:1 was cited to support the claim that “you should pray for everyone.” A superficial look would seem that “all” would mean “all” in the sense of all without a single exception. But a closer look at the Greek word for “all” here indicate the Greek term has its particular meaning.
- The word for “all” here in the Greek is πάντων.
- Typically in our English vocabulary the meaning of “all” is understood as “everything without exception.” But we want to know what the Greek word means and its lexical range rather than just the English word to translate the Greek term. The Greek word does not necessarily mean English sense that we often understand it. The Greek term can mean “all sorts of… (various categories)” in a sense that doesn’t require the meaning of “every/all (with no exceptions).”
- The use of the Greek adjective of πάντα and its various declined form does not necessarily have to take the meaning of “every/all (with no exceptions)” in its usage in other verses.
- For instance 1 Corinthians 10:23 states “All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify.” Clearly Paul doesn’t mean everything is lawful with no exception. If that was the case there would be no such thing as sin. Rather the Greek function of “all” often refer to every sort of class or categories.
- 1 Corinthians 13:7 is another example. See our discussion in our response to the alleged Bible contradiction “Should we believe in unseen things?“
- 1 Timothy 6:10 is a third example. See our discussion in our response to the alleged Bible contradiction “Is money good or bad?“
- John 21:25 is a fourth example. See our discussion in our response to the alleged Bible contradiction “Does the gospel of Luke contain everything that Jesus did?“
- John 15:15 is a fifth example. See our discussion in our response to the alleged Bible contradiction “Did Jesus tell his disciples everything?“
- A sixth example see our discussion in response to the alleged Bible contradiction “Should we believe everything?“
- A final example can be seen in our response to “Was Jesus a ransom for many or a ransom for all?“
- This idea of “all” as “various sort” can be seen in the context of 1 Timothy 2; not how in verse 2 it lists types and kinds of people, in a way that is consistent with what I’m arguing about here of how “all” should be understood.
- Just in case someone think our consideration of the lexical range of the meaning of the Greek term πάντων is illegitimate because we are saying the word has more than one meaning consider how English and any other natural language also have words with more than one meaning. Consider the example of the English word “whopper,” “love” and ““left.“
- Thus there is no contradiction here. Seems like the skeptics need to learn from our post How to Handle Bible Contradictions.
- We shouldn’t miss that worldviews are at play even with the skeptic’s objection to Christianity. The worldview of the author of the Skeptic Annotated Bible actually doesn’t even allow for such a thing as the law of non-contradiction to be meaningful and intelligible. In other words for him to try to disprove the Bible by pointing out that there’s a Bible contradiction doesn’t even make sense within his own worldview. Check out our post “Skeptic Annotated Bible Author’s Self-Defeating Worldview.”
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Thanks for the great analysis and your continued work in debunking this nonsense.
Have a stunning day in paradise.
[…] Bible Contradiction? Should you pray for everyone? […]
Great post as always! Thanks!
Thank you for this clarification, particularly points 6, 7.2, and 9. You are right, it is pointless for Jeremiah to pray when it was revealed to him what judgement (out of serious sin/depravity) awaits all in GOD’s sovereign will and plan. This is new to me. GOD bless you, Nancy, and the kids!
Thank you Gersom for reading this! How did your day go overall yesterday? Still very grateful for all your help with the presentation brother Gersom…
You’re welcome, Pastor. I’m glad to help.
So important today if ever to understand.We are so close and there are some who will still go with us ..at the last minute.
Thank you for that encouragement of a comment. I hope these posts will encourage people we don’t know who use search engines to look up answer and see that the Word is true and not contradictory and God would help plant seed so they would then get saved…that’s my prayer actually and even more so as this year things have gotten so much more darker and lawless…just prayed for your prayer request, let me know if you have more or an update yeah?
So far so good on my son’s problem. I’m sure it isn’t over but God is good.
Jim, I appreciate this affirmation of prayers said in the name of “all” who share a common darkness, such as with Covid.
You’ve answered this without getting into a messy Calvinism and Arminianism debate but stayed on the Scriptures; congratulations, that was not what I was expecting when I first began reading this.
Thanks for thoroughly examining and refuting this alleged contradiction. Once again, Steve/Stephen Wells resorts to the “either-or” logical fallacy by completely ignoring context.
You’re welcome! Thank you for reading this! You’re right, another fallacious ones from Steve Well’s listing. There’s so many fallacies committed for each one on his list that if I taught a course on logic in the future, I can draw from the many examples from Steve Wells of various kinds of logical fallacies. I do plan to do a series on logic sometime in the future, and Lord willing post it each week on here on the blog like our ongoing leadership series. Speaking of which any series you plan on soon for your blog for 2021?
I’m looking forward to that series on logic. I enjoyed Dr. Lisle’s examination of logical fallacies, but I have a hard time keeping them straight.
Nope, no series planned for 2021 as of yet, but I have my eyes open for a good resource. I recently downloaded a book by a convert to Catholicism in which he expounds on the great joys of being a Catholic. That’s a possibility.
BTW, I was able to listen to your examination of purgatory in segments throughout the day today. You did an excellent job of examining the proof texts the RCC uses for purgatory. Great stuff! I really appreciated how you said purgatory is just one part of a larger puzzle/paradigm that is the RCC’s false gospel. A person can’t just focus on purgatory because connected to that are indulgences, mortal vs. venial sins, praying for the dead, the sacrifice of the mass, and ultimately Rome’s salvation system of salvation via sacramental grace and merit and you referred to all of those.
A powerful critique. Praise God! I pray this video is used by God to cause Catholics to question their church’s doctrines and read God’s Word for themselves.
Wow thanks for watching it! It sounds like you watched it all the way! There are some of the trolls commenting in that video that the host wanted me to respond to on YouTube. I feel not so eager but might make a post on here on my blog responding to them as blogging seems to be more worthwhile than only sticking to a YouTube comment war. Don’t know if you saw some of the comments on there lol, I usually don’t pay attention to YouTube comments since the quality of response usually isn’t that good…what do you think?
Yup, I watched to the end. I actually did read some of the comments from Catholic YouTubers. Those people aren’t looking for truth.
In this current era we are living in, we should pray for everyone
I agree with everything this year especially. Blessings from Canada
Mr. Null and Void is out of context, Again.
He’s always kicking dirt when he shoots and never getting the target. Steve Wells have committed almost every fallacy imaginable in his twisting of Scripture. I pray for his salvation as he will be judge most severely for leading others astray if he doesn’t repent! And he’s getting up there in age too! Pray!
I will.
Thank you for doing such a perfect job debunking this absurdity.
You’re welcome! Thanks for reading this Crissy; how did the interview go with the pastor and pastor’s wife?
It went really well. They were so easy to talk to. Tomorrow God willing I will be accepted as a new member after they voted me in today. Thank you for praying brother Jim.
It is a Christian thing to pray for others
Jeremiah in his situation was different since the people were hardened
And they were given a lot of chances to repent before God said He’s done with them and they will be punished for sure.
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Teachers like to say there’s no such thing as a stupid question. Well they need seen questions atheists ask question begging a Bible contradiction when there are none