For today’s post we will tackle the question the Skeptic Annotated Bible asked: When did Ahaziah begin to reign?
Here are the two answers which the skeptic believes shows a Bible contradiction:
In the twelfth year of Joram.
“In the twelfth year of Joram the son of Ahab king of Israel, Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah began to reign” (2 Kings 8:25)
In the eleventh year of Joram.
“Now in the eleventh year of Joram, the son of Ahab, Ahaziah became king over Judah.” (2 Kings 9:29)
(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 2 Kings 8:25 as affirming the claim “Ahaziah begin to reign in the twelfth year of Joram” against 2 Kings 9:29 as affirming “Ahaziah begin to reign in the eleventh year of Joram.”
- 2 Kings 8:25 was accurately interpreted by the skeptic; it does affirm “Ahaziah begin to reign in the twelfth year of Joram.”
- 2 Kings 9:29 was accurately interpreted by the skeptic; it does affirm “Ahaziah begin to reign in the eleventh year of Joram.”
- I think there’s not necessarily a contradiction. Remember that Ahaziah was “the son of Jehoram.” We need to know about the life of Jehoram. In 2 Chronicles 21 reveal details about Jehoram who fathered Ahaziah. 2 Chronicles 21:6 mentioned that Jehoram did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord. The Lord disciplined him the last two of his life according to 2 Chronicles 21:18-19 “So after all this the Lord struck him in his intestines with an incurable sickness. 19 Now it came about in the course of time, at the end of two years, that his bowels came out because of his sickness, and he died in great pain. And his people did not make a funeral fire for him like the fire for his fathers.” I imagine in the last two years of his life struggling with health issue there must have been a time Ahaziah stepped in and served functionally as the king. One can imagine Ahaziah lead as king while his father was still alive though the father physically was unable to be the king even though technically Jehoram was still king.
- As an analogy I pause whenever someone asked when did I start being a pastor. Our denomination would say its after my licensing examination and questioning. Yet I was shepherding with my church the members for a longer time before that. But then I also felt even when I was in Seminary I was busy preaching, teaching and shepherding and counseling weekly though I wasn’t paid at the time and members did see and my church even introduced me to others as pastor. Ask different people in the church they mentioned different years I’ve been a pastor and they are not wrong.
- There is no contradiction here. Seems the skeptic needs to learn of 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.”
[…] When did Ahaziah begin to reign? […]
Excellent refutation. Love your analogy about when you became a pastor.
Shalom!
Thanks for reading this all the way and noticing the pastor illustration! Blessings to you this weekend, I pray it be spiritually meaningful sir!
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Thank you Vincent; I hope your Saturday is going well?
You also forgot to mention another solution is counting ascension years versus non-ascension years
See point 6
Read about the accession-year system here: https://tecartabible.com/share/2202/39
Excellent post. I agree.
THanks Doug for reading this. I think this one was easier than the one on “How old was Ahaziah when he began to reign?” that you pointed me to think about. Have a blessed day brother!
Very good Jim!
Brother Andy thank you for the encouragement!!!
Good stuff. I like how you added that the worldview of the author of the Skeptic Annotated Bible can’t support the law of non-contradiction. All presupp all the time 😎
Haha good eye to see that I bought Presup to bear 😎
I love seeing how the Bible is reasonable when you consider the context. Your page is elite trolling of the atheists 😹 and it’s wonderful to see
Yep they be mad on Twitter 😂
And on Facebook they be swarming
Thanks for this good rebuttal. “Black and white” Steve/Stephen Wells will not tolerate any nuance or subtlety.
Yep no nuances and no context of the previous king that would answer their own objection! About to go to sleep now; how did your Saturday shift go????
RE: shift
Thanks! Yesterday was slow and today is the same. Was able to solve an expensive inventory discrepancy today that I was putting off. How did your Saturday/prep day go?
Once again we have unbelievers confusing their opinion with what the Bible actually says. Critics need to read some of the Bible in context and church history. Many of these objections can be corrected if one consider these steps
My comfort is that He is in control and so there’s nothing that’s ultimately a contradiction in the Bible even if I do not know enough to understand and reconcile passages yet. Yet I know reading more of the Bible helps like reading 2 Chronicles 21 helps with the two 2 Kings verses
Trust God for the answers and trust God when we don’t know the answer. The atheist I come across I tell them easy peasy its all right there in the Bible, even the answers to your twisting of the Holy infallible Word.
The only problem that I have with so-called Bible Contradictions is the new converts. Their faith is so new and easy to shake.
To try to explain to them about the different manuscripts and the different variants between or saying it was a scribal error can really do a lot of damage, if you don’t handle it correctly.
These kind of conversations should be with people who are deeply rooted in their faith in God. Just my opinion.
The nonbeliever doesn’t just absorb lies but swallow entire systems of unbelief. We be the same if it wasn’t for the Spirit
Seems important to note that one Verse says “became king” and the other says “began to reign”.
Wow good point! I’ll have to look at the Hebrew for that later on. Attention to details matter; both as an artist and also reading the Bible amen???
Amen❗
Slimjim is right. That is a good point. It will be interesting to see what he finds out.
I agree!
Doug I emailed you back about 30 minutes ago. Couldn’t find any of your comment on spam filter or the trash; I don’t think I deleted. Sometimes in the past when I type on my phone a comment on someone’s page I think there was issues I didn’t press enter properly and I moved on and it was not posted and my phone no longer have memory of what I wrote. If you want to post your comment again, that would be great to hear your take even if you disagree with me with how to resolve the alleged Bible contradiction (so long as you don’t attack the Bible or say there’s actual contradiction with God’s original text of the Bible, obviously). I did look up what RG mentioned about the distinction of “became king” and “began to reign” and unfortunately in the Hebrew there’s no distinction and it was more the English translation since the Hebrew verb in both 2 Kings 8:25 and 2 Kings 9:29 use the same verb מָלַ֛ךְ (with even the same vowel pointings). Still I think the points made in this post still stands as why there’s not a contradiction here with this passage. Thanks for reading this blog brother.
Hello, I agree Christians need to be careful about talking about manuscripts matter with young believers.
So I did look at the Hebrew for the two verses whether there’s a distinction of “became king” and “began to reign” and unfortunately in the Hebrew there’s no distinction and it was more the English translation phrasing things that way since the Hebrew verb in both 2 Kings 8:25 and 2 Kings 9:29 use the same verb: מָלַ֛ךְ (with even the same vowel pointings). Still I think the points made in this post still stands as why there’s not a contradiction here with this passage. Thanks for reading this blog brother.
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