Bible Contradiction? Is it OK to curse people?

 

For today’s post we will tackle the question the Skeptic Annotated Bible asked: Is it OK to curse people?

Here are the two answers which the skeptic believes shows a Bible contradiction:

Do not curse anyone.

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.” (Romans 12:14)

No

“If anyone does not love the Lord, he is to be accursed. Maranatha!” (1 Corinthians 16:22)

“But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! 9 As we have said before, even now I say again: if anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!” (Galatians 1:8-9)

(All Scriptural quotation comes from the New American Standard Bible)

Here’s a closer look at whether or not there is a contradiction:

1. 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.
2. 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.
3. The skeptic tries to pit Romans 12:14 as affirming the claim “One should not curse people” against both 1 Corinthians 16:22 and Galatians 1:8-9 as affirming “One could curse people.”
4. The skeptic needs to pay attention who is doing the action with the verbs for “curse” in these passages.
5. The skeptic cited Romans 12:14 correctly as affirming the claim “One should not curse people.”  When it says “do not curse” the Greek verb for curse is a second person plural imperative in which the imperative with a negative particle before the verb indicate this is a prohibition while the second person plural refers to the readers of Paul’s epistles.  So Christians are not to curse those who persecute them but rather bless them.
6.   Looking carefully at 1 Corinthians 16:22 and Galatians 1:8-9 we see the verses is not teaching believers that “One could curse people.”  Note the verbs for both passages use a stative verb plus the noun “curse.”  The stative verbs for both 1 Corinthians 16:22 and Galatians 1:8-9 are third person singular as oppose to second person singular; so its not telling the readers to do something but instead it focuses on the individual who does not love the Lord (1 Corinthians 16:22) or the individual who preach another Gospel (Galatians 1:8-9).   These individuals have brought upon themselves curses because of their action (note the verbs are active voices, and with the subject being the individual).  Stating the factual truth of the matter of what are the consequences of such individuals is not the same thing as going around being the very one performing the cursing.  
7. If it helps to think about it from a linguistic perspective of speech acts, Romans 12:14 prohibit cursing nonbelievers with us doing the act ourselves; but that is not the same acts with Paul’s speech in 1 Corinthians 16:22 and Galatians 1:8-9 informing readers that certain individuals action will bring about obligatory consequences that are curses.
8. There is no contradiction here.  Seems the skeptic needs to learn of How to Handle Bible Contradictions.
9. 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.”