Contradictions in the Acts of the Apostles? Acts 9:7; 22:9; 26:14 A long time ago, a friend challenged me that the Bible contradicts itself in reporting the details of the conversion of the Roman citizen, Rabbi Saul of Tarsus, who became the Christian Apostle to the Gentiles, Paul. Seeing differences between the three accounts of the conversion in the Book of Acts (9:7; 22:9; 26:14) is not difficult and a good exercise for any serious student of the Bible, anyone—that is—whether they are for or against the Bible. There is no contradiction in this particular matter, but it helps to show that by looking at the Greek. Of course, we would not be expecting a contradiction. The author of Acts was not Paul himself, but Luke, who’d probably heard Paul describe his conversion many times. I’d be expecting Luke himself to pick up contradictions in Paul’s story had he actually offered such during the time he and Luke were travelling together. Contradictions between books are more likely than those within books, and people who argue that the New Testament texts have been corrupted, will surely *not* want to find contradictions, which would be some of the first things to be eliminated in any competent revision of a work to fit one’s agenda. Apparent but unreal contradictions actually end up being good arguments for authenticity. People telling the truth typically don’t cover themselves against unfriendly interpretations. Those deliberately setting out to deceive, on the other hand, are often very particular indeed. If seeking to get someone to swallow a lie, one wants to surround it with as much fine looking palatable dressing that suspicions aren’t aroused. But anyway, it’s an excellent question, Just what did happen on the road to Damascus? It’s a slightly different question to What did people see and hear? Did they all see and hear the same thing? But those are good questions too. It is also worth asking What did people report? What did Paul report? And Do we have reliable documentation of sense impressions of an actual historical event? Finally, we should ask if Luke captures accurately Paul’s interpretation of the significance of the event. But let’s be very basic, and just look at the words. All the other clever things I’ll leave to the reader. But here’s a summary for those who are already tired or suspicious on account of all the (overly) careful logic above. Acts 9:7 is explaining why only Paul, not his companions, could testify as to who was speaking: “The others heard the sound of his voice, but only I actually saw him.” Acts 22:9 is explaining why only Paul, not his companions, could testify as to the content of what the voice said: “The others were dazzled by the light, not paying attention to the sound of the voice.” Acts 26:14 is explaining But what really matters is the raw data, even more than any analysis I offer, so here’s the text itself, with skeleton notes. Acts 9:7 ἀκούοντες μὲν τῆς φωνῆς μηδένα δὲ θεωροῦντες hearing sound seeing no one A B B A structure: hearing / sound no-one / seeing Acts 22:9 τὸ μὲν φῶς ἐθεάσαντο τὴν δὲ φωνὴν οὐκ ἤκουσαν they observed the light not listening to the voice τοῦ λαλοῦντός μοι which was speaking to me Acts 26:14 ἤκουσα φωνὴν λέγουσαν πρός με τῇ Ἑβραΐδι διαλέκτῳ Just for the fun of it, since the Greek is so easy in this particular case, I’ll introduce some Greek as though to someone who’s never studied it before. The first things to point out are some vocabulary items, together with the warning that although the whole point of having words in the first place is that they mean the same thing irrespective of speaker, hearer or context, but that’s not an absolute, as we all know. Most, if not all, words can bend and flex to the needs of settings, but only within reason. Words are neither infinitely plastic, nor perfectly frictionless, they are *mainly* precise, but with fairly conventional room for manoeuvre. Here are some of the key words in our texts. noun φῶς (fōs, as in “photo”): light verbs θεωρέω (theōreō, as in “theory”): see (perceive), melihat (mengerti) θεάομαι (theaomai, as in “theatre”): see (watch), melihat (menonton) Note: two words for similar ideas More important than specifying the actual distinction between these words is simply observing that some kind of distinction existed. They are etymologically (historically) related, suiting themselves to being used to make subtle semantic (meaning) distinctions, which may vary with time, place and speakers (or maybe not vary so much). noun φωνή I (fōnē, as in “phone”): noise (sound) φωνή II (fōnē, as in “phone”): noise (voice) verb ἀκούω I (akouō, as in “acoustic”): audit (hear) ἀκούω II (akouō, as in “acoustic”): audit (listen) Note: two similar ideas for the same word Note also that degree of congnitive processing of sensory input leads directly to clearly meaningful distinctions between all the words we’re looking at. verbs λαλέω (laleō, as in “glossolalia”): talk (chatter) λέγω (legō, related to “eulogy”): talk (speech) Much of the logic of life is in making distinctions between things, and language is part of that, sometimes at the very basic level of vocabulary, but also at higher levels like syntax (grammar). two sides of the same coin ... μὲν ... δὲ ... ... on the one hand ... on the other ... each particle second word in clause in example texts in Acts, second clause is a negated empirical, historical proposition ... not seeing anyone (9:7) ... they did not listen (22:9) the rhetorical effect is contrast influencing lexical selection in English as receptor language to be continued
Posted on: Wed, 07 Aug 2013 10:57:02 +0000
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