66 Books, 40 Authors, Zero Contradictions?  🔗 **Source:** [66 Books, 40 Authors, Zero Contradictions?](https://share.snipd.com/episode/34ff8190-4608-41d7-8dce-1a606c276d45) ## Highlights - **66 Books Is A Protestant Preference** - The idea of a single 66-book Bible is a modern Protestant preference rather than an objective fact. - Dan McClellan and Dan Beecher note multiple Christian and Jewish canons (Catholic, Orthodox, Ethiopian, Samaritan) with differing book counts. Transcript: Dan Beecher I, you know, you and I have talked a lot about how there's, one canon of the Bible. Dan McClellan Yeah, there are multiple different canons. When we determine what Bible we're looking at, that's based on answers that we're providing to questions that don't really have objective, empirically decidable answers. These are preferences more than anything else. And they're preferences of different groups of different sizes. So, you know, there are groups that have more adherence that say one thing and groups that have fewer adherence to say others. But 66 books is clearly a modern Protestant canon. Because if you went back to the King James Version, or even Martin Luther, they might say different numbers. Yeah. So it's a modern Protestant concept of the canon. If you go to the Catholic Church, you have more. Yeah. And if you go to, there are Eastern Orthodox, you've got Greek Orthodox, you've got Russian Orthodox, you've got Georgian Orthodox. They each have different ideas of the extent and the contours of the canon. And then we could get into the Armenian Apostolic canon, the Ethiopian Orthodox. Tewahedo canon is the biggest. That's like 88. Don't get me started on that canon. Yeah. Coptic Orthodox, Syriac Orthodox Church of the East. And that's just Christian. Right. Because we can go to Jewish and we can talk about the Jewish canon. We can even talk about the Samaritan Pentateuch, which is a different canon. Like there are still Samaritans around as well who only hold the Pentateuch as the canon. Dan Beecher And every one of those books has the word the Bible on the front of it. Like, yeah, maybe not the Jewish ones. The Jewish ones may not have the word Bible. Dan McClellan Yeah, they generally call it Tanakh. But in English, frequently, you will have them refer to the Bible. Yeah. And also within the canons, you can have different versions of these texts. Yeah. So right off the bat, we're not talking about something that is objectively the Bible, because there's no such thing as the Bible. Right. There are Bibles. And this is just saying, this is the version of the Bible I prefer. But then you get into questions of, okay, well, what manuscripts are you using? Okay, what translation are you using? There are a lot of different ways this can go. So right off the bat, the first claim, 66 books, flag on the play. That is a preference. That is not a fact. ([Time 0:04:18](https://share.snipd.com/snip/f05f1fe9-84d0-4eee-83f8-53f1a106089a)) - **Traditional Authorship Often Lacks Evidence** - Authorship claims like 'Moses wrote the Pentateuch' are traditions, often centuries later, not documentary facts. - The hosts point to internal anachronisms, repetitions, and narrative of Moses' death as evidence against single authorship. Transcript: Dan Beecher Authorship, as we know from doing this show, is very easy to nail down when it comes to the Bible. So we should easily be able to determine who wrote it and how many of those authors there are. Dan McClellan Yeah. And this is the part of, this is why this claim is apologetics, because if it's, and the claim sometimes is 40, sometimes it's 45, sometimes it's 46, sometimes it's about 40. But that claim presupposes not only that every single word of the Bible is historical, but every single traditional assignment of authorship and dating is also traditional or is also Accurate. Right. And so it's presupposing what it sets out to prove. Because the whole point of this is to suggest, hey, this has got to be true because of all these things. Right. But all these things presuppose that it's true. Right. Dan Beecher Well, and not even stuff like, like these are not biblical claims. A lot of these authorship questions, there are claims that were made after the fact, long after the fact in many cases. Dan McClellan Centuries after the fact, frequently after the Bible was completed, because it requires that only one person have written the entire Pentateuch, Moses. Now, you might say, well, maybe it's just one person, but it doesn't necessarily have to be Moses. Yes, it does, because the claim that it is 1,500 or 1,600 years of writing requires that it be written by Moses. You're jumping claims. You're jumping claims. Okay, there have got to be some points of contact here. Dan Beecher There are some very distinct points of contact. Dan McClellan But there's nothing in the Pentateuch that says Moses wrote all of this. Right. There are a couple of places where it says, and Moses wrote down the law or Moses wrote this down. But in every instance, what Moses wrote down is some discrete subsection of a single book within the Pentateuch, not even a whole book. Dan Beecher Well, it would be very weird for Moses to write down and Moses wrote down the law. Dan McClellan Like that would be a very weird thing for a person to write. And then to narrate what happened after he died. Right. Yeah. At the end of the book of Deuteronomy. He, I died. Dan Beecher And here's what happened a little bit after that. Dan McClellan Yeah. And when we look at the Pentateuch, like it's very clear, not only that it was not written by one person, because as we've discussed many times on this channel, it frequently contradicts Itself and repeats itself because different versions of stories are being brought together. Right. Sometimes they appear in separate chapters. Sometimes they're right next to each other. Sometimes they're interwoven. And yeah, it's just not plausible that there was one author. And also, all of the anachronisms, it was not written in the second millennium BCE. There are people groups. How dare you? I dare. There are people groups that weren't around until the first millennium BCE. There are, and you know, the text will frequently say, oh, such and such happened and that place is still there down to this very day. It's like, that's not what you write when the thing just happened. Right. So yeah, there are all kinds of indications that no, this was not written by one person. It was not written in the 15th century BCE. It was not written by Moses. But in order for it to be 40 to 46 authors, it has to have all been written by Moses. It just didn't happen. ([Time 0:09:02](https://share.snipd.com/snip/4b8fa949-88b6-4f11-b8d9-0fd4dd7c5e9e)) - **Language Dating Undercuts Early Exodus Claims** - Linguistic evidence dates the Pentateuch to a developed Hebrew from the 8th–6th centuries BCE, not the 2nd millennium BCE. - McClellan argues texts reference peoples and places that postdate a historical Moses. Transcript: Dan McClellan Yeah, because Hebrew didn't exist when a historical Moses would have existed. Hebrew didn't exist until around the 11th century BCE at the very earliest. And that was a very rudimentary form of Hebrew. The Pentateuch is not written in a rudimentary form of Hebrew. It's written in a very developed form of Hebrew, something that is like the second quarter of the first millennium BCE. So between the eighth and the sixth centuries BCE. And that happens to be when these people groups that are named were around. And that happens to be far enough away from the setting of the events for somebody to say, and it's still there down to this very day. Like all of the data point to a handful of centuries in the middle of the first millennium BCE. ([Time 0:14:22](https://share.snipd.com/snip/161993e0-7f7e-4f55-9f7a-f931ba845537)) - **1500 Years Claim Depends On Presuppositions** - The oft-repeated 1,500–1,600 year span (Exodus ~1400 BCE to NT ~100 CE) depends on accepting late traditional datings like Moses in the 15th century. - McClellan calls that range a presupposition, not a scholarly consensus. Transcript: Dan McClellan No. So the idea is that it was written between, if they say 1500 years, they're thinking 1400 BCE to 100 CE. And as Wes has stated, he believes that 99% of all biblical scholars believe the 27 books of the New Testament were completed by the end of the first century CE, which is laughably untrue. But 1400 BCE to 100 CE, 1500 years. Now there are early and late datings for a historical Moses. You have the crowd who thinks Moses lived in the 15th century and the Exodus happened like between 1460 and 1420 or something like that. And so if Moses was writing around that time period, then it's more like 1500 or yeah, 1560-ish years. So you say in the neighborhood of 1600. ([Time 0:15:44](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3b15563c-85b1-45f7-b9e4-a68f3cd617a9)) - **Three Continents Is A Misleading Claim** - The 'three continents' claim inflates geographic diversity; most biblical texts were produced around the Mediterranean basin. - The hosts note the whole corpus fits inside a circle smaller than the Mediterranean Sea. Transcript: Dan Beecher Yeah, we do need to talk about the continents, but that's just a brief thing, right? Dan McClellan Yeah, yeah. Three continents, that is presupposing that the Pentateuch, or at least parts of it, were written by Moses in Egypt. In Egypt, yeah. In the 15th century BCE. That's not accurate. You could salvage it, though, if you conclude that one of the Catholic epistles, so like maybe 3 John or 2 Peter or something like that, was written in Alexandria. If you decide that, great, three continents. Is that plausible? Sure, it's plausible. I don't know if scholars have argued that a given text was written in Alexandria. It's certainly plausible, but I don't know. And that's not what the claim is. Dan Beecher Certainly, that's not what the claim is. Yeah, and it doesn't really matter. But the other point is that three different continents makes it sound like there was someone in like far east Asia writing one thing and someone in north, you know, north Europe writing Another thing and someone in South Africa writing a third thing. And these are all like it's this tiny little even if we were to suppose that Egypt were part of it. The circle that you draw to get all of these on here and i'm assuming i maybe i don't know actually i'm assuming that the europe claim is just uh john of patmos is there more than just that Is there who else what other what other thing could have been written in Europe? Dan McClellan Or is it just Revelation? Well, it's the idea that Paul was writing some places from... From like Rome or something. Somewhere around there, yeah. Okay. And, you know, it depends on whether or not you identify Turkey as Europe. Dan Beecher Well, part of it is. Dan McClellan Yeah. Yeah, that's the diameter of the circle you have to draw to include every last text of the Bible is smaller than the Mediterranean Sea. Right. Like it's all surrounding the same body of water, which is not an ocean. ([Time 0:27:46](https://share.snipd.com/snip/e1b6d07d-f7f9-4964-8a38-cf8ec369be1a)) - **Three Languages Claim Is Accurate** - The Bible was written in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic (bits in Ezra/Daniel), and Greek for the New Testament. - The hosts accept the three-language claim as accurate while disputing other aggregated claims. Transcript: Dan McClellan And then the, the claim that it's written in three different languages, that's accurate. So you got one. Yeah. I'll give, we'll give you that one. That one's good. Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek, uh, with parts of Ezra and Daniel and then a few scattered verses elsewhere written in Aramaic. The overwhelming majority of the Hebrew Bible written in Hebrew and then the New Testament written in Greek. ([Time 0:30:10](https://share.snipd.com/snip/67b60e95-2218-410b-967c-1cdfc032cb78)) - **Zero Contradictions Claim Begs The Question** - Claims of 'zero contradictions' ignore how the Bible accumulated texts that respond to and rewrite earlier material. - McClellan points out intentional riffing, redaction, and flat contradictions between Samuel/Kings and Chronicles. Transcript: Dan McClellan It's an accumulating anthology. It's not like they just all wrote their books independently and brought them together and were like, what? Jackpot? Yeah, exactly. That's not how it went down. They were intentionally riffing off of responding to quoting. And when it comes to the gospels you know they were bar they were using the other gospels as sources everybody used whatever was was had already been published as a source well and you Dan Beecher Know you look at the more ancient texts you look at the the the texts that come to us from the hebrew bible and they were changing each other as they went along Like, you know, somebody might Have written something new, and for all we know, they went back and changed the older book to line up with the new thing or whatever. Like, they had the ability to do that. It's not like there were printing presses about. There were very few copies of these things. Dan McClellan And you can compare the books of Samuel and Kings to the books of Chronicles and see they're telling the same stories, but in many cases they're flatly contradicting each other. They're changing them significantly. And so when people say there are zero contradictions, they can't support that. Dan Beecher But that's a claim. Dan McClellan That's not a fact. That's not a datum. You can't point to that and go, see no contradictions. That's nonsensical. ([Time 0:31:25](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3849295c-d8b0-4ca0-b4a2-9f515f3f918b)) - **Ten Commandments Presume Ownership And Slavery** - The Ten Commandments presuppose private property and even slave ownership in passages rarely highlighted in modern displays. - McClellan emphasizes the economic clauses protect property but also often accomodate slavery. Transcript: Dan McClellan Go ahead. Which is problematic. He focuses on the shall not steal. The idea seems to be that if you have personal property, that's capitalism and cannot be socialism, which again is drawing the line well outside of where it belongs when it it comes to The relationship of socialism to capitalism. But the Ten Commandments also twice, if I recall correctly, refer favorably to slaves that you own as well. Dan Beecher They don't usually print that part. When you see a Ten Commandments in a school room in Texas, it's not going to say that. Yeah, you've got dot, dot, dot. Dan McClellan Well, what was there? Slaves were there. That's what the ellipses are occluding, is the fact that the Ten Commandments presuppose that you own slaves. And so where's that in this economy that Driscoll is constructing from the Ten Commandments? Well, it's not there because we decided that was bad. We overruled that. And most of the Ten Commandments that have anything to do with economics are about not necessarily protecting your private property, but protecting the weak and the poor from the wealthy And the strong. ([Time 0:52:32](https://share.snipd.com/snip/2db9f4a3-0ae5-4384-892c-ab7f9e8d8799)) - **Jubilee Laws Respond To Debt And Land Concentration** - Laws like gleanings and the Jubilee in Deuteronomy/Leviticus address land consolidation and debt relief as responses to growing inequality. - McClellan notes these were scribal attempts to legislate protections though there's little evidence they were enforced. Transcript: Dan McClellan Yeah. And in response to this, the fact that suddenly this command economy was leading to a lot more income inequality and it. I get all wealth being concentrated in cities, you had other folks coming out and you had the prophets who were saying, all of this is incredibly wicked and God hates you. And then you had people who were responsible for particularly the book of Deuteronomy, which is coming in the late 7th. It's probably starting up in the late 7th century BCE. So about a century after all this is getting really, really bad, it trickles down to the scribal class. And they're like, okay, well, we're going to write laws that ease this, that make up for what's going on here. And that's why you have, oh, you got to leave the gleanings for the poor. Oh, you've got to, uh, in the seventh year, they go free. ([Time 0:56:48](https://share.snipd.com/snip/8443bc59-1dca-47f1-be17-d5e55cbc88b7)) - **Acts Portrays Explicit Early Christian Communalism** - Acts 4 describes an early Christian communalism where believers pooled possessions and distributed to need. - The hosts note Ananias and Sapphira were punished after deceiving the community about their contributions. Transcript: Dan McClellan Driscoll's supposed to like that guy a lot. Yeah. And supposed to listen to him saying multiple times, sell everything you have, give it to the poor. Right. But also you've got like Acts 4 and 5, which is explicitly communalism, where nobody, everything that they had, and then it was distributed as people had need. Right. Dan Beecher And what's his name and what's her name were punished for not doing it. Well, not just punished, they died. That's punishment. That counts as punishment. Dan McClellan And people say, oh, well, it's because they lied to the spirit. About what? About whether or not they gave them all their money. Right. And, yeah, if you, you can't read that and be like, oh, well, that doesn't count. ([Time 0:59:55](https://share.snipd.com/snip/aa374087-945e-4b31-b7d1-54ea7976e4ec)) - **Render Unto Caesar Undercuts 'Taxation Is Theft'** - Jesus' 'Render unto Caesar' passage supports paying taxes and recognizes governmental authority over currency. - McClellan argues the story implies civic obligations rather than a blanket theological claim that taxation is theft. Transcript: Dan Beecher What is he referring to in that moment when he says that? Other than taxation, it seems like it's kind of the thing. You're supposed to pay your taxes. Dan McClellan Which undermines the whole everything belongs to God. Right. When Jesus says whose face and inscription is on it, oh, Caesar's. Okay, give that to Caesar. Render unto God what is God's. And Mark's saying, oh, well, turns out everything is God's, even Caesar's stuff. ([Time 1:03:24](https://share.snipd.com/snip/4fcf16fe-edb2-45fa-8bc6-b356019e3cb8)) - **Government Action Is Necessary To Care For The Poor** - Relying only on voluntary charity can't meet systemic needs; the hosts argue government action is necessary to adequately care for the poor. - They call Driscoll's insistence on individual voluntarism an evasion that protects wealth holders. Transcript: Dan Beecher I mean, what he's doing is trying to leverage his Christianity so that none of his parishioners notice that he's being gross about his wealth. Like he's like, he's amassing as much wealth as he can and doesn't want to give it away. His whole position is about being, you know, being protected by the law, but not bound by the law, but he wants others to be bound by the law and not protected by the law. And that just seems, it seems as backwards as it could possibly be. Dan McClellan Yeah, it is insincere. It is hypocritical. It is fundamentally selfish. And, you know, the love of money is the root of all evil. Wait, where does it say that? Oh gosh, it's somewhere, I don't know. Dan Beecher I feel like that was, I think it was A.A. Milne? Dan McClellan I think that was, it was a headline. I read a headline one time that said something like that. Yeah. And, you know, if there's anybody who loves money, it's Mark Driscoll. Yeah. So. No, look, hey, I'm not opposed to generational wealth. Dan Beecher I would love to get some. Dan McClellan I think we should make it available to everybody without trying to mitigate other people's access to it just because we think that that makes it easier for us to get it. Right. Dan Beecher And if you actually believe that the poor, the needy, the underserved should be well taken care of the way it seems like a Christian should. Yeah, like you point out, Dan, government's the only thing that can do that. It's literally the only way that can happen. ([Time 1:05:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/47cd4467-9b9f-465d-b2a5-621e76ea91f7))