admin asked Staff ago Perhaps you have an explanation for the contradiction in I Kings 15:2-10, which reads:
[Abijam] reigned three years in Jerusalem; his mother’s name was Maacah, daughter of Abishalom…Abijam slept with his fathers; he was buried in the City of David, and his son Asa succeeded him as king…He reigned forty-one years in Jerusalem; his mother’s name was Maacah, daughter of Abishalom.”
How is it that the names of the mothers of both Abijam and his son Asa is Maacah the daughter of Abishalom? Is this a Biblical Oedipus story?
Another contradiction in the Torah: This week we read the portion of Shelach. In the portion of Beshalach it is said that Joshua destroyed the Amalekite nation through his teacher’s power
In this portion, after the incident of the spies, it is written:
[verse 25] Now the Amalekites and the Caananites occupy the valleys. Start out, then, tomorrow and march into the wilderness by way of the Sea of Reeds.
[verse 45] And the Amalekites and the Canaanites who dwelt in that hill country came down and dealt them a shattering blow at Hormah.
A. How were the Amalekites reborn after they were destroyed?
B. Where did they dwell, the valleys or the hills?
Aaron
jsadmin Staff answered 22 years ago
Dear Aaron,
An explanation of the existing contradictions in the Holy Writ is relevant to theologians who fully believe that the Holy Writ issued from a single source –G-d. There should be no contradictions in the Scriptures according to this view, for two reasons:
A. The whole Holy Writ is a collection of books which complete each other and express the word of G-d.
B. The Holy Writ was not written by people who can err, make mistakes, and contradict themselves.
But one who does not believe that the hand of G-d is manifest in the Holy Writ, that it is the work of flesh and blood, knows that there are many contradictions, errors, and needless repetitions on the Holy Writ and that this is natural and normal, for this is the way of man.
Note that religious people treat the Holy Writ as a unified and true factual reality, and just like researchers and scientists who see, in nature, two opposite actions, will try with all their skill and intellectual ability to reconcile them.
Thus do theologians try, with all their might and intellectual skill, to settle the contradictions in the Holy Writ. This has produced both reasonable interpretations and questionable ones.
As to your question of how it is possible that Maacah the daughter of Abishalom was the mother of Abijam (In Chronicles his name is Abijah) and also the mother of Asa, his son. This is the theologians’ answer: Maacah the daughter of Abishalom is the grandmother of Asa, and the Scriptures call her his “mother” because the Scriptures sometimes call a grandmother a mother (Radak on I Kings 15:10).
Incidentally, in Chronicles it is written that Abijah’s mother was Micaiah the daughter of Uriel: “He reigned three years in Jerusalem; his mother’s name was Micaiah daughter of Uriel” (II Chronicles 13:2).
Theologians explained that she had two names (Radak). In the portion of Miketz we brought examples of our rabbis’ way of turning different people into a single person.
I didn’t understand the second contradiction since it is never said that Amalek was completely destroyed. Moreover, the next verse notes G-d’s promise to destroy Amalek in the future, meaning that they were not utterly annihilated.
Sincerely,
Daat Emet