Inerrant Lie #33

Another lie from "God's ineffable, inerrant word":

When the children of Israel, at the request of Cyrus king of Persia, returned to Jerusalem from Babylon to rebuild the 'temple to the name of the LORD' which has always been referred to as 'Solomon's temple,' they 'scrupulously' inventoried all that went in the 'wagon train.' This accounting was recorded by "Ezra, the priest, the scribe [Ezra 7:11a & b]," in chapter 2 of the book by his name. Not only were the people 'dutifully' numbered and recorded: the religious artifacts returned from the temple at Babylon were also so inventoried.

This inventory was later copied by "Nehemiah, the Tirshatha [Nehemiah 10:1b & c]," in the book bearing his name. The number of discrepancies in these two ostensibly identical inventories is too large to mention one- by- one. My 'nose' first twitched on the scent of herring as I was reading Nehemiah, and noticed the absence of the infamous number "six hundred sixty and six," therein.

In Ezra, we read the following: "The children of Adonikam, six hundred sixty and six [Ezra 2:13]." This is easily memorable because of the much- feared- and- hated number. However, in Nehemiah's copy of this same inventory, we read: "The children of Adonikam, six hundred threescore and seven [Nehemiah 7:18]." There is an obvious discrepancy, here, of one. In all, I count no fewer than twenty such discrepancies between these two accountings.

The 'bottom line' of Ezra's tally reads: "The whole congregation together was forty and two thousand three hundred and threescore, Beside their servants and their maids, of whom there were seven thousand three hundred thirty and seven: and there were among them two hundred singing men and singing women [Ezra 2:64 & 65]." In- and- of itself, this tally is faulty. If you add all numbers given in the inventory: the sum comes to 27,829. This leaves a difference of 14,531 persons between the inventory and it's summation. These are uncounted people who are nonetheless tallied.

Nehemiah's inventory and tally are presumably copied from Ezra's-- though some years later: "in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king [Nehemiah 2:1b]," at the earliest. As I've said, Nehemiah's inventory-- as recorded in Nehemiah 7-- differs from Ezra's in no fewer than twenty particulars; though it is presumably a direct copy of the same.

The tally recorded by Nehemiah states the following: "The whole congregation together was forty and two thousand three hundred and threescore, Beside their manservants and their maidservants, of whom there were seven thousand three hundred thirty and seven: and they had two hundred forty and five singing men and singing women [Nehemiah 7:66 & 67]." Compared with Ezra's tally: this is exactly the same in number-- except for the addition of forty- five 'singing men and women.'

The sum of all numbers given in Nehemiah's inventory is 30,101. This leaves a difference of 12,259 persons unaccounted- for in his summation; and is 2,272 more than the sum of Ezra's inventory. Again: these are uncounted people who have been nonetheless tallied.

I suppose the question all these discrepancies in such 'meticulous' accountings begs is: Do these differences reflect the human- trafficking of Jews? or do they rather reflect the Jewish 'passion' for human 'sacrifice?' or both? I smell the 'first love' of wolves-- putrefaction-- here, in any case.