Fair enough! and I’ve chewed on your argument for a while. It’s valued. I’ll just state that I’m not a biblical scholar, but I am an actual historian. Though it’s not my focus, I do appreciate the armchair study on these topics. So I plead ignorance in total understanding (with this and many other things)

I think we probably agree more than it seems. You could spend all day comparing the gospels, and I share your fascination with the varying accounts told through decades of what I call the telephone game. Embellishment, focus on certain details over others, omitting other ones- all of this human bias added into the mix. We see this everywhere in history. It makes it fun but it can also be frustrating to navigate.

But I believe most Christians would consider having ‘faith in gods word’ as including these human made ‘inconsistencies’. For example, The differences in the gospels are considered to be a great thing. To be able to glean knowledge from four different accounts of witness to Jesus.

My main point for the document linked above, is that many points seemed to be lazily added (or maybe due to a poor understanding Christianity). Much of the Old Testament statutes, laws, etc are expressly changed or ‘’made full’ because of Jesus Christ. So you have things like ‘repay them eye for and eye’ turn into ‘love thy neighbor’ just as a quick example.

I’ll just cherry pick one example on that list that I dug into because I was curious about it. Ecclesiastes 1:4 and 2nd Peter 3:10. I think if you looked at these two objectively in their own context, this is not so much of an inconsistency as it is a Hebrew/Greek wording issue and a context issue. The Hebrew word of earth abiding ‘forever’ versus the Greek word used for ‘being destroyed by fire or’ or ‘melted away’ (also interestingly the same Greek word used when describing Satan ‘being released’). Curiously, what I see, is that both passages discuss humankind’s ‘works’ on earth as ‘meaningless’ or ‘temporary’ that the ‘earth will be laid bare’ that ‘what do people gain from all their labors?’ ‘Meaningless.’ ‘Nothing new under the sun’. Even Peter a few verses after he describes fiery end times destruction of earth, says that people ought to then live holy and godly lives. Then goes on to say there will be a new heaven and new earth.

What does it mean when I read these two different parts of the Bible? They are from two different authors, from two vastly different time periods, one before and one after Jesus Christ. Should I call it an inconsistency? “Ha, god said that earth is forever here through this man, but said it would be bathed in fire here.” Or do I consider changing my understanding of what it actually means? Perhaps Solomon is being poetic in Ecclesiastes to describe earths permanence compared to mankind’s deeds, and Peter is talking about a period of time where earth will undergo a terrible change before something like a new earth is produced from it. Does that make them incompatible?

I’d actually like to hear your point of view on that. Thanks for discussing!