Why does the Bible says God doesn't change his mind ever but the Bible shows that God did change his mind???

Question

Genesis 1:31
God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

Genesis 6:6
The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.

So God was first satisfied with creating man, and called his work "very good," and then he regretted creating man and was grieved.

1 Samuel 2:30-31
30 "Therefore the LORD, the God of Israel, declares: 'I promised that your house and your father's house would minister before me forever.' But now the LORD declares: 'Far be it from me! Those who honor me I will honor, but those who despise me will be disdained.
31 The time is coming when I will cut short your strength and the strength of your father's house, so that there will not be an old man in your family line

So God did change, and he disowned/nullified his previous vow/promise/declaration



Just out of interest, why did the Bible say:

"They fought against Midian, as the LORD commanded Moses, and killed every man........Now kill all the boys [innocent kids]. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. (Numbers 31:7,17-18)"

It says “save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man” therefore it means “save the virgin girls so you can have sex with them”

Answer 1

Christians are squirmy worms, they'll squirm their way out of any argument if not through logic then through illogic... so how can you get anywhere or have any kind of serious debate with them about anything at all regarding belief?
Unreason won't be reasoned with.

Answer 2

You judge their ways of doing things from you vantage point while your society and others drop atomic bombs on people or are ready to do so. So, if you want to judge be assured that the same yardstick shall be applied to you and yours!

Your comments are insincere and offensive. These girls were not sex slaves. The Israelites married them off to have honorable married lives. The fact that these were conquered people, what is that to you? These were enemies that had attacked without provocation! Would you have preferred that they had all been radiated with atomics? So much more humane, right?

Is that what you tell American soldiers? Oh, No, don't shoot back! You might hurt someone! It is very recent history, when in our times Hitler for no good reason eradicated millions of people. If we start poking around in historical archives you have a lot to defend Mr Self-righteous, as do a lot of nations worldwide.

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As far as God's regrets. Perhaps he regretted that these people who had so much potential now needed to be erased. Since only eight were subsequently saved the general term of "grieved that he had made man on the earth" was used.

The fact that it didn't mean that God regretted creating man may be clearly understood from the fact that he saved eight by means of Noah's ark. If he had indeed regretted creating man from that angle, he would have killed every single one remaining. Even today that is an option.

Answer 3

I'm sure the Christians will argue that the change was not in God but in man, in the examples you cite.

And as to the save-the-virgins command, perhaps they were saved for some other reason. Like to become respectable wives, because in those days, having girls from some other tribe for wives was a good way to reduce the inbreeding that caused problems.

I grant you there are contradictions in the Bible, but these are by no means the worst of them. It is possible to speculate on valid responses. If you really want an interesting debate, go looking for those that really do defy logic.

Answer 4

Lol, I'm not the only one to have noticed then!

You could argue that God was learning about Man |(which is my belief), but that would destroy the image that "God is all-knowing and perfect". As if he was so perfect why would he create a race that slaughters its' own not for food but sometimes for the sheer sake of it? That wipes out thousands of its' own kind to try and be superior to others? Where a large chunk of the race does not even accept there could be a God?

Though it is Man that wrote the Bible, but did God not dictate it to them?

BTW, you missed out in Genesis where God floods the world, and then afterwards turns round and sayd "Well I'm not doing THAT again!"

A lot of christians could argue that is is MAN, not GOD that has changed in the time. The issue with that though would be that if God is perfect and made Man in his image, wouldn't we be faultless, selfless beings? Which again counters the imagery conjured up when people think of God.

I'm gonna get a lot of thumbs down for this, but does it matter?

Toodles

Answer 5

Where, please, does the Bible say that God never changes his mind? And where please do we learn that to change one's mind means to "disown," "nullify"? How do you make that leap?

The original language Hebrew word you are loosely paraphrasing as "promise" carries the meaning of utterance, declaration. It does not carry the meaning of promise or vow. Thus it would read "the utterance of the Lord" or "this is what the Lord says." To paraphrase and then condemn God on the basis of your personal paraphrase is questionable, at the very least of it.

As for Numbers, again, you have made the leap from "preserve alive the virgins" to "save them for yourselves so you can have sex with them." And you have set up your own standard by suggesting that the boys put to death were "innocent kids."

You do not want an answer, you want an argument.

Hannah J Paul

Answer 6

well there was the argument he had with lot for a start and moses put him in his place a few times read the whole book he changes a very great deal from the baby killing god in egypt and the genocidal god on noah to the loving god of jesus dont just listen to the parasite in the pulpit read the book

Answer 7

Short answer? Because the men who initially wrote the bible were fools, and didn't think that there would ever be people who held real logic.

Long answer? Look at all the wars and fighting in the world over religion and other insane ideas. People fight over the most ridiculous stuff, and won't step back to ever truly examine what they're fighting over. Those parts of the bible you quoted really ARE in there, and they really DO show contradictions.

Personally, I'm fed up with the bible, and with bible thumpers.

Answer 8

Good Grief when will people ever learn..
GOD IS NOT AN INSTITUTION, HE WAS MADE ONE FOR MAN BY MANKIND!
God is not defined by religious doctrine or text, for these where written by mankind to control the weakness and frailty of men, to instill guilt and remorse in man for any that would think outside the box!
God never asked to become an institution, the religious cultures down through the centuries used him as a means to instill fear in man and abuse its fellow man for all sorts of ideology and beliefs.
God is in everything, he is not confined to a bible that man made to satisfy his need for power over his fellow brethren. God is faith and the path to enlightenment, fulfilment, honesty and love..
I don't need a religion to tell me this..and if you believe what some monk in a sack cloth wrote centuries ago , then you are a fool!

Answer 9

The first one isn't exactly right. The earth was good, the situation changed, man mucked up the earth, therefore God was allowed to be upset.

This is like if you had a beautiful new car, you might think the car was good. But if someone then crashed & wrote off the car, it would no longer be so good.

Answer 10

Most of Bible scholars believe that Bible was written more than 2 person.

It's obvious that those people didn't talk each other or read others.

Therefore, there are a lot of contradiction.
The more read, you will find more ( Of course , you need to be realist first ).
However , it won't stop believer who has strong faith.

God Bless You :)