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WHY KENT HOVIND HAS POOR KNOWLEDGE OF THE BIBLE

By Rook Hawkins

“We can now say with considerable confidence that
the Bible is not a history of anyone’s past.” – Thomas L. Thompson[1]

Some of you know (and if you don’t know, please look into it immediately) of the recent problems with Creation Science Evangelism (CSE), specifically that relating to the Youtube videos that have been pulled down and removed due to false copyright submissions based sent to Youtube by the Hovind family or (business?) whatever CSE is. Not only is the concept of creation flawed scientifically, but also from a historical and cultural perspective, the creation account in Genesis could not have happened.

I’ve decided to weigh in on this issue, mainly because I know so many Christians are ignorant of the problems in Genesis, and what scholarship now concludes on the narrative itself. There will be some lengthy discussion of the subject of the Old Testament in general in my upcoming book, however it was necessary to take some time from my book to complete this specific refutation of Hovind’s ministries and some of the poor arguments they use to try to prove the validity of the Genesis account.

I am going to attack this from a few fronts, so before I start let me explain my methods. The first front will be to discuss the internal problems of the Genesis creation account, and digress a little as to why there are problems and contradictions between especially that of Genesis chapter 1 and chapter 2. Kent claims the bible is inerrant and perfect. He as stated to his son, “The wind changes often, God's word never does.”[2] No doubt Kent has an intimate knowledge of 2 Timothy 3:16, which claims that the Bible is inspired by God.

This is a problem right from the get go, as not only does the Bible contain errors, but specifically it is known throughout modern scholarship that the reason why this is so, is because different people wrote the different books, under different socio-cultural periods in history, in different locations and with different influences. This is the second front I’ll be attacking. As knowing how and in what way we have the Old Testament today is important, including going over the various theories among modern scholars as well as some of the influences on the Genesis accounts.

Finally, the third front is how Hovind specifically dodges key points and ignores a vast amount of other points necessary to provide a case against the problems listed above, including censorship and ignorance on the part of not only himself and his family, but also his constituents. These problems listed here are not going to idly go away simply because Hovind wishes they would, nor will they be left behind by the many skeptics and atheists and freethinkers who seriously seek to gain knowledge and understanding, where Hovind and his ilk have done nothing but stamp out ones ability to seek truth.

That being said, here we shall begin.

1.1 Contradictions in Genesis: The Abridged Version

Kent has a series of contradictions listed on his website that he feels his friend has supposedly answered. He lists them in his Articles section of the CSE website, and of the thousands of contradictions one could utilize, he only seems to answer a small few. And even those he doesn’t seem to answer, but rather respond to. (And there is a difference)

I’m not going to spend all my time debunking every one, because I already have, as well as others.[3] Instead, I will focus on one of the most obvious contradictions, even in light of Kent saying “There are no contradictions.”[4] Also, as stated earlier, a lot of this information will be covered in my book, and retyping it to demolish a dishonest tart like Hovind is not high on my priority list. Rather, if the Bible is perfect as Kent claims, there should not be one error in the Bible. If we find one error, contradiction or fallacy, then the Bible is not perfect. Case closed.

The most prominent contradiction in the first few pages of Genesis is the problem with which came first. No, not the chicken or the egg! (By the way, a Creationist says the chicken came first, somebody who accepts evolution would say the proto-egg came before the Chicken) I am referring to man or beasts. Genesis 1:24-25 has animals being made first.

“There was evening and there was morning, a fifth day. Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth after their kind”; and it was so. God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good. Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (Gen. 1:23-27)

It should be clear from this passage that the events happened in this manner: The fifth day ended. The sixth day starts, God creates animals. Then God specifically says “and let them rule over the fish of the sea and…the birds of the sky and…the cattle…ect…” which should be clear that God created man AFTER he created all of these beasts. It is pretty obvious just via reading. So why then does Gen. 2:19 state that the opposite happened? Specifically, that animals were made after man?

“Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.” Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him.” (Gen. 2:15-20)

Now the Christian (and Hovind’s) response to this is thus, “Genesis 2:19 is describing only the animals created in the Garden, after man. The purpose of this second batch of animals being created was so that Adam could name them and select a wife.” But a quick look at the verses exposes Hovind’s poor thinking abilities and his dishonesty. First the claim that this is a second batch of animals is incredulous. Nowhere in the chapter does this appear, and seems to have just been made up by Hovind on a whim. Unfortunately, this isn’t how critical study is done. One can’t simply insert whatever they want into the text when they don’t like what it says initially. That is called deceit, and the Bible seems to be pretty certain where deceitful people are going.[5] It is written in 2 Peter 1:20 that “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.”

Perhaps Kent needs to brush up on his reading?

Further, the passage before the animals are created God specifically says man is alone. (Greek: monos)[6] It didn’t say that man was feeling lonely. (Greek: duseremos; ekpatios; oiophron) Why would God need to recreate animals for Adam? Didn’t he already have the animals there to choose from? (According to Hovind, yes…) It seems redundant and unnecessary, it doesn’t fit the context (which seems to following a very specific set of events). And this seems to be the only part of Genesis that has this sort of problem. No where else do we see this sort of paraphrasing of an earlier chapter in the way we see it here.

It also says God formed every beast of the field and bird of the sky. Every. (Greek: pante) It doesn’t say “God created other beasts of the field” (Greek: allos) or “created distinguished beasts of the field” (Greek: diadelos). It specifically says “every,” which makes a case for an additional group of beasts to be made impossible to coincide with the text itself.

God then brought the beasts before man. So obviously man had to be around in order to name them, right? So the context clearly confirms that chapter 2 of Genesis has man coming before animals, and chapter 1 has man coming after animals, and God can’t seem to make up his mind. So either God has planted a contradiction in his holy book, or there is another more practical reason why this contradiction exists. This is where we get into the next part. (I sense the segue coming.)

(More Coming)
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Endnotes:

[1] Thomas L. Thompson, The Mythic Past (1999), p. xv

[2] Article on the CSE Website, Created and Made, Kent Hovind (http://www.drdino.com/articles.php?spec=45)

[3] Dennis McKinsey, The Encyclopedia of Biblical Errancy; Rook Hawkins, http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/rook_hawkins/biblical_errancy/47

[4] Hovind Article, Contradictions in the Bible? (01) (http://www.drdino.com/articles.php?spec=88)

[5] St. Augustine defined lying as consisting “in speaking a falsehood with the intention of deceiving." (De Mendacio 4, 5: PL 40, 491) Indeed, the Bible seems to denounce lying as the work of Satan, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it." (John 4:88) It also states very strongly in the eighth commandment that it IS a sin. Jesus states “Defraud not!” (Matt. 19:16-18; Mark 10:17-19; Luke 18:18-22) as one of his additional commandments (which incidentally he breaks his own laws by adding to the law after he said nobody should in Matthew 5:17-21) A lie, no matter it's intentions, are a direct act of dishonesty, and according to your Bible, it is against the law of God. "If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth." (1 John 1:6) And God doesn’t like it one bit, Kent. Didn’t you know? "Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord; but they who deal truly are His delight." (Prov. 12:22).

[6] I use the Greek because it is what was commonly used by Christians during the stages of their development as a cult. It is also easier to read and understand then the Hebrew, and it is more precise. It is interesting that translators of the Hebrew into the Greek chose these specific words to replace the Hebrew translations. All my definitions can be checked in the LSJ 9th Edition.