Last month, Mark Woods wrote an article in Christian Today exploring the apparent contradictions between the two accounts of Judas’ death, in Matt 27.3–8 and in Act 1.18. In the first, Judas hangs himself, the priests buy the field, and it is named ‘Field of Blood’ because of the betrayal by Judas. In the second, briefer account, Judas buys the field first, falls to his death there, and it is named ‘Field of Blood’ because of Judas’ death. These differing accounts have recently become a focus for attention on whether the NT is reliable, and no wonder. Biblical scholar Richard Longenecker believes that the difficulty of reconciling these two accounts is ‘often considered the most intractable contradiction in the NT’. Yet this is hardly a new problem; Augustine was aware of the issue, and it is not much different from reconciling other differences within Acts itself, such as the three accounts of Paul’s conversation in chapters 9, 22 and 26.
Mark Woods suggests a way of living with this. Rather than try and reconcile the two accounts artificially, we should accept the ‘blindingly obvious’ point that there are two different, contradictory stories, and that ‘one of them got it right, and the other didn’t.’
I don’t believe for one moment that the Bible is compromised by honesty about the parts where it contradicts itself or where the biblical writers, speaking spiritual truth in the context of erroneous ideas about science and nature, simply got things wrong.
But there is one rather large problem with this. If there really are two stories, and they really cannot be reconciled, the logical conclusion is not that one is right and one is wrong—but that they are both wrong since historical reliability (at least in our understanding of the idea) is not important to the NT writers. And if these two stories are not reliable, what about the rest of Acts? Or the gospels? In particular, what about the ‘contradictions’ between the accounts of Jesus’ healings? Or the whole shape of his ministry (about five months in Mark, three years in John)? Or his trial and crucifixion? Or the resurrection—was there one angel (Mark) or two (Matthew)? Two women or three? The women first to the tomb, or the men? And did they say nothing, or tell the others…? And so on. If these accounts cannot be reconciled, then the most obvious conclusion to draw is not that one of the accounts is accurate and the others are not, but that none of them are. And I don’t think it is then possible to conclude that in matters of faith the Bible is trustworthy, but in the matter of facts it is, well, a little bit hit and miss. The NT documents do not separate faith and facts in this kind of way.
In fact, Matthew and Luke tell us that they are interested in facts, in their different ways. For Matthew, the story about Judas has a particular function in his narrative. It is an odd place for him to include this episode, since it means taking events out of order—jumping ahead to Judas’ death and then jumping back to Jesus’ trial. Luke’s order in Acts is more logical. But Matthew does this because he wants us to spot three things: first, that Judas’ fate was a fulfilment of Jesus’ words in chapter 26; second, to see the contrast with Peter, and the difference between Peter’s repentance and Judas’ ‘remorse’; and thirdly that all this was a ‘fulfilment’ of the OT Scriptures. So he follows up the story of Judas with a quotation from Jeremiah. Except that the quotation incorporates elements from Zechariah as well, and doesn’t actually fit the story very well! As with Matthew’s other examples of ‘fulfilment’ (particular in the birth narratives), the fit looks rather forced. If Matthew was making the narrative up, then he could have done a much better job—and the logical conclusion from this is that he is making the ‘fulfilment’ fit the facts, rather than the other way around. The facts do matter.
Luke, in his own way, is also making this point. Having noted that others have offered their own versions, he sets out to provide his own account from eye-witness research so that his readers might be confident in what they have heard (Luke 1.1–4). In this aside about Judas (which most English versions put in brackets), he includes a puzzling little phrase (me oun) which suggests that he is filling out some detail for a story that his readers might have heard elsewhere. It looks very much like he wants to fill in some facts!
To see what is going on here, let me give you an illustration from my own experience. I was recently rather late getting to the station for a train, was very hot and bothered as I jumped on and found my seat. There was no refreshment service on the train, but the person opposite me was very kind and offered me his bottle of water. When I opened my Bible for the reading of the day I found this: ‘Truly I tell you, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to the Messiah will certainly be rewarded’ (Mark 9.41). Moral of the story? God speaks through Scripture into our situations.
Or another story. I usually cycle to the train station, but on one occasion hadn’t done so for several weeks. The night before I thought to myself ‘You really ought to check the bike.’ But I couldn’t be bothered and left it till the morning. When I got the bike out, disaster—it had a flat tyre! I pumped it up, cycled like the wind, and arrived at the station as the train pulled in! Moral of the story? Prepare ahead of time—though even if you don’t, God will provide a way.
In fact, those are two stories about the same event—but you’d be hard-pressed to tie them together, not least because the two trains mentioned were not the same, but connecting trains, and the full story wouldn’t quite agree with either. So the question might arise: what was the true story of my journey that morning? When we tell stories, we edit them and condense detail in order to draw out a particular point, and this is the way that the gospel writers use their material—often in an even more condensed way, since they use many fewer words than we would today.
This points to something essential about the nature of Scripture. To talk of Scripture as ‘inerrant’ might fit if it were just a rule book, or a car maintenance manual—but it is neither, and to that extent I agree with Mark’s view. In his Models for Scripture, John Goldingay points out the different ways that Scripture talks of itself. One of these is as ‘witnessing tradition’—a testimony to what happened passed down faithfully to others. As a ‘witness’, the accounts of what happened have been edited, to draw out a point—the main one being that in Jesus, God has come and redeemed the world. But testimony always have to have a facticity about it; it has to offer a coherent account if it is to be taken seriously as a reliable witness. This comes back to something Mark Woods says early on in his reflection: ‘It’s true that logically, there’s nothing impossible about this way of reconciling two stories.’ And for me, it is vital that this is possible, even if it not the first thing that I want to do with these texts.
If they cannot be reconciled—if they are not at some level reliable accounts of what happened—then they are not a credible witness. And if they are not, then they cannot tell me the truth about Jesus Christ.
A version of this article was published in Christian Today on 3rd October 2015
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Ian, why does your faith need this all-or-nothing approach? How did it come about?
The Bible can be unreliable in some aspects, and still give a credible foundation for faith, just as a verdict can rest on imperfect testimony. And, of course, the Bible speaks in many voices, some more reliable than others.
When I posted this, I felt it had ‘James Byron’ written all over it!
This approach comes from being consistent and thinking the issue through. If Luke and Matthew contradict each other, the most obvious conclusion is that we cannot trust either account. And if we cannot trust them, how do we know that anything in the NT happened the way it is reported?
I think the most consistent view on this is that of non-believers, who I think correctly draw that conclusion.
Do point out where the line of reasoning I set out doesn’t work. If the Bible speaks with many voices, some more reliable than others, how do you discern the reliable ones? In relation to ethics, it is fine to deploy one’s own moral judgement. But how do you do that in relation to events in history?
Biblical scholars have various methods to test reliability — criterion of embarrassment, multiple independent attestation, etc — but that’s beside the wider point: however difficult it is to assess a text’s accuracy, it’s no reason to jump to believing that God made it reliable.
Since biblical reliability’s a faith position, why not instead have faith that the core of the Christian story is true, while allowing for unreliability in details like Judas’ death?
So, on what basis is even the core of the Christian story held to be reliable? And what bits of the gospel constitute the core of the Christian story?
For instance, let’s put the scripture aside for a moment and ask: ‘on what basis did God make the apostles’ testimony about any aspect of Jesus’ earthly ministry reliable for those who were not His eye-witnesses?’
It would be, at least, intellectually honest for those who doubt the authority of scripture to be equally dubious regarding the authority of the apostles.
The issue of reliability is the same, whether we consider Jesus’ message as conveyed through scripture, or as transmitted by group of apostles, who claim that God chose Him and that He, in turn, chose them.
So, what is the unmediated truth of the gospel that is deemed by the rationalists who post here to be reliable? Is Jesus’ eternal personal involvement essential to achieving its purpose?
David: to ask a question about the authority of scripture just doesn’t make sense to me. What on earth does that really mean? It’s like asking if Shakespeare has authority. Or does Keats have authroity. Or does the Times leader have authority. The bible is a collection of all of these sorts of writing. The bible has a unique place as one of our title deeds, and so has some authority for that reason alone, but I suspect you mean is it true? My answer is as in a post below. It bears witness to the truth. And that’s a different thing.
Ditto the apostles – because we only know the apostles through scripture.
We know Jesus through four things: scripture, the church, human reason, and human experience. What do you mean by unmediated?
Andrew,
The question was rhetorical.
You’ve employed the metaphor of a title deed, while resisting its implication: how would you distinguish a genuine title deed from a fraudulent one?
So, what is it about scripture, the church, human reasoning, or human experience that reassures you that they are witnesses to objective truth?
Hi David
Great question about how do you trust whether a title deed is genuine. I think the trust comes from using the thing and seeing if it rings true – and judging it against other things like reason and experience. The title deed of a house is only true until someone else comes along and shows they have a claim on the title as well……
And you ask: what is it about scripture, the church, human reasoning, or human experience that reassures you that they are witnesses to objective truth? Well what else is there to use? I think I said that they are witnesses to truth – and you have inserted the word objective. I don’t find that word necessary and wonder what on earth you mean by it.
And still wondering what you mean by unmediated truth…..
Oh and as a further thought about title deeds….if the Church is the holder of the title deeds, and the church isn’t very trustworthy, or seems to be so far removed from the experiences of people, then it isn’t surprising that people begin to lose truth in the title deeds is it?
Hi Andrew,
You responded rhetorically to my question that asked what is it that reassured you about the reliability of scripture, the church, human reasoning, or human experience with ‘Well, what else is there to use?’
The absence of viable alternatives to these doesn’t magically imbue them or your particular emphases in using them with any greater reliability.
‘The title deed of a house is only true until someone else comes along and shows they have a claim on the title as well’. Indeed, there are plenty of religions, including Islam and Judaism, all waving title deeds to what purports to be the same house, but all with thoroughly different wording and owner of the freehold.
So, what was it/is it that makes Christian’s title deed and witness to truth any more valid than, say, the Muslim’s? Is it simply because they declare Jesus to be owner of eternity’s freehold?
‘I think the trust comes from using the thing and seeing if it rings true – and judging it against other things like reason and experience.’
Yep, and a devout Jew or Muslim would all lay claim to doing exactly the same, only to reach a substantially different conclusion. This is why I qualified ‘truth’ with the word ‘objective’.
It’s all very well to make pithy statements, like: ‘Truth possesses people, who then witness to the truth.’ As everyone does, you use your discretion to apply the norms and boundaries of your own reasoning and experience to the record.
The crux of the issue is what happens when scripture describes God as expecting or prohibiting something that disagrees with the norms and boundaries of your existing framework of moral reasoning and experience (and that of your reference group on moral issues).
According to that frame of reference, on such a point, is the scripture implausible in declaring that God would expect or prohibit such a thing and, therefore, untrue? When I speak about ‘authority’, I am specifically referring to this issue of how the church assigns moral precedence to scripture, the church, human reason and experience.
Hi David
My answer ‘well what else is there?’ was not rhetorical. It is a very genuine question to you: What else is there?
When you talk about scripture as being plausible or implausible in declaring what God would expect or prohibit then I really only have one answer: God expects love, and prohibits anything that demonstrates a lack of love. That’s the bottom line. Where scritpure seems confused about that, then that scripture isnt terrible plausible and I’d be more inclined to trust human reason and experience. Those were the two things that the people who wrote the scripture relied upon – why shouldn’t we?
You also ask the great question ‘So, what was it/is it that makes Christian’s title deed and witness to truth any more valid than…..?’ Precisely my point. I was born in Stratford upon Avon. So the chances are that I was going to be Christian. If I’d been born in Calcutta those chances are going to be very different. There is an awful lot of chance involved with religion, wouldn’t you say? What makes it more valid is that it works for me. But the history of our dealings as Christians with other human beings will make the validity questionable for all kinds of people. We haven’t been great at looking after our ‘title’…
And I’m still wondering what you mean by ‘unmediated truth’. Can you help me on that one?
Andrew,
You say: ‘God expects love, and prohibits anything that demonstrates a lack of love. That’s the bottom line. Where scripture seems confused about that, then that scripture isn’t terrible plausible and I’d be more inclined to trust human reason and experience.’
‘Those were the two things that the people who wrote the scripture relied upon – why shouldn’t we?’ Well, you don’t know who wrote the scripture, so you can’t be sure.’
The phrase ‘seems confused’ is telling. Something in scripture that is at odds with your standards of love or reasoning or experience might simply indicate the limitations of the latter and that human foresight in is limited in understanding ultimate outcomes. Or does love impart perfect foresight?
‘What makes it more valid is that it works for me.’ Great, but on that basis, it’s validity begins and ends with you.
So, really, the relative validity is subjective. My point is that any and everything that witnesses to what we call truth is medium of that truth, whether scripture, the church, human reasoning or experience. Each is a lens (or, as St. Paul might say, mirror) by which we may claim to perceive truth. The fact that they might not perfectly convey everything about that truth doesn’t change the reality that we have to make the best of these imperfect witnesses.
We follow Christ, not simply because a book tells us to, but because, at the deepest levels of our consciousness, we believe that we have experienced the sort of beneficial change that is consonant with the Person whom the writers of the Old and New Testaments described as the Anointed One.
A person might indeed grow up in a thoroughly different religious culture, but that doesn’t matter. It’s doers of God’s will and not hearers who are vindicated by God. That is our faith, by which we perceive through a mirror darkly, but then face to face.
Thanks David. I think I’d value clarity on two points.
1. How do you know what is objective truth? How do you judge it?
2. What is unmediated truth?
Hi Andrew,
In response to your queries, I’ll go back to my earlier question: ‘So, what is the unmediated truth of the gospel that is deemed by the rationalists who post here to be reliable?’
It was a rhetorical question because everything of the reliable and unchanging assurances of the gospel is incarnational: the transcendent and divine is at work through earthly means and witnesses and they mediate our understanding of its truth, whether by scripture, the church, human reason or experience.
There is no thoroughly unmediated truth, even if we hope, as the Pharisees and Sadducees did, for Christ to produce an incontrovertible cosmic ‘sign from heaven’.
You said you were more inclined to trust reasoning and experience than scripture where the latter ‘seems confused’ in respect of love. By way of contrast, I would first question my understanding of what love entails for the sovereign Owner of the universe who imparts His power to grant us existence.
My higher aspiration in writing here is to expose my own understanding to the scrutiny of those who differ. None of us may be entirely objective, but this dialogue does challenge our biases far more than engaging with only those who agree.
When we discuss issues here, I hope that we are examining the resilience of our respective underpinning assumptions and extrapolating their logical consequences to determine which are, at least, internally consistent and not self-contradictory.
While internal consistency and lack of apparent self-contradiction are no guarantees of objectivity, they do favour it.
What I find startling is the ease of straining the gnat by demonstrating scripture to be unreliable through the relatively minor differences in the emphases of OT and NT writers, while swallowing the whole camel of accepting human reasoning and experience as far more trustworthy sources of moral guidance about love. Human history would tend to contradict such confidence in them as groundless.
Thank you David. That is a really helpful post and I fully agree that the best reason for posting here is to have one’s views subject to helpful conversation and debate (which is why I don’t appreciate Ian’s, at times, sarcastic approach).
I think we are not so far apart as might have sometimes been inferred and I have found this last comment of yours extremely valuable. Thank you.
Have just seen this. I agree with James Byron above. I agree also with your statement immediately above, Ian, that if A does not agree with B, this makes both “unreliable “, but this is not the same thing at all as saying, as you do in the blog, that they are both “wrong”. If A does not agree with B, A could be right, B could be right, both could be wrong, or there could be elements of truth in both accounts but, over time, aspects of the story telling have become corrupted in transmission. I believe the last option is, very generally speaking, the most likely. I don’t believe that these minor differences make the Bible less credible. If anything, they make it more credible.
Excellent piece as ever – thanks, Ian. How would you respond to the argument that the broad sweep of the Bible narrative is consistent, providing a history which is essentially accurate, and that it only contradicts itself in inessentials? Eg if John and the Synoptics have the crucifixion at different points in the Passover, that’s just interesting, but if one of them said that Jesus wasn’t crucified at all, that would be alarming.
Is one of the problems that Western thinking is derived from a Greek logic e.g. A + B = C (If we know the values for B & C we can work out A) . Whereas I believe those that wrote the Bible were more interested in what the story meant from a human level: so in these examples they both show that Judas’s death is a fulfillment of prophecy and results from his betrayal of Jesus; the fact that they don’t stack up literally isn’t important to the original writers/readers (but to us it possibly is).
To generalise if we assume America has a work ethic, The far east values honour and family, Africa is quite tribal in its politics – we could imagine that someone writing about working on a farm, in each region, would emphasis different things in the day to bring out the culture they were in.
I like this. We are assuming that the Bible should fit our 21st century expectations of what constitutes a ‘reliable’ document. Surely we should check back to what we know of 1st century CE writers. It might illuminate a whole load of stuff which gives us trouble because we’re making inadequate and uninformed assumptions.
The problem with your analogy is that all of the “facts” in your train narratives are complementary, but those in the Matthew and Acts account are not on any obvious reading of the texts. I’m sure one can come up with an imaginative harmony, but the danger is that one may then come across as making the actual text(s) fit a prior definition of scripture, rather than making one’s definition of scripture fit the actual text(s).
Thanks for this Ian. What I’d like to know is whether you pointed out your daily bible reading to the kind water-giver on the train. What an opportunity for evangelism!
There is a statement on the rather ridiculous ‘Stand Firm’ website currently that says:
“It depends on whether you see Scripture as Truth or a book of suggestions. And we have centuries of history to see what happened to those organizations who took the suggestion route. ”
The author, of course, sets up a dichotomy and archetype that are totally wrong. Scripture is neither of those things. Scripture certainly attests to both of those things. It witnesses to the truth. It suggests what might happen if we ignore the truth. But scripture is a library of books with many varied forms of literature. Like any library, there are bound to be contradictions. But like any library, it contains testimony to a priceless truth. No person or book possesses truth. Truth possesses people, who then witness to the truth. That’s what the bible is a record of.
Ian, a psychology question please. About the apparent contradiction between the two accounts of Judas’ death, or any other contradiction or apparent contradiction: my guess is that 95% of us evangelical bible-reading Christians just ignore this. We sail through life, or struggle through life, reading the bible every day, or most days, but we filter out the awkwardnesses. Do you agree with my guess, and if so why do we do it?
Most internet writers who offer a reconciliation of the two accounts focus on the manner of death, and it does seem fairly easy to suppose that after Judas hanged himself, his body was left for a while, long enough for his visceral organs to swell and eventually burst.
But that still leaves the question of the field. Matthew provides the more detailed account, so I follow that, but it does not seem inconceivable that the priests, having paid out the money and having refused to accept it back as a donation to the treasury, did not consider it to be their own and hit upon the idea of buying the field – in which Judas hanged himself – in Judas’s name. After all, the field had to belong to someone. It could not belong to the Temple because it was blood money, and they could hardly buy it jointly in their own names when it was not their money. So Judas ended up the owner of the field. It was called the Field of Blood because it had been bought with blood money – Luke does not contradict this.
Moreover, I can’t see that Judas would have had time before the resurrection to buy the field himself (especially with Sabbaths intervening), and it makes no sense for a man in that remorseful and suicidal state (1) to have bought a field in order to have somewhere to hang himself, and (2) to have waited however long was needed to complete the transaction before hanging himself. Surely these ideas are absurd. The priests might have bought the field from whoever owned it weeks after the crucifixion.
There are two different accounts of Judas’ death, because Matthew & Luke have different models for theologising about Judas, and, to some extent, about Jesus. The texts that result from the theologising have different contents, and are contradictory for that reason, and in that way, because
1) For Matthew, Judas is a new Ahithophel the Shilonite, the excellent but treacherous counsellor of King David who sided with Absalom, gave Absalom excellent advice that Absalom foolishly disregarded, saw that David was going to win, went home, and hanged himself. Jesus, in St Matthew, is the new David, who is going to prevail over death & over His human opponents. So Judas goes & hangs himself.
2) For St Luke, Jesus is also a royal figure, but in a different way.
SLIGHT DIGRESSION that isn’t really: Both Evangelists use Psalm 72 to construct their presentations of Jesus, but they emphasise different parts of the Psalm. St Matthew emphasises the Jewish, Davidic, Kingly, Universal aspects of the Psalm; St Luke emphasises the Jewish, Kingly, Universal aspects, but in a rather different way; as well as having the Davidic connection to the Temple as a theme. The Matthean Jesus exercises dominion over all nations, because “Solomon” in Psalm 72 does; for St Luke, this universal dominion is exercised as “seek[ing] and sav[ing] the lost”, including all descendants of Adam – not of Abraham or of David alone.
So both Evangelists represent Jesus as King, as Davidic King, as Universal Davidic King; but they treat this shared idea in different ways.
We have seen that for Matthew, the new King David has a new Ahithophel. Judas functions, for each Evangelist, in the way he does, because Jesus functions in the way He does. The way in which Judas is represented, is dependent on how Jesus is represented.
And in Luke, Judas is, almost certainly, represented as a Nadin/Nadab figure. That is, as the treacherous nephew of the wise counsellor Ahikar, who in the Ahikar story is a counsellor of King Sennacherib. In the story, which is the frame-story for a collection of wisdom sayings, Ahikar is falsely accused by his nephew, and is imprisoned. Later, he is vindicated, and set free, & restored to favour. His nephew Nadin is punished by being shackled, and by having to listen to Ahikar spout endless wisdom sayings. Finally, whether from boredom or some other cause, Nadin bursts in the middle, his entrails spill out, and he dies. Just as Judas Iscariot does later on.
Jesus is represented as a king, and as a wisdom figure: two traits present, in different characters, in the Ahikar story. So some influence from the Ahikar story upon Luke’s account of Judas’ death seems likely. Especially in view of a third story, about the death of Antiochus IV (175-164 BC) which St Luke could have found in 2 Maccabees 9.5-12:
“5 And so the all-seeing Lord, the God of Israel, struck him with an unseen but incurable blow. Hardly had he spoken those words when he was seized with excruciating pains in his bowels and acute internal torment— 6 an entirely suitable punishment for one who had inflicted many barbarous torments on the bowels of others. 7 Nevertheless, he did not in the least diminish his insolent behavior. More arrogant than ever and breathing fire in his rage against the Jews, he gave orders to drive even faster. As a result, he was hurled from the lurching chariot, and the fall was so violent that every part of his body was racked with pain.
8 Thus he who only a short time before had in his superhuman arrogance believed that he could command the waves of the sea, and who imagined that he could weigh high mountains on a scale, was thrown down to the ground and had to be carried in a litter, clearly manifesting to all the power of God. 9 The body of this ungodly man swarmed with worms, and while he was still alive suffering agonizing torments, his flesh rotted away, so that the entire army was sickened by the stench of his decay. 10 Only a short time before, he had thought that he could touch the stars of heaven. Now no one could even bring himself to transport the man because of his intolerable stench.
11 Ultimately, broken in spirit, he began to lose his excessive arrogance and to come to his senses under the scourge of God, for he was racked with incessant pain. 12 When he no longer could endure his own stench, he exclaimed: “It is right to be subject to God. Mere mortals should never believe that they are equal to God”.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Maccabees%209%3A5-12&version=NCB
What Judas & Antiochus have in common, is that they are human opponents of God; as was Sennacherib, in the OT accounts of his siege of Jerusalem. The first two die disgusting deaths, all die unpleasantly. Which may help to explain why Luke seems to have used a story in which Sennacherib plays a part. Another opponent of God in the OT is Nebuchadnezzar, who in the Book of Judith sends his general Holophernes, who attacks “Bethulia”.
And one of the themes of the Book of Acts, is the worsting of human opponents of the Gospel. Given what happens to him & why, it seems likely that Luke in Acts presents Judas as the first of these opponent-figures, with the high priests, Ananias & Sapphira, Simon Magus, the Sanhedrin, Saul the persecutor, Herod, Elymas, etc., being others. The human opponent of God is perhaps most familiar as “The Antichrist” who in Rev 13 is the First Beast. The Lucan human opponents of God are in some sense historical; the Johannine First Beast is, for whatever reasons, an apocalyptic figure, not a figure from history.
As to whether it matters that the NT contradicts itself:
We see contradictions, to be sure; but is that how the NT authors would have conceptualised the matter, if, somehow, they could have had 27-book New Testament available to them ? Contradictions are the result of comparison; if there are no alternatives available for comparison with that available to oneself, then there are no contradictions. To us, St Matthew & St Luke give contradictory accounts of the death of Judas; but what info & ideas on the subject did each of them have, & how come ?
It is perhaps just as well to point out that the (Calvinist ?) notion that “what the Bible says, God says”, does not fit the NT very well, because differences voices & views are represented. God cannot, in one and the same manner, be behind both speeches in the mouth of satan, and also, answers to those speeches put in the mouth of Jesus. Yet all these speeches are found in the Gospels. Not everything in the Bible can be read as a faithful or even a final transcript of the Mind of God; the Bible, and the NT specifically, are not that kind of writing. The Koran, both in Sunni theology, and in its canonical presentation, comes far closer to being that kind of writing, because most of it is presented as a Divine monologue for Mohammed to transmit to others. Muslim apologetic deprecates the Bible; and the prominence in the Bible of what human beings do, and think, and say, is a main reason for that.
Contradictions, or the perception of them, also depends on interpretation: if David who killed Goliath, and Elhanan who killed Goliath, are the same individual – maybe “David” was Elhanan’s throne-name – then both accounts of who killed Goliath can be correct (that they might both be incorrect, tends not to be suggested by those who agonise about such details).
Since the OT books contain many (what are often called) contradictions, maybe the NT authors were as unconcerned about such things as (some at least) of the OT authors seem to have been. Modern Fundamentalists might get into a lather about who killed Goliath, or about how Judas Iscariot died; but would the ancient authors & hearers and readers have done so ? And should Christians ? No matter whose hand killed him, Goliath is dead; and all the accounts of his death, connect the event to David. No matter how exactly he may have died, Judas Iscariot ends up dead, and his death is related to the blood money he took, and to the Betrayal of Jesus. Certain details remain constant in the tradition; others float, and are changeable, as happens in myths & legends. And the theological ideas in the different accounts are sufficiently alike for the different accounts to be closely connected. The Judas whose death is narrated, is clearly Iscariot, & not one of the other Judases in Christian or Biblical tradition. So if anyone wants to argue that (say) the death of Judas Maccabaeus is being narrated, that case can be made; but whether it would be persuasive or well-founded is another matter.
ISTM that the Biblical authors are far more concerned with their theological message, than with getting every last detail of “what happened” perfectly correct or in perfect agreement. Fundamentalism is so keen on trying to vindicate the exceptionless detailed perfection of the Bible, and is so busy trying to show (say) that both accounts of the death of Judas are in perfect and totally accurate harmony, that it misses the (vastly more important & interesting) significance of the different Biblical passages. No harmonisation should be attempted, because to do that, would be to pervert and falsify what the texts say. The texts do not say what Fundamentalism wants them to say. They say what they say, because that is what the best available evidence of the transmission of the texts has them saying.
Maybe it was more important for the Jews and Christians who assembled & edited the texts – so that they exist in their current forms – to put as much of their tradition together in written form, even if parts of it were incompatible, than to iron out all the inconsistencies. If there was an attempt to iron out all consistencies in the texts, it was ineffective; so I for one am going to assume that no such task was undertaken.
A P.S. on the death of Judas: there is another suicide worth looking at: that of Razis:
37 A man named Razis, one of the elders of Jerusalem, was denounced to Nicanor. He deeply loved his compatriots and was highly esteemed by them, and he was known as the father of the Jews because of his loyalty. 38 In the early days of the revolt, he had been convicted of practicing Judaism and had risked unhesitatingly both life and limb in that cause. 39 Nicanor, in his determination to demonstrate his contempt for the Jews, sent more than five hundred soldiers to arrest him, 40 for he thought that by such an action he would deliver a severe blow to the Jews. 41 When the troops were on the point of capturing the tower and were forcing open the outer gate, they called for fire to burn down the doors. Razis, finding himself surrounded on all sides, turned his sword on himself, 42 preferring to die nobly rather than fall into the hands of evil men and suffer outrages unworthy of his noble birth.
43 However, in the heat of the struggle he failed to hit his mark exactly. So while the troops rushed in through the doors, he quickly ran up to the top of the wall and courageously threw himself down into the crowd. 44 They quickly separated, and a space opened, and he plunged into the midst of the empty area they had vacated. 45 Still breathing and inflamed with anger, he picked himself up and ran through the crowd, even though blood was gushing from his severe wounds. 46 Then, standing on a steep rock, with almost the last drop of blood drained from his body, he tore out his entrails with both hands and flung them into the midst of the crowd, calling upon the Lord of life and spirit to restore them to him once again. This was the manner of his death.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Maccabees%2014&version=NCB
It may be, that an element in the Lucan presentation of the death of Judas Iscariot is, that Judas is being presented as an ignoble foil to Razis. Jesus is opposed by the “elders of Jerusalem”; Judas Iscariot, like Razis, is on their side; but in a very bad cause. Razis surrenders his outpoured innards to God; Judas does not.
I think there are many disagreements in the NT, of various kinds. And I can’t think of any that matter. St Paul’s conception of the Reign of Christ as (apparently) temporary (see 1 Cor.15) may be peculiar to him, as other NT authors seem not to agree with St Paul in that respect. I don’t think differences within & between the Biblical books on such matters are a problem, unless one believes that the NT must be totally free of all contradictions & errors. Which is attractive as an idea, & has a long history; but does not agree with the texts.
What is perhaps overlooked, is whether the ideas in the NT disagree with each other. Those held by Jesus are represented as disagreeing with those of His opponents. They sometimes disagree with each other. What people are usually concerned about, seems to be whether there is disagreement between the authors of the NT books. And there is, throughout the Gospels especially. That this can often be explained or accounted for, does not abolish the disagreements; it does make one cautious in explaining them. According to Paul, writing in Galatians, he disagreed with both Peter & Barnabas. Paul was quite sure that he was in the right. It does not follow that he was. Quite possibly, as often in human affairs, there was right on all sides. Galatians gives only Paul’s idea about the disagreement, so it is impossible to say.