The Bible is reliable

The Donkey Problem Two people give an account of the same event but do not match each other. There can be multiple reasons why this happened which makes it hard to establish a contradiction. Instead of one or the other being in error, perhaps Mark and Matthew mentions only the information they feel is relevant to what they want to say. What is the use of both of them writing the exact same thing anyway? 1. Two donkeys are mentioned in the one account but it is never said there had to be ONLY one donkey brought to Jesus in the other account. 2. The Donkeys found in Matthew's account was found tied down and loosened and do not contradict anything Mark recounts about a Donkey being tied down and loosened. The only difference is that Mark does not mention the other Donkey. 3. Two writers who give an account of the same event are under no obligation to mention the exact same detail. For example: If I say to Tom and Harry that I want Tom to make me coffee will it be a lie if Jane recounts the story and say I told Tom to make me coffee without mentioning Harry? The answer is no. 4. It is required of you to prove that Matthew and Mark tried to give the exact same account of the same event to establish that they really did change the words of Jesus as you infer. If not then the two writers are therefore entitled to make bona fide selections supporting their account of what was said relative to their intended narrative. Matthew mention what was applicable to both Donkey's and for Mark to mention only what was applicable to one donkey does not contradict the overall story. 5. Deduction can isolate one as intended although two are mentioned. Basically, the prophet said the Messiah would ride in on a Colt and therefore Mark could possibly only have mentioned the Colt because the other Donkey, although mentioned, was irrelevant to him. My argument is that the different accounts are justifiable based on the writers intentions. The two accounts allows room for harmonization to get an overall picture that is not contradictory. No evidence for the Exodus Your argument basically comes down to whether there were enough people left over in Egypt to accomplish certain tasks. My answer is there probably was. I do not agree with your conclusions that the Egyptian race was reduced to such a degree that it was impossible for them to attain anything else. 1. You state Egypt MAYBE had 3.5 million people. Exact numbers eludes us therefore your theory is impaired already. 2. The animals died, the crops were ruined but only the first born of every household was killed. Let's entertain the idea of 2 million Egyptians and 4 members per family (based on your 2 children reasonable assumption). That means that 1 in 4 people were probably killed leaving a population of three fourths in tact. 3. The entire army was not destroyed as you claim. It was the chariot riders and horse riders that were destroyed. There was no mention of the foot soldiers pursuing Israel into the sea and it is also mentioned that the "chosen" captains perished with Pharaoh. Ex. 14:23 And the Egyptians pursued, and went in after them to the midst of the sea, even all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots, and his horsemen. Ex, 15:4 4 Pharaoh's chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea: his chosen captains also are drowned in the Red sea. "Chosen" indicates not everyone joined Pharaoh and therefore it cannot be established that in fact the entire army was destroyed. 4. Egypt made use of Slaves to accomplish what they set out to do. This means that a small number of people controlled a vast majority of people to accomplish tasks. Egypt's slave trade spread into many different nations and they obviously had overseers everywhere who was not part of the army that joined Pharaoh. Egypt conquered many nations and would obviously have had many citizens outside of it's borders to oversee its affairs. The plagues were localized to Egypt and would not have affected all the Egyptian citizens and soldiers located outside of the Egyptian borders.