The Bible underneath it
The Contradictions
Where the text disagrees with itself, including about whether God can lie or change his mind. Both verses linked.
The point in one sentence
The Bible disagrees with itself in places any reader can check in two clicks, including about God’s own nature, and the standard harmonizations (the explanations believers give to make two verses fit) either concede that the text contains an error or add something neither passage says. Joseph Smith’s own revision of the Bible patched some of these contradictions and left others standing. That is what a man editing a text does. It is not what God correcting his own word would look like.
You were probably taught that the Bible is the word of God, and that God does not change and cannot lie. This page takes that seriously. It uses only the King James Bible the Church prints, the Church’s own footnotes, and the Church’s own statements about the Bible. Every verse is linked so you can read it for yourself.
The sharpest example, six verses apart
1 Samuel 15, King James Version. Same chapter, same event: the rejection of King Saul.
- “And also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for he is not a man, that he should repent.”
- “And the LORD repented that he had made Saul king over Israel.”
Both verses at churchofjesuschrist.org. The English “repent” in verses 11, 29 and 35 renders forms of the same Hebrew root, nacham.
The text this page is about
The English Bible in Latter-day Saint scriptures is the King James Version. By the standard account it was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611 under King James VI and I, the work of 47 scholars in six committees at Oxford, Cambridge, and Westminster. Everything quoted on this page is that translation, and every verse is linked to the Church’s own copy so you can read what surrounds it.
Chronicles retells much of Samuel and Kings. Most scholars think its author worked from those books or an early version of them, though that is debated. It was written some time between 400 and 250 BC, most likely 350 to 300. That matters because two of the pairs below (David’s census and Ahaziah’s age) are the same story told twice, centuries apart.
A word about what this page leaves out. Many “Bible contradictions” lists include items that do not hold up, and that is part of why the genre gets waved off. What is below is what survived: both passages are canon, both can be read in context in two clicks, and the best harmonization is stated before it is questioned.
What the text and the Church say about the text
2 Timothy 3:16-17 (KJV)
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
The usual claim, in the text itself: scripture is God-given and fit to ground doctrine. Whether this verse means every sentence in the present Bible is, of course, part of what is at issue.
2 Timothy 3 on churchofjesuschrist.orgArticle of Faith 8, Joseph Smith, 1842 (Wentworth letter)
We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.
The Church’s own position is already qualified. Note the phrase “as far as it is translated correctly,” which grants in advance that the English text can be wrong.
Articles of Faith, on churchofjesuschrist.orgChurch Gospel Topics, “Bible”
As the Bible was compiled, organized, translated, and transcribed, errors were introduced into the text.
This is the Church speaking in its own voice, not a critic. The question for the rest of this page is not whether the text contains errors; it is which verses, and how a reader tells.
Read the topic pageSo the Church agrees the Bible text has errors. The disagreement is over where.
The pairs below are the ones where the text contradicts itself, in places where the question is what God is like.
From the telling to the translation to the Church’s position
Dates are for the texts and the translation, not for any single contradiction.
Sources: Wikipedia, King James Version and Books of Chronicles; Church Gospel Topics; Articles of Faith
Part one: what God is like
These are the pairs that carry the page, because they are not about dates or numbers. They are the Bible disagreeing about the character of God, and they are the ones where “a copyist slipped” is the weakest answer.
Does God change his mind?
The strongest answer to the 1 Samuel 15 pair comes first, because it has real force. In verse 29 it is Samuel speaking, telling Saul that the kingdom is gone for good: “The LORD hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day” (verse 28), and God “will not lie nor repent.” Verse 35 is the narrator, and verse 11 has God saying it himself (“It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king”), describing regret at having made Saul king. On that reading, God does not reverse his decree but can feel sorrow about how events went. The Church’s own footnote on “repenteth” in verse 11 reads the Hebrew this way: “The Hebrew root means ‘to sigh,’ therefore ‘to feel sorrow.’” That is a coherent distinction and many readers hold it.
Here is why it still leaves a problem. Verse 29 backs a particular decree with a statement about God’s nature (“for he is not a man, that he should repent”), and elsewhere the same Bible shows him reversing a stated course of action, which is the thing the distinction needs him not to do.
Numbers 23:19 (Balaam speaking) against Jonah 3:10
KJV, on churchofjesuschrist.org
Jonah 3:10: “And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.”
What it establishes: Numbers 23:19 asks “hath he said, and shall he not do it?” Jonah 3:10 describes God not doing what he had said he would do. The usual answer is that Jonah’s warning (3:4) was conditional, as Nineveh’s king assumes (3:9) and Jonah says he expected (4:2), and that Numbers 23:19 is about a promise. The first is Balaam speaking (Numbers 23:7-8 shows him taking up his oracle); Jonah 3:10 is the narrator.
Jonah 3Exodus 32:10-14
KJV
What it establishes: A stated decree is reversed after Moses argues with God. This is the case the “decree versus feeling” distinction does not cover: it is not regret over the past but a changed course of action, which is why defenders reach for the conditional-warning reading instead.
Exodus 32Genesis 6:5-7 and Jeremiah 18:7-10
KJV
Jeremiah 18:8: “If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.”
What it establishes: In Jeremiah 18:7-10, relenting is stated as how God operates: his announced judgment or blessing depends on how a nation responds. Many readers take that as the reconciliation, God’s character fixed and his actions answering to people. Malachi 3:6 sits on the other side: “For I am the LORD, I change not.”
Jeremiah 18There is an old and serious reply, and it deserves to be stated at full strength. It is called anthropomorphism, which just means describing God in human terms. The Bible does this throughout, so the regret passages describe his responses to people while the unchanging passages describe his character. Theologians have said this for centuries. The difficulty is that both sides of the pair are written in the same human language, in the same chapter in 1 Samuel. The text does not mark which “repent” is figure and which is literal. The reader has to assign it, and the assignment tends to follow the doctrine the reader already holds.
Can God lie, or send the lie?
The strongest answer comes first here too, and it is better than it first looks. Titus 1:2 and Hebrews 6:18 are about God’s promises. Hebrews 6:17-18 is explicitly about the oath God swore to the heirs of the promise: it is “impossible for God to lie” in that context because the promise is secured by two “immutable things.” The lying-spirit texts, on the other side, are about God dealing with a king and a people who had already chosen against him. In 2 Thessalonians 2:10 the people who are sent the delusion are those “because they received not the love of the truth.” Read this way, God does not lie to those he promised; he judges those who rejected him, and the judgment takes the form of giving them what they have chosen.
That is a coherent theology and the surrounding verses do support it. What it costs is the verbs. Look at what the texts actually say God does.
Both columns are canon
Left: what the Bible says about God and lying. Right: what the same Bible describes God doing. King James throughout.
- Numbers 23:19: “God is not a man, that he should lie”
- Titus 1:2: “God, that cannot lie”
- Hebrews 6:18: “it was impossible for God to lie”
- 1 Kings 22:23: “the LORD hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets”
- Ezekiel 14:9: “I the LORD have deceived that prophet”
- 2 Thessalonians 2:11: “God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie”
Each verse is linked in the exhibits below
1 Kings 22:19-23, the throne-room scene
KJV
What it establishes: The spirit offers the plan, which is the part defenders lean on. But God asks “Wherewith?”, approves the method, and commands “go forth, and do so.” The prophets had spoken in his name: “Thus saith the LORD, With these shalt thou push the Syrians” (verse 11).
1 Kings 22Ezekiel 14:9
KJV
What it establishes: The English versions split. The ESV also prints “deceived”; the NIV prints “enticed” for both words. Either way God is the one acting. The context is idolaters coming to a prophet to inquire (verses 3-8).
Ezekiel 142 Thessalonians 2:10-12
KJV
What it establishes: The judicial reading is right here in the text: the delusion is a consequence of refusing the truth. It is still described as something God sends.
2 Thessalonians 2Titus 1:2 and Hebrews 6:17-18
KJV
Hebrews 6:18: “That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us.”
What it establishes: Both are about God’s promises. Numbers 23:19 is the unrestricted form: “God is not a man, that he should lie.”
Hebrews 6The judicial reading, that God hands over people who have already refused him, survives all of this, but the texts do not say God stood back and let it happen. They say he put, deceived (or enticed), sent. A judge who hands someone over to false counsel is still the one who handed them over.
It appears on many skeptic lists of “God deceives” verses. “The god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not” is read, including in the Church’s footnote (Ephesians 6:12; Topical Guide “Devil”), as Satan, not God. It is not one of the verses where the text says God deceives.
Can God be seen?
Exodus 33:11 against Exodus 33:20
KJV, nine verses apart
Verse 20: “And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live.”
What it establishes: The usual harmonization: verse 11 is an idiom for close conversation, and verse 20 is literal. That is a real idiom and a reasonable reading. It is also an assignment made exactly where the problem requires it. Genesis 32:30 has Jacob say, in the same phrase, “I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved,” though that is Jacob’s own statement after wrestling with “a man” (verse 24). Against it: John 1:18, “No man hath seen God at any time,” and 1 John 4:12, the same sentence.
Exodus 33Part two: the verse-and-verse table
Most of the next pairs are not about God’s nature. They are included because each is two passages in the canon that can be read side by side. Each row is two passages, KJV, both linked. The third column is a harmonization the believing tradition offers.
Verse A, verse B, and the usual answer
Click either reference to read it in context. The third column is stated as its defenders state it.
| Verse A | Verse B | The usual harmonization |
|---|---|---|
| 2 Samuel 24:1: “the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, Go, number Israel and Judah.” | 1 Chronicles 21:1: “And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel.” | God permitted Satan to act, as in Job. Possible, but neither verse says it; each names a single agent. The Church’s footnote on 2 Samuel 24:1 takes another route: “Apparently something is missing, and ‘Satan’ should be the antecedent of ‘he.’” (The same census: 2 Samuel 24:9 counts 800,000 and 500,000; 1 Chronicles 21:5 counts 1,100,000 and 470,000. Verse 13 offers “seven years of famine”; 1 Chronicles 21:12 offers “three years’ famine.”) |
| Matthew 27:5-7: Judas “went and hanged himself”; the chief priests “took counsel, and bought with them the potter’s field.” | Acts 1:18: “Now this man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.” | The rope broke or the body fell after hanging, and the priests bought the field in his name. Neither account says this; it is supplied to join them. (See the JST note below: Joseph Smith’s revision supplies the first half of it.) |
| 2 Kings 8:26: “Two and twenty years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign.” | 2 Chronicles 22:2 (KJV): “Forty and two years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign.” | A copying error in the Chronicles text. The ESV prints “twenty-two” in both places and footnotes that the Hebrew of 2 Chronicles reads forty-two (the Septuagint, twenty); the Church’s footnote at 2 Chronicles 22:2 reads “Twenty-two; see 2 Kgs. 8:26.” Note that 2 Kings 8:17 puts his father Jehoram at thirty-two when he began his eight-year reign, so forty-two would make the son older than the father at the time of the father’s death. The usual answer is a concession that the transmitted text has an error. |
| Genesis 1:11-12, 24-27: plants on day three; animals; then “male and female created he them.” | Genesis 2:5-9, 18-22: “the LORD God formed man of the dust” before the plants of the field grew; then “out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast” to find the man a helper; then the woman from the rib. | Genesis 2 is a close-up, not a second sequence, and “formed” can be read as “had formed.” That is grammatically possible. The animals in 2:18-19 are formed because the man is alone, which reads as the order reversed. (A Latter-day Saint answer: Moses 3:5, see the JST section.) |
| Acts 9:7: Saul’s companions “stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man.” | Acts 22:9: “they saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me.” | The usual answer is that the companions heard the sound but not the words. Some commentators support it from the Greek, where the verb for hearing takes a different ending in each verse, which they read as hearing a sound versus understanding it; others reject that grammatical distinction as too weak to carry the point, and read the two accounts as an unessential difference in telling. (JST Acts 9:7 changes the English; see below.) |
| Matthew 1:16: “And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary.” | Luke 3:23: “being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli.” | One line is Mary’s, or a levirate marriage joins them. Either is possible. Neither Gospel says so, and Luke names Joseph, not Mary, as the link. |
| Numbers 25:9: “those that died in the plague were twenty and four thousand.” | 1 Corinthians 10:8: “and fell in one day three and twenty thousand.” | Paul counts “in one day” and Numbers counts the whole plague. Reasonable, but it assumes the 24,000 includes deaths on other days, which Numbers does not say. |
| Genesis 6:19: “two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark.” | Genesis 7:2: “Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens.” | Chapter 7 refines the rule of chapter 6. Possible. Many critical scholars instead read two tellings joined together; here the reader is deciding between the two. |
| Mark 15:25: “it was the third hour, and they crucified him.” | John 19:14: Pilate’s judgment, “about the sixth hour.” | Several answers are offered. One is that John counts hours from midnight, in the Roman manner, which other commentators reject as unsupported. Another is that both count in the Jewish manner and “about the sixth hour” is approximate. A third is a copying error in a numeral. None is stated in either Gospel. |
Every reference is linked to the Church’s own KJV
For Latter-day Saints, several of these pairs have an answer from the Joseph Smith Translation (JST), Joseph Smith’s revision of the Bible text, and it is worth checking each one. The next section does that. In short: the Church’s printed selections patch some of these verses and leave others untouched, and they patch some in ways that agree with the other side of the pair.
What the Joseph Smith Translation does and does not change
This is the Church’s own printed set of selections from the revision: the JST Appendix, plus the JST readings printed in footnotes under the King James text in its scriptures. Both were checked verse by verse. It is not the whole manuscript text, so “no change” below means “no entry in either place.”
The revision, passage by passage
What it changes, quoted from the Church’s own JST pages.
| Passage | What the JST does |
|---|---|
| Genesis 6:6 (God repented) | Moses 8:25: “And it repented Noah, and his heart was pained that the Lord had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at the heart.” God no longer repents. |
| Exodus 32:14 (God repented of the evil) | JST Exodus 32:14: “And the Lord said unto Moses, If they will repent of the evil which they have done, I will spare them, and turn away my fierce wrath …” The repenting moves from God to Israel. The Church also prints a JST footnote at Exodus 32:12, where Moses’s “repent of this evil against thy people” becomes “Thy people will repent of this evil; therefore come thou not out against them.” |
| Exodus 33:20 (no man see me and live) | JST Exodus 33:20 rewrites the verse so that God’s face cannot be seen “at this time” by a people who are “exceeding sinful,” and adds: “And no sinful man hath at any time, neither shall there be any sinful man at any time, that shall see my face and live.” Exodus 33:11 has no JST entry. |
| John 1:18 and 1 John 4:12 (no man hath seen God) | JST John 1:19: “And no man hath seen God at any time, except he hath borne record of the Son; for except it is through him no man can be saved.” JST 1 John 4:12: “No man hath seen God at any time, except them who believe.” |
| 1 Kings 22:23 / 2 Chronicles 18:22 (lying spirit) | JST 2 Chronicles 18:22: “the Lord hath found a lying spirit,” with the Church’s heading “The Lord does not put a lying spirit into the mouths of prophets.” 1 Kings 22:23 has no JST text of its own, but the Church’s footnote on 1 Kings 22:22 sends the reader to JST 2 Chronicles 18:22. |
| Acts 9:7 (Saul’s companions) | JST Acts 9:7: “saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him who spake to him.” Resolved by changing the English to match Acts 22:9. |
| Matthew 27:5 (Judas) | JST Matthew 27:6 adds: “hanged himself on a tree. And straightway he fell down, and his bowels gushed out, and he died.” This supplies the first half of the table’s harmonization, a fall after the hanging, in the text itself. It does not touch the field purchase (Matthew 27:7 versus Acts 1:18). |
| Genesis 2 (order of creation) | Moses 3:5: “For I, the Lord God, created all things, of which I have spoken, spiritually, before they were naturally upon the face of the earth.” A Latter-day Saint answer: a spiritual creation came first. Moses 3:5 does not settle the order of the animals and the man: Moses 3:7 calls Adam “the first flesh upon the earth,” and Moses 3:19 forms the beasts afterward, while Moses 2:24-27 has the animals before the man. |
| Readings printed only in footnotes under the King James text | 1 Samuel 15:11: “and he repenteth not that he hath sinned”. 1 Samuel 15:35: “the Lord rent the kingdom from Saul whom he had made king over Israel.” Jonah 3:10: “… evil way and repented; and God turned away the evil that he had said he would bring upon them.” Ezekiel 14:9: “I the Lord have not deceived that prophet.” 2 Samuel 24:16: “the people repented, and the Lord stayed the hand of the angel, that he destroyed not the people.” 2 Chronicles 22:2 carries a JST footnote too, “Two and twenty,” matching 2 Kings 8:26. The Church’s headings on JST Jeremiah 26:13 and JST Amos 7:3 read “The Lord does not repent; men repent.” |
| No JST entry anywhere in the Church’s printed scriptures (Appendix or footnotes) | Numbers 23:19; Titus 1:2; Hebrews 6:18; 2 Samuel 24:1 (the Church’s footnote there says instead that “Satan” should be the antecedent of “he”); 1 Chronicles 21:1; 2 Kings 8:26; 2 Thessalonians 2:11 (the Appendix has verses 2-3 and 7-9 only); Jeremiah 18:8 (its footnote points to JST Jeremiah 26). |
Sources: Church JST Appendix and the JST footnotes under the King James text, checked Oct 13, 2026
Take everything above at face value. These are real fixes, and a Latter-day Saint is entitled to point to them. The Church’s printed scriptures go further than the Appendix: footnotes under the King James text carry Joseph Smith’s readings at Genesis 6:6, Exodus 32:12 and 14, 1 Samuel 15:11 and 15:35, 2 Samuel 24:16, Jonah 3:10 and Ezekiel 14:9, and the Church’s own headings on JST Jeremiah 26:13 and JST Amos 7:3 read “The Lord does not repent; men repent.” At each of these places the revision removes the statement that God repents or deceives, and in several it gives the repenting to the people instead. That is a consistent position: at these places the King James wording is treated as the mistake. Two things are left over. The selections keep “the Lord beheld Israel, that he repented him of the evil” at JST 1 Chronicles 21:15, and the verses on the other side of the page (Titus 1:2, Hebrews 6:18, 2 Thessalonians 2:11) and 1 Kings 22:23 carry no JST text of their own. The believing answer is that Joseph Smith was restoring what the Bible had lost, and at the places it patched, that is the claim being made. But a restoration from God would not leave God lying and sending lies in the very next book, and Joseph’s revision did. It patched some of the contradictions about God and left others standing. That is the work of a man revising a text, deciding verse by verse which wording to keep. It is not the pattern of God correcting his own word.
Bats listed with birds, hares chewing cud, pi equal to three in 1 Kings 7, the mustard seed as smallest of all seeds, and the four corners of the earth are complaints about how ancient writers described the world, not contradictions between passages. And “unicorn” in Numbers 23:22 (“the strength of an unicorn”) is the King James rendering of a Hebrew word the Church’s own footnote glosses as “a wild ox.” Ancient functional categories, round numbers and figures of speech are ordinary ways of describing the world, which is why these items are weak evidence of a contradiction.
When a prophecy and history disagree
You may have heard Ezekiel’s prophecy about Tyre taught as one of the Bible’s great fulfilled predictions. Read it, and then read what the same prophet wrote years later.
Ezekiel on Tyre, two chapters of the same book
King James Version. The first says what Nebuchadnezzar will do. The second says what he got.
- “Behold, I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon… And I will make thee like the top of a rock: thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon; thou shalt be built no more: for I the Lord have spoken it.”
- “Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon caused his army to serve a great service against Tyrus… yet had he no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus… Behold, I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchadrezzar.”
Both chapters at Ezekiel 26 and Ezekiel 29, churchofjesuschrist.org.
History matches the second chapter. Wikipedia’s article on the siege says: “After 13 years of siege, the Tyrians negotiated a surrender with the Babylonians” and calls the result “militarily inconclusive” (only the ancient writer Josephus gives the 13 years, and historians debate it). The king was replaced by one who became a vassal of Babylon. Alexander the Great took the island city in 332 BC. And Tyre is still there: Wikipedia calls it “one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world.” The 586–573 BC siege, the 332 BC siege, Tyre today.
Believers have good answers, and here is what each one leaves standing. “Many nations” (26:3) means waves of attackers, Babylon first and Alexander later. But verses 7 to 12 name one attacker and say what he will do: “when he shall enter into thy gates.” Chapter 29 says that attacker was paid nothing for it. “Verse 12 switches to ‘they,’ and Alexander fulfilled it.” This is the strongest answer. Verse 12 does change from “he” to “they,” and Alexander did build a causeway out to the island city. But verse 14 still says “thou shalt be built no more,” and Tyre was rebuilt and is a city today. “Built no more means the old site.” Then the text means less than it says, and verse 21 (“thou shalt be no more… never be found again”) has no old site to hide in.
None of that touches 29:18. There the book itself says the attack on Tyre did not pay. A prophecy that the same book has to correct a few chapters later is not a prophecy being fulfilled. This is the same pattern as the rest of this page, a text that disagrees with itself, and here it disagrees with the record as well. The Church’s own predictions get their own pages: the temple that was never built.
What is true on the other side
The strongest opposing case is not that each of these has an answer; it is that the people who assembled these books were not troubled by them. On the usual scholarly view the author of Chronicles had Samuel and Kings available and still told David’s census differently. Ancient writers did not hold the modern standard of one smooth, consistent record. On that view the differences are the signature of a library of different voices, not an engineering failure, and a reader who expects uniformity is asking the wrong question.
That is true, and it is the page’s point from the other direction. If the text is a library of voices who saw God differently, then the voice that says “God cannot repent” and the voice that says “God repented” are two views of God, not one. A reader can have that, but not at the same time as a claim that every sentence of the English text is the word of God exactly as written.
The common rebuttals
“Each of these has an answer.” Granted, one at a time, and several of the answers above are good. The pattern is the issue: most of the answers work by supplying a detail neither passage states, and they are applied only where a problem appears. A method that is free to do that can reconcile almost any two accounts, so its succeeding here says little about whether the texts agree.
“Those are copying errors. The original manuscripts were perfect.” This is the Church’s own position too: errors were introduced as the Bible was transcribed and translated. What that concedes: nobody has an original manuscript, so the perfect text is one no one possesses. And copyists do not explain the God pairs: the repenting runs through Genesis, Exodus, 1 Samuel, Jeremiah, and Jonah, and the sending of deception through 1 Kings, Ezekiel, and 2 Thessalonians, in separate books. A scribe’s slip can turn forty-two into twenty-two; it does not write the same disagreement across a number of separate books.
“God talks in human terms so people can understand him.” That is a very old answer and it is a good one. It also applies to the verses that deny he changes. “He is not a man, that he should repent” is just as much a human sentence about God as “it repented the LORD.” The explanation does not tell you which is which.
Joseph Smith patched some of these contradictions and left others standing.
That is what a man revising a text does. It is not what God correcting his own word looks like.
What this means
You saw the Bible say, six verses apart, that God will not repent and that God repented. You saw it say that God cannot lie, and that he put a lying spirit in the mouth of all of King Ahab’s prophets, deceived a prophet, and sent a delusion so people would believe a lie. You saw two retellings of one census disagree on who started it, how many were counted, and how long the famine would be, and you saw that the Church’s printed scriptures edit most of the places where God repents or deceives, but not the ones where he cannot lie, and not every repenting verse either.
The Church already says errors entered the Bible. Its own revision of the text patched some of the contradictions about God and left the rest. A God who knew the right text would not have had to choose.
Some of these answers, given one at a time, are as good as an answer gets. But the deeper question is not whether a verse can be harmonized. It is what you would be using to decide that the voice saying “God cannot lie” is right and the voice saying “the LORD hath put a lying spirit” is the one that is mistaken, and whether that tool is the text itself.