ANTILOGIA. - The term (ἀντιλογία) means “contradiction”; it is used by scholars of biblical studies to designate those cases in which two passages of the Bible appear to contradict one another.
Contradictions may be real, when the original or translated text has undergone alterations that have changed its meaning, or merely apparent, in which case they are also called enantiofanies (“contrary appearances”). Real a. are frequent in arithmetical data, which in ancient scripts were easily subject to errors; but even apart from numbers, real a. due to scribal or translation errors are encountered. It is the task of the biblical interpreter to correct such errors by resorting to the means suggested by sound criticism. Apparent a. arise from the fact that the relevant biblical passages refer either to similar but different subjects, or to different circumstances of the same subject, or result from different ways of presenting the same subject, and from similar causes. In general, the rule of s. Agostino applies: «Si aliquid in eis offendero Litteris quod videtur contrarium veritati, nihil aliud quam vel mendosum esse codicem, vel interpretem non assecutum esse quod dictum est, vel me minime intellexisse non ambigam» (Ep. 82, n. 3). V. FRENEURICA.