Like a lot of kids, I was raised on Bible stories. Granted, most of my knowledge of the Old and New Testaments was acquired second-hand—from children’s books, Sunday School lessons, popular culture.

At Christmas, the theme of peace and goodwill filled the air. At Passover, my family gathered around the dinner table to recount the exodus from Egypt. In our version of the Passover story, Moses demanded that Pharaoh “Let my people go,” and God parted the Red Sea to ensure the Israelites’ escape. It was a celebration of freedom.

It wasn’t until later in life that I read the Bible itself. Perhaps naively, I was challenged by what I found.

I was deeply troubled by the biblical version of the Passover story, in which God explicitly endorsed the institution of slavery.

“Such slaves as you have, male or female, should come from the nations round about you; from them you may buy slaves,” God told the Israelites after setting them free.

I knew God promised his Chosen People the Promised Land -- but I had no idea he commanded them to exterminate the prior inhabitants.

“You must not leave a soul alive,” he said.

I was taken aback by the New Testament words of Jesus himself, seeking to overthrow the old order. “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword,” he said.

I was also perplexed by countless contradictions and inconsistencies. For example, after betraying Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, did Judas throw away the money and hang himself, as the Gospel of Matthew relates? Or did Judas live long enough to spend his reward, as Acts tells it?

Similarly, did David slay Goliath, as one chapter of the Bible says? Or did someone named Elhanan kill the giant, as many translations of a different chapter would have it?

Questions like those helped inspire Jezebel’s Tomb. It involves an Israeli journalist struggling with an age-old conflict and a Catholic professor of biblical archeology searching for a reason to believe – or a reason not to.

But they’re just characters in a novel.

In the spirit of thoughtful dialogue that marks this forum, I’d like to offer two questions for discussion:

If the Bible is to be regarded as the literal, infallible Truth, how are we to make sense of its contradictions?

And how are we to reconcile our own notions of morality with God’s law when God’s commandments embrace such injustices as slavery?

David Hilzenrath is a reporter for The Washington Post and the author of Jezebel’s Tomb, a novel being published in serial form. Click here for excerpts that explore biblical underpinnings of the Passover and Easter stories.