You aren't supposed to fact-check Ben Carson's stories: They are biblical allegories.

[DetlefK]

http://www.salon.com/2015/11/09/ben_carson_is_about_to_crack_he_thinks_his_biography_is_the_bible_immune_to_fact_checking/

Luckily, there is one simple answer to these questions: Fundamentalist Christianity. Carson is not running a typical campaign for office—arguably, he’s not really trying to win office at all—so much as he’s trying to build his brand as a fundamentalist Christian icon. He wants his book to be wrapped and placed under every evangelical’s tree this Christmas. After he bows out of the presidential race, he has a nice career ahead of him as an “inspirational” speaker—and seller of tapes and sermons and educational materials—for the Christian right circuit. His exaggerated tales of sin and redemption sound bizarre to most Americans, but they are par for the course in the evangelical circles that Carson is trying to win over.

Take the Yale story: A young man who needs $10 and doesn’t have it and then is put in this situation where his convictions are tested and voila! He is given the $10 he needed. It’s a weird story if taken literally. But the story is perfect for a Sunday sermon on how the good Lord will provide to the righteous man.

...

Hammering messy real world experiences into trite fables about sin and redemption is standard operating procedure in conservative Christian circles. So is the exaggeration. Tales of your behavior before you were saved are embellished for maximum drama. What’s important is not the literal truth, but reinforcing fundamentalist notions that the world outside of the Jesus bubble is a depraved hellhole.

...

Carson’s claim that he was a violent youth who renounced his sinful ways after praying has to be understood in this light. In Christian circles, the literal truth of such stories doesn’t matter nearly as much as their usefulness in spreading the word that Jesus is the cure for all your problems. A story about Jesus’s ability to save you from murder is just more memorable than, say, a tale of renouncing your habit of shoplifting.

This is all why Carson is starting to get angry with the press, as well. Most people who write “inspiring” tales of sin and redemption to be used in Christian instruction don’t expect journalists to go sniffing around to find out if any of that is true. So he probably does feel unfairly singled out.

More to the point, this singling out is a real threat to his brand. Carson has positioned himself to be a role model whose life story is chock full of little tidbits and fables than can be repackaged and sold over and over again to adoring Christian audiences.

...

Previous questions about Carson’s policies and beliefs regarding the Nazis or the pyramids might hurt his presidential aspirations, but this latest round of questions about his biography? That might undermine book sales.

[pinboy3niner]

1. When Ben resorts to alligators you know it's time to drain the swamp

[jberryhill]

2. Good point. Jesus has the same problem

[pinboy3niner]

3. On the scale of problems, that might not have been at the top of Jesus' list

[longship]

4. Like many Christian grifters.

Maybe he could become the next farting preacher.