CNAME and other data -vs- could not find NS and/or SOA records

[Jim Reid]

>>>>> "Phil" == phil-news-nospam  <phil-news-nospam at ipal.net> writes:

    Phil> I have a domain (several of them, actually) in which I need
    Phil> to CNAME them to another domain (which is under someone
    Phil> else's authority).

The DNS does not allow domains to be CNAMEd, to use your terminology.
I believe you've been told this already.

    Phil> The only other records were SOA and NS.  So when I remove
    Phil> them, BIND gives this message in syslog and fails to load
    Phil> the zone:

    Phil>     could not find NS and/or SOA records

That's right. Every zone MUST have exactly 1 SOA and at least 1 NS
record.

    Phil> So how do I bypass this conundrum?

There's no conundrum to bypass. The DNS just doesn't work the way
you think it does. Or ought to work.

If you want anyone to help you, try telling us what *exactly* you're
trying to do. ie "I have a zone called ipal.net. Here it is. I want
anyone sending mail to ipal.net to have it sent to the ipal.com mail
server. And anyone looking up www.ipal.net should be directed to the
web server at www.ipal.org. I need to do this for ipal2.net and
ipal3.net too. Here are their zone files. What's the solution?"