bacht

Yes, it probably wasn't the patriarchs who developed monotheism, there seem to be several candidates:

Moses - 13th C?
David - 10th C
Hezekiah - 8th C
Josiah - 7th C
Deutero-Isaiah - 6th C
Ezra - 5th C

The centralization of sacrifices at Jerusalem seems like a monarchical idea but it's hard to know how reliable the old stories are in Kings/Chronicles

Tristan Scott

They probably all had a hand in the development.

Moses is a mysterious character-don't really know who he was. One possibility is that he could have been Akhenaten, the Egyptian Pharaoh, who abandoned Egypt's traditional polytheism for a more monotheistic Aten. He came out of Egypt, about the time that Moses was supposed to have, as a conqueror in the areas of Canaan and Babylon.

semiopen

Moses had the snake idol (Num 8:4-8) that was destroyed by Hezekiah (2 Kings 18). Examples like this suggest that if Moses was actually historical, the Israelites of that time were far from monotheistic.

David had a terafim (Samuel 19-1), which is the same name as the idol Rachel stole from her father. If David was historical, having an idol in your house is not monotheistic.

I agree that this was a gradual process, much of which was more politically than theologically motivated.

Hezekiah was dealing with the fall of Israel and consolidated the religious center at Jerusalem. He also managed to piss off the Assyrians and got Judea destroyed, although God rewarded him by saving his stupid ass.

The evil Manasseh was one of the better kings, although the Talmud is filled with outrageous stories about the idol worship that he condoned and mandated.

I tend to think that the high places, centralization etc are accurate. The centralization of sacrifices seems completely political, but oddly a critical step in the development of the wonderful three religions we have today.

Roger Pearse

Let's keep to things for which there is actually some ancient evidence. This sort of speculation may be fascinating, but is sterile.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Tristan Scott

Sure, no problem, like you've been contributing so much...and then of course there's all the "ancient evidence" from Egypt that there was actually a Hebrew named Moses in Egypt.

C'mon Roger, if you've got something, let's see it.

Tristan Scott

Agree, I think at the time of Moses, around 1300 BCE (and for the next 4-500 years), what was going around in Canaan and even with the Egyptian (sorry Roger), was a hybrid not really monotheistic, but more henotheistic, it's even alluded to in the Pentateuch when the writers refer to other gods, they point out that they are false, of course, but there are other names, El Shaddai, or God of the Mountain, or Most High God-that alludes to the fact that there must be other, lesser gods. God explains to Moses that he appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai, but that he is really Yahweh, non-the less, the name still aludes to there being other gods.

tradewinds

I believe the Moses was more concerned with law than history. It seems he personified much early folklore to illustrate legal principles. Obedience to law and the Ten Commandments were clearly good laws for an ancient civilization. Not to covet be not be realistic today; we do not legislate wishes not acted upon, in other times perhaps it was more feasible. All of the dietary laws have a practical application, the control of livestock and avoidance of animals prone to undetectable disease. The religious aspect is fitting for the time and found in most ancient societies.

tradewinds

Unlikely, in fact, incorrect, as Akhenaten lived before Moses, but Moses could have been an Egyptian, perhaps his grandnephew? Moses might have come to monotheism through similar beliefs as Akhenaten held. Do a search on the dates, I think you might come across what I am suggesting.

IamJoseph

Covet = stalking; an obsession - not simply desiring in secret. This is a bona fide law today.


The dietary laws are not seen elsewhere in the ancient world, and were a major cause of wars with many nations. That some of the Mosaic laws are seen in one source [Babylon], and wrongly dated as older, has probems. The hebrews had no contact with Babylon till 580 BCE; the Hamurabi code is post-Abraham; while many obvious laws did predate Abraham - e.g. circumcizion. Its not the commonality of obvious laws, but the new, uncommon laws which signify the Hebrew as an independent set of laws, and its total absence of warring dieties which made it so controversial. Monotheism was a dangerous law in the era of divine kings.

IamJoseph

Egypt at no time had Monotheism. The belief in one SUN Deity, for a brief experiment, is not monotheism but mono-polytheism. This too was tried for political reasons against the Egyptian priests - it was not a belief system. No nation observed Monotheism - it was inculcated as barbaric even in later Roman times.