fredhsu

The lion has been used as a royal symbol throughout the world. Why does the the Lion of Judah have to come from Egypt?

About the Book of the Dead: I don't know much about it, but doesn't it contain a lot of spells? When you try to find a very small set of things in a big pool of words/phrases, you often end up 'finding' what you are looking for. Think "The Bible Code". Also, some people point to the Code of Hammurabi set in stones as source of inspiration for the Ten Commandments.

spin

What makes you say that exactly?

1. Lions were such a common symbol in ancient times, lions standing at gates in Carchemish, Mycenae, in reliefs at Persepolis, and numerous other situations; and
2. In what archaeological stratum (for dating) was the first example of the said symbol found in Israel?

spin

Asha'man

Well, this theory is a portion of the thesis promoted by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman, a pair of professional archaeologists, in their book The Bible Unearthed.

The key part of this theory is that the land of Canaan shows no sign of conquest in the 13th century BCE. Most notably, the artifacts that we have from that time period show a continuity of culture. The pottery shards show no sudden shift in style towards Egyptian influence, which is exactly what would happen if all the local potters were killed and replaced by slaves escaping from Egypt.

Remember, according to the story, the Hebrews had been in Egypt for 400 years, and over a million people fled during the Exodus. This is exactly the type of mass migration of people that archeology is really good at detecting, but the evidence is flat out against it.

Instead, the actual archaeological traces from the region show that the Hebrew culture developed slowly, out of Canaan natives (not invaders), from around the 11th century BCE to the 7th. The polytheistic religious practices were gradually replaced with a Yahweh-first movement, then a Yahweh-only movement.

aa5874

The Biblical rendition, in the first chapter of Exodus, is extremely questionable.

It is quite amazing that the King of Egypt would proclaim, in chapter 1 v9, 'Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we', and then proceed to enslave them for hundreds of years.

Anat

So if the biblical account is questionable and the archaeology doesn't support it, why take any of its claims seriously at all?

aa5874

I really do not take them seriously, but as you are aware some scholars do, and I think it is for that very reason why archaeologist and historians have been literally digging up the globe to see if Biblical accounts did occur. So far, the Biblical accounts of the children of Israel have not been verified conclusively.

I think it is a matter of time before the scholars, perhaps like me and you, discard the Biblical accounts as fairy tales.

Sheshbazzar

Because we live in a world where many do take its claims seriously, or are at least are willing to give token lip service to the bible and it's god.
Powerful political leaders find it very useful and are ever ready to use (and abuse) its stories and examples for the goal of expanding their power base.
What U.S. president has not employed the Book for his political advantage? or used it to "prove" that his and his Parties position was the "right" one?
Where is the politician that will stand up and say that The Bible is a fabricated lie? and that being "Christian" does not equal being "good"?
Much of our current imbroglio in the Mideast arises directly out of our "Christian" politicians "praying" and then setting up national policy revolving around the "gospel Truth" of the Bible, and a "Christian duty" of the "free world" to protect and support Israel and further the Zionist cause.

So while it may be ethically and intellectually honest to discount The Bible's claims, there remains an ethical and intellectual duty -to humanity- to be well educated as to The Bible's "truth's" and truisms as well as to it's errors, inconsistencies, and contradictions.
When politicians are using The Bible for manipulating the populace, and instigating wars, which affect the quality of life of all, based on contrived and biased readings and interpretations, it is only the ethically and intellectually honest and Scripturally educated who can resist and expose these "religious" charlatans for what they are.
Know what is right, so you will know what is wrong.
Know what is wrong, so you will know what is right.

aa5874

The most serious problem, that the atheists confront, is the politician, not the believer, since the believer's God is powerless.

Constantine and Eusebius are prime examples.

Cheerful Charlie

Yes. The OT claims the Israelites went into Egypt as 70 people and emerged with 600,000 men between ages of 20 and 45 430 years later. Hebrew is a typical Western Semitic language, a Canaanitic language with few traces of Egyptianisms you'd expect from the situation above.
Not only that, but the earliest Israelite hilltop farms show no signs of Egyptianisms in pottery,
architecture, or writing, you'd expect them to have learned by then to write in at least demotic.
Israelite writing was borrowed from the Phoenician scripts about 1050 BCE.

The only real overt Egyptianism was some weights and measures adopted from Egypt, but since Egypt was the main market for the region and had controlled the area for centuries you expect something like that.

Bluntly, they were in fact, typical Canaanites. I believe Egyptologist Donald B. Redford has written about some of this lack of evidence you'd expect.