Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Tristan Scott · 05-23-2013, 09:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cheerful Charlie

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Scott

I think it is most likely that the writers of Genesis and Exodus were just re-writing the local mythologies, customizing them to fit their dogma-making the stories that the people of the area were familiar with fit into their religion.

That was obviously the case with the flood story. With it we have real evidence in the form of the Gilgamesh, written 1500 years before Genesis was written-the stories are nearly identical.

There is no record in Egypt that would fit the Exodus story, however the story of Akhenaten, Pharoah (Amenhotep IV) married to Nefertiti, and promoter of a monotheistic religion worshipping the god Aten, does raise some interest. There are some scholars who have speculated that the Moses figure may have been a follower of Akhenaten who fled Egypt after the death of Akhenaten, who's successor Tutankhamun expunged the religion. The timing would have been about right.

The problem with that speculation is that the Egyptiians intensely believed in an afterlife, but the early Israelites did not, even in the time of Jesus, the Sadducees did not believe iin an afterlife because it was not to be found in the Torah. the Leyden papysuses, written late in the reign of Rameses II had a number of hymns to a monotheistic god who was seen as the one true God. All the old Gods were merly aspects of the one God. Interesting trial balloons by the Amun priesthood of that time.
It is also interesting that exodus tells us the Israeiltes had forgotten their god and worshipped the Egyptian Gods. If so, they would know about the concept of eternal life after death but did not complain th Moses and God about no afterlife offered to them in the new religion. The El myth cycle was the source of early israelite's idea of god and also had no concept of an afterlife.

Cheerful Charlie

I'm sure that any speculation as to who any of the characters in the Pentateuch were or even if they existed at all will have many problems Charlie. I have found no mention of Akhenanten's religion's stand on the afterlife, just that it was a nearly complete departure from previous Egyptian religions.

semiopen · 05-24-2013, 05:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

By the way, it is untrue that the Saduccees didn't believe in an afterlife. They simply believed life here did not lead to a bodily resurrection, but that life kept continuing elsewhere, and that one's actions here had no effect there.

Then I guess it means that this is wrong -

Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes

Quote:

The Sadducees rejected the idea of the Oral Law and insisted on a literal interpretation of the Written Law; consequently, they did not believe in an afterlife, since it is not mentioned in the Torah. The main focus of Sadducee life was rituals associated with the Temple.

Sort of true maybe, then he goes on -

Quote:

The Sadducees disappeared around 70 A.D., after the destruction of the Second Temple (see below). None of the writings of the Sadducees survived, so the little we know about them comes from their Pharisaic opponents.

Actually none of the writing of the Pharisees survived either, we proceed on the word of the Rabbis who may have been hybrids like

Michael Corvin in the Underworld film series.

Quote:

These two "parties" served in the Great Sanhedrin, a kind of Jewish Supreme Court made up of 71 members whose responsibility was to interpret civil and religious laws.

This seems to have descended into BS. There were Sanhedrins, but the existence of a

Sanhedrin#Great_and_Lesser_Sanhedrin structure is dubious as is the 71 members.

Sadducees

Quote:

According to Josephus, the Sadducees believed that:

There is no fate
God does not commit evil
man has free will; “man has the free choice of good or evil”
the soul is not immortal; there is no afterlife, and
there are no rewards or penalties after death

The Sadducees rejected the belief in resurrection of the dead, which was a central tenet believed by Pharisees and by Early Christians. This often provoked hostilities.[11] Furthermore, the Sadducees rejected the Oral Law as proposed by the Pharisees. Rather, they saw the Torah as the sole source of divine authority.[12] The written law, in its depiction of the priesthood, corroborated the power and enforced the hegemony of the Sadducees in Judean society.

Josephus says there is no afterlife according to Sadducee belief.

The longer paragraph descends into some more BS. The Pharisees didn't propose an Oral Law but an Oral Tradition as we have discussed before. The Oral Law is a Rabbinic concept.

The concept of them not believing in an afterlife is from Josephus and Mark so far as I understand it. This is probably versus a claim in the Talmud that they did if Dufi can find it.

Duvduv · 05-24-2013, 05:27 AM

It wouldn't matter the source because you wouldn't accept it anyway. Their belief in the afterlife was influenced by the Greeks. Their belief in any punishment only covered this world according to theplain meaning of the Torah text, and not the next world.

Cheerful Charlie · 05-24-2013, 05:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

How could you possibly lay claim to demanding proof without even laying out the criteria that would satisfy you of the existence of that Exodus? And howwould you know which proof would be universally accepted leading the whole world to become Orthodox Jews? And how could you think that you already know on what basis to make such demands merely based on a limited amount of information from the Torah text by itself?!
Do you rely on the same criteria for judging other ancient events as I asked in my original posting? And if a person doesn't believe the Torah is true, than what does he care what it says?
Do I care what the Bhagavad Gita says about the life of Krishna or what the Pali sutras say about Buddha? They aren't true as far as I am concerned, so what do I care what they claim?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cheerful Charlie

The exodus involves about 1 1/2 million people according to Numbers 2. Thy supposedly invade Palestine and then, 2 1/2 million people immediately exit the archaeological record. No they HAVE to leave obvious traces. Remember, Exodus tells us they outnumbered the Egyptians, the most poplous nation of the late bronze age, rwo to one. They leave no cities, towns, villages, farms, wells, houses, pottery, kilns, bones and middens, no graves. These things do not just disappear not even over 2500 years.

And all you have is a very lame rhetorical question? That doesn't work does it? No professional Near East archaeologist, posed this question will have any answer than to tell us that the exodus tall tale hasn't any truth in it, and this question I pose demonstrates that fact. Israel/Judea are not big areas of land. It would be impossible to overlook the archaeological evidence of a sudden influx of 2.5 millions of invaders into late bronze age Palestine as per Exodus, Joshua, Numbers et al

Now, you have no reasonable explanation for this, and it is obvious you will, never, ever agree that all of this does not work, no matter how obvious it is that this does not work. But this is indeed another good argument against considering the OT exodus story might possibly be true, to pose to other apologists.

Yes 2.5 million people allegedly invade Israel/Judea and leave no trace of the vast numbers, the Lying OT claims invaded the area.

Your nonsense offers nothing but tripe, and bad reasoning based on the magic word interpretation. The facts are there are no traces of 38 years at Kadesh Barnea, which rationally and factually there MUST be if Exodus is in any way true, but then, as I just realized, it gets worse for Exodus tall tales. And every atheist here who considers that for 10 seconds will realize, I am right. 2 1/2 million people do not invade a small portion of the world and then utterly disappear archaeologically speaking, without a trace.

Cheerful Charlie

where are the cities, town and villages of 2 1/2 milliion new inhabitatnts of Isreal/Judea?
This is the criteria. where is the broken pottery of 2 1/2 million Israelites? The new wells? The gravesites of 2 1/2 millions of that era The new farms, the terraced slopes, the new cisterns dug by 2 12 million people No, the criteria are OBVIOUS. It would leave very obvious artifacts in vast quantity that suddenly appear. Now, archeologists have been intensely excavatiing Israel for well over a century and the obvious artifacts we would expect of 2 1/2 new inbitants are not found as the MUST be if there was any truth to exodus.

Your rhetorical question is meaningless. Even if we cut the OT numbers by a factor of ten, the resultiing 250,000 new inhabitants would have changed the face of Paslestine dramatically. Anybody who has read the books about israelite archaeology knows the movement to hill top settlements changed the archaeology and was easiily discernable in numbers far, far less than 2 1/2 millions. The 30,000 or so Philistines made obvious changes easily found.

The basic torah makes claims that leave no room for error. but it has alll proven false. untrue. Nobody iis going to became an orthodox jew based on this nonsense.

2 1/2 million Jews march into palestine and immediately disappear from the archaeological record. And that shows us it is all an ancient lie wriitten by a lying preist many years later.

Cheerful Charlie

semiopen · 05-24-2013, 05:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

It wouldn't matter the source because you wouldn't accept it anyway. Their belief in the afterlife was influenced by the Greeks. Their belief in any punishment only covered this world according to theplain meaning of the Torah text, and not the next world.

The source matters because providing it is in the terms of use for this forum. You're not supposed to make spurious claims.

Where do we find someone saying that the Sadducees believed in the afterlife?

semiopen · 05-24-2013, 05:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Scott

I think it is most likely that the writers of Genesis and Exodus were just re-writing the local mythologies, customizing them to fit their dogma-making the stories that the people of the area were familiar with fit into their religion.

That was obviously the case with the flood story. With it we have real evidence in the form of the Gilgamesh, written 1500 years before Genesis was written-the stories are nearly identical.

The Rabbis were not aware of Gilgamesh and it is not clear how Haredim respond to this. The author of Gilgamesh apparently had his work plagiarized by God.

The Flood of Noah and the Flood of Gilgamesh

This has a table in the back comparing similarities. I'd stop short of calling them identical.

My impression is that this was copied from a source as opposed to being some local campfire story.

Babylonian_law and Assyrian Law obviously influenced the bible.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/...4_0_03317.html

Quote:

The laws of the goring ox best demonstrate the difference between cuneiform law and the Book of the Covenant, for the biblical version (Ex. 21:28–32) is the only one that preserves an inherent religious evaluation. The sole concern of the corresponding cuneiform laws, LE 54–55 and LH 250–252, is economic; hence, the victim's family is compensated for its loss. The laws are not concerned with the liability of the ox. Only according to biblical law is the ox stoned, its flesh not to be eaten, and the execution of its owner demanded.

Sarpedon · 05-24-2013, 05:59 AM

Oh is that all you want? For us to lay out what we would consider proof of the Exodus? Is that all? Here it is:

A date, within a certain reasonable margin for error, typical for events of the era.
AND
Evidence of the Exodus in Egypt: Different Pharaohs clearly identified, (real names within the conventional chronology) evidence of large hebrew population, evidence of the plagues (via records, or a big collection male mummies all hastily prepared and stuffed in tombs together, economic downturn caused by the calamities and deaths, etc)
AND
Evidence of the wandering in the desert: Encampments etc, as described in recent posts.
AND
Evidence of the arrival and conquest of Caanaan. This obviously cannot be established without FIRST establishing a date, because as is pointed out, various cities claimed to have been conquered were abandoned at certain times. You must establish a date that links evidence in Egypt with evidence in Caanaan, because that is the crux of the issue. A local disturbance in Caanaan cannot be claimed as evidence of the Exodus, unless it happens at the proper time relative to disturbances in Egypt.

Good luck.

Sarpedon · 05-24-2013, 07:50 AM

And, as token of goodwill and fairness, I will give evidence of my position: That people can make up ridiculously false stories about the past, cloak them in the garb of religion, and have large numbers of people believe them without question, even though there is absolutely no archaelogical evidence to support them. The evidence of this I submit is:

Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

The Mormon belief system revolves around the idea that there was a vast civilization here in North America, which was visited by the resurrected Jesus. This civilization was later destroyed by the ancestors of the present Native Americans, and its writings were preserved and passed down to Smith himself.

Of course, there is absolutely no archaeological evidence to support this, yet is believed by many.

I submit that this story was obviously invented, and passed down as doctrine of faith. That many 'scholars' and theologians have written in defense of this, and that they are not stupid people, despite being wrong. That this is analogous to the situation of the Exodus and the Jews.

Tristan Scott · 05-24-2013, 08:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by semiopen

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Scott

I think it is most likely that the writers of Genesis and Exodus were just re-writing the local mythologies, customizing them to fit their dogma-making the stories that the people of the area were familiar with fit into their religion.

That was obviously the case with the flood story. With it we have real evidence in the form of the Gilgamesh, written 1500 years before Genesis was written-the stories are nearly identical.

The Rabbis were not aware of Gilgamesh and it is not clear how Haredim respond to this. The author of Gilgamesh apparently had his work plagiarized by God.

The Flood of Noah and the Flood of Gilgamesh

This has a table in the back comparing similarities. I'd stop short of calling them identical.

So would I. In fact I did.

Quote:

My impression is that this was copied from a source as opposed to being some local campfire story.

Both were probably true. Unless you think all Babylonians had a copy in their library. Maybe it was a best seller?

Instead of getting further into the weeds, it may be a good idea to discuss the point and that is that these stories were stories that the people in this region were familiar with and therefore were used in one form or another in the scripture as the religion evolved. I don't believe this was an over-night process. The Hebrew religion evolved over centuries.

semiopen · 05-24-2013, 08:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tristan Scott

Instead of getting further into the weeds, it may be a good idea to discuss the point and that is that these stories were stories that the people in this region were familiar with and therefore were used in one form or another in the scripture as the religion evolved. I don't believe this was an over-night process. The Hebrew religion evolved over centuries.

This is reasonable and the stance of many conservative Jewish scholars such as

Jacob_Milgrom

Quote:

Jacob Milgrom (1923–2010) was a prominent American Jewish Bible scholar and Conservative rabbi, best known for his comprehensive Torah commentaries and work on the Dead Sea Scrolls.[1]

Quote:

Jacob Milgrom spent most of his career at the University of California, Berkeley, where he headed the Department of Near Eastern Studies. He was known for his research on Biblical purity laws and considered the world's leading expert on Leviticus.[3]

After retiring in 1994, Milgrom and his wife Jo immigrated to Israel. He died in Jerusalem in June 2010.[4]

I learned something else in this thread: didn't know he died.

The idea is that they took the Canaanite stuff and discarded what they didn't like and in some cases made things different just on general principles.

He dates a lot of the Torah to mid first temple times, which seems dubious to me. On the other hand I'm not sure how his opinions are viewed by more radical scholars.

For example, he considers the bird sacrifices in Leviticus a later addition.

These discussions would be much more interesting without the craziness (for lack of a better term) of the "traditional" view. Do we really want to argue with someone who claims Moses wrote the Torah, when we are in the 21st century?

The issue of the source is very interesting, I suspect it had to be written. Maybe something from the Assyrians.

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05-24-2013, 05:27 AM	#203
Duvduv Veteran Member Join Date: Nov 2011 Location: USA Posts: 4,095	It wouldn't matter the source because you wouldn't accept it anyway. Their belief in the afterlife was influenced by the Greeks. Their belief in any punishment only covered this world according to theplain meaning of the Torah text, and not the next world.

05-24-2013, 05:59 AM	#207
Sarpedon Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Minnesota, the least controversial state in the le Posts: 8,446	Oh is that all you want? For us to lay out what we would consider proof of the Exodus? Is that all? Here it is: A date, within a certain reasonable margin for error, typical for events of the era. AND Evidence of the Exodus in Egypt: Different Pharaohs clearly identified, (real names within the conventional chronology) evidence of large hebrew population, evidence of the plagues (via records, or a big collection male mummies all hastily prepared and stuffed in tombs together, economic downturn caused by the calamities and deaths, etc) AND Evidence of the wandering in the desert: Encampments etc, as described in recent posts. AND Evidence of the arrival and conquest of Caanaan. This obviously cannot be established without FIRST establishing a date, because as is pointed out, various cities claimed to have been conquered were abandoned at certain times. You must establish a date that links evidence in Egypt with evidence in Caanaan, because that is the crux of the issue. A local disturbance in Caanaan cannot be claimed as evidence of the Exodus, unless it happens at the proper time relative to disturbances in Egypt. Good luck.

05-24-2013, 07:50 AM	#208
Sarpedon Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Minnesota, the least controversial state in the le Posts: 8,446	And, as token of goodwill and fairness, I will give evidence of my position: That people can make up ridiculously false stories about the past, cloak them in the garb of religion, and have large numbers of people believe them without question, even though there is absolutely no archaelogical evidence to support them. The evidence of this I submit is: Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The Mormon belief system revolves around the idea that there was a vast civilization here in North America, which was visited by the resurrected Jesus. This civilization was later destroyed by the ancestors of the present Native Americans, and its writings were preserved and passed down to Smith himself. Of course, there is absolutely no archaeological evidence to support this, yet is believed by many. I submit that this story was obviously invented, and passed down as doctrine of faith. That many 'scholars' and theologians have written in defense of this, and that they are not stupid people, despite being wrong. That this is analogous to the situation of the Exodus and the Jews.

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