J-D

It is not ridiculous to ask somebody who makes an assertion to produce evidence for it.Older medical texts are known both from ancient Egypt and from ancient Mesopotamia.

storytime

What land did the Hebrews/Israelites claim they owned when moving into Egypt at the invitation of Joseph? The bible story says the Israelites didn't even know the name of their god until Moses declared to them, "my name is 'I Am'; tell them "I AM" hath sent thee.

In Genesis 15:18-21 Abraham is given land that doesn't belong to him, and ten peopled groups are listed within that land. Haran was the original owner but he died and this inheritance was left to Abraham. No Hebrews are listed, no Israelites, no Jews. These names would surface later in the story and claim rights as the one seed of promised blessing in Isaac. (Ishmael had already been blessed as a great nation and therefore needed no "promise".)

The Israelites go live in Egypt and over extend their welcome. Joseph has died and no one leader is left to protect the interest of Israelites. So the new guy in power wants change and an illegal immigration policy that expells the Israelites. The Israelites are angry because they like the freedom they had in Egypt. But the Pharoah said they gotta go because of the downturn in economic conditions. Egypt could no longer sustain its massive population and wasn't about to kick its own citizens out. So if the Israelites wanted to remain they must be enlisted as slaves. Hard labor was the ony employment around for the average Egyptian but the Israelites thought themselves above that sort of work. So Moses leads the Israelites into Sinai where he gives them commandments of law and establishes them as a nation of people. Then Moses trains his new army to kill and slaughter people in the land of Canaanites, an invasion for the purpose of taking land and obtaining the promise, for the promise could not be fulfilled without the Israelites slaughtering people and taking their land and calling it their own. And not all the tribes were able to take land for themselves and ended up sharing with another tribe.

semiopen

That is absolutely false about the rebbe, he was proclaimed the Messiah by many in Chabad. The latest I've heard is that group is now a minority (seeing that he has been seriously dead for some time) and I'm accepting this is true for the moment. The Moshiach movement continues to this day.

There continues to be advertisements for Moshiach (where they ask you to sign something to say you accept the Rebbe) in papers like the New York Times.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that you are not deliberately lying, there may also be a semantic issue (although my quote above seems clear). Many members of Chabad believed that the Rebbe was the Messiah even after he died (including Rabbis, of which I assume most of the adult male Lubavichers are). This at one time was probably a majority of Chabad members; now as the years have passed (and his deadness continues) this has probably become a minority. This was never a position on the official Chabad website, which may be the semantic string you may wish to cling to if you want to defend your view.

Many links can be brought up by Googling "rebbe moshiach." For example,

http://moshiachtalk.tripod.com/ras.html

http://www.yechihamelech.com/

http://rebbegod.blogspot.com/2006/01...vs-rambam.html

Rabbi David Berger is a noted Orthodox authority on this who has written on the subject.

The_Rebbe,_the_Messiah,_and_the_Scandal_of_Orthodo x_Indifference

FailedMessiah.com is a little extreme, but I find it interesting...

http://failedmessiah.typepad.com/fai...om/chabad.html

If we look at the history of Messianism, there is always the changes in calculating the date of his (or her I suppose) coming. Today they say 6000 on the Jewish calendar which has the advantage of not having happened yet. But how do we explain the previous thousands of years when the Jewish sages were not able to calculate the date properly. There is always the descent into sin (Jesus seemed to avoid this) even with the Rebbe whose followers are at least avoiding sexual degeneration (I guess that's a positive). And the messiah inevitably dies, which is usually a technical problem. The whole concept makes no sense.

DCHindley

Whaaa?

So, you're saying the Israelites never invaded "anyone else's lands" in their entire history?

By what twists of logic do you justify that? That God "gave" the land of Canaan to Abraham (or whatever) and that whenever the Israelites or Judahites invade any place within a vaguely defined area called Canaan they are only reclaiming what is theirs by divine right? Notice that the region he is promised is called "land of Canaan."

That is like saying white people never invaded American Indian occupied territory by using "manifest destiny" or by interpreting "invade" so as to exclude breaking of treaties and encroaching on land. Oh wait, that is "historical revisionism"!

DCH

Sheshbazzar

From another thread that IAJ abandoned;

(my reply, slightly revised and expanded for this thread)

Joseph Joseph, Joseph,
The name 'Jude', comes from יהודה _'Yĕhuwdah' in Hebrew which by the Greek linguistic conventions became Ἰούδας _'Ioudas' which our Modern English convention then renders as 'Jude'.

The name 'Mary' מרים _'Miryam' in Hebrew, in the Greek alphabet and linguistic conventions became 'Μαρία'_ 'Maria' which our Modern English convention then renders as 'Mary'.

The name 'Jesus' comes from יהושוע_ 'Yĕhowshuwa' in Hebrew, which in the Greek Alpabet and linguistic conventions became Ἰησοῦς'_ 'Iēsous', which our Modern English convention then renders as 'Jesus'.
(This same Ἰησοῦς'_'Iēsous' for 'Jesus/Joshua' rendering convention was employed by the Hebrew translators of The LXX, circa 300BCE and was evidently an approved of, accepted, and common form of that name as employed by the Greek speaking practitioners of the Jewish religion at that time)

Yĕhuwdah, Miryam, Yĕhowshuwa, Ya'akov', 'Ioudas' and 'Iēsous' were most certainly names empoyed by Greek speaking Jews, and are valid and very common 'Jewish' names of the NT times.

And of course, the Jews -never- used the name 'Joseph'
(ready to give up your name, 'Joseph'?)
The name 'Joseph' comes from the Hebrew יוסף _'Yowceph' in Hebrew, which in the Greek becomes 'Ἰωσήφ'_ 'Iōsēph' which our Modern English convention then renders as 'Joseph', Joe.
Your name, as spelled and pronounced, 'Joseph' is utterly foreign to the Hebrew language, although I can spell it in the Hebrew, it is meaningless in the Hebrew, unless 'corrected'.

As I recall, I have addressed you many times in these forums by the name יוסף, but it seemed that you could not read? nor understand? -anything- that I wrote in that manner?

You never replied to any issue that I raised, or to any question that I have ever asked of you while writing to you in the Hebrew.

You have previously admitted that you cannot read, write, or speak Hebrew, nor do you read, write, or speak Greek,
and, using a name arising in English convention as your own moniker certainly doesn't give you much of a basis to be insisting that the English speaking world use any other than those same Modern English conventional names that you yourself employ.
'Correct' the spelling of -your own name- first, חנף_ὑποκριτής

C_Mucius_Scaevola

I would agree with IAJ here. I think the Hebrews were an indigenous Canaanite group who took control of the land sometime in the couple of hundred years either side of the turn of the 1st millenium BCE.

Unfortunately for IAJ, if this is true, the Hebrews never invaded Canaan and the Exodus never happened. This is a blow to his reliance on Moses since [No Exodus=No Moses].

As for his grandiose claims for the scope and influence of Hebrew law in today's world: we've been over this kind of ground before. Suffice to say there's a shitload of laws in the tanakh that are nowhere to be found in the statute books of any truly modern state (dietary laws, worship admonitions and restrictions, among others) while the torah and other "scripture" contains no laws against such practices as slavery, and outdated statutes for crimes such as rape. Much of what became Hebrew law through the torah (lex talionis, laws against false witness, theft, etc), was published almost a millenium earlier in the Hammurabi Code, which doesn't help its cases for priority and uniqueness.

While the Hebrew state was in some ways advanced for its time (compared with cultures worldwide, though not necessarily those in the Middle east/Mediterranean area), IAJ would have us believe that it invented or discovered everything that is the basis of modern society and that no culture before or since has matched or bettered their achievements. My reaction to this attitude consists of two words, and one of them isn't off.

IAJ, you remind me of the islamists who call everything before Mohammed "Jahiliya", ignorance. You're so wrapped up in that tree you find so beautiful, that you can't even see that it's only one in a forest of trees, many of which grow taller and stronger than the one you so admire.

C_M_S

IamJoseph

T/u. Born, incepted in Cannan. What's it take to get a green card around here!?

IamJoseph

There were nine tribal groups in Canaan, of which one was the Hebrew tribe. A regional famine caused the Hebrew tribe to go down to Egypt - the nile never runs dry, invited their by Joseph the Vicar was became lodged there before the famine. After Jospeh's death, a new king and his preists enslaved the Jews. They returned to Canaan under Moses and Joshua - aka the Exodus.

There are 613 laws, all are contained only in the five books of Moses - the rest of the prophetic writings and psalms are not about laws. Of the 613, the ritual laws are specifically directed only to Jews, prefixed with 'unto you' - these act as a uniform of ID and relate to diet, attire and festival observances. Aside from these, there are the moral, ethical, judiciary, women's rights, animal rights laws, etc, etc. All the world's accepted laws are contained here - exclusively. In medevial Europe, they found these laws could not be set aside - actaully the church's fullfiled doctrine failed, and they are sometimes referred to as common law; most of Islam's laws come from here also. All the hebrews of Judea followed the ritual and non-ritual laws, and these are all active today, except only the laws which related to the temple. the world turns by the Torah laws - exclusively - amazing and pompous sounding no doubt - but also true and correct. You have not named a law from elsewhere accepted by the world at large?
I grant you it can appear that way that many firsts are deemed from the Hebrew, but there is a clear doctrine in the Tanach there is rightiousness and wisdom in all nations - I have not seen that majestic premise in any other scripture. That aside, although the Hebrew came late in the ancient scene, nonetheless today they are still a very old nation, while most of the other ancient nations are not around anymore. Except for India and China, maybe 1 or 2 others, most ancient nations are gone - ancient Egypt was not Arab, and today's Palesenians have no connection with ancient history. This makes it reasonable that many firsts and sources of premises will be pointed to the Hebrew. By first, means there are no records of ancent nations possessing the Hebrew laws and alphabetical writings. This makes the firsts premise in the Hebrew a natural historical effect.
Except that the Hebrew is not based on 'belief' but is backed by historical proof. Islamists say Moses was a Muslim, qualifying this 'by belief' - which is even more wrong: the Pre-islamic peoples never followed the Mosaic belief.

I find that these negations and villifications are not found in any other religion aside from the M/E ones, and that too specifically seen in the Gospels and the Quran - how can these accept any positives in the Hebrew, when they say Jews are born of the devil and/or the apes. If these two religions really followed the Hebrew - to give equal justice for stranger or inhabitant - billions of innocent lives would not have been destroyed -resultant because of their doctrine all others are disbelievers and thus also evil - and thus must also be destroyed. This is now so engrained into the dna of its followers - denial is to be anticipated.

wordy

That is my atheistic understanding of scripture too. It makes much sense reading it that way. I've had that view since 1983

think of the Samaritan anonymous woman talking with Jesus at the well of Sykar when he says that she has had 5 men and that the one she have now is not her man either.

she is symbol for the Samaritan people and the "men" is their 5 Lords they made stone for in the old tale of OT 2kings 17 something. They name the Lords there being twon gods for different Samaritans tribes and when the text was written they only had one god not totally same as the Jew god.

And the text wants them to consider a new interpretation making Jesus the new Lord.

Makes sense to me. All is about taking the old text and applying it to the time one lives in. Midrash but under another name. Forgotten which name.

It is not strictly Midrash cause that one is more about old laws applied to modern times.

IamJoseph

What if the entire report is based on fiction - aka belief; view; etc? Its not a hypothetical question: there is not a shred of evidence outside of the Gospels, while there is loads of evidence it is a fiction.

However, even allowing the story to be historical and true - it still does not make any sense. How did Judah betray - and what was his first loyalty? How would you act being a Judean Jew in that time? What would you expect from JC if you were a Jew in Judea - bow to Rome's emperor's image and say thanks? Why is this trial not recorded in any Roman archives - when numerous other trials are recorded? How would Jesus have survived Rome's decree of heresy if there was a trial - millions never did?