Doctor X

Originally posted by Doctor X

"Relevant" only to one who does not care about what the texts state. I think it significant that this individual argues that babies are "very selfish and even manipulative" such that it would Justify their mass-slaughter. How this Justify's the death of the unborn children I remain uncertain.

Apparantly a fetus can prove most obstreperous. . . .

Such delusions speak for themselves. Unfortunately, they are not justified by the text.

Non sequitur that does not respond to the point.

--J.D.

Ed

Actually there is strong evidence that Exodus and the rest of the Pentateuch were written by Moses. For example, the Deuteronomic Covenant matches very closely the Hittite Suzerainty Treaties of the second millenium B.C. Also there is evidence that the writer of Exodus was well acquainted with Egyptian geography and very little of Palestinean geography. He knew about Egyptian papyrus (Ex. 2:3), the character of the Nile bank, and was well acquainted with the sandy desert (Ex. 2:12). And I could go on and on.

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Ed: He just states from the perspective of his giving them bad laws because ultimately he is in total control of the situation. dx: Which means you conceed the YHWH demanded the sacrifices. The text is quite clear about "passing through the fire."

No, nowhere does He demand human sacrifices. He does demand the death of those that stand in the way of the settlement of the PL.

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Ed: One major reason DH is flawed is because it assumes what you are trying to prove, ie it assumes up front that supernaturalism is impossible. dx: Ipse dixit and wrong. The DH results from the observations of the texts. It has nothing to do about assumptions on the supernatural.

One of the early DH scholars Abraham Kuenen came out and admitted it: "So long as we attribute a part of Israel's religious life directly to God and allow supernatural or immediate revelation to intervene even in one instance..... It is only the assumption of natural development that takes account of all the phenomena."
He also said "the familiar intercourse of the divinity with patriarchs constitutes for me one of the determining considerations against the historical character of the narratives."

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Ed: And there are many other problems, such as the assumption that the divine names are just randomly used as signs of different authors, . . . dx: No, linguistically they follow the style of the text and the authors. Try again. I gather I can conclude that no supported alternative to the DH will offered. Should one wish to understand the DH, Friedman's introduction is quite clear.

No, the great Hebrew scholar Umberto Cassuto among others blew the divne Name theory out of the water.

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dx: Also: this gives a great overview of the polytheism. I particularly like the recognition: "Originally El was the supreme god for Israelites as he had always been for Canaanites. Even if one discounts the pronouncement of El in the Baal cycle,'The name of my son is Yaw'- the import of which is still being debated- one cannot ignore a passage in the Bible which shows Yahweh as subordinate to El. Deuteronomy 32:8 tells how when El Elyon, i.e., El the Most High, parcelled out the nations between his sons, Yahweh received Israel as his portion." (pp.131-132. "Yahweh and the Jerusalem Monarchy." Norman Cohn. Cosmos, Chaos and the World to Come, The Ancient Roots of Apocalyptic Faith. New Haven and London. Yale University Press. 1993)"

No, it is quite obvious from the context that El Elyon and YHWH are the same being and His sons are are humans not gods see below the phrase "sons of man":

Deu 32:6 "Do you thus repay the LORD, O foolish and unwise people? Is not He your Father who has bought you? He has made you and established you.
Deu 32:7 "Remember the days of old, Consider the years of all generations. Ask your father, and he will inform you, Your elders, and they will tell you.
Deu 32:8 "When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, When He separated the sons of man, He set the boundaries of the peoples According to the number of the sons of Israel.
Deu 32:9 "For the LORD'S portion is His people; Jacob is the allotment of His inheritance.

He is plainly referring to when he gave humans their places of habitation that he set aside the hebrews as his special people.

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Ed: Evidence that they are repeats of different authors? dx: Doublets and triplets of stories with characteristic linquistics and names do, indeed, point to multiauthorship--particularly when the doublets contradict one another.

While there are similarities among certain stories and some phrases are repeated, it is widely known that ancient writers did such things even when there is only one author. And there are no contradictions when understood using grammatico-historical hermeneutics.

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Ed: See above about Ezekiel. dx: Failed to appreciate the significance of the quote then and now. Try again.

Failed to appreciate the significance of my quote then and now. Try again.

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Ed: Evidence for your assertions about Deut.? dx: See Friedman for a concise discussion as previously noted.

See above about the author of the Pentatuech.

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Ed: If herem was ritual human sacrifice there would be mention of it in the ceremonial law with humans as one of the clean animals used for sacrifice but they are not. dx: It is depicted stereotypically in the OT stories. It also follows the Moabite inscription where Mesha does to Omri's Isael a ban under the direction of Chemosh. Ludemann's book referenced above is a good overview. The purpose of animal sacrifice is very different than the "consecration for destruction" of people ordered by YHWH in the passages listed above.

See my earlier post about herem above.

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Ed: Also if what you say is true then human bones would have been found in association with hebrew sacrifical altars in the 14th thru 11th century BC. But they have never been found that way. dx: Is actually not surprising since the practice did "die out" or stop. They have, however, found a very long-in-use "Tophet" in Carthage used up to the first century. The details are in Levenson.

But there is no archaeological evidence that it ever even STARTED on a widespread scale.

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Ed: And in Jeremiah prophecy is in poetic language and often phrases are repeated in poetic language so your assertion about that passage is pure unfounded long distance psychoanalysis. dx: Poetic ipse dixit and, again, wrong. Jeremiah's passage is not prophecy as demonstrated by reading it as quoted above.

Evidence?

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Ed: No, the burden of proof is on the positive assertion. dx: The evidence has been given along with references. You wish to rebut it, rebut the evidence and the references rather than make statement contradicted by both without contrary evidence.

see above.

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Ed: No, see verses 16-21 where God talks about His laws and how good they are. dx: Not the use of "were." Try again.

Non sequitor. Try again.

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Ed: Their suffering was not unjustified, all humans are sinners and deserve death. dx: Anyone who feels that a child deserves the extreme and extensive suffering has lost the right to claim the title of "gentleman." Apology can lead one to worship evil, apparently. Unfortunate.

What extreme and extensive suffering? A sword to the neck or heart causes very little suffering. Death is almost immediate.

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Ed: But by looking at how far off they were from God's Mosaic laws, they would eventually turn back to His laws. dx: As above, it was required under Exod 22:28-29 Ed: No, see above. dx: Unfortunately, per Exod 22:28-29, "yes."

The very same terms are used in I Samuel 1 and Samuel was not killed but placed in Temple service which is what the phrase means in that context.

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Ed: Child sacrifice was not prohibited at a later time in Israel's history, it was condemned under Moses, read Deut. 18:10. dx: Evidence cited above indicates otherwise. Ed: See above about contrary evidence. dx: You have offered none but misreads of the texts.

I am afraid that is the pot calling the kettle black. Try again.

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dx: Try again. Below is a good example of such misreads: Which explains why the god of Mesha can kill the Israelites? Again, ipse dixit and ignoring the texts does not make an argument. YHWH himself demands the herem and punishes those who fail to carry it out. You may declare all you want, but you cannot change the texts. Ed: See above about humans not being among clean animals for sacrifice. dx: Irrelevant to the requirements for the herem. YHWH personally demands the destruction and punishes those who fail to do it. Period. Read the cited passages. "Clean animals for sacrifice" is irrelevant.

See my earlier post about herem and its purpose.

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Ed: I want to know on what basis you think it is wrong. dx: Unjustifiable homicide, for I do not share the delusion that infants "deserve it" because they are "sinners" even if they disturb my sleep on airplanes. --J.D.

But why is unjustifiable homicide bad? Is homicide ever justified? If so why? Why does it need to be justified?

Jack the Bodiless

The Hebrews were a backward tribe surrounded by more advanced civilizations, from which they stole much of their mythology. If the author of Deuteronomy stole stuff from the Hittites, how would this be evidence of the existence of Moses?

And are you seriously arguing that the Hebrews wouldn't otherwise have known that a nearby nation consisted largely of sandy desert, or that they wrote on papyrus? Just how ignorant do you think they were?
Wrong, as previously noted. You have tossed aside the Bible (again).
Why bother to post a verse which disproves your position?

OF COURSE "sons of man" refers to humans! The verse makes it quite clear that those are the humans that are divided up by El, with the people of Jacob forming YHWH's share!
There IS archaeological evidence of human sacrifice among the Caananites.
More excuses for the worship of an evil deity. You still haven't explained why you have a problem with some evil (even to the extent of denying the Bible), but not this.
Samuel is a later book, written after the practise of child sacrifice was ended.

...And do you remember THIS?
This was obviously wrong, because the phrase DID mean human sacrifice when used in Numbers 31 (from Callahan: "The Hebrew word translated as a "heave offering" in the KJV is terumah, meaning specifically, a sacrificial offering").

So the phrase acquired two meanings, depending on the context.

Ed

See my post to Brighid early in this thread where I deal with the hardened heart topic.

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Deut 3:3-7 So YHWH our God gave into our hand Og also, the king of Bashan, and all his people; and we smote him until no survivor was left to him. And we took all his cities at that time--there was not a city which we did not take from them--sixty cities, the whole region of Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. All these were cities fortified with high walls, gates, and bars, besides very many unwalled villages. And we utterly destroyed them, as we did to Sihon the king of Heshbon, destroying every city, men, women, and children. But all the cattle and the spoil of the cities we took as our booty. dx: I am sure the interested can look up the other passages I listed previously. For some odd reason, YHWH is not terribly concerned with "humans not being among clean animals for sacrifice." Quod erat demonstratum ad nauseum. . . . --J.D.

Because this not human sacrifice, it is the herem which is the utter destruction of the people preventing the acqusition of the PL and the day of reckoning for their sins.

Doctor X

Most unfortunate for him to remind the Readership that Bridgid kicked his ass on this topic.

By definition and by the texts, the herem is human sacrifice.

Blind denial does not change that.

--J.D.

Ed

No, because only God has the right to enforce capital punishment for sin, humans do not except for the short period during the acquistion by the hebrew theocracy of the promised land.

Ed

I looked at their website and did a search and there was no article that stated that the ancient hebrews engaged in human sacrifice.

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Ed: No, keep ignoring verses 16-21 and screaming "Na na na na, I am going to ignore the truth, I am going to ignore the truth.." dx: On the contrary the verse was discussed in the original post. That the individual does not like what it says remains his error. I would recommend, however, he does remove the fingers from his eyes and cease the screaming.

I would hardly call saying "Not the were", a discussion! My statement about these prior verses' relationship to the later verses stands unrefuted.

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Ed: Polytheism is irrelevant. In the above book Gordon drew upon parallels in ancient near eastern literature to show the complete inadequacy of using the divine names in the Pentateuch as a criterion for documentary analysis. . . . dx: Gordon does not address the DH in that book. Furthermore, it is not just a matter of "divine names," but doublets, contradictions between the doublets, specific writing styles, et cetera, which the individual would know about if he READ the references rather than just denied they exist.

Similar events sometimes happened to different patriarchs at different times, but that happens. I have had it happen to myself and others. If that is what you are referring to as doublets. And there are no contradictions. Oftentimes an author will use a different style when they are dealing with a different subject or perspective.

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dx: Now with this: Ed: Fraid so, it shows that the problem is probably anti-semitism on Friedman's part. dx: Charging a scholar . . . a celebrated and respected JEWISH scholar . . . with anti-semitism demonstrates the level that this individual must sink to maintain his delusions. Is that it? Does it come to that? That the individual has no sense of decency? No gentleman would make such an ignorant and cowardly baseless charge. Since I only deal with gentleman, I feel no further need to recognize the blatherings of this individual further.

I am just trying to show you how ridiculous long distance psychoanalysis can be, as he tried to do with Jeremiah. But also, many secular jews look down on and ridicule their more religious brethren, while it may not be technically antisemitism it is close, given that it could be argued that a secular jew is not really a jew.
And this condescension is what Friedman is doing to Jeremiah.

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dx: I will note with his feeble attempt at argumentum ad hominem the observation of Dr. Johnson: Your work is both original and good. Unfortunately that which is good is not original, and that which is original is not good. --J.D.

And here is my observation of you:

Your work is both original and true. Unfortunately that which is true is not original, and that which is original is not true.

Doctor X

Go to the section on the Journal of Biblical Literature, then go to Spring 2003, and you will be able to get a PDF of Collins' article. The other texts referenced also discuss the matter.

In fact, let me see if I can make this easy:

JBL-Spring-2003

You may think that, I could not possibly comment.

Is it Aaron or Moses?

Consider reviewing Friedman's works--particularly the new The Bible with Sources Revealed--for an explanation of doublets.

No, he is not. That is not Friedman discussing Jeremiah it is another, apparently, self-hating Jew--Jonathan Levenson. One should at least get the scholars he wishes to libel straight.

These charges are ridiculous argumentum ad hominem. If they continue I will recognize that there the person making them cannot debate the issues honestly.

--J.D.

greyline

To get back to the heart-hardening for a moment...

re. the phrase "Pharaoh's heart was hardened", which has been interpreted in two ways:

(1) Pharaoh's heart hardened

and

(2) Pharaoh's heart was hardened [by God]

I just wanted to find out if the reason why Ed and Brighid disagreed was simply the tense used? If that's the case, is it possible to figure out from the original text the correct translation? It certainly seems to me that if the intention of the author was that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, the wording used would have been (1), not (2).

greyline

How can Pygmies in Africa know the true God exists? (forgive my non-PC example, but it's the first thing I could think of - you know what I mean.)

I do like the "deserves their worship" bit - it's the point of this thread, I guess, in which some are pointing out why they believe he's not worthy of worship. Ed, would you be able to give me a reason why he deserves worship?



Some of "them" probably just read a few history books and came to the conclusion quite rationally.