Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Clivedurdle · 02-12-2007, 09:40 AM

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I was working on a list of other possible symbolic uses of place names in the NT,

Please post in any case!

Clivedurdle · 02-12-2007, 09:44 AM

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Elim (Bible)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Elim (Hebrew: אֵילִם) was one of the places where the Israelites camped following their Exodus from Egypt. It is referenced in Exodus 15 and 16 and Numbers 33.

According to Exodus and Numbers, Elim is located near the eastern shore of the Red Sea. It was possibly south of the Israelites' crossing point, and west of the Sin Wilderness. Exodus and Numbers both record that at Elim "there were twelve wells of water, and seventy date palms," and that the Israelites "camped there near the water."

The Book of Exodus also records that after leaving Elim, on the forty-fifth day since leaving Egypt, the Israelites headed to Mount Sinai through the Sin Wilderness.

Several ministries of mercy, Christian and otherwise, have adopted the name Elim.

Now, as it is agreed the exodus didn't happen is it not extremely suspicious that it should have 12 wells and 70 palms, except here be photos!

http://www.baseinstitute.org/photos_sinai.html

And don't start me on Mt Sinaii!!

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It is no secret that we here at The BASE Institute have formulated certain possible scenarios (e.g. the probable location of historical Mt. Sinai and the possible historical mountains of Noah), based on the testimony of the Bible, personal investigation, examination of evidence, and other factors.

Gamera · 02-12-2007, 01:08 PM

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Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

I haven't made any claims! I thought I was putting forward some interesting factoids for discussion - might there be theological and symbolic (political? diplomatic?) reasons for choosing the places Paul wrote to?

As I see it, this is definetely worth exploring further - and I don't get this gnostic is post xian stuff all the time. The idea of inner secrets, initiation etc is quite clear in Zarathustra, Plato and all over the place. Why did everyone continually consult so and so for knowledge? What is that Roman story about books of knowledge, what were these Greeks doing spending time in volcanic fumes?

What was Paul doing studying the scriptures and believing god had told him the answer is 42?

The problem, of course, is that what we know of Zorastrianism and Platonism is post-Christian, even if these movements were pre-Christian. And much of it passed through the hands of Christian scribes.

Clivedurdle · 02-12-2007, 01:39 PM

An awful lot of stuff is pre xian

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delphi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibyl

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The word sibyl comes (via Latin) from the Greek word sibylla, meaning prophetess. The earlier oracular seeresses known as the sibyls of antiquity, "who admittedly are known only through legend" (Burkert 1985 p 117) prophesied at certain holy sites, probably all of pre-Indo-European origin, under the divine influence of a deity, originally one of the chthonic earth-goddesses. Later in antiquity, sibyls wandered from place to place.

I would be extremely careful about place names.

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What are "thin places"? Places where two worlds meet.

Since the beginning of recorded history, scholars, peasants, artists, slaves and kings have been fascinated and drawn to places where the veil between this world and the "other world" is thin. Legends have been created and tales passed down through generations that describe adventures and encounters when the two worlds met and time stood still.

The Western European landscape is dappled with such places. Some, such as Glastonbury and the Giant's Causeway are familiar to most. But hidden in fields, forests, mountain villages and remote islands are thin places with a more subtle glow, like tiny pearls resting safely in the bosom of their mother country.... waiting to be discovered again and again.

http://www.thinplaces.net/

Gamera · 02-12-2007, 02:18 PM

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Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

An awful lot of stuff is pre xian

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delphi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibyl

I would be extremely careful about place names.

http://www.thinplaces.net/

There's no doubt these religions were prechristian, Clivedurdle. The problem is the texts we have purportedly by them or about them are post-christian.

We know virtually nothing about mystery religions, for instance, except what christian writers "preserved" or wrote about them. It is highly unlikely that what we know about these religions has much to do with what their practitioners thought about themselves. They simply left us few texts telling us, and those that are extant are in mss that are hundreds even a thousand years after the fact, opening up the distinct possibility of redaction, especially under the influence of christian scribes.

Much of what we deem "pagan" religion, is simply a 19th and 20th century retrojection of ideas we processed through later texts.

Clivedurdle · 02-12-2007, 03:40 PM

But my starting point is that we are likely to be retrojecting geography because defining place accurately on maps is an enlightenment idea (slightly earlier with the age of exploration and the contacts with the Chinese).

Before accurate mapmaking, place was defined in relation to the gods - holy places. I am sorry, there is more than enough evidence of this - stonehenge is placed astronomically for example.

Down the road from me is a street called Ley Street.

It is an assumption we are making that "letter to the Corinthians" has no theological meaning. I cannot see from the evidence that we can rule that out, it is not therefore worth asking what might the theological meaning be?

Clivedurdle · 02-12-2007, 03:49 PM

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When Rome demanded the dissolution of the Achaian League, Corinth, the leader, resisted and so Lucius Mummius, the Roman consul, leveled the city in 146 BCE, killed the men and sold the women and children into slavery. Some of the wealthier families escaped to the island of Delos. For the next 100 years, only a handful of squatters occupied the site. Julius Caesar refounded the city as a colony in 44 BCE, named it Colonia Laus Julia Corinthiensis and populated it with conscripted Italian, Greek, Syrian, Egyptian and Judean freed slaves. New Corinth, as Ancient Corinth, thrived.

"Within just a few years, new Corinth's settlers' enormously profitable commerce at this crossroads of the nations had brought thousands more eager settlers from all over the Mediterranean and enormous personal wealth to a local ruling class of self-made women and men." [Horsley and Silberman, The Message and the Kingdom,p. 163] The wealthy Greek families who had fled to Delos also returned.

He writes to a resurrected city?

http://www.abrock.com/Greece-Turkey/corinth.html

Casper · 02-12-2007, 03:59 PM

I don't think that is too far-fetched.

Consider the russian City Novgorod. Literally it means the new city. Nothing special.

And in American Folk and Gospel Music, we often refer to "crossing the river Jordan" as a phrase for overcoming hardships.

Gamera · 02-14-2007, 04:52 PM

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Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

He writes to a resurrected city?

http://www.abrock.com/Greece-Turkey/corinth.html

This is interesting. Lends credence to the Hebrew scriptures' claims of exile and return, which frankly I've always found unlikely.

Clivedurdle · 02-18-2007, 02:22 PM

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It will be interesting, later, to see how neatly John de-calendarizes (and de-maps) "Babylon"; and although the problem here is a much more tricky one, we will contend that such is precisely what he wants to do with "Jerusalem" as well. There is no good reason why it should be, and there is no evidence in the New Testament that it ever was the case, that the fate of the Christian church depends upon the fate of a particular plot of ground named Jerusalem. One of the striking things about New Testament Christianity, as over against the Old Testament Judaism out of which it was born, is the way it broke free from any geographical ties, from any theological focus on a particular land, city, culture, or people. And it is inconceivable that so totally Christian a thinker as John would move back to tie the outcome of his universal gospel to the fortunes of one particular human city. No, for John, "Jerusalem" identifies an idea rather than any specific place.

In this regard, it is probably deliberate that, although it obviously is Jerusalem John here has in mind, he nowhere explicitly names it as such. He calls it "the holy city" in Rev. 11:2; but in Rev. 11:8--in what would seem to be a conscious effort at "de-mapping"--he calls it "the great city that is prophetically called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified." Jerusalem, yes; but also a Jerusalem that has been freed of any physical, geographical limitations so that it can be located anywhere at any time. Just as Picasso's Guernica is, at one and the same time, both Guernica, Spain, 1937, and also any and every other place where war has wreaked its destruction, so John's Jerusalem is the home of the church, thus to be located wherever the church is located. This present scene can and does take place wherever "Jerusalem" happens to be at the time; and finally, as universal, eschatological event, it will happen when, where, and how God chooses to bring it about.

http://www.hccentral.com/eller7/part5.html

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02-12-2007, 03:40 PM	#26
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	But my starting point is that we are likely to be retrojecting geography because defining place accurately on maps is an enlightenment idea (slightly earlier with the age of exploration and the contacts with the Chinese). Before accurate mapmaking, place was defined in relation to the gods - holy places. I am sorry, there is more than enough evidence of this - stonehenge is placed astronomically for example. Down the road from me is a street called Ley Street. It is an assumption we are making that "letter to the Corinthians" has no theological meaning. I cannot see from the evidence that we can rule that out, it is not therefore worth asking what might the theological meaning be?

02-12-2007, 03:59 PM	#28
Casper Regular Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Texas Posts: 430	I don't think that is too far-fetched. Consider the russian City Novgorod. Literally it means the new city. Nothing special. And in American Folk and Gospel Music, we often refer to "crossing the river Jordan" as a phrase for overcoming hardships.

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