Banzaibee

Hmm, archaeology is the study of human behaviour through physical evidence. Is the bible physical evidence? No. Dubious semantics regarding "remnants" will not help you....

This is a plea type argument hiding a dubious assumption. The assumption is that potency is linked to existence. Take Khephri the Egyptian god who in the form of a Scarab beetle rolled the sun across the sky each day. Khephri does not exist, has never existed and will never exist. Yet for about 3000 years, Egyptians worshipped him in one form or another. A potent, non-existing god. You might argue that he "existed for the Egyptians", but then I could argue the fictional Jesus "existed for Christians".

Ok. Here goes. These documents are published after the fact, up to a generation or two afterwards. Furthermore there is no reliable verification from alternate sources. Therefore the safest course is to seek archaeological proof of these stories. Archaeologists have been doing this for as long as archaeology has existed (about 200 years, thanks Napoleon), and found nothing. What physical evidence we have had for the bible has been entirely faked. This includes bits of the true cross, milk of the virgin, several foreskins, a bunch of spears, fingernail clippings and a faked shroud.

Now, all I am saying is we cannot prove he existed, and it is a belief that he existed, for all concerned. Do you disagree with anything I have said?

This is not how archaeology operates. Archaeology operates by studying what is found. One reason I view biblical archaeology with scepticism is it begins with a book.

Heh, Sherlock was a drug addict who refused to study stars. Ok, amusing trick. Take your house. In 5000 years time what will be left of your house? Anything organic. Gone. Anything plastic. Gone. Anything metal, if it corrodes, gone, if it doesn't, mostly gone as other people recycle it. The thing that will be left, is your ceramic tea and coffee mugs. Now, apply Sherlock's “proof from elimination of all options” to a scenario where he is studying your house in 5000 years time. 99% of it is gone and he has your coffee mugs left to look at.

Would love to see what answer he got with "whatever is left, no matter how improbable, must be the truth". YES THE TEA CUPS DID IT!!!!!

Sorry, couldn't resist. :Cheeky:

badger3k

I agree. There is always the possibility that it will remain an unknown. "I don't know" wouldn't work for a fictional "World's Greatest Detective" (before Batman, of course ), but for the real world, it happens all the time.

badger3k

Well, most of the documents were written more than a generation or two (going by a 20-yr generation, hope I'm correct). Some of these documents that people cite are up to a few hundred years after. Even Paul's letters have been questioned as to the dates, but I can't comment on that, not having looked into it yet, so there may not even be anything written within a generation or two, only later.

Banzaibee

One last post before bed.

Hmm, fair points, “fluff” was a bit harsh.

I accept literary evidence is used as a guide in some areas. Some, not many. The simple fact is that the literary sources are mostly useless or missing. We have a colossal amount of archaeological data on farming, for which the literary texts are a bit iffy. Further, the amount of physical data is growing exponentially, whilst the amount of literary data is pretty constant in comparison (although I fantasise about Herculaneum having an intact library). Also, the two most important areas of archaeology have nothing to do with texts. Why we started farming/why we stopped being nomadic. I agree with most of your post, that in order to progress, we go with what we can get, but I am still worried about it.

I will snip this bit....

Literary Critical theory is my pet hate. Ouch, I am hurt. However, the point of my post was to outline a problem that you cannot escape from; the lack of evidence has serious implications regarding our ability to understand what the hell was going on.

To illustrate why this is a problem, a bunch of archaeologists studied a site of nomadic Native American tribe had lived on a month earlier. Just a month. The archaeologists excavated and did every test in the book, then they interviewed the tribe about their conclusions. They got most of it wrong. The problem I have with discussions like this is not post-modernist bollocks, it is the words “getting it wrong”.

-------------------------
Thanks Badger, messed up with generations regarding bible, it isn't my area, so I am liable to make muppet like mistakes.
-------------------------
edit : changed "a" to "of"

gurugeorge

I once caught myself actually physically drooling when daydreaming about the possibilities of that. I do hope they manage to get the funds together to rescue the big library.

No Robots

The figure in the NT is human, nothing like a "scarab-headed man."

Umm, the only reason we know the name of Troy is because of a book.

Banzaibee

Nothing?
Matthew 4:16 "The people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned."
Matthew 17:2 "His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light".
John 12:46 "I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness".
Ephesians 5:14 "Christ will shine on you".

Couldn't resist, sorry. Further, how about the Hawk headed god, Horus? Son of Osiris and Isis? Or Osiris himself, who is usually depicted as a green mummy? Do they likewise share absolutely nothing in common with Jesus? Look before you leap .

Misrepresented argument :banghead:. What worries me is archaeology that uses a book as it's starting point and main terms of reference, and source of potential answers. Now, most biblical archaeology is nothing like that, but there has been plenty of bad archaeology done this way, sadly. Further by far the greatest amount of archaeology has no literary reference, so the names are nice, but we have to cope without them most of the time.

aa5874

Achilles was depicted as the son of a human and a goddess.

Jesus was depicted as a God with a human body who could riase from the dead and go through clouds, perhaps like "hot air.

Solitary Man

And...

And there's a mountain on Mars that has an uncanny resemblance to a human face...at one angle. What's the point? The commonalities are superficial, and the differences are far more profound.

That type of archaeology has been roundly rejected by mainstream Near East archaeologists today. But it's not a misrepresentation. As an archaeologist, you should know to what extant Schliemann used the Trojan epic - oh come on, Mask of Agamemnon? Are you kidding me?

And that kind has been roundly rejected by the establishment.

Very true. But when you have names, it's also possible to see it line up with what we have in the record. There's nothing wrong with that. We have literary records for Ur, none of Catal Hoyuk. It doesn't change anything, except with literary records, we have the added possibility of knowing more.

Solitary Man

I never thought we could escape this. I recognize the extreme disability we have in knowing what happened.