Freethought & Rationalism Archive

beastmaster · 11-06-2003, 08:02 PM

What's the significance of the 17th day of the second month to the Jews?

Compare Genesis 7:11:

Quote:

In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

with Jubilees 3:17-18:

Quote:

And after the completion of the seven years, which he had completed there [in the garden of Eden], seven years exactly, and in the second month, on the seventeenth day (of the month), the serpent came and approached the woman, and the serpent said to the woman, 'Hath God commanded you, saying, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?'

Obviously the commencement of the Great Flood and the Fall were the greatest disasters in Jewish legend -- interesting that two different sources have both beginning on the same day of the year. Especially a day so seemingly arbitrary.

Is there some numerological or mystical significance to that day? Is it like Friday the 13th or something?

Am I missing something obvious?

beastmaster · 11-07-2003, 11:20 AM

Apparently, some scholars have commented on a possible connection between the seventeenth day of the month as seen in Genesis and the Osiris myth:

Quote:

In Egyptian religious belief Osiris was drowned �on the seventeenth day of the month Athyr.� Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, ch. 13; cf. also ch. 42. [The coincidence of the Biblical date of the beginning of the Deluge with the date of Osiris� disappearance, or drowning, was noted by the eighteenth-century scholar Jacob Bryant, who claimed, in addition, that in both accounts the month was the second after the autumn equinox (A New System or An Analysis of Ancient Mythology, second edition [London, 1775], p. 334. Bryant also believed that �in this history of Osiris we have a memorial of the Patriarch and the Deluge� (ibid., p. 334, n. 76). The identity of the two dates has been noted by several other authors, among them George St. Clair. See his Creation Records Discovered in Egypt (London, 1898), p. 437. On the significance of the date seventeen in Egypt, cf. Griffiths, Plutarch�s De Iside et Osiride, p. 312. Cf. H. E. Winlock, �Origin of the Ancient Egyptian Calendar,� Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 83 (1940), p. 456 n.: �Throughout Coptic and Arab times at least, the night of June seventeenth was celebrated as �the night of the Drop� when it was believed that a miraculous drop fell into the Nile, causing it to rise.� ].

Here's the relevant quotations from Plutarch:

Quote:

13 ... They say also that the date on which this deed [i.e., trapping Osiris in the sarcophagus] was done was the seventeenth day of Athyr [footnote: November 13], when the sun passes through Scorpion, and in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Osiris; but some say that these are the years of his life and not of his reign.

Quote:

42 The Egyptians have a legend that the end of Osiris's life came on the seventeenth of the month, on which day it is quite evident to the eye that the period of the full moon is over. Because of this the Pythagoreans call this day "the Barrier," and utterly abominate this number. For the number seventeen, coming in between the square sixteen and the oblong rectangle eighteen, was, as it happens, are the only plane figures that have their perimeters equal their areas, bars them off from each other and disjoins them, and breaks up the ratio of eight to eight and an eighth by its division into unequal intervals.

CJD · 11-07-2003, 12:23 PM

If the two texts in question shared closer proximity, I would be more inclined to see a relationship. Precise dates, which are unique in Genesis and other portions of the canon are usually reserved for kings. Use of precision here invests the story with importance and credibility. Note that Israel used two different calendars: one began in fall, while the other began in the spring. Which is in use here scholars have no idea.

If this unusually precise chronology is indeed informed by the 364-day calendar used in Jubilees, then the clear intent was to connect the Flood event with the Creation event (something the Genesis narrative already does throughout): Creation and Re-Creation. Strap yourselves in; the following events and [computed] dates come from Wenham Genesis 1�15, p. 100:

1. Announcements of the Flood: (7:4) 10.2.600, Sunday

2. Flood begins: (7:11), 17.2.600, Sunday

3. Flood last forty days and ends: (7:12) 27.3.600, Friday

4. Waters Triumph: (8:4) 17.7.600, Friday

5. Mountaintops appear: (8:5) 1.10.600, Wednesday

6. Raven sent out: (8:6�7) 10.11.600, Sunday

7. Dove's second flight: (8:10) 24.11.600, Sunday

8. Dove's third flight: (8:12) 1.12.600, Sunday

9. Waters dry up: (8:13) 1.1.601, Wednesday

10. Noah leaves ark: (8:14�18) 27.2.601, Wednesday

Keeping Jubilees in mind, we see that the Flood begins to 'corrupt' the creation on a Sunday, the very day that creation began, and ends its work triumphantly on Friday, the day creation was finished. However, just as striking from this hypothesis, the acts of re-creation occur on Sunday and Wednesday, the days that began the two triads in the first week of creation (i.e., Days 1 and 4).

Other than this, I am unaware if anything of significance regarding the actual seventeenth of the month remains.

Regards,

CJD

offa · 11-07-2003, 01:59 PM

Offa,

Using the Jubilee system the 17th day of the second month is
Thursday, May 5. New Year's Day was the 1st of Nissan which is our Sunday, March 20. Add 285 days or the equivalent of the pregnancy cycle and the infant is born on February 14th (Valentine's Day).

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

11-07-2003, 12:23 PM	#3
CJD Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: greater Orlando area Posts: 832	If the two texts in question shared closer proximity, I would be more inclined to see a relationship. Precise dates, which are unique in Genesis and other portions of the canon are usually reserved for kings. Use of precision here invests the story with importance and credibility. Note that Israel used two different calendars: one began in fall, while the other began in the spring. Which is in use here scholars have no idea. If this unusually precise chronology is indeed informed by the 364-day calendar used in Jubilees, then the clear intent was to connect the Flood event with the Creation event (something the Genesis narrative already does throughout): Creation and Re-Creation. Strap yourselves in; the following events and [computed] dates come from Wenham Genesis 1�15, p. 100: 1. Announcements of the Flood: (7:4) 10.2.600, Sunday 2. Flood begins: (7:11), 17.2.600, Sunday 3. Flood last forty days and ends: (7:12) 27.3.600, Friday 4. Waters Triumph: (8:4) 17.7.600, Friday 5. Mountaintops appear: (8:5) 1.10.600, Wednesday 6. Raven sent out: (8:6�7) 10.11.600, Sunday 7. Dove's second flight: (8:10) 24.11.600, Sunday 8. Dove's third flight: (8:12) 1.12.600, Sunday 9. Waters dry up: (8:13) 1.1.601, Wednesday 10. Noah leaves ark: (8:14�18) 27.2.601, Wednesday Keeping Jubilees in mind, we see that the Flood begins to 'corrupt' the creation on a Sunday, the very day that creation began, and ends its work triumphantly on Friday, the day creation was finished. However, just as striking from this hypothesis, the acts of re-creation occur on Sunday and Wednesday, the days that began the two triads in the first week of creation (i.e., Days 1 and 4). Other than this, I am unaware if anything of significance regarding the actual seventeenth of the month remains. Regards, CJD

11-07-2003, 01:59 PM	#4
offa Regular Member Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: Monroeville, Ohio, USA Posts: 440	Offa, Using the Jubilee system the 17th day of the second month is Thursday, May 5. New Year's Day was the 1st of Nissan which is our Sunday, March 20. Add 285 days or the equivalent of the pregnancy cycle and the infant is born on February 14th (Valentine's Day).

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.