DrJim

Spin has raised the question of reliablity of the common perception of the Chronicler's use of Samuel and Kings as a source material. Spin holds there seems to be evidence of both Sam-Kings and Chr. developing independently from a common source, baing himself on Josephus' retelling of monarchic history, among other reasons.

As I noted in an earlier post, Graeme Auld of the U. of Edinburgh has argued for a similar conclusion to Spin on albeit completely different grounds. His main theory was outlined in his book "Kings without Privelege (T and T Clark, now part of Continuum International).

Those interested in the question will have to wait for Spin to get the time and inclination to lay out all his evidence.

Auld, however, has contributed a chapter to a book produced under the auspices of the journal Biblical Interpretation. It is available online for free (I think I've mentioned it before).

http://zerlina.ingentaselect.com/vl=...569/contp1.htm

The volume is entitled, "Virtual History and the Bible" which explores a lot of "what if" scenarios. Auld writes on "What if the Chronicler did Use the Deuteronomistic History".

On the link above, scroll down to volume 8: 1/2. You will be able to read the whole book. Lots of neat stuff.

As far as Auld's thesis goes, it will take an awful lot of detailed discussion to test it. It has been ruled out by a lot of folk, but as I remember it, htere is more substance to it than first meets the eye. Anyway, I don't have a copy of "Kings without Privilege" myself, and its been ages since I read it, so I'm not really qualified to attack or defend it in any detail.

Anyway, I hope you have some fun with "virtual history".

SOME of the TOC:
'ISRAEL IS LAID WASTE; HIS SEED IS NO MORE': WHAT IF MERNEPTAH'S SCRIBES WERE TELLING THE TRUTH?
Keith W. Whitelam

ADDE PRAEPUTIUM PRAEPUTIO MAGNUS ACERVUS ERIT: IF THE EXODUS AND CONQUEST HAD REALLY HAPPENED
Lester L. Grabbe

WHAT IF WE HAD NO ACCOUNTS OF SENNACHERIB'S THIRD CAMPAIGN OR THE PALACE RELIEFS DEPICTING HIS CAPTURE OF LACHISH? Diana Edelman

IF THE LORD'S ANOINTED HAD LIVED Philip R. Davies

It might be fun to do some virtual history here too to think through some issues: like, What would history be like if David did have an empire? I'm just being naughty, sorry.

I don't mean to hijack this thread, so, back to the regular programming...

JRL

Celsus

And, as we shall see, we see archaeologists doing the same sort of thing about the Bible.
Not necessarily. I don't think an in-joke can be read into such a thing. Rather, the people who did see the ruin genuinely thought that that ruin was the work of their forebears. Having no name for Ai other than Ai, they wrote the story in the same way as Jericho and the rest (with a slightly different twist).
Or in the 6th, or it could have represented the demographic circumstances of a Hellenistic writer who had a really old history, travelogue, or map. Remember, ancient "histories" also included ancient geographies--Manetho and Herodotus both give detailed descriptions of Egypt's geography in their "histories" and any sort of description of Israel may well have done the same (More stuff thought up in the last 5 minutes... er, the Manetho/Herodotus bit is true). In fact, if one looks at Manetho, you get a very good idea of how an ancient historiographer may have worked. Things that we say about Manetho are barely permitted in biblical scholarship. I will try and do a comparison between him and our biblical authors one day (and what scholars say about each). It is extraordinarily revealing (I'll explain Finkelstein proper below).
As I've said before, the errors are less, but by the time we get to the bits of Kings prior to the exile, we are very near my proposed date of authorship (at least in its original form), so I'm not surprised if there are records available. Baruch Halpern wrote what almost is an apologetic called The First Historians. You may like to get your hands on that. I believe that this idea of Israelite historians is another myth of biblical scholarship and retrojecting modern methodologies into the hands of the ancients. So what, if there starts to be some corroboration? It doesn't give us anything more than a lower date, and the stories are still fanciful.

An obvious point is that if one reads the Deuteronomy-Kings portion as a single text (which many scholars do), it ends at the exile, and therefore can date to no earlier than the 6th century. When one reads Genesis-Numbers, to what degree does it presuppose Deut-Kings? That's the start of the investigation. The problem with archaeologists reading the Bible is that Halpern, Finkelstein, Dever, etc. all pick and choose from the Bible wherever it suits them. They find a correlation with one of their theories, and immediately declare the Bible to date to that period so that they can bring that period to life with much more detail.
What do you think of the theory that so-called "E" elements seem to reflect the concerns of traditions in Beersheba and the Negev?
I would say the lack of political centralisation, the fact that Palestine was always the stomping grounds of Middle Eastern powerhouses, the high diversity of religious beliefs and polytheism, the nonexistence of the Hebrew language (in its biblical form), the nonbelief of the first truly Israelite dynasty (Omrides), and so on. Is that enough to give reasonable doubt?
Really? Is David's joining the Philistines as a mercenary, or slaughtering of Uzziah "legendary"? There isn't any supernatural elements to that. Or what about Abraham's trickery with Abimelech (or was it Pharoah? ) What's so legendary about that? What about the sacrifice to Chemosh (2 Kings 3)? What about the Elijah/Elisha cycles? Aren't those legendary? Perhaps all this has something to do with the annalistic nature of Kings?
See above. Finkelstein's work bases itself on names of towns. What can we confidently know about the towns in the Iron II? Not a lot. So the demographical situation is quite sketchy, and Finkelstein is asking for too much out of his data, and his correlation with the Bible is not as strong as you may think. The key point is: it does not necessitate placing the Bible in that period (lest I be accused of special pleading). That is all. I recognise that my theories are conjectural and not completely supportable, and Finkelstein should recognise likewise.

Joel

Amlodhi

Hi Celsus,

Of course I agree, no theory regarding the sources is, at this point, completely supportable.

Just wanted to make a note here to thank you, spin, Doc X, etal., for your collective input on this matter. I have some additional selected reading (including Van Seters) I want to digest, and then, with your indulgence, perhaps I will impose on you again.

Thanks,

Amlodhi