Clivedurdle

Many moons ago for my 13th birthday in 1966 my father gave me Pears Cyclopaedia, which I still have.

At the beginning is a timeline of history, a few things hopefully have been changed in later editions, like it has life appearing two billion years ago and it has a line 1300 BC Israelite oppression (Ramases II).

We have with difficulty moved from a geocentric belief system, but I wonder if we are still stuck with an unconsious City of God centric belief system?

Jerusalem has not actually been that important - it has though in terms of beliefs, for example using up a huge proportion of resources in the middle ages.



It is interesting to note what in this world history time line does not appear, or appears very tangentially in the Bible. It is almost as if the Biblical writers deliberately rewrote history from their perspective...

3500 Sumerian civilisation flourishes.
2980 Memphis capital of Egypt
2850 Golden age of China (legendary)(Why is that word not used for biblical stuff?)
2700 Great pyramid
2200 Middle Minoan
1700 Hammurabi
1500 Phoenicia thriving
1450 Zenith of Minoan civilisation
1400 Ugarit culture at its Zenith. Cretan civilisation ends.
1300 BC Israelite oppression (Ramases II).
1023 Establishment of kingship in Israel (South).
1000 Jerusalem capital of Israel
961 Solomon begins temple at Jerusalem.
900 Probable period of Homer's epics.
850 Foundation of Carthage (traditional).
776 Olympiad
753 Foundation of Rome (Traditional)
750 Greek colonists in Southern Italy
683 Kingship abolished in Athens
594 Athenian constitution reformed by Solon
586 Jerusalem taken by Babylonians
508 Democratic constitution proclaimed in Athens
490 Marathon
480 Thermopylae. Salamis.
371 Leuctra.
333 Issus. Alexander defeats Darius .
326 Alexander conquers Punjab.
274 Asoka
264 Rome v Carthage
124 Chinese Grand College to train Civil Service officials.
49 Rubicon
4 Birth of Jesus Christ

"It ain't neccessarily so"

Quintana Roo

"It is almost as if the Biblical writers deliberately rewrote history from their perspective..."

That's pretty much a given. Have you ever read Asimov's Guide to the Bible (Old and New)? It's worth reading over and over, explains the Bible from a secular, historical perspective.

mens_sana

For some time, I have been under the impression that the biblical writers and redactors were concerned, not with world history, but with the actions and agents of YHWH as revealed in the life of Israel. So I'm not at all suprised at what they omitted from their essentially parochial account.

mountainman

-4 BCE Apollonius of Tyana

312 CE - THE TREATISE OF EUSEBIUS, THE SON OF PAMPHILUS, AGAINST THE LIFE OF APOLLONIUS OF TYANA WRITTEN BY PHILOSTRATUS, OCCASIONED BY THE PARALLEL DRAWN BY HIEROCLES BETWEEN HIM AND CHRIST.

Gamera

This assumes that there are histories written from some unbiased, disinterested perspective, which is nonsense.

All historiography, and especially historiography from antiquity, is biased and subject to political and other agendas. That's why they wrote history.

mountainman

The political climate is an all important factor in the assessment
of the literature generated under its sway. Most notably, at the
time the bible was first bound and published, the publications of
Porphyry -- perhaps the leading academic of Constantine's newly
subjugated eastern empire -- and (that Porphyrian) Arius -- were
being destroyed.

Clivedurdle

But this particular history makes some extraordinary claims - that it is not a parochial story but is about the relationships between the creator of the universe and his chosen people and describes the salvation of mankind via the intervention in history of his only begotten son (or whatever it is).(Does John 3 16 contradict later creeds?)

And because of these claims, how we think now - as evidenced by a common or garden encyclopedia - we do give this stuff too much attention and do not clearly state what was also going on. No one spends the time and energy discussing the meaning of sentences in Mills and Boon novels that we do on the texts of these books!

The Bible has an extremely partial and biased view of things, why are we still giving it the time of day?

Clivedurdle

Looking at the reviews of Asimov, it does look badly out of date - it accepts the existence of Moses for example and even the Jewish Encyclopedia questions that now! (Of course that entry may have been written by Finkelstein!)

Quintana Roo

Well sure, but many (like Earl Doherty) question whether or not Jesus really existed, no one will ever really know for sure.

Asimov wrote many historial works a long time ago, but most of his historical research has stood the test of time and peer review. Some of his scientific conclusions are now understood differently, but that's the nature of the scientific process.

Asimov, from the get go, goes through the passages of the Bible and equates them to the known histories and geography of the day. It's a pretty awesome piece of work really. Go to a library and just read the first few chapters. You'll be hooked!

gstafleu

I'm not sure how QR's statement assumes that there are (other) unbiased histories. But in any case, if there aren't then that just reinforces his point.

Gerard Stafleu