Loomis

Psalm 14 and Psalm 53 are the same psalm except Psalm 14 is attributed to Yahweh. This is proof that editors tweaked things by substituting the word ‘Yahweh’ for El(ohim).

And Genesis 14:22 is proof that editors tweaked things by inserting the word ‘Yahweh’ where it never was originally. (It’s not in the LXX, the Peshita, or the Genesis Apocraphon.)

With all this ‘glossing’ it is hard for me to understand why Friedman wants to emphasize that the name of God in the Bible is Yahweh and that the God of Israel was Yahweh. It just seems stupid and irresponsible. After all, the subject of his book is Who wrote the Bible, not Who was the guy who tweaked things and inserted the word Yahweh everywhere.

Loomis

See what I mean?

If we are genuinely interested in the author’s original story then that fact that Yahweh’s name supplanted Gilligan’s is of little consequence. Arguing that Gilligan and Yahweh are the same god doesn’t get us anywhere. It was not Yahweh’s Isle when the author wrote it.

So one more time …

Why in the hell is Dr. Richard Elliott Friedman (well respected among his peers) saying irresponsible shit like the name of God in the Bible is Yahweh and the God of Israel was Yahweh?

How is that going to get his readers warmed up to facts surrounding the subject of who actually wrote the Bible? It’s just going to confuse them and point them in the wrong direction. Isn’t it?

Loomis

Except that the Masoretes were still absorbing El into Yahweh sometime between 500 CE and 800 CE.

And except that the substitution of the words ‘God’ and ‘LORD’ are further refinements that obfuscate El and Yahweh.

And except that in 2006 there are still millions of Mormons who believe that El and Yahweh are two distinct gods.

And except that the author of Isaiah 40 – 45 appears to understand the difference between the El creation story and the Yahweh creation story.

And except that Psalm 82 demonstrates that ‘Yahweh’ was not a necessary ingredient in the move toward monotheism.

And except that ‘the early biblical texts’ have very little to do with Yahweh …

Except for all those things – I think you might have a very good point. :thumbs:

I think I asked this once before: Do you think that the guy who wrote the Oracles of Balaam was ever even exposed to the word ‘Yahweh’?

What "God of Israel" was he writing about?

El or el?

Steven Avery

Its impressive to site the Genesis Apocryphon for this "proof" comparison. However, since the verse is not in the manuscript at all, it is also quite misleading.
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/humm/Resou...Txts/1Q20.html

I was trying to figure out where you got this claim from, to correct them, all I found was one morman site.
http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?id=6&table=transcripts

The only clear 'glossing' is seeing "proof" of such a theory on minimal evidence, especially the throwing in the DSS, which simply gives no evidence either way.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Anat

I don't think the motivation of the Masoretes was the same as the motivation of the earlier redactors. While early redactors had been working in a culture that considered El and YHWH to be different deities and were promoting the idea of uniting them into a single deity, at later times Elohim and YHWH were perceived as 2 names representing different aspects of the same deity - one supposedly represented the measure of justice and the other the measure of mercy. So I wouldn't be surprised to see texts being tweaked to conform to this ideology even by people who had n memory of the two ever being separate entities.

mens_sana

It may be that Friedman is stuck with that position. YHWH has been the "official" God of Israel for centuries — and there were very, very few 20th century academics who disputed this, not even Frank Moore Cross who saw YHWH, coming out the South and absorbing El. It is only in the last 10 years or so, with Kuntillet Arjud, Khirbet El-Qôm, Beit Lei and several studies of the Taanach cult stand that anyone has been able to conceive of El and Baal as continuing into the late monarchy. William Dever has a popularly written book on this, Did God Have a Wife? (2005) and he refers admiringly to Ziony Zevit's The Religions of Ancient Israel(2001), which is far more detailed.

Loomis

Damn. That sounds so good I’d love to agree with you. It certainly makes sense – and you’re making a good point: If the Documentary Hypothesis dictates that we pretend that The name of God in the Bible is Yahweh then maybe we should set it aside.

BUT WAIT! I JUST REMEMBERED SOMETHING!

In one of his other books (either The Bible with Sources Revealed or The Hidden Book in the Bible) he draws from the MT reading of Deuteronomy 32:8 (with “Children of Israel�).

Maybe I’m weird – but to me that is an unforgivable sin and sets a red flag:

Friedman is clueless! Friedman is clueless!

I guess I shouldn’t be so critical of him. After all, we all make mistakes, and we all learn.

mens_sana

That Friedman speaks such of YHWH does not mean he is clueless. YHWH was the only one after the Exile, after Ezra, the "last" redactor. And the status of YHWH vs El, Baal, et al., has little to do with the Documentary Hypothesis — which is about historical sources, in which deities are only incidental. The Hypothesis has been overstated by its most ardent proponents. After you line up the doublets and triplets, compare word forms and deity names, examine the language in terms of linguistic development, etc., there is still a lot of text that is unassigned. The ardent proponent goes ahead anyway and assigns the text to the designated sources based on what is assumed to have been the interest of the original authors — and this is where the "overstatement" occurs. Later critical approaches, while not based on the DH alone, incorporate much of the DH. Multidisciplinary approaches can be quite fascinating, while one approach, by itself, is like the DH by itself: flawed. Out of the DH grew Form Criticism, Tradition-Historical Criticism, Redaction Criticism, and eventually Social-Scientific Criticism and Canonical Criticism.

rob117

True. I'm sure that it varied locally as well. Also, mono-Yahwism doesn't seem to have been the "official" Israelite religion until the time of Hezekiah- J and E (which are probably pre-Hezekiah) were probably written by reformist priests trying to influence the people and the monarchy. Before Hezekiah, the official religion was probably something like this:

Yahweh (identified with El) at the top.
Asherah as his consort.
Subordinate worship of other deities.

The situation in Moab seems to have been similar:

Chemosh (identified with El) at the top.
Ashtar-Chemosh (mentioned in the Mesha stele) as his consort.
Subordinate worship of other deities.

IMO, the Mesha inscription and the Dan stele (which puts Baal-Hadad at the top) seems to indicate that centralization around a single deity (without necessarily ignoring all the others) was happining throughout the Levant at this time, with the deity varying from kingdom to kingdom. Israelite monolotry, and then monotheism, were just taking this general trend one step farther.

Steven Avery

Having already noted the misreference to the Genesis Apocryphon on Genesis 14:22 (awaiting acknowledgement/correction), I have a question here.

Precisely what are the textual evidences of this 'absorbing'. Since we have the DSS of a lot of the Pentateuch from way before the period mentioned, as well as the Peshitta and Vulgate from an earlier time than mentioned above, it should be rather easy to give a few examples that could be checked with the texts. Could you give a list of at least a few verses which had an "El" morphed into a Tetragrammaton demonstrable by text differences ?

Thanks.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic