Clivedurdle

Is that right?

The Evil One

It's unlikely the stories were deliberately made up by particular individuals at the behest of some leader. It's more lilkely that they are folklore that developed over a great deal of time, with no one person responsible for them.

Magdlyn

I agree, all the ancient storeis of the Torah were folk tales of heroes. The long long life spans are a clue.

King Josiah's scribe "just happened" to find a copy of Torah in a dusty corner of the Temple? Seems so very suspicious to me.

Clivedurdle

But don't folk tales - Arthur, Robin Hood, have some basis in reality?

Why isn't it all fiction made up by Josiah's scribes?

Baidarka

It ain't necessarily so (Gershwin)
Sportin' Life:
It ain't necessarily so,

All:
It ain't necessarily so.

Sportin' Life:
De t'ings dat yo li'ble
To read in de Bible -
It ain't necessarily so.

Li'l' David was small, but oh my!

All:
Li'l' David was small, but oh my!

Sportin' Life:
He fought Big Goliath
Who lay down and dieth -
Li'l' David was small, but oh my!
Wadoo!

Ensemble:
Wadoo!

Sportin' Life:
Zim bam boddle-oo!

Ensemble:
Zim bam boddle-oo!

Sportin' Life:
Hoodle ah da waah da!

Ensemble:
Hoodle ah da waah da!

Sportin' Life:
Scatty way!

Ensemble:
Scatty wah!

Sportin' Life:
Yeah!
Oh Jonah, he lived in de whale

All:
Oh Jonah, he lived in de whale.

Sportin' Life:
Fo' he made his home in
Dat fish's abdomen -
Oh Jonah, he lived in de whale.

L'il' Moses was found in a stream

All:
L'il' Moses was found in a stream

Sportin' Life:
He floated on water
'Till Ole' Pharaoh's daughter
She fished him, she says from dat stream.

Wadoo!

Ensemble:
Wadoo!

Sportin' Life:
Zim bam boddle-oo!

Ensemble:
Zim bam boddle-oo!

Sportin' Life:
Hoodle ah da waah da!

Ensemble:
Hoodle ah da waah da!

Sportin' Life:
Scatty way!

Ensemble:
Scatty wah!

Sportin' Life:
Yeah!
It ain't necessarily so

All:
It ain't necessarily so

Sportin' Life:
Dey tell all you chillun
De Debble's a villun
But 'tain't necessarily so.

To get into Hebbben
Don't snap fo' a sebben -
Live clean! Don' have no fault!
Oh, I takes dat gospel
Whenever it's pos'ple -
But wid a grain of salt!

Methus'lah lived nine hundred years,

All:
Methus'lah lived nine hundred years,

Sportin' Life:
But who calls dat livin'
When no gal'll give in
To no man what's nine hundred years?

I'm preachin' dis sermon to show
It ain't nessa, ain't nessa,
Ain't nessa, ain't nessa -

All:
It ain't necessarily so!

I posted this before but it's so damn good!

Asha'man

You should probably take a look at a book like The Bible Unearthed by Finkelstein and Silberman for a more thorough discussion of what archeology has and hasn't found.

However, here is my short summary (from my memory of this book):
The story of the patriarchs (Abraham, Jacob, etc) cannot be located in any particular date in history, most especially not in the 2nd millennia BCE as the story claims. The only clues to dating the story are clearly anachronistic, and all point towards an understanding of the world that existed sometime around the 7th or 8th century BCE.

The Exodus never happened. There is no evidence of a large population of Hebrews leaving Egypt, traversing the desert for 40 years, and then invading Canaan. (Evidence of people moving through the Sinai desert has been found, both before and after the time of the supposed exodus, but 2-3 million Hebrews left not a trace) The actual evidence points to a growth of the Hebrew culture as an extension of native Canaanites.

There was no conquest of Canaan by Joshua and company. Cities like Jericho may have been sacked at various periods in time, but not by Hebrew invaders coming out of Egypt. At the time of the infamous battle at the walls of Jericho, Jericho didn’t have walls.

There was almost certainly no unified kingdom under David and Solomon. The kingdoms of Israel and Judah started off on very different economic and cultural paths, and were never unified under a single government early in their history. Not a trace of the great wealth and buildings of Solomon has been found. There is one carved rock that appears to mention the “House of David,� but that does not clearly imply a kingdom, and it was carved several hundred years after David’s supposed reign.

However, as the Hebrew Bible begins to trace the kings of the separate kingdoms of Israel and Judah, we do begin to see a trace of actual history. There is clear evidence of king Omri, and his stables have been mistaken for Solomon’s. The Assyrians have a record of Omri, and the strength of his chariot army was worth commenting on. Later kings also begin to pop up in external history, showing that the Hebrew account is clearly presenting a biased view.

The vast majority of this history seems to have been codified around the time of Josiah, as you mentioned. There is a clear political and theological motivation for writing the history in the way it appears, providing a mandate for Judah to take over it’s neighboring Israel, as well as solidifying the control of the ‘Yahweh Only’ movement over rivaling cults.

The actual authorship is hard to establish clearly, but the evidence does point the finger at someone trying to support Josiah and his policies.

I would suspect that some elements of these stories existed in some form before that, but were assembled and crafted together around that time for political reasons.

Clivedurdle

I may have missed the plot, but if it really ain't neccesarily so, why is this kept so quiet? Talk about the Emperor having no clothes!

Asha'man

I wouldn't say that it's been kept quiet. Scientists and historians have known that much of the Hebrew Bible is simply fiction, like the story of Biblical creation and Noah's flood. But despite literal mountains of evidence on these issues, the ignorant sheep continue to believe what their priest tells them rather than their science teachers. They don’t want to know, and their faith acts like a blindfold to new information.

Earlier archeological studies did find evidence to support the bible, as long as you assumed that the bible must have been correct in the first place. Jericho showed evidence of being burned, so it must have been Joshua. A grand old building was found, so it must have been built by Solomon. It's only more recent studies, done in more depth and with a conscious attempt to avoid preconceptions and bias, that show how wrong the earlier studies were. Jericho was burned in the wrong century, and the grand old building was built by king Omri, not Solomon. It’s easy to see how an archeologist with biblical blinders could be misled.

Books like The Bible Unearthed are available on Amazon, and discussed widely around here. But the sheep have no interest in truth, only their comfortable little delusions, so they bury their heads in the sand and learn nothing.

Magdlyn

Biblical research/scholarship is one thing.

Sunday school chat is another.

Most people don't care to dig any deeper than the spoonfeeding once a week from the pulpit.

If that.

Most "Xtians," when asked, admit to never reading the bible. They say, it is too hard to understand.