Powerful questions to DEBUNK the flood of Noah's day

by Black Man 63 Replies latest jw friends

  • Leolaia
    Leolaia

    I'd not like to frame it that way, Recovery. I don't see myself as "refuting" the accuracy of "the Bible". A historian who critically examines what Berossus or Herodotus wrote does not aim to "refute" those ancient writers but rather assesses not just their accuracy but also their methods of composition, artfulness, ideological motives, and cultural context. There will be things that in objective examination will not be accurate, which might be invented or slanted, but that doesn't mean the book is itself refuted and can be dispensed with as an ancient source. All sources are slanted, inaccurate, etc. Ancient writers were not historians in the modern sense and they wrote from their own cultural point of view. Myth, folklore, and history were not carefully distinguished and narratives became better, more interesting stories through storytelling. A writer has the traditions at their disposal (which themselves draw on years of oral storytelling) and then crafts them in his or her own way in writing. I think the problem rather arises when as a religious text one demands that the stories are literally, unimpeachably true. Then the kind of normal literary examination of the text that one might do in the case of the Iliad or the Mahabharata becomes viewed as "attacking" or "trying to refute" the text. Rather, what is refuted in this instance, is the interpretation of the Flood myth that the Society (and YECs) proposes that makes historically and scientifically falsifiable claims. Then, yes, one could refute that. But the myth itself is ... a myth. I don't think it is without historical basis either. If you trace the history of the storytelling of this particular myth, from biblical to the Akkadian to the original Sumerian story, one could see that indeed the story likely preserves a memory of certain major floods that occurred in Mesopotamia in the Ubaid and Early Dynastic periods. But those memories have merged with certain folkloric archetypes that are not historical. But to take that ancient story, which was rooted in a very different cosmological and historical understanding of the world than we have now, and to take it as the basis for believing that it accurately relates a global flooding disaster in the recent past (bearing upon the scientific facts of the world as we currently understand them) is to stretch the story farther than it was intended to go.

    I have written a lot on the Bible and looking at it from a critical perspective, including matters pertaining to historical accuracy. For instance, I consider the book of Jonah as a satirical story with certain social aims (in other words, it's akin to a parable). It's actually very funny satire; it would totally miss the point of the story to insist on it as literal history.

  • hamsterbait
    hamsterbait

    The sheer quantitiy of Faeces produced every day in the ark would have required constant shovelling, up three storeys (unless the animals were on the upper deck(s) and food below) . Even so it would require shovelling all day and night. The eight people would be dead of exhaustion.

    The small ventilation windows around the upper deck would not only provide insufficient oxygen, but also inhibit the escape of methane from the faeces and rotting vegetation in storage. Maybe that is why Erich von Daniken suggests the Tsohar in the roof was an insulated light bulb as a naked flame would have caused a massive explosion that blew the ark to bits.

    If the ark sloped a little to one side all the animals and stores would slide to one side and cause it to tip over.

    Chinese records went back to before 2370 bc. When the Jesuit Missionaries told the Chinese about the flood and its alleged date they were greeted with mirth.

    An almighty omniscient god had been unable to inform the Chinese people that they had all been drowned, or to alter their tax, astronomical and harvest records to take account of the fact.

    HB

  • jam
    jam

    Hold on folks, in regards to the Grand Canyon the JW,s

    may on to something. Thier dates may be slightly off a

    tad. Geologists know that the canyon and the river had to

    have formed within the last, are you ready, 80 million years.

    Published in 2011 contends that this ancient northeast

    river system carved the Grand Canyon as early as 70 million

    years ago.

  • braincleaned
    braincleaned

    / Perhaps all of those diverse disciplines (the ones ending in -ics, -ing, and -ology) converging to destroy the Flood account mightexplain why JWs fear higher education, like a vampire fears the cross? //

    Hahaha! Good point. Science and knowledge is their boogey-man! :D

  • Darth Rutherford
    Darth Rutherford

    I love that they say the flood was so powerful that it carved out the Grand Canyon. Explain to me, then, how the Euphrates River (mentioned before the flood at Genesis 1:14) stayed intact?!

  • never a jw
    never a jw
    Note I did not want to calculate the exact total, because the extremely arduous task of accounting for the zero year is beyond my abilities.

    Funny! Unbelievable. A religion with 7 million members and billions in assets was founded by a man who couldn't perform basic Math

  • never a jw
    never a jw

    Leolaia,

    You and others in this site write as if you could have never been indoctrinated in the JW faith. You display erudition in your comments that makes it hard to believe that you could have ever been sold such conspicuosly fallacious argumentation as that of the WTS. Could I ask you for a very brief explanation of your background?

    By the way, thank you. I never fail to read closely any of your comments whenever I see them. They never disappoint. Actually, they are always great.

  • OnTheWayOut
    OnTheWayOut

    It's softball answers for a good JW. Watch how easy it is to relieve the cognitive dissonance:

    How do you reconcile 10,000 (or whatever the number is) years of Arctic ice core samples with the idea that 100% of the earth's surface was covered with liquid water a mere 4400 years ago?

    Arctic ice core samples are simply wrong. The ice goes way down, but their age guesses are guesses.

    How could Noah collect pairs of all animals and birds from all over the world, without the benefit of modern air transport/travel?

    Jehovah's spirit helped.

    Why did lifespans drop so dramatically after the flood?

    Mankind was perfect and connected with God's spirit when Adam started out. It's as if we were unplugged from God when Adam and Eve sinned, the same as a fan can be unplugged. The fan coasts for awhile but it runs out eventually. The further in time from being unplugged, the faster men slow down and die. (Don't try to say these answers don't work. They are JW answers. I know they don't work.)

    How were all the animals fed?

    Maybe they used baby (just weined) elephants. Plus, the animals were different. God changed them after the flood as Man was allowed to eat meat. They probably all mostly ate the same stuff. If Jehovah can provide manna every day, he could do similarly for Noah with animal chow.

    I can do the JW answers all day. I see it as a dead end with waking up many JW's.

  • dazed but not confused
    dazed but not confused

    marking...this is great

  • King Solomon
    King Solomon

    OTWO said:

    It's softball answers for a good JW.

    Yeah, "God Magic" (AKA miracles) covers the scientifically-impossible, used by slippery Xian literalists to get out of a logical equivalent of a Full Nelson. Hence why it's better to focus on the logical flip-flops, the contradictory depiction of YHWH in the account, or even the fundamental unfairness depicted.

    Is it a knock-out punch? Hardly: people cannot be forced to see what they're not willing to see (and as you see above, the Stockholm Syndrome also explains the willingness to "love" a monster).

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