Who told the first lie?

by nicolaou 299 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  KalebOutWest

  Jeffro:

  There are obvious and broadly accepted connections between the biblical ‘J’ stories (where ‘J’ is simply shorthand for those stories that we all know I’m referring to) and Mesopotamian stories, particularly the epic of Gilgamesh. It isn’t the case that there is no way to know that, and it isn’t remotely surprising or controversial that Jewish culture was influenced by Babylon.

  My comments were about the origins of all mythology from the Bronze Age that shared common elements, not about where the Hebrews based the narratives found in their mythology.

  We have no real historical records whatsoever for any civilization due to the Great Bronze Age Collapse, and that was what I was commenting on. Stories like the Trojan Horse tale might have been such a tale, but the Collapse makes it hard to tell. This is an example.

  The mythology in the Torah fit within this model, but I was only speaking of their stories in light of the Collapse. We know they have connections to other Bronze Age stories, but none can claim which came first since many civilizations have similar stories and heroes in several cases, though not always.

  The Jews do make reference to purposefully adapting Babylonian tales, often to mock them, and later scholars learned they were often lifting from the Epic.

  But this is true about all our practices and celebrations. They come from various different sources and cultures, like Purim--totally grabbed from others.

  Only Hanukkah comes from a historical event, but that was altered by rabbis with a "miracle" story since the Hasmonean dynasty ended in failure.
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  KalebOutWest

  And I mean, we don't always know whose myth really came first.

  Writing doesn't prove a culture always came up with it or didn't lift it from its conquered people when we are talking about shared mythology using tropes common among civilizations before the Bronze Age Collapse.

  I know the Jews didn't invent the Flood, but who did? We cannot say. It is fuzzy.
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  Jeffro

  Thanks for clarifying. I had taken your comments in the context of a response to peacefulpete’s more specific quoted statement about the Adam and Eve story.
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  Jeffro

  I know the Jews didn't invent the Flood, but who did? We cannot say. It is fuzzy.

  Separate civilisations have developed local flood stories (often presented as ‘global’), some related to this one and others that are entirely independent (despite the tedious JW claim that they all got the story from the Bible one). But we may never know what prior or contemporary alternative versions of the flood story in the Epic existed, originally as oral traditions only.
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  Jeffro

  Me earlier:

  But we may never know what prior or contemporary alternative versions of the flood story in the Epic existed, originally as oral traditions only.

  (I am aware that there are some other known Sumerian flood stories separate but related to the Epic of Gilgamesh, but because I was in a hurry on mobile device I was considering them the same basic family of flood stories as it wasn't worth the elaboration.)
  
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  TonusOH

  KalebOutWest: Which God are you arguing over?

  This is always an issue when discussing the Bible, which itself could be described as two Bibles (OT and NT), which themselves are collections that may or may not include many other books. Even for those Christian denominations that share the same Bible, there is no shortage of explanations for who and what god is, what he wants, what he plans, and so on. To discuss the 'god of the Bible' is to discuss thousands of versions of that being.

  Since the JW religion was the only one I followed, I am biased towards that version and those interpretations. I can keep up with discussions to some degree only because that version isn't too different from mainstream Christianity, at least as it developed in the west. When I was a JW, there was one correct version/interpretation and many wrong ones. Now, there are just a great many versions and interpretations, and I can try to look at it from each individual's perspective. Not always easy, but otherwise I risk talking past the people I am talking to.
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  peacefulpete

  Somehow, when I believe I'm being clear, I'm not. My comments regarding the use of the conventions J and P (etc.) was to clarify that I'm not clinging to the Wellhausen form of source criticism. Yet the sources are distinct and my use of the labels is referent to the blocks of text not the hypotheticals associated with them.

  My comment was in response to the suggestion that individual sources can be linked to Babylon more intimately than others. All the sources appear to have been active during and after the exile. (using older short legend and motifs) It's entirely possible they were near contemporaneous camps of scribes. It's been argued that an extensive narrative such as was created through the merging of individual compilations best fits the Greek period, as literature of that nature was unknown prior. It was also the beginning of the era of fastidious scribal copying, which fortunately prevented extensive improvements on the final composition, thereby enabling us to perceive some of the document's history.

  The J story, whether you accept Freidman's belief that it was the backbone of the Pentateuch or not, betrays a nuanced talent, that to my understanding, resembles later Greek philosophical reuse of epic and satire. Perhaps I am reading too much into it.

  The Bronze Age collapse might well explain the opportunity for local kingdoms in the Fertile Crescent to get established and likely was the ultimate source of certain threads of tradition in the Primary History, but I was focusing on the 5th to 2nd century as the period of advanced literature and philosophy reaching Palestine, Alexandria and Babylon.
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  MeanMrMustard

  So...

  In conclusion, even if the story is borrowed... err... stolen.... err... culturally appropriated, it's still God lying about the fruit.....
• 

  KalebOutWest

  peacefulpete:

  Perhaps I am reading too much into it.

  I am not too sure what you are talking about and why. I am sure you have your reasons and that they are all good.

  I was merely mentioning how the two stories are presented in Torah (chapters 1 and then 2-3) as a foreword or introduction to the Torah--like when you go to a musical and you sit down and before the curtain rises you hear the orchestra play a bunch of the tunes of the songs that are going to play throughout the show jumbled together in a fancy introduction called the "Overture."

  That is how it is presented when it is taught in Hebrew School from a theological perspective: i.e., Why does the Book of Jewish Law begin with Stories instead of Laws? Answer: It is a demonstration and an explanation all-in-one on the importance of obeying the Law and why we often do not .

  As Jeffro and I cleared up among one another, I was not talking about where the story actually came from. I was talking about what the story was about.

  I don't comment with others regarding the Document Hypothesis because most people here use the older form that Wellhausen invented.

  Because I use the updated form, I only use R (Redactor) and D (Deuteronomist) and sometimes J (which now stands for Judean and not Jawist). *

  I know this is not what you mean when you write things such as:

  The J story, whether you accept Freidman's belief that it was the backbone of the Pentateuch or not, betrays a nuanced talent...

  So I avoid it as we are not talking about the same "J" here.

  I adopted the updated form to keep up with the standards my school and synagogue required several years ago.

  ___

  *--Jawist had been combined with Elohist as it is now believed to be the same redactor and has been given the tag JE.
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  peacefulpete

  Yes, and as Kaleb said that ought not be any more surprising than his walking around his garden or talking with snakes