Posts by KalebOutWest

34

The snake of Genesis 3:1

by Halcon in

we've got some really knowledgeable members on here so i have a question for them and everybody.

what was the earliest adjective used to describe the snake of genesis 3:1?

currently one can read words in english translations like 'cunning' and 'crafty'....but in other languages you see words like 'wise' and astute...which convey a completely different idea.. i'm wondering what may have been the earliest and most accurate adjective known or used.

KalebOutWest

The Torah wasn't written by the Gnostics or for the Gnostics. They had no idea of its existence. They were Hellenists, Greeks. The Torah was written by the Jews to teach them to observe the Mosaic Law. It wasn't written for the Gentiles.

While I lived for a few years with a JW aunt after my family dissolved, I was born and raised Jewish and continue to be to this day. One of the things my Jewish education has afforded me is to know the difference between when the Gnostics came on the scene and when the Levitical priesthood did, which was centuries before.

The Kohen line, otherwise known as the Levites, were influencing the people of the Levant to Judahite religion long before Babylon came and drove the people away in chains. The Yahveh God may not have been the only God the Kohens promoted at the time, but eventually they developed their trademark monotheism that Judaism became known for. Some time before 586 B.C E. these priests and their scribes (and their prophets) were a group, even though they didn't resemble the Bible tales exactly the way they are portrayed in the narratives.

The Gnostics, who are Gentiles of Greek origin, did not come onto the scene until circa 300 B.C.E., maybe 400, but that is stretching it. Most scholars actually put their arrival at about 200 B.C.E.. But the ones who studied the Gnostics who studied the Jewish texts? Those are the generally known as the Marcionists.

Marcion of Sinope, the 2nd-century (C.E.) Christian bishop who went rogue by creating (get this) the very first Biblical canon (as the Church Fathers did not believe the Christian congregation needed an official Biblical canon), made things worse by threatening the Church with Gnosticism and the teaching that salvation came to a select group that could glean enough gnosis from holy writings and become demi-gods like Jesus. (The Church countered this with the teaching that salvation was "katholicos" or "universal"--catholic, open to all who had faith in the gospel, whether they read it from Scripture or merely heard it preached from another Christian. And the Church thereby set to creating an official list of canonical writings, excommunicating the Marcionists.)

Plato was born in 428 BCE. He did not read, study or teach the Hebrew text. In fact, there is no textual evidence which shows any early Greek philosopher (from Thales to Epicurus) quoting or commenting on The Old Testament. Both Phythagoras and Plato were reported by some to have traveled to Israel and the greater Middle East but there is no reliable textual evidence which proves this.

I am Jewish. I know the interpretation of my own people's culture. The reason for the narratives and the characters of Eve and Balaam are placed in the Torah is to teach Law--this is not a book of "History." This is the Law, a book of binding commands. Any narratives within the Law teach Jews how to apply the Law by illustration, not history or a bedtime story. These narratives do not teach Greeks wisdom. They are designed to teach my people how to apply the Mosaic Law. Five books of Law. Not history. Not tales of wisdom. Law. Torah.

In Judaism, God is not spirit or mind. God is Ineffable.

34

The snake of Genesis 3:1

by Halcon in

we've got some really knowledgeable members on here so i have a question for them and everybody.

what was the earliest adjective used to describe the snake of genesis 3:1?

currently one can read words in english translations like 'cunning' and 'crafty'....but in other languages you see words like 'wise' and astute...which convey a completely different idea.. i'm wondering what may have been the earliest and most accurate adjective known or used.

KalebOutWest

Well of course. And I am not arguing with your general conclusions.

The Christians and the Gnostics later saw things in the words the same way that rabbinical sages of the Talmud composing midrash would from these texts. This was not the original intent, any more than Balaam telling his donkey that her warning was making him a "fool" or "made a mockery of me" at Numbers 22:29. Was the donkey likewise wise, shrewd, able to "navigate" in a way that Balaam could not? Or was this just a device for what he could do himself if he followed the Law? What was the intent of the authors of the Torah but to tell Jews to observe the Mosaic Law?

The Christian and Gnostic commentators and theologians of later ages endowed the serpent not only with qualities, but entirely disconnected it from the Torah. In both Genesis and Numbers the "speaking animal" is simply a stand-in for the Jewish conscience telling the Jew not to break any of the Ten Commandments. (Later, Jews would actually invent what cartoonists would much later depict as an "angel" on one shoulder and a "devil's advocate" on the other.)

Eventually the serpent became an entity of its own for Christians, but it's all unassociacted invention whether it's Christology, Gnostic teaching or even Jewish Midrash.

I can invent anything after the fact that looks like it matches the original material. Anybody can do that. To "ooh" and "aah" over something that is not original is to give a lot of credit where it just isn't due.

34

The snake of Genesis 3:1

by Halcon in

we've got some really knowledgeable members on here so i have a question for them and everybody.

what was the earliest adjective used to describe the snake of genesis 3:1?

currently one can read words in english translations like 'cunning' and 'crafty'....but in other languages you see words like 'wise' and astute...which convey a completely different idea.. i'm wondering what may have been the earliest and most accurate adjective known or used.

KalebOutWest

I don't think the serpent "possesses" any "knowledge" or is meant to be a separate entity from Eve. It is just an early Hebrew narrative device explaining a character's crisis of conscience, as in the case of Balaam and his donkey.

The talking donkey is the same device. It has no knowledge. It is just Balaam too, trying to decide whether he should break the Mosaic Law or not, just like Eve.

Neither animal existed. Neither event is historical. The Garden of Eden is a myth and the Balaam tale is folklore, but both contain the same Jewish trope.

34

The snake of Genesis 3:1

by Halcon in

we've got some really knowledgeable members on here so i have a question for them and everybody.

what was the earliest adjective used to describe the snake of genesis 3:1?

currently one can read words in english translations like 'cunning' and 'crafty'....but in other languages you see words like 'wise' and astute...which convey a completely different idea.. i'm wondering what may have been the earliest and most accurate adjective known or used.

KalebOutWest

The word in Hebrew is aROOM, and it means "sensible," to have "smarts," which is why the RJPS 2023 renders Genesis 3:1:

The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild beasts that the Eternal God had made.

It means "shrewd" in the sense of "prudence" in clever knowledge and sight, usually in navigation.

The idea, when absent of all Christian influence, is to be compared to the only other time, later in the Torah when an animal speaks, Numbers 22, when a jenny, or female donkey, talks to the prophet Balaam.

The situations are identical. Both people act as if animals always speak. Both talk back to the animals like normal. An angel with a sword is present in both accounts. A sin against the Mosaic Law is what is being considered by each player.

But the stories end differently. In Genesis, Eve breaks the Mosaic Law, the Law against stealing. Balaam does not, the Law against testifying falsely against one's neighbor (and using God's Name is vain in a curse--since he is a prophet). Both narratives seem to be lessons in dealing with breaking Decalogue terms of the covenant and their outcomes.

Due to the influence of Christology, most readers cannot see beyond the idea that the serpent must be "Satan the Devil," and thus the "shrewd" abilities of the "serpent" must be of "evil" intent. But there was no such being in Judaism at the time this was composed (and there continues to be none).

Yet when compared to the donkey in Numbers 22, the idea is that serpent is a narrative device of warning, having foresight into Eve's inner conflict over whether or not the idea of taking the steps she is contemplating is really a good idea. The same is to be said about the jenny in Balaam's story. The donkey can be likened to an inner dialogue, a form of narrative device that had yet to be invented for Balaam's "crisis of conscience." (Such "inner dialogue" would later be found in Hellenistic writings and even suggested in the Song of Songs.)

The angel with the sword at the end of both tales shows that deadly error for the negative path could be the outcome, but only one takes it. The other hears the warning, Balaam. Neither talking animal is a demon.

The idea of "Satan the Devil" as an evil entity would not be fully created until Christianity fleshed itself out as a facet within Judaism. For a brief time Judaism itself considered the idea that some angels were separate entities, some of which could be demonic as the Hellenists taught, but this idea fell to the wayside as the idea of God as an anthropomorphic deity was abandoned in favor of being the Ineffable concept it is today. It was during this period that Christianity developed the idea that Jesus was likely divine, and thus an "archenemy" in the Devil made more and more sense.

49

40 Years Ago Today: May 15th 1984 "1914 Generation" issue was released. False prophecy, thy name is WatchTower.

by WingCommander in

jw
friends

it's incredible how this cover, and also this "series" of watchtower's is burned into my mind.

i was almost 5 years old when these were released.

“1914 and you” — may 1, 1984 watchtower.

KalebOutWest

Ratigan350:

FYI, it is not a false prophesy because it was not a prophesy. IT was an interpretation of scripture. That's why people proclaiming the rapture is not a false prophesy as that also is an interpretation of scripture. That is a misinterpretation of scripture. 1914 is a valid interpretation of scripture. You all are just disappointed because it didn't result in what you wanted it to be.

The term "prophesy," as in a "prophet" from the Bible era does not refer to someone who can foretell the future. It refers to someone who speaks the words of God to the people of God or to people who God wants to speak to.

For instance, the prophet Jonah gives a prophecy that Ninevah will be destroyed due to their sins, but the people in Ninevah repent. Jonah's words do not come true. Jonah gets very angry because this is what he expected to happen in the first place. He doesn't want to talk to God after his prophetic warnings do not come to pass, even when God comes to him to converse about the situation.--Jonah chapter 4.

The entire Mosaic Law forbids "soothsayers" from existing among the people. (Deuteronomy 18:9-12) A "soothsayer" is anyone who can "foretell the future." The difference between foretelling the future, which is what a soothsayer does and uttering a prophecy, which is what a prophet does, is that the message of a prophet is not a foretelling of events or a forecast. It is often a message, a lesson, and sometimes, like in the case of Jonah and the people of Ninevah, a warning.

But warnings are just that, warnings. When parents warn you that something may happen, they are not telling you that it will happen. They are telling you it may happen. "If you keep walking too close to the edge, you may fall," or "if you play too close to the stove while I am cooking something, you might burn yourself." The choice in such warnings is yours.

This is why Jonah is not a false prophet. If you notice, God wanted Jonah to understand that the work of a prophet was not to bring judgment or foretell the future, but to offer a means of light, a way out, a road to repentance. God tried to teach that lesson to Jonah, explaining to him at the end of the book that he should be rejoicing that his message was heard, not that he is someone who is a foreteller of events.

It is in this light that the text in Deuteronomy 18:20-22 is written:

Any prophet who presumes to speak in My name an oracle that I did not command to be uttered, or who speaks in the name of other gods--that prophet shall die....If the prophet speaks in God's name and the oracle does not come true, that oracle was not spoken by God; the prophet has uttered it presumptiously: do not be in dread ot them.--RJPS 2023

A prophet is anyone who claims to speak for God. Oracles that foretell events or deal with forecasting the future on a timeline are what are specifically being warned about in the context of Deuteronomy chapter 18. Immediately before verse 20, the previous verses forewarn the people against the practice of foretelling the future via the dark arts, like soothsaying. The main type of "oracle" that is being spoken of here in verses 20-22 are those that claim to make forecasts of future events regarding dates in God's name. Here the Mosaic Law it is basically telling the Jews that no such prophet will ever rise that will have that ability whatsoever.

No one outside of the Watchtower religion thinks there is an invisible Jesus who has "returned to power" or whose "invisible parousia" has started around October 2nd, 1914. People don't believe that on their own. People outside the Watchtower religion don't come to those views spontaneously. They have to come into contact with Watchtower literature and people who have been taught by Watchtower leaders who teach these things.

So everything one learns about the Watchtower religion's expectations regarding 1914 is dependent not upon a personal expectation regarding 1914 but upon what is officially taught via official theology from official Jehovah's Witnesses theology.

The 1914 information disappoints because it fails. It doesn't fail because of what people believe about it.

18

Out of the Mouths of Vampires

by peacefulpete in

one of the most quoted and loved passages of the bible has an unexpected textual history.

at matt 21:16 jesus is made to say:.

have you never read, ‘from the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?”.

KalebOutWest

I do feel he is misreading Mark's article or not reading it at all.

Either you are hurt somewhere by what I wrote or upset, because it is obviously apparent that I did read it. I quoted from it, remember?

Because of your "vampire" title and because of it's Catholic theme on creation, I had to even call someone who told me he was sure I knew Mark (we were in the same room at several events and he just never introduced me).

Mark is quite clear he sees a related parallel myth to the Ugaritic.

I also ended my comments on the article saying it was related to this myth, commenting on how after my discussion with my scholar/translator friend it was explained to me that the idea was that the Psalm might be advancing some inner hymn to a third cosmological creation mythology.

Like Judaism, Catholicism also holds that the Genesis story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is allegorical, so this makes these references equally so.

But since in Catholicism there is great richness in the Garden of Eden allegory, Psalm 8, being a Messianianic/Christological hymn in Catholic liturgy, the idea that it has cosmological creation allegory is important to Catholics. This last part is what I knew I was missing from the article, and was a central point. But being Jewish I needed help since I didn't get it.

The idea that you think Mark is a Catholic apologist like Jimmy Akin makes me realize why you would think I don't know what I don't know what I am talking about. You are still not outside the world of the Witnesses in some ways, despite how many years you have between them or what you have studied. You are thus working hard and perhaps struggling to create your own worldview, which I forget can be difficult to do. Sometimes we feel we can be there only to suddenly realize, no, not yet. Other times we feel like we will never make it to shore. It isn't our fault. We are cast out to see by a system controlled by the Governing Body and I don't think the outside world knows how hard it is to build a person from scratch afterwards.

For many I've met, leaving the Watchtower has meant seeing God as a monster. Why? Because that religion is controlled by monsters. It ruins people's lives. So anything in any form of academic paper that highlights a connection with God as something monstrous or grotesque becomes appealing in a way to sort of say: "See? Here's the proof! I was right. God is a monster."

In reality, Judaism and its writings are quite modern. It is just as much of a false story as what the Jehovah's Witnesses offer, but there was never a Governing Body or masters of one's faith. Instead of a monster at the head, there was status and reward. Instead of a visible idol, our God was invisible. There was no idol to care for in a shrine. The myths could not be verified. There were tons of laws, but they were designed to keep a person Jewish in a world where identity was valuable. God was in the stories of the past. There was no one looking over your shoulder. Judaism was practiced in our home where the doors were closed.

The reward for keeping the rules was eternal, true, but even better for now, there was a feeling of superiority over your Gentile neighbors who you could look down upon for being idol worshipers and stupid. A monster God could not be at the center of all this. Something more "human" had to be there.

The Levitical priesthood was intelligent enough to create a Deity unlike the gods of the nations. The stories may have been distant in time, but the character of the God of Abraham was definitely not. YHVH may have created us in his image, but the Levitical priesthood created God in the image of man. God feels, loves, gets jealous, debates, saves, gets angry, wages war, etc. YHVH is relatable unlike the gods before him. Still not a perfect "image-less" God, but monotheism was on its way.

This was late in the era of Babylon's existence. This is why there is a Babylonian Talmud. The Jewish sages took residence there even after most returned to Jerusalem and created a great center of learning. From the time of the Exile onward, the Levites began developing their system of cultural preservation, and at the center of it was a new and improved God, unlike anything seen before, even unlike anything they worshiped before the Exile.

You cannot recreate something that did not come from your culture and your language. You cannot tell Native American people that they got their myths wrong or Japanese that you know more about Shinto than they do, especially when you don't read or understand their languages or lived their lives or practiced their religions. Can you imagine what you must sound like to me?

But I understand that you are trying to make sense of things, struggling to find a path of knowledge. I will stop trying to convince you of something that you don't want to hear.

Along your way way in life, however, don't accuse people of not reading things they have. You don't know what they know. And especially when it's the works and mythology of their own culture in the native language that they speak in everyday. Especially right now when it's tough to go outside and just be who you are. The "vampire" comment right now isn't helping.

18

Out of the Mouths of Vampires

by peacefulpete in

one of the most quoted and loved passages of the bible has an unexpected textual history.

at matt 21:16 jesus is made to say:.

have you never read, ‘from the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?”.

KalebOutWest

I gave you the link to Mark's Prineston Seminary profile. He is a full-blood Roman Catholic, alright. But he is not an apologist. A Catholic apologist is a different sort of person, usually not an academic, but a religious (a member of a Catholic religious order), like a monk or nun, sometimes a layperson who is not even a scholar but assigned a ministry in the church to defend the faith. Smith is a professor. They don't do the work of a Catholic apologist as that requires a religious calling of some kind.

The problem is that you've never been exposed to Catholic theology. Just read the footnotes to the NABRE, the official Catholic Bible.

Or better yet, read the New Collegeville Bible Commentary.

You will find that Catholic theology is very hardline critical. There is no room for a Jesus that can foretell the future. There is no "Moses" who wrote the books of Moses. There is no prophet Daniel who prophesied about the coming of Jesus. Isaiah did not foretell the virgin birth, so who knows where Matthew got his quote. And none of the apostles wrote any of the books assigned to them.

This is just the beginning, the surface, and it is a hard and bumpy ride for many Catholics who have to do a balancing act between "faith" and data which Rome says each of the faithful must be exposed to.

Smith is mild by comparison to what you read in Collegeville and some of the footnotes of the NABRE. Some Catholics damn the NABRE as heretical, but it is what the USCCB and Rome have put their stamp of approval on.

Catholic apologists are people like Jimmy Akin and individuals associated with the ministry of Catholic Answers. These individuals are not necessarily academics, nor do they work in my profession. They generally do not speak or learn Biblical languages like me or like Smith.

18

Out of the Mouths of Vampires

by peacefulpete in

one of the most quoted and loved passages of the bible has an unexpected textual history.

at matt 21:16 jesus is made to say:.

have you never read, ‘from the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?”.

KalebOutWest

P.S.:

That new Psalter, The Abbey Psalms and Canticles, already published for the U.S. market, won't be issued here in the American Church until about a year later due to a delay in the publication of the Liturgy of the Hours, the Church's official prayer book, which includes the Psalms throughout.

It should be about only one year later, with an entire update of the NABRE incorporated along with it. The pandemic was mostly to blame for the delay, but the project was massive, as can be seen by this update page at the USCCB.

18

Out of the Mouths of Vampires

by peacefulpete in

one of the most quoted and loved passages of the bible has an unexpected textual history.

at matt 21:16 jesus is made to say:.

have you never read, ‘from the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?”.

KalebOutWest

So I got to do some further research on the article and its author. I had some trouble understanding what the paper was saying. Since it was from The Catholic Bible Quarterly, I asked an old acquaintance of mine who was a Catholic and a Bible translator who has asked for my help in translation in the past.

To my surprise, he told me that I actually run in the same circles as Mark Smith. I have just never met him.

First, Mark's article is not about "vampires" and the referring to the God of Abraham as "El." My buddy showed me this, even demonstrating that, just as I had posted on here earlier, the origins of the etymology of the word for "sucklings" stems from Semitic roots involving a non-Jewish myth that might involve something Smith labels as "divine 'suckers;'" but he goes on to say:

"It is hardly necessary that the same myth be involved."

This means that Psalm 8 has nothing to do with the myth even though a word evolved from the idea.

"The paper is about a Catholic theology quandary," my friend told me. "Is Psalm 8 another creation narrative? If so, who are these children and babes? Who is the enemy? What is the silencing that occurs? Is this a parallel to chapter 3 in Genesis?"

For Catholics, the question about Psalm 8 is not why is it using this word, but their belief that it is Messianic, about Jesus, and somehow tied up to him creating the world, and their view that it may have something to do with Genesis 3:15. If it does, if that can be proved, then in their eyes they will have a real "anchor" of sorts. (The only problem is that the Psalm is not as old as they want it to be.)

My question was put forward as to how did Smith and other Catholics (since Smith is Catholic) see Psalm 8?

While I am sure he couldn't directly speak for Mark himself, Mark is a very well-educated Catholic layman, serving as a professor at various universities. But he did have this to offer about the general Catholic viewpoint:

"There is a difference between the academic answer and the one that motivates us by faith," he answered. "One [critical scholarship] is at service of the other [faith]. But for a Catholic, all Scripture has the earmark of divine inspiration."

My friend, by the way, is a language scholar who helped produce the new English-language Psalter for the Roman Catholic Church which is being employed, beginning this Advent, all around the world, in every country where English is spoken. He isn't stupid by any means.

The idea is that this Psalm might involve a cosmology in which creation, as Smith puts it, "ancient, divine victory over cosmic enemies," even though it is allegorical (there are no "children" or babies" in heaven, for example, and there was not yet a complex demonology in Judaism adopted into the Hebrew religion).

This is important for Catholic theology in building its Christological ideas and theological instruction, especially as it evolves.

18

Out of the Mouths of Vampires

by peacefulpete in

one of the most quoted and loved passages of the bible has an unexpected textual history.

at matt 21:16 jesus is made to say:.

have you never read, ‘from the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?”.

KalebOutWest

Believe whatever you wish.

English is not my first language. I grew up speaking Hebrew, Ladino and Aramaic, praying the Bible and the Siddur daily all my life in Hebrew. It was just an opinion

I have been an instructor in praying the Jewish liturgy for some years now. But It doesn't mean I know everything.

You do you.