Posts by Leolaia

18

The Bible and the Canaanite "Book of Balaam bar-Beor" (8th century B.C.)

by Leolaia in

in earlier posts, i have described how heroes, kings, and other legendary characters from canaanite lore were incorporated in the ot either through direct allusion or exaptation as literary characters in new distinctively israelite stories.

the legend of danel, the father of aqhat, is directly mentioned in ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 and was likely reused as source material in the cycles of legends about the righteous judge job, the young warrior david, and the prophet elisha (cf.

the legends surrounding the rephaim kings revered in bashan and who the canaanite leaders regarded as their ancestors contributed to the biblical stories about the mighty nephilim and rephaim warriors and the giant og, king of bashan (cf.

Leolaia

Narkissos....I am quite unconvinced of the unity of the narrative material in Numbers 22; the episode with the donkey forms a self-contained unit that conflicts with its preceding context in several ways, as I already mentioned in my first post. Regarding Lemaire's reading of Shamash, this is understandable because the name occurs only three times in the text, and the first two instances have lacunae after the initial consonant (i.e. s[...]). The third instance comes from a fragment which Lamaire may not have considered, and here it gives the full name as sgr-w-'str. This fragment parallels the first by reserving the curse the Shaddai-gods placed on the goddess.

Ginosko....Yahweh is clearly not the god mentioned in the Ugaritic texts; yw is an epithet of Yamm-and-Nahar, the very enemy of Yahweh in Hebrew mythology. The single text where the title occurs is as follows:

"He (i.e. El) took [a cup in his hand], a goblet in both his hands....El appointed his son regent, Bull El [installed him as king]. Then the Wise One, the receptive god, spoke: 'Yamm is the name of my son, divine lord (yw) of the gods [is Nahar!].' And he proclaimed the name 'Yamm', and [pronounced the name 'Nahar']. They responded to him, 'You shall indeed invest him,' ... you shall proclaim him 'Lord (adn)'. [And El replied:] 'I am the Wise One, the perceptive god. Over my hands I pronounce [my son king], your name is 'Beloved of El (mdd 'l),' I shall give you a house of silver, [a palace] of gold." (KTU 1.1 iv 9-22)

This is scene (analogous to Psalm 2:4-9 and Psalm 110) where the father god El appoints Yamm as king, adopts him as son, and bestows on him royal and divine epithets including adn "Lord," mdd 'l "Beloved of El," and yw il[m] which N. Wyatt translates as "Lord of the gods". Yaw-'ilym thus appears to be a title associated with divine kingship (just as Yahweh was the divine king of Israel). As an epithet or theophoric element, yw frequently appears in other inscriptions as an equivalent of 'l: in the Levant campaign list of Thutmose III we find the toponym Byt-ya which evidently is the same as Bethel, the name of the ruler of Hamath is variously given as Ilubidi or Yaubidi in another text, and in BM 93035 we have the equation ilu = yau. It is tempting to connect yw with Indo-European dyaw "god" as it is in Sanskrit dyauspitar "father god" (cf. Latin Jupiter), and regard the Canaanite epithet as derived through Hittite or Mitanni influence. There is some evidence that yhwh is of a later independent and southernly (i.e. Judahite or Kenite) origin, but it is possible that Yahweh originated as a hypostasis of Baal representing his political kingship; the problem with this is that yw is not attested as an epithet of Baal. However the preexistence of -yw as a theophoric element and title associated with El and gods of kingship may have nonetheless facilitated the adoption of "Yahweh" as a name for Baal in the early Israelite period and encouraged the later conflation of Yahweh with El.

Greenpalmtree, jst2laws....."Shaddai" is cognate of Akkadian shadda'u "mountain dweller" and shadu "breast, mountain," and ultimately recalls the Sumerian conception of the cosmic mountain from which the sun rises and sets, Mount Mashu, as twin breasts. Names such as Zuri-shaddai "Shaddai is my rock" in Numbers 1:6 might also reflect Shaddai as the divine mountain. The clearest OT texts referring to Shaddai as an epithet alluding to God's mountain is in Psalms:

"When Shaddai (sdy) scattered kings on it, snow fell on Dark Mountain. That peak of Bashan, a mountain of God? Rather, a mountain of pride, that peak of Bashan! Peaks of pride, have you the right to look down on a mountain where God has chosen to live, where Yahweh is going to live forever?" (Psalm 68:14-16)

"If you live in the shelter of Elyon and make your home in the shadow of Shaddai, you can say to Yahweh, 'My refuge, my fortress, my God in whom I trust' " (Psalm 91:1-2)

The Shaddai-gods (sdyn) that stir up cosmic trouble in the Book of Balaam intriguingly recall the biblical sdym or shedim "demons" (cf. Deuteronomy 32:17 and Psalm 106:37) of the OT. In Akkadian and Assyrian texts, the shidu are griffin-like deities in the form of winged bulls that guard the entrances to temples. The sdyn in the Book of Balaam are thwarted through sacrifice and supplication, and each of the references to the sdym in the OT refer to sacrifices to them (including possibly Hosea 12:12 where lswrym "to bulls" has been amended to lsdym "to demons"). The nefarious Shaddai-gods of the Book of Balaam might possibly represent a conflation between the Akkadian shidu and the Northwest Semitic concept of mountain gods (sdym/sdyn). But perhaps both concepts come from a common origin. Note also that Ezekiel 28 locates the garden of Eden, the abode of Yahweh, on "the holy mountain of God" where the defiant prideful "guardian cherub" ('t-krwb) was stationed (28:13-16). Like the shidu, the karibu (i.e. the cherubim) were also guardian griffin-like deities at the entrance of temples and the description in Ezekiel recalls the krwbym of Genesis 3:24 posted at the entrance of Eden. It is well-known that the krwbym are personifications of the wind, and thus they are mentioned as Yahweh's means of locomotion in his cloud-chariot (cf. 1 Samuel 4:4; Isaiah 37:16; Psalm 18, 65:12; 68:4; 80:1; 99:1; note also 2 Kings 2:11-12 where the "chariot of fire" brings a "whirlwind") and the means through which the Tree of Life is fertilized in Babylonian art, and the connection between the krwbym and mountains is obvious considering the wind-swept peaks of mountains. It is not difficult to imagine how ancient Canaanites perceived the winds as spirits (indeed, rwch in Hebrew means both "wind" and "spirit") inhabiting the mountains. The Shaddai-gods are thus analogous in a way to the cherubim mountain-spirits, and perhaps the motif of the krwb being thrown down from the mountain of God in Ezekiel has something to do with the sdym demons of Hebrew mythology. In this vein, consider the god Mot who resides in Sheol (cf. Ezekiel 28:8 of the krwb being thrown down to "the pit" of Sheol) and brings the east sicorro winds over the earth, drying up crops and representing the death of Baal. That does not necessarily mean that the chthonian god Mot was formerly a mountain-god (indeed he is nowhere described as such), but interestingly the Book of Balaam also describes El building a house (palace?) in Sheol, possibly for Mot.

JC anon.....Dualism is a late, Persian-influenced concept foreign to the polytheism of the Canaanites and pre-exilic Israelites. Just consider how Anat is the source of both war and life (cf. her epithet rchm "Womb"), and her coexistence with many other gods in the pantheon. As regards your appeal to a negative proof (i.e. Satan could have existed as a concept before the concept itself was attested), this is only possible theoretically, but we are not entitled to a priori assume that this was the case without positive evidence, and indeed there is evidence against this, as Narkissos pointed out in an earlier thread, that the earliest usage of stn "opposer" in a theological context is not at all consistent with the late Jewish and Christian concept of Satan as the primary adversary of God who is the source of all evil. Indeed, there is a huge body of Canaanite, Aramaic, and Akkadian religious literature where the figure of Satan nowhere appears. But we can see how the Christian figure of Satan draws on separate Canaanite traditions about different deities that were combined together, such as the chaos dragon Lotan defeated by Baal and the Venus god Athtar (and later, possibly, Shahar) who was also defeated by Baal. It is thus with good reason that I describe Satan as a late post-exilic synthesis of Persian and earlier Canaanite traditions.

gita.....Good idea, and I've thought about that too. I had a great dinner the other night with a person of note where I got to talk for over an hour about my interests in the Bible, of which he was quite intrigued, and I thought it would be great to show him some of my research w/o having it come from a JW website.

18

The Bible and the Canaanite "Book of Balaam bar-Beor" (8th century B.C.)

by Leolaia in

in earlier posts, i have described how heroes, kings, and other legendary characters from canaanite lore were incorporated in the ot either through direct allusion or exaptation as literary characters in new distinctively israelite stories.

the legend of danel, the father of aqhat, is directly mentioned in ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 and was likely reused as source material in the cycles of legends about the righteous judge job, the young warrior david, and the prophet elisha (cf.

the legends surrounding the rephaim kings revered in bashan and who the canaanite leaders regarded as their ancestors contributed to the biblical stories about the mighty nephilim and rephaim warriors and the giant og, king of bashan (cf.

Leolaia

jst2laws.....Thanks for the encouragement! Apparently my old avatar must've been really ooogly.

18

The Bible and the Canaanite "Book of Balaam bar-Beor" (8th century B.C.)

by Leolaia in

in earlier posts, i have described how heroes, kings, and other legendary characters from canaanite lore were incorporated in the ot either through direct allusion or exaptation as literary characters in new distinctively israelite stories.

the legend of danel, the father of aqhat, is directly mentioned in ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 and was likely reused as source material in the cycles of legends about the righteous judge job, the young warrior david, and the prophet elisha (cf.

the legends surrounding the rephaim kings revered in bashan and who the canaanite leaders regarded as their ancestors contributed to the biblical stories about the mighty nephilim and rephaim warriors and the giant og, king of bashan (cf.

Leolaia

Double Edge....Yes indeed I have a large library.... To answer your question, I used Context of Scripture, Vol. 2 for the Deir 'Alla text and references, and Driver's Old Testament Literature for some of the analysis on the text in Numbers. I was thinking of posting some time the books I consider indispensible for placing the Bible in its ANE and extrabiblical context....I should do that sometime. :)

JC anon....Hislop is one of the worst sources on ANE mythology, and if you are referring to Hellenistic mysteries, I consider those sources much too late unless they constitute the earliest source for a given feature; otherwise I prefer earlier Egyptian, Greek, Canaanite, Akkadian, etc. sources. Kabbalist tradition is even more recent. However, this very thread shows exactly how late kabbalist tradition is relevant to one aspect of much older Canaanite mythology: nogah "brilliance, radiance" as a term for Venus may be related to how Canaanite myth used this same word in connection with Shagar-and-Ishtar. I have nothing to say about Satan because this is a much later post-exilic concept that stands outside the pre-exilic Balaam traditions. Lilith is a fascinating survival of ancient Canaanite myth in Jewish tradition and I might write a thread on this subject sometime later.

Other than that, I find your references interesting though I tend to continue, as you know, discount that every single similarity between traditions means one came from the other rather than an earlier common source.

I think you have misconstrued what I wrote. I do not regard every single similarity as indicating a causal relationship between Text A and Text B. Indeed, in this case this cannot be true because the Deir 'Alla story is, while earlier, represents a radically different tradition about Balaam than the Israelite-focused and Yahweh-focused stories in Numbers. But they do prove that a body of Balaam literature and Balaam tradition did antedate the biblical texts from which both the Book of Balaam and the Numbers narratives derive. In other cases, such as the influence of 1 Enoch on the NT and the allusions to the Danel-Aqhat legend in Ezekiel, the influence is indeed causal. And in other cases, the sheer number of resemblances and parallels points strongly to a common tradition, with the Canaanite versions being prior to the later Israelite ones.

18

The Bible and the Canaanite "Book of Balaam bar-Beor" (8th century B.C.)

by Leolaia in

in earlier posts, i have described how heroes, kings, and other legendary characters from canaanite lore were incorporated in the ot either through direct allusion or exaptation as literary characters in new distinctively israelite stories.

the legend of danel, the father of aqhat, is directly mentioned in ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 and was likely reused as source material in the cycles of legends about the righteous judge job, the young warrior david, and the prophet elisha (cf.

the legends surrounding the rephaim kings revered in bashan and who the canaanite leaders regarded as their ancestors contributed to the biblical stories about the mighty nephilim and rephaim warriors and the giant og, king of bashan (cf.

Leolaia

In earlier posts, I have described how heroes, kings, and other legendary characters from Canaanite lore were incorporated in the OT either through direct allusion or exaptation as literary characters in new distinctively Israelite stories. The legend of Danel, the father of Aqhat, is directly mentioned in Ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 and was likely reused as source material in the cycles of legends about the righteous judge Job, the young warrior David, and the prophet Elisha (cf. [1], [2], and [3]). The legends surrounding the Rephaim kings revered in Bashan and who the Canaanite leaders regarded as their ancestors contributed to the biblical stories about the mighty Nephilim and Rephaim warriors and the giant Og, king of Bashan (cf. [4]).

Another well-known example is the story of the non-Israelite divine seer named Balaam, son of Beor. According to Numbers 22-24, Balaam was a devout worshipper of El/Yahweh whom the Moabite king Balak tried to bribe into cursing the children of Israel. Balaam asked God what he should do and Balaam refused Balak's offer on his divine counsel. Not satisfied, Balak tried again and "sent chiefs, more numerous and more renowned than the first" who begged Balaam to please go with them and curse the Israelite people (22:15-17). In reply, Balaam specifically rejected material gain: "Even if Balak gave me his house full of silver and gold, I could not go against this order of Yahweh my God in anything" (22:18). Then God came to Balaam in the middle of the night and said to him, "Have not these men come to summon you? Get up and go with them, but you must do nothing except what I tell you" (22:20). And so Balaam OBEYS Yahweh and saddled his donkey and went out with the Moabite chiefs. Then, almost inexplicably, Yahweh changed his mind and sent an angel to block the path and open the mouth of the donkey to speak to Balaam (v. 22-35). Balaam berates and curses his donkey who (unbeknownst to him) was being obediant to God, and when the angel reveals himself Balaam realizes that he had sinned against God. Subsequently, Balaam delivers his blessings to Israel and the sons of Jacob (ch. 23-24). The picture of Balaam in Numbers is thus that of a righteous but imperfect man who desired to follow God. It should be noted however that the account in Numbers is actually a composite built of several different literary traditions. Source critics usually distinguish two distinct documents in ch. 22: Elohist (E) material in 22:2-21, 36-41, Yahwist (J) material in 22:22-35a, and a harmonizing gloss by the JE redactor in 22:35b. Thus in E, 'lhym dominates as the term for God and there are literary resemblances with other passages in E (cf. 22:9a, 20a = Genesis 20:3, 31:24), whereas yhwh is exclusively used in the J passage. There is also a literary seam at 22:22 which is evident in the very poor fit between the Yahwist episode with the talking donkey and the angel (22:22-35a) and the preceding context. The text in 22:22 says that "his going kindled the wrath of Yahweh" which inexplicably follows God's command to Balaam two verses earlier to go with the Moabites (v. 20). Moreover in v. 21 Balaam goes "with the princes of Moab" whereas in the episode that follows he is evidently alone. There is also a doublet in v. 35 that repeats in a variant form the command and actions in v. 20-21. When we separate the two sources, we see two different portraits of Balaam which were merged by the compiler of Numbers. In the Elohist narrative, Balaam was an altogether righteous person who consistently followed the word of God and is not described as sinful. In the Yahwist narrative, Balaam set out with bad intentions, angering Yahweh and it was only after his encounter on the road with the angel that Balaam repented and followed God. When the two stories were grafted together, the disobediant Balaam disappeared and Yahweh is made to appear inexplicably wishy-washy. But a separate stream of tradition in Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomist History also posits Balaam as initially lacking good intentions:

"No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord because they hired against you Balaam son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you. Nevertheless Yahweh your God would not hearken to Balaam but Yahweh your God turned the curse into a blessing for you" (Deuteronomy 23:3-5).

"Then Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab, rose and fought against Israel, and he sent and invited Balaam the son of Beor to curse you, but I would not listen to Balaam; therefore he blessed you, so I delivered you out of his hand" (Joshua 24:9-10).

These accounts conflict with the Elohist account but conform well with J. It is also interesting that while E is thought to have a northern Israelite provenance, J has a southern Judean origin -- the same as in Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomical History (of which Joshua forms a part). Jewish tradition later ran with the negative assessment of Balaam (Nehemiah 13:1-3; Philo, Moses 1:267-268; Josephus, Antiquities, 118; m. Abot 5:19; Targum Neophyti, Num. 22:30), which also was used in the NT as a moral example despite the fact that Numbers gave an overall positive account of Balaam (cf. 2 Peter 2:15-16; Jude 11; Revelation 2:14). More details can be found in my discussion of this matter in [5].

Then there are the actual oracles that appear in Numbers 23-24. These are undoubtedly of a more ancient and originally independent origin though they were mediated through their inclusion in J and E; thus we see that the two prophecies in 23:18-24 and 24:3-9 are versions of the same oracle, though it is unclear which document they originally derived from. Some genuinely archaic and distinctively Canaanite features of these oracles (absent in the preceding narrative) include: (1) The use of El instead of 'lhym or yhwh as the name of God (cf. 23:22; 24:4, 8, 16), (2) the use of the epithet Shaddai (sdy) to refer to El (cf. 24:4, 16), (3) animalistic imagery that is used to describe El, particularly his horns "like a wild ox" (cf. 23:22; 24:8), (4) archaic syntactic forms such as yiqtol past tense forms in (23:7), waw in possessed forms in 23:18, plural forms of prepositions in 24:6, and full-root conjugation of verbs in 24:6, (5) archaic vocabulary such as tswr "hill, mountain" in 23:9 and drk "rule, govern" in 24:17 which are paralleled in Ugaritic texts, and (6) the allusion to the twelfth-century B.C. invasion of the Sea Peoples in 24:23-24. Though archaic, the clear allusions to the Moabite wars of Saul and David (Numbers 24:17; cf. 1 Samuel 14:47; 2 Samuel 8:2) point to a much later date during the Judahite dynasties (e.g. eighth to sixth centuries B.C.).

THE EIGHTH CENTURY B.C. BOOK OF BALAAM BAR-BEOR

We are however fortunate to have a completely separate and extrabiblical source for traditions on Balaam: the remarkable eighth-century BC inscriptions discovered by H. Franken in 1967 in Deir 'Alla (in the ancient Valley of Succoth, in Gilead) which related excerpts from the spr Bl'm br-B'r "Book of Balaam, son of Beor". The plaster fragments date before the destructions of Tiglath-Pileser III (734-732 BC) and most likely date to around 800 BC. They are thus older than the narrative material in Numbers on Balaam, and likely older than the poetic material as well.

These fragments of the Book of Balaam show many similarities with the poetic and narrative material in Numbers. The inscription begins with the words: "The misfortunes [related in the] Book of Balaam, son of Beor. A divine seer was he ('s chzh 'lhn h')" (COS 2.27, line 1). The word chzh "seer" is related to mchzh "vision" which is associated with the biblical Balaam who is said to "behold the vision (mchzh) of Shaddai" (Numbers 24:3, 16). The emphatic "A divine seer was he" ('s chzh 'lhn h') is also paralleled in 1 Kings 13:26 which says regarding a prophet: "A man of God was he ('s h-'lhym h')". After this brief description of Balaam as a "divine seer," the inscription next relates the theophany he received one evening:

[1] "The gods ('lhn) came to him at night. And he beheld a vision in accordance with El's utterance. They said to Balaam, son of Beor: 'So will it be done, with naught surviving, no one has seen the likes of what you have heard!' " (COS 2.27, lines 1-4).

Here the gods are messengers of El's divine edict, much like the angels of later Jewish religion. Note that they approach Balaam during the night, just as what we find regarding 'lhym in Numbers 22:20: "God ('lhym, or "the gods") came to Balaam during the night". This raises the possibility that the legend used by the Elohist originally referred to "gods" and not "God". Here Balaam beholds a "vision" (mchzh) which as noted above is the same verb used in Numbers 24:3, 16, and it is a message of the god El which the gods relate to him. The word ms' "utterance" is the same as Hebrew mss' which frequently occurs in the OT to refer to prophetic utterances or oracles (cf. Isaiah 13:1; 15:1; 19:1; 21:1). Although the oracle itself it not related directly (being saved for later for dramatic effect), it is clearly an oracle of an impending disaster like that related to Ut-Naptishtim regarding the Flood or Abraham regarding Sodom and Gomorrah. The inscription relates what happened next:

[2] "Balaam arose on the morrow. He summoned the heads of assembly unto him, and for two days he fasted, and wept bitterly. Then his intimates entered into his presence, and they said to Balaam, son of Beor: 'Why do you fast, and why do you weep?' Then he said to them, 'Be seated, and I will relate to you what the Shaddai-gods (sdym) have planned, and go, see the acts of the gods!' " (COS 2.27, lines 4-7).

The Shaddai-gods refer to divine beings who inhabit mountains, or associated with them in myth. In the Canaanite Baal Epic, each of the major gods reside at their own holy mountain (including El, Baal, Yamm, Anat), and the divine council of the lesser deities also resides on a mountain (please see [6] for more information). In Hebrew, Shaddai is closely associated with El and in Ugaritic literature "Shaddai" also occurs as an epithet of El. In the Yahwist oracle of Balaam in Numbers 24, we thus read:

"The oracle of Balaam son of Beor, the oracle of the man with far-seeing eyes, the oracle of one who hears the word of El. He sees what Shaddai makes him see, receives the divine answer, and his eyes are opened" (Numbers 24:3-4).

In the Deir 'Alla inscription, Balaam next relates the vision he received from the gods:

[3] "The gods have banded together, the Shaddai-gods have established a council (mw'd). And they have said to the goddess Shagar: 'Sew up, close up the heavens with dense cloud, that darkness exist there, not brilliance.' Obscurity and not clarity, so that you instill dread in dense darkness. And -- never utter a sound again!' It shall be that the swift and crane will shriek insult to the eagle, and a nest of vultures shall cry out in response. The stork, the young of the falcon and the owl, the chicks of the heron, sparrow and cluster of eagles, pigeons and birds, the fowl in the sky. And a rod shall flay the cattle; where there are ewes, a staff shall be brought. Hares, eat together! Freely feed, O beasts of the field! And freely drink, asses and hyenas!" (COS 2.27, lines 7-13)

In Ugaritic myth, m'd or mw'd refers to the divine council of the seventy sons of El and Asherah who reside on a holy mountain analogous to the Mount Olympus of Greek mythology (cf. KTU 1.15 II 7, 11). Psalm 82:1-6 and 89:5-10 also refer to this heavenly assembly of the gods, Ezekiel 28:2, 14, 16 refers to El sitting in the "dwelling of the gods" and on the "holy mountain of the gods (hr qds 'lhym)", and Isaiah 14:13-14 refers to the "stars of El (kwkby-'l)," a poetic description of the lesser gods, as located on the "mount of assembly (hr-mw'd)," the same word in the Baal Epic and in the Book of Balaam. But the mw'd in the above quote is not an allusion to El's divine council. These Shaddai-gods, or mountain-gods, are described as setting up their own council and later on we see clearly that they are rebelling against El and especially the goddess Shagar. These renegade gods are thus analogous to the fallen angels of 1 Enoch 6:6-7 and subsequent tradition describes an earthly assembly of renegade angels on Mount Hermon:

"And they were altogether two hundred; and they descended into 'Ardos, which is the summit of Hermon . And they called the mount Armon, for they swore and bound one another by a curse. And their names are as follows: Semyaz, the leader of Arakeb, Rame'el, Tam'el, Ram'el, Dan'el, Ezeqel, Baraqyal, As'el, Armaros, Batar'el, Anan'el, Zaqe'el, Sasomaspwe'el, Kestar'el, Tur'el, Yamayol, and Arazyal." (1 Enoch 6:6-7)

In the Book of Balaam, the Shaddai-gods "established, set up" (ntsbw) a divine council and this verb curiously also occurs in Psalm 82:1 which says that "God stands up (ntsb) in the assembly of El". At the council, the gods force the goddess Shagar to curse the heavens, unleashing primeval darkness on the earth. Later on in the book, we encounter the full name of this deity as Shagar-and-Ishtar (sgr-w-'str) which suggests a conflation of Ishtar (Athtart or Astarte) with Venus. In Akkadian and Canaanite mythology, Athtar and Athtart were male and female counterparts of the planet Venus and both were responsible for terrestial irrigation of water. The linking of the two names evokes the repeated biblical expression "the issue (sgr) of your herds and the fertility ('strt) of your flocks" in Deuteronomy 7:13, 18:51; 28:4. The sewing up of the heavens that Shagar is instructed to do recalls the frequent description of the heavens in the Bible as a tent flap or garment (cf. Psalm 102:25-27, 104:2; Isaiah 34:4, 50:3), and the verb skr "shut up, close up" is employed in Genesis 8:2 to describe the shutting of the wells of the Deep after the Flood. The connection between Shagar-and-Ishtar with Venus is also recalled in the following statement: "Sew up, close up the heavens with dense cloud, that darkness exist there, not brilliance (ngh)." In post-exilic and rabbinical Hebrew texts, nwgh or nogah is the name given to Venus. This would explain why Shagar is given the task of darkening the land. The effect would be to the detriment of a wide variety of birds (mostly unclean birds from Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14), and the beasts of the field are threatened with a rod or staff (cf. Balaam's oracle in Numbers 24:17 of the sceptre crushing brows and skulls).

The text that follows is more fragmentary, but it is clear what happens next. Balaam acts to save the goddess and the land through the offerings and divinations he recommends:

[4] "Heed the admonition, adversaries of Shagar-and-Ishtar! ... To skilled diviners shall one take you, and to an oracle, to a perfumer of myrrh and a priestess, who covers his body with oil, and rubs himself with olive oil. To one bearing an offering in a horn, one augurer after another, and yet another." (COS 2.27, lines 13-14)

The feminine nouns in this text shows that all the listed diviners and practitioners were women, which is appropriate in the case of the female deity. The adversaries of the goddess were then afflicted by the priestesses: "They heard incantations from afar, then disease was unleasehed and all beheld acts of distress. Shagar-and-Ishtar did not [sew up the heavens], the piglet drove out the leopard" (COS 2.27, lines 14-16), that is, domestic animals drove out wild beasts and order and calm was restored. Thus, Balaam son of Beor helps save the day.

The Deir 'Alla inscriptions include another Balaam oracle, concerning El building a necropolis in Sheol for the dead kings, but it is too fragmentary to discern the story behind this episode (COS 2.27, II, lines 6-15). The Deir 'Alla texts from the Book of Balaam show that a living, vibrant tradition about Balaam existed in Israel and Judah before the biblical texts were compiled into Numbers (and almost certainly from the earlier Canaanites and Moabites), and show that there is much to the tradition beyond what the Bible has to say.

35

Does the faithful slave exist?

by XQsThaiPoes in

i have known a few anointed and a few bethlites.

after researching pubilcations and the watchtower websites i belife the faithful slave does not exist in a tangible form and is a ghostwriter for the entire org.

everything is subcontracted from mostly the great crowd now billed as corespondants.

Leolaia

Please see my post on the "faithful and wise servant" which reveals his true biblical identity:

http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/67457/1.ashx

The "faithful and wise servant" simply refers to disciples whose behavior imitates the illustrious example of Joseph and the parable promises that they will be rewarded for their faithful service just as Joseph was. Only through contorted reasoning and self-aggrandizement does the WTS twist the intended meaning into a biblical "proof" of their divine appointment.

15

Moses did not write Pentatuch

by peacefulpete in

i realize that most of us have neither the time nor interest for complex arguments about the bible.

so lets us this thread for posting examples of anachronisms obvious to anyone reading with an eye to see them.

i'll start with some rather glaring statements in the pentatuch that preclude moses as the author as is claimed by jew and xtian alike.

Leolaia

Narkissos.....In your opinion, J is not older than D? What is your opinion of Driver's evidence that in both the legal and narrative material, D expands and revises JE? Driver provides a list of parallels from the "legal core" of D to JE wherein the latter represents laws revised or replaced by D (cf. like the examples I mentioned regarding sanctuaries).

50

A Really Dumb Error in New Study Book

by proplog2 in

jw
friends

are you ready for a really dumb mistake?

im not talking about willful deception.

im not talking about stubborn adherence to a dogmatic idea.

Leolaia

proplog2....Hey, nice catch, that was a good one! :))

15

Moses did not write Pentatuch

by peacefulpete in

i realize that most of us have neither the time nor interest for complex arguments about the bible.

so lets us this thread for posting examples of anachronisms obvious to anyone reading with an eye to see them.

i'll start with some rather glaring statements in the pentatuch that preclude moses as the author as is claimed by jew and xtian alike.

Leolaia

My comments (taken largely from SR Driver) will mostly relate to Deuteronomy:

1. The language in the Pentatuech is much too recent to be that of the time of Moses. The Song of Deborah in Judges 5, which purportedly was composed after the time of Moses, is far, far more archaic. In the case of Deuteronomy, the early prophets such as Amos, Hosea, and First Isaiah, show no certain traces of Deuteronomical language and style, whereas Jeremiah exhibits marks of it on nearly every page, and Ezekiel and Deutero-Isaiah reflect it as well. This strongly suggests that Deuteronomy was written after the time of Isaiah but before Jeremiah.

2. Regarding Deuteronomy, the use of the phrase "beyond the Jordan" (b'br hyrdn) for the country east of the Jordan in Deuteronomy 1:1, 5; 3:8; 4:41, 46, 47, 49, exactly as in Numbers 22:1; Joshua 2:10; 7:7; 9:10; Judges 5:17; 10:8, shows that the author was a resident of western Palestine.

3. There are expressions in the retropects, especially the repeated "at that time" in Deuteronomy 2:34; 3:4, 8, 12, 18, 21, 23 and "until this day" in 3:14 that implies a much longer interval than a mere 6 months since the events referred to took place. Also the differences between Deuteronomy and Exodus 21-23 point to a period considerably removed from each other, with the latter having become obsolete by the time of Deuteronomy's composition. The terms of 17:8-13 in which the consitution of the supreme tribunal is not prescribed but assumed as already known appear to presuppose the existence of the judicature, instituted according to 2 Chronicles 19:8-11 by Jehoshaphat.

4. The forms of idolatry alluded to in Deuteronomy, especially the worship of the "host of heaven" (4:19; 17:3) point to a date not earlier than the second half of the eighth century B.C (cf. 2 Kings 17:16; 21:3, 5; 23:4-5; 11-12; Zephaniah 1:5; Jeremiah 8:2; 19:13; Ezekiel 8:16).

5. The law of the kingdom in Deuteronomy 17:14-20 is colored by reminiscenes of the later monarchy of Solomon. In Deuteronomy, the law respecting sacrifice is unambiguous and strict: it is not offered in Canaan "in every place that you see" (12:13) but only at a single place chosen by God "out of all the tribes to set his name there" (12:5, 14, 18; 14:23, and repeated often), that is, at some central sanctuary or temple. But in Exodus it is said "in every place where I record my name, I will come to you and bless you" (20:24), and the practice described from Joshua to 1 Kings 6 describes sacrifices as offered in different parts of the land, with utterly no concept that a law from Deuteronomy was being violated (cf. Joshua 24:1, 26; 1 Samuel 7:9, 17; 9:12-14; 10:3, 5, 8; 11:15; 14:35; 20:6; 2 Samuel 15:12, 32, etc.).

6. Later theological ideas run thorugh Deuteronomy. In 16:22 we read: "You shall not set up a massebah (standing stone) which Yahweh your God hates". Had Isaiah known of this law he would hardly have adopted the massebah in Isaiah 19:19 as a symbol of the conversion of Egypt to the true faith. Or if he had known Deuteronomy 14:1 would he have said in Isaiah 22:12 that Yahweh called to a practice which is there prohibited?

7. Deuteronomy, in relating historical episodes, is dependent on earlier Pentateuchal materials, compare 1:24-46 with Numbers 13:17-14:25; 14:40-45; 20:1; and compare 2:1-3:3 with Numbers 21:4-35. As a general rule, the substance of the earlier narrative is reproduced freely with amplificatory additions, and a phrase from one incident in the earlier work is applied in Deuteronomy to another. But what is remarkable is that in reproducing and reconstituting earlier Pentateuchal material (including both laws and history), Deuteronomy is dependent on JE, and not P, indicating that JE and P were not yet united into a single work, and JE alone formed the basis of Deuteronomy. Thus we find reference to Sinai, and not Horeb (cf. Exodus 3:1; 17:6; 33:6), Dathan and Abiram but not Korah (Deuteronomy 11:6; cf. Numbers 16), etc.

8. Deuteronomy, in fact, does not claim to be written by Moses. Whenever the author speaks himself, he purports to give a description in the third person of what Moses did or said.

51

Avatars and Perception: A Study On The Effects of Visual Impression

by new light in

jw
friends

how much does a persons avatar affect how you view them?

i mean, don't you picture the avatar when you think of the person, if that's all you have to go by?

i know i do, at least if the avy is a photo of a human.

Leolaia

LMAO new light! Hey......how do you know that isn't Leolaia's real picture? Your gonna feel like an ass now if it is.

new light, Gumby.....Ah, so this thread was originally about my avatar! Okay, fess up, it's okay, what did new light say about my avatar before he edited his post?

13

Behemoth

by peacefulpete in

i'll not pretend to be as thorough as leolaia in discussing ancient mythology, but i felt it might be of interest to some to learn more about the monster behemoth from job 40. recently leolaia did a bang-up job providing a mythological background for the leviathan imagery in job and a number of other places.

the partner of leviathan is behemoth.

first it must recognized that no literal creature is being described there.

Leolaia

PP....You seemed to have taken care of the Isaiah reference, so in answer to your question on Job, the translation I was using was the Jerusalem Bible.