Genesis 1:1-25 Is An Amalgam of Near Eastern Creation Myths

This Article covers Genesis 1:1-25 and compares it to older pre-existing Near Eastern creation myths of the universe and earth.

Using the principle that the greater civilization influences the lesser, this series of articles intends to falsify the claim that the Torah was given to moses by God and to show how syncretism(1) blended folklore(2) in the Ancient Near East and South-Southwest Asia as a result of the interconnectedness of the Ancients which was discussed in the first article of this series Interconnectedness of the Ancients(3).

This article begins with some historical background information intended to show that key elements of Hebrew scripture existed in several areas of the Near East and Southwest Asia prior to being Incorporated into scripture. Once the background information has been presented, it uses Genesis 1:1-25 as its point of reference. Because the focus of this article is the book of Genesis, it overlooks many similarities between the Egyptian(4), Mesopotamian(5) and Hindu(6) religions that are not incorporated into Judaism(7), and it overlooks aspects of the other religions that share concepts with Christianity(8) which came much later. It is my assertion that the more popular religions in the Near East borrowed from each other.

BACKGROUND: SOME IMPORTANT CIVILIZATIONS AND EVENTS
A list of Important Civilizations and events follows. I could not list all of the most important ones (such as the city-states) because I wanted to keep the article as short as possible. I tried to make a "snapshot" estimation of the positions of the largest civilizations to each other on the map. I recommend you scroll down and open the map at the bottom of the article in another window so you can reference it as you follow along. The map is meant to represent "initial conditions" of the LARGEST civilizations at the start of the second millennium and ignore the smaller nomadic, mountain and Arabian tribes present in the area. For example, the Persians lived in the mountains of Iran as early as 3000 BCE but they weren't organized to any significance.

* 8000 - 500 BCE - Vedic Religion in the Indus Valley
* 5000 - 300 BCE - Mesopotamia
* 4000 BCE - Estimation of the creation of the world as calculated according to Hebrew Scripture.(39)
* 4300-3300 BCE - Southern Levant, Canaan. The Ghassulian period created the basis of the Mediterranean economy which has characterised the area ever since. This region was also the natural battleground for the great powers of the region and subject to domination by adjacent empires, beginning with Egypt in the late 3rd millennium (3000-2000) BCE. Although Neanderthals (from 200,000 BCE) and Homo Sapiens Sapiens (from as early as 75,000 BCE) occupied the same territory for thousands of years, it can't be classified as a civilization.(11)
* 3650 - 1100 BCE - Minoans (9)
* 3500 - 2000 BCE Sumer
* 3100 BCE Egyptian and Sumerian Languages develop.(18)
* 3150 - 31 BCE - Egypt and their Myths
* 3000 - 1500 BCE - Indus Valley (10)
* 2400 - 612 BCE - Assyria
* 2350 BCE - Traditional date for the global flood
* 2300 - 2100 BCE - Akkadian
* 2300 - 1000 BCE - Indo-Iranians, Andronovo (12)
* 2250 BCE - Traditional date for the tower of Babel and the catalyst for the differentiation of all the languages of the world.
* 1959 - 1659 BCE Babylonia
* 1920 BCE - Traditional date for when Abraham was approached by God.
* 1750 - 1180 BCE - Hittites (13)
* 1700 - Enuma Elish created
* 1550 - 1060 BCE - Mycenaean (14)
* 1550 - 1450 BCE - Moses traditionally thought to have lived
* 1500 - Exodus?
* 1150 - 1020 BCE David traditionally believed to have lived.
* 900 BCE - According to the Documentary Hypothesis, thought to be when the Jawist scriptures were written.
* 700 BCE to 1935 CE - Persia until it became Iran. (15)

- During the Second Millennium, when Abraham showed up, the Near East was a busy place. Here is a proposed map of 1300 BCE I presume done by a historian of sorts.(17). In The Second Millennium Indo-Aryans migrated into the the Indus valley(19). They brought with them the Sanskrit language and the Vedas. The Hindus up until the the Buddha (between 500-400 BCE) were very ethnocentric and concerned with ritual cleanliness. Only the priests knew the scriptures, they were called Brahmins, and were the source of this ethnocentrism. Their culture was more pastoral, less violent. I mention this because I notice many similarities between Hinduism, Judaism and Christianity and because to get to Mesopotamia from the Indus Valley, it would only take a little over a month of traveling along the coast on a raft. There has been discussion for over a century about the Hindu Origin of the Abrahamic religions(42).

OBVIOUS INCONSISTENCIES BETWEEN HISTORY AND THE BIBLE
- The Agricultural revolution was already underway in Mesopotamia when scripture says the world was created and human beings had already spread all over the world, even to the Polynesian Islands.
- Commerce and exploration by sea was already underway by the time of the Global Flood. Sea worthy ships capable of carrying cargo already existed and probably could have carried a crew with enough supplies to last a little over a month (or up to 40 days).
- There were already a multitude of languages by the time the Tower of Babel was destroyed.

BACKGROUND: TRAVEL TIME BY SEA VIA COAST OR OPEN SEA
Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian explorer, set out to test his theory that South Americans had populated Polynesia using rafts(20). He was investigating reports from Spanish explorers to Peru that had been told legends about a "white race" that had been routed and escaped to the west on rafts. Heyerdahl theorized that they wound up in Polynesia and settled there. He made a raft to second millennium specifications which he named Kon-Tiki, set sail and after a 101 day, 4,300 mile (7,000 km) journey across the Pacific Ocean, Kon-Tiki smashed into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands on August 7, 1947. Using Kon-Tiki's voyage as a baseline, 43 miles a day or roughly two miles an hour, comes out to about 1.5 knots an hour. To get from Oman to the Indus Valley which is 439 miles at 1.5 knots would be 12.19 days open ocean (http://www.dataloy.com/).

It would take a little over a month or up to 40 days to go from the Indus Valley to Mesopotamia.
Persian Gulf properties(21)
* Max length - 989 km
* Max width - 56km
* Average depth - 50m
* Max depth - 90m

Gulf of Oman(22)
* Width: ~230 mi (370 km),
* Length: ~340 mi (545 km) long.
It connects with the Persian Gulf through the shallow Strait of Hormuz.

It would take a little over a month or up to 40 days to go from the lower Red Sea to the upper red sea.
Red Sea Properties(23)
* Length: ~2,250 km (1,398.1 mi) - 79% of the eastern Red Sea with numerous coastal inlets
* Maximum Width: ~ 306–355 km (190–220 mi)– Massawa (Eritrea)
* Minimum Width: ~ 26–29 km (16–18 mi)- Bab el Mandeb Strait (Yemen)
* Average Width: ~ 280 km (174.0 mi)
* Average Depth: ~ 490 m (1,607.6 ft)
* Maximum Depth: ~2,211 m (7,253.9 ft)

And using the length of the Red Sea as a standard, and a ruler, you can see for yourself that the distance from the coast of Africa to the Indus Valley would take a little over a month or up to 40 days.

And by the same standard, to get from Mycenea to Canaan, would be 15-20 days.

NEAR EASTERN CREATION MYTHS
A list of common themes in Near Eastern and South-Southwest Asian creation myths(24) follows.
1. Some Gods pre-exist, or self-create.

2. Creation is done by acting on some sort of primordial matter, in a state of chaos, which is often represented by the Sea. The Sea is big, uncertain, frightening, unmanageable, destructive and a source of chaos.

3. Creation is done through conflict, between god and chaos where chaos is represented as some sort of sea monster. The God kills the chaos monster uses the body of the monster to create the ordered cosmos. The God and the chaos monster exist before everything else. In the Old Testament in Job(25), a Leviathan(26) is discussed and it is a sea monster which God can and does overpower.

4. Creation is the result of a Sexual act. Gods in human form have sex and make other gods. Sometimes Gods have sex with Humans.This type of thing happens in Greek and Egyptian mythology. In the Enuma Elish(27,28), Gilgamesh was part God part human, and went on to be king. It turns out there was Historical Gilgamesh. Obviously the kings name was inserted in the story to Legitimate him. In the old testament we have mention of the Heroes of old (Nephilum)(29) that were the result of supernatural beings mating with human women.

5. Creation is the result of spoken word identifying and controlling the essence. It requires only a single god. In ancient languages, breath, wind and spirit were conveyed by single word. In Hebrew scriptures god spoke the universe into existence, breathing out a word giving it spirit, giving it life. In Greek, the Logos existed prior to all things and in Hindu, the God spoke the Universe into existence with the word AUM(33).

Egyptian Creation stories seem to be indigenous to a City or Region. They can be found in books about creation myths or online(41). Because of their age, they have been modified to fit the culture that used them and are frequently contradictory. The best known Mesopotamian creation story comes from the Enuma Elish(27,28) of which versions have been found in Canaan, and in modern day Iraq and was very well known in that area. Variations of portions have been found in many more places. Hindu Creation Stories come from the Vedas and were evidently a composite of pre-existing Indus Valley civilization and immigrant Central Asian people commonly known as the Aryans. Hindu scriptures (Vedas) are so old that they have been modified as they were used by groups and therefore are sometimes contradictory.

SUMMARY OF IMPORTANT DATES IN NEAR EAST RELIGION
* 8000 - 500 BCE - Vedic Religion in the Indus Valley
* 3150 - 31 BCE - Egypt and their Myths
* 1700 - Enuma Elish created
* 1550 - 1450 BCE - Moses traditionally thought to have lived, creation of the the Torah.


GENESIS 1:1-25
* Egypt - Some Gods like Atum(30), Ptah(31), Amun(32) pre-existed.
-- Amun was believed to be not only king of the gods but also the divine essence found in all gods.
-- Amun is understood as “self-generated,” active in creation as the impulse of creative energy prompting the Ogdoad (a group of four pairs of gods and goddesses) into action.

* Hindu - The God Vishnu was pre-existant, grew a lotus flower from his belly and from that was born the God Brahma who created the other Gods.

* Mesopotamia - Enuma Elish begins with three uncreated Gods, the God Apsu, his consort Tiamat, and Mummu.

* Jewish - God pre-existed or was self-created
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

* The Universe and Earth were created by the Gods acting on some primordial matter, in a state of chaos. Common representations of Evil were the dark, chaos, and the sea because of its unmanageable nature, it potential for destruction, the fact that salt water wasn't drinkable and the Hebrews weren't sea faring people so they didn't understand the fundamental characteristics of the sea. Breath, wind and spirit were conveyed by a single word.

* Egyptian - Amun created the Ogdoad and they were the agents of creation. The Ogdoad existed initially as entities within the primordial sea.
-- Before creation Nun (Primordial chaotic waters) already existed as a principle of chaos.

* Hindu - The Golden Seed incubated on the waters of chaos

* Mesopotamian - Tiamat is a body of water, the bitter sea waters that support the earth.
-- Like the waters of the abyss, Tiamat is formless and exerts power without purpose.
2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.


* Egyptian- Ptah was worshiped from the early dynastic era, but his role as the patron of artisans (for example, carpenters, woodworkers) came later. Ptah creates by speaking a word, giving spirit to a divine idea and “breathing” it into being.

* Hindu - Some Hindus believe that the universe created from Sound. The sound was AUM(33). Each letter is the sound of a God. It is the sound of the three foundational gods, the Trimurti(40), ("The Great Trinity" Brahma(34), Shiva(35) and Vishnu(36)) as One. Three gods make up one which is similar to the Christian idea of the Trinity. In reading the Vedas, ancient Hindu scripture, it is customary to start with the word AUM and end with the world AUM. Similar to the Christian word and usage of Amen. Sound is very important to the Hindu gods. Similar to Logos, it regulates moral order, ritual, morality. Sound and Ritual ceremony was connected to the cosmic structure, morality and moral activity. The Vedas(37), were a collections of prayers, wisdom literature (but not stories like the Old Testament) that could only be handled by Brahmin(38) (Priests) and were thought to be lethal to non-priests. The ears of a non-priest would burn if they came in contact with their sounds. In the beginning, it was considered heresy to try to capture the Vedas in writing, however, the influx of outsiders and the potential for their corruption caused someone to write them down. The Vedas were not written down until around 600 BCE and not translated into English until the 18th or 19th centuries.

3 And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.


And now we have the ordering and organization of things which follows closely the order or creation in the Enuma Elish.
4 God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness.

5 God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.


* Egyptian - A few myths cover this in different ways. Geb and Nut were separated to make the earth and the sky.

* Hindu - They have few myths that cover this it different ways. The golden egg separated and each have half made the the earth and the sky. Or one of the Gods bodies was sacrificed (concept similar to Mesopotamian god that was killed to make people and the Christ that was sacrificed for the benefit of humans) and divided up to make the earth, cosmos and people.

* Mesopotamian - Finally, Marduk smashes Tiamat’s (waters of Chaos) head and splits her body in two to form the heavens and earth.
6 And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water."

7 So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.

8 God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day.


Egyptian - In the midst of Nun, Atum stood on the Benben, a primeval pyramidical hill that arose out of the waters
9 And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.

10 God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.


At this point (Genesis 11-25) God created the rest of the vegetation, animals, sun, moon, and Man. The Hebrew scriptures diverge with the Egyptian and Mesopotamian gods and their more violent, less nurturing natures. The Hebrew God is more like the Hindu gods in that he is more part of the creation, has created the cosmos for humans, however the Hebrew god is not as much a part of creation as the Hindu Gods.

Myths are a reflection of the culture they belong to. The remarkable thing about the Indus Valley Civilizations are the lack of weapons relative to Mesopotamia and Egypt. They seem to be a more peaceful people. In the Egyptian and Mesopotamian myths man is created as lowly, flawed, subservient and savage by design. The creation of Humans will be covered in the next article.

CREATION MYTHS OF CONFLICT EMBEDDED IN THE BIBLE
In Job, Isaiah and Psalms there are characteristic elements of the conflict type of Creation story embedded. Since there is evidence of water-borne trade starting around 4000 BCE, It seems that sailors saw whales and relayed information about them that made their way into creation myths. The description in Job is similar to characteristics of commercial whaling. The description in Isaiah and Psalm 74:14 is more similar to creation myths, and Psalm 104:26 seems to describe a whale.

* Book of Job 3:8 "May those who curse days curse that day, those who are ready to rouse Leviathan "; NIV

* Book of Job 41

* Isaiah 27:1: "In that day,
the LORD will punish with his sword,
his fierce, great and powerful sword,
Leviathan the gliding serpent,
Leviathan the coiling serpent;
he will slay the monster of the sea." NIV

* Psalms 74:14: It was you who crushed the heads of Leviathan and gave him as food to the creatures of the desert. NIV

* Psalms 104:26: 26 There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan, which you formed to frolic there. NIV

This brings us to the creation of Man in Genesis 1:26.
To be continued......


"Snapshot" of Ancient Civilizations in the second millennium (2000 - 1000 BCE)


Land and Sea routes between the Civilizations

Quick Reference to material in the sources. For the Quick References, Wikipedia is used liberally because while academics don't consider Wikipedia definitive or acceptable as a source they do consider it generally good enough for quick reference. Please do not confuse quick references with the sources. The sources are where the majority of information came from.

1. Syncretism
2. Folklore
3. interconnectedness of the Ancients
4. Ancient Egypt
5. Mesopotamia

6. Hinduism
7. Judaism
8. Christianity
9. Minoans
10. Indus Valley Civilization

11. Southern Levant
12. Indo-Iranians
13. Hittites
14. Myceneans
15. Persia

16. Abraham
17. Eastern Hemisphere 1300BCE
18. List of Languages by first written accounts.
19. Indo-Aryan Migration
20. Thor Heyerdahl; Kon-Tiki

21. Persian Gulf
22. Gulf of Oman
23. Red Sea
24. Common Themes in Creation Myths
25. Job

26. Leviathan
27. Enuma Elish
28. Enuma Elish Text
29. Nephilum
30. Atum

31. Ptah
32. Amun
33. AUM
34. Brahma
35. Shiva

36. Vishnu
37. Vedas
38. Brahmin
39. Blue Letter Bible Chrono-Genealogical Table
40. Trimurti

41. Egyptian Myths
42. Hindu Origins of Abrahamic Religions


Sources
1. Human Prehistory and First Civilizations, The Teaching Company
2. Great World Religions: The Religions of India, The Teaching Company
3. Great World Religions: Hinduism (2nd Edition), The Teaching Company
4. Religion in the Ancient Mediterranean World, The Teaching Company
5. Ancient Near Eastern Mythology, The Teaching Company

6. The Book of Genesis, The Teaching Company
7. Great Figures of the Old Testament, The Teaching Company.
8. History 4A_ The Ancient Mediterranean World - Fall 2007, University of Berkeley
8. The Power of Myth, Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers
9. Biology and Human Behavior: The Neurological Origins of Individuality, 2nd Edition, The Teaching Company


RELATED INFORMATION

Joseph Campbell books on Amazon
The Early History of God, Mark Smith

Ancient Ships
* Maritime history - Wikipedia, the free encyclop...
* ancient ships
* Archaeology team helps find oldest deep-sea shipwrecks HarvardScience
* Ancient Egypt: Ships and Boats
* Ancient Phoenician Ships, Boats and Sea Trade
* early ways of navigating sea

Whale information
* Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) - Office of Protected Resources - NOAA Fisheries

Monsoons
* Monsoon African Connections: An ... - Google Bo...
* 538bc monsoon

Ancient History
* Ancient history
* First dynasty of Egypt - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ancient Prehistory
* archaeolink.com archaeology, anthropology, social studies, general knowledge
* Evolution of Modern Humans: Early Modern Homo sapiens
* Hominid Species

Behavior
* Novelty Seeking Study
* NOVELTY SEEKING e-Review of Tourism Research

Interconnectedness of the Ancients
* Early Modern Homo sapiens
* Prisoners Dilemma
* Sea Level
* Monsoon Winds
* Ancient Sea Exploration

* Second Millenium shipwreck
* Whales Arabian Gulf
* Whales Turkey and Greece
* Whales Coast of Oman
* Leviathan

* Syncretism
* Creation Myths


Foundational Study, recommended reading

Cognition
- Influence: Science and Practice (4th Edition) by Cialdini, Robert
- Persuasion: Theory and Research (Current Communication) by O'Keefe, Daniel J.
- How to Think About Weird Things: Critical Thinking for a New Age by Theodore Schick and Lewis Vaughn
- Innumeracy : Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Social Consequences by John Allen Paulos
- Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (Popular Science) by Martin Gardener
- Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer
- Historians' Fallacies : Toward a Logic of Historical Thought by David H. Fischer
- Conquering Deception by Nance, Jef
- General Psychology course from Berkeley
- Self and Society by John P Hewitt
- How We Know What Isn't So by Gilovich, Thomas

Christianity
- Evidence that Demands a Verdict Vol. 1 by Josh McDowell
- Evidence that Demands a Verdict Vol. 2 by Josh McDowell
- More Than A Carpenter by Josh McDowell
- Biblical Errancy: A Reference Guide by C. Dennis McKinsey
- Looking for a Miracle: Weeping Icons, Relics, Stigmata, Visions & Healing Cures by Joe Nickell
- Mysterious Realms: Probing Paranormal, Historical, and Forensic Enigmas by Joe Nickell and John F. Fischer

Folklore
- Folklore in the Old Testament by Frazer by James George
- Gospel Fictions by Helms, Randel
- Holy Writ as Oral Lit : The Bible as Folklore by Dundes, Alan
- Old Testament Parallels (Fully Expanded and Revised) by Victor H. Matthews and Don C. Benjamin
- Don't Know Much About Mythology by Kenneth C. Davis

History
- The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin by Neil Asher Silberman and Israel Finkelstein
- The Bible with Sources Revealed by Friedman, Richard E.
- The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel by Mark S. Smith
- The Historical Jesus & the Mythical Christ by Massey, Gerald
- The Secret Origins of the Bible by Tim Callahan

37 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow Lee! This is good! And, if we think that the earlier sources to an event are preferred to later sources which borrowed from earlier sources, then the Biblical account of creation the Fall and the Flood are too late to be of any historical use.

Anonymous said...

Thanks John,
I plan on doing this kind of thing for a while. This is what I had in mind when I joined DC, but I got distracted.

John said...

Interesting stuff. I remember when I was a Christian this is what caused me the most problems with the Bible. I remember struggling trying to reconcile the Bible with science. All you need to do is look at the fossil record and history of the universe to see that the two don't match. Long creation days or not the two contradict each other plain and simple. All attempts to harmonize the two have failed. I tried for years with pain to harmonize the two. It cannot be done.

Like the Gnostics (Not that I am one) I now believe that the God of the Old Testament is NOT the true God. He's a boodthirsty sick freak who slaughters innocent animals and sacrifices His only son because He can't control His anger.

I've had to let go of that God.

Love and peace from the God of love.

Calvin

Scary Jesus said...

This is probably the most comprehensive treatise on this subject I have ever read on the web.
Excellent post. The standards on this blog just keep getting higher and higher.

Unfortunately you are forgetting that Satan knew what was going to happen and created earlier counterfeits to confuse the human race;)

Thanks guys.

Steven Bently said...

Excellent post, Thank you, Lee.

To Scary Jebus, I've personally heard many of the so-called preachers say that Satan also believes in Jesus, if this is true, then according to John 3:16, Satan is a Christian, perhaps Satan is in fact a follower of Jesus...lol

Anonymous said...

Hi Scary Jesus,
do you know where a more comprehensive treaty is?
I'd like to get hold of it. I had to cobble this all together on my own. I suspect this kind of thing is a branch of cultural anthropology but I'm not sure.

District Supt. Harvey Burnett said...

Lee~ PARALLELOMANIA and PARALLELOMANIACS...

What do parallels prove other than common ANCESTRY? ...Which the Bible ALREADY clearly teaches.

The differences are night and day...God NEVER struggled for power with any of his creation.

That very fact by itself is the PRIMARY difference between the God of the Bible and all the "supposed" parralels you present.

All other Law codes given were not law codes that promised relationship to their god's, they were law codes that promised relationship to humanity and community.

Examining the evidence clearly proves that God's laws were about relationship to HIM. It's not a problem if some thiongs were more widely and commonly accepted....PARALLELS DO NOT MEAN BORROWING...

And don't get me started on your folklore rants...you KNOW that mess is unevidential and is only based on your presupposition of antisupernaturalism which is UNSCIENTIFIC to the core...

I won't rain on your little anti- Christ party on this one...Have fun parallelomanics!

Scary Jesus said...

Lee, no, I can't think of anywhere I've ever seen this subject as well presented. It's terrific.

Steven Bently; Satan does believe in Jesus, but he doesn't worship him. In fact if you remember in the book of Job Satan seemed to hang around chilling with God enjoying the friendly riffing that was their relationship.

I wonder where Jesus was during this time. Probably at the kids table.

the agnostic rationalist said...

Wow is right!! This post is just amazing and so informative.

Evan said...

Harvey,

Do you really wanna say:

Examining the evidence clearly proves that God's laws were about relationship to HIM. It's not a problem if some thiongs were more widely and commonly accepted....PARALLELS DO NOT MEAN BORROWING...

Cuz you are proving Islam is the true religion if you do that.

You see, Islam believes that God garbled his message in the Bible but he gave it correctly to Mohammed. Normal people who aren't Muslim believe that the Koran is just a plagiarized Bible with some other stuff put in, but under your definition, the Koran is authoritative.

In addition, the Koran has a law code that explicitly is based on God's relationship to his people.

You oughta look into it if you really believe what you're saying.

Harry H. McCall said...

Great post Lee. One thing is for sure, the Bible is a "newcommer" as for as religious time goes.

Harry H. McCall said...

DSHB: “All other Law codes given were not law codes that promised relationship to their god's, they were law codes that promised relationship to humanity and community.”

Kings in the ancient Near East were divine and their codes reflect this. Thus, the curse by god at the end of the Code of Hammurabi is a case in point.

Anonymous said...

HI Harvey,
you are quite the wordsmith, PARALLELOMANIA and PARALLELOMANIACS
those are almost as long as words on a german street sign. We could probably tack another suffix on the end to make another word.
Parrallelomaniology, parrallelomaniosophy, parrallelomaniaism, help me out here.....

What do parallels prove other than common ANCESTRY? ...Which the Bible ALREADY clearly teaches. ....Examining the evidence clearly proves that God's laws were about relationship to HIM. It's not a problem if some thiongs were more widely and commonly accepted....PARALLELS DO NOT MEAN BORROWING...
Is this how you teach your kids to get through school? copying other peoples work? Good luck with that "parallels do not mean borrowing" when you have to talk to their teacher. Also use the "Evidence" argument, even though it doesn't work around here, it probably will to a teacher who obviously is not as stupid as we are.

The differences are night and day...God NEVER struggled for power with any of his creation.
That very fact by itself is the PRIMARY difference between the God of the Bible and all the "supposed" parralels you present.

What does this mean? You lost me.

All other Law codes given were not law codes that promised relationship to their god's, they were law codes that promised relationship to humanity and community.
Harvey, most of them provide instructions and rituals for how to have a relationship with their god. Thats what makes them a religion instead of a literary anthology.

And don't get me started on your folklore rants...you KNOW that mess is unevidential and is only based on your presupposition of antisupernaturalism which is UNSCIENTIFIC to the core...
Harvey, the evidence converges on folklore being being more likely than revelation from god. My article clearly demonstrates that. Please show me where my data is wrong or it does not support the conclusion.

Here's a game I like to play with ludicrous arguments. Word substitution. I got it from studying for the LSAT.
"And don't get me started on your Leprechaun rants...you KNOW that mess is unevidential and is only based on your presupposition of antisupernaturalism which is UNSCIENTIFIC to the core...
see I replaced folklore with leprechauns. Isn't that wild?

Harvey, here is the clue of this series of articles. I have solved the problem of how to use an external validation mechanism to break out of the circular argument that
The bible is the word of god.
The bible says that god exists.
The bible says that it is the word of god.
The bible is valid to know about god because of its special relationship to God.


Wait till my next article where I will demonstrate some measure of likelihood that the story of Adam being made from dirt could have originated with the "language" of the homo sapiens that abandoned africa in the second human diaspora over 70,000 years ago.

Heres some hints. Look up "origin of Language" and look for gestures, pidgin and creole. Look for the "technology" boom in tools. Think about how communication facilitates cooperation and technology development. then draw a star on a world map to all the cultures that have a man being made from dirt by a god that aren't abrahamic.

I suppose if you don't know about biology and evolution, and you see plants sprouting up from the ground from out of nowhere, its not a very large intuitive leap to figure that the first man must have come from the ground too.

Manifesting Mini Me (MMM) said...

Even Y'shua acknowledged that the Torah was not all divine revelation but partly the influence of Moses' surrounding (and very human) community. The story of the OT is one of people who were willing to do the hard work of clearing a path for the Messiah.

Anonymous said...

Hi MMM,
so then, you agree that the creation of the world didn't really happen the way genesis says it did?

Manifesting Mini Me (MMM) said...

Hi Lee - Your question is a reflection of an all or nothing approach - the word can be rightly divided between that which is of divine and that which is of prideful nature.

I feel arguments concerning the exact nature and beginning of creation are neither constructive nor conclusive - however, my stance is consistant with the belief in trusting that creation is the expression of a progressive and redeeming God.

Anonymous said...

Hi MMM,
that was a very uninformative response.

basically you don't want to commit. You don't think it is a valid question?

Then you don't know if the version of the creation of the world is true or not?

Manifesting Mini Me (MMM) said...

Hi Lee - I was out of town for awhile so unable to respond to your response-

I'm okay that you reject my perspective as uninformative - since I no longer practice idolotry, I acknowledge (and gratefully so!) that I cannot produce, the "god" that you are seeking.

The best to you, Lee!

akakiwibear said...

Hi Lee, great work and it certainly reflects a lot of effort!!! You have set out very well what Catholic scholars have taught for years.

Sala kahle - peace

Drow Ranger said...

Dude you have this all backbumwards. It's the ancient OTHER "creation myths" that stem from Genesis, not the other way around. Dating isn't solid and there is some ambiguous case, and sometimes getting a good ballpark is like nailing down jello. Why isn't it solid? Well it depends on the method but mostly the issue is the validity of various assumptions required to even TRY to get to a date.

It's like trying to determine whether the sun goes around the earth or the earth goes around the sun with only the sunrise as your "evidence."

Anonymous said...

Hi Mary,
"Dating isn't solid and there is some ambiguous case, and sometimes getting a good ballpark is like nailing down jello. Why isn't it solid? Well it depends on the method but mostly the issue is the validity of various assumptions required to even TRY to get to a date."

Show me why otherwise reliable dating methods are not reliable when it comes to refuting the originality of the torah. And then tell me the how you fit millions of years of history in under ten thousand years. You create a problem for yourself of overlapping dependent subsequent technologies, and languages which doesn't make any sense even for you.

You are engaging in special pleading. That is a fallacious argument technique.

Drow Ranger said...

>Show me why otherwise reliable dating methods are not reliable when it comes to refuting the originality of the torah

Who says they're reliable at all? Dating methods vary but most are serious guesstimates. What's this about "refuting the originality of the torah"? How about refuting the originality of pagan copycats? BTW just because there seems to be some copies lying around that "seem" recent, doesn't mean that there weren't older copies and even OLDER originals that haven't been seen by modern science, let alone dated.

>And then tell me the how you fit millions of years of history in under ten thousand years.

Simple, dude, there IS NO "millions of years of history." What you think are millions of years are actually layers of sediment laid down mainly in a single event, with other smaller layers resulting from normal erosion/deposition. The reason it's not "solid" is because it is a result of interpretation of evidence. And the interpretation you are following is not necessarily the correct one. There are simply not enough human bodies (living or dead) to justify a history of millions of years.

>You create a problem for yourself of overlapping dependent subsequent technologies, and languages which doesn't make any sense even for you.

No I do not. "Overlapping technologies" don't always give an overlapping answer, and in any case all of them depend on the same flawed premises. But just to give you a sample of how flawed it really is, take note that there is measurable Carbon-14 in diamonds that are "supposed" to be millions of years old.

> No I am NOT special-pleading. I don't regard ANY radiometric dating to be particularly accurate, although I regard C-14 dating as somewhat more accurate than any other method (due to the constraints upon it--if it's there, it's there, and if it's not, it's not--thus establishing some sort of hard benchmark boundary for the ballpark). There are other dating methods other than radiometric measures, but these are made of guesswork and fail.

BTW it doesn't take THAT long for languages to form. Especially if their root tongues were all formed instantly on one day.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mary,
Delusion from answers.com
"A delusion is an unshakable belief in something untrue. These irrational beliefs defy normal reasoning, and remain firm even when overwhelming proof is presented to dispute them...."

Have a nice day.

Harry H. McCall said...

Mary, do you know who the late James Barr was? Before he went Vanderbilt University and then retired a the School of Theology at Claremont, Calf., he was for decades, Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University.

Have you ever read his 1987 Ethel M. Wood Lecture delivered at the University of London entitled “Biblical Chronology: Legend of Science?”?

In short, the Hebrew word “YOM” means a 24 hour day and all facts based on the Hebrew text point ONLY to a “Young Earth” creation; a creation which happened about 8,000 years ago.

Drow Ranger said...

>Before he went Vanderbilt >University and then retired a the >School of Theology at Claremont, >Calf., he was for decades, >Professor of Hebrew at Oxford >University.

>Have you ever read his 1987 Ethel >M. Wood Lecture delivered at the >University of London >entitled “Biblical Chronology: >Legend of Science?”?

No, I've never gotten my hands on it. Although, I've seen similar things.

>In short, the Hebrew word “YOM” >means a 24 hour day and all facts >based on the Hebrew text point >ONLY to a “Young Earth” creation; >a creation which happened about >8,000 years ago.

And the problem with that is WHAT, exactly? Maybe you should check up on why Radiometric Dating isn't all it's cracked up to be. Did you know they invented "millions of years" long before radiometric dating was even invented?
(I'll give you a hint--if K-Ar is used to date something and it comes out as millions of years, and if an artifact dated by C-14 successfully that was associated with the rocks that was dated as millions of years by K-Ar, which is going to be CLOSER to "correct"?!) Did you know that it's scientifically IMPOSSIBLE to determine the difference between radiogenic and nonradiogenic Argon-40? It would be like distilling water from Lake Superior and Lake Okanagan, mixing them together not knowing which was which, and trying to figure out which came from where without knowing what amount came from where.

Anonymous said...

HI Mary,
Come on man you gotta try harder than that.


You seem to be a tough nut to crack. Since I don't see any inherent value in continuing our discussion, I will continue with you after you have made a donation and it has been verified by John.

Keep living the dream.

Drow Ranger said...

>You seem to be a tough nut to crack. Since I don't see any inherent value in continuing our discussion, I will continue with you after you have made a donation and it has been verified by John.

Oh I see. You haven't got anything, so you're giving up. Figures. Now I see why JPH has little patience with this crowd.

Harry H. McCall said...

Mary, please do some honestly objective reading. In 1982, noted Semitic scholar Jeffrey Tigay published his award winning book: Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic (paper 2005). This text proves that, just like the latter Hebrew Bible (JEPD), the ancient cuneiform text have been highly edited to keep the ancient story and religion in vogue.

If you don’t do any reading in that book, at least read his “Empirical Models for Biblical Criticism” (paper 2005). Awake up Mary! DC is not a Sunday school class!

I get soooo tried of trying to educate you in order to carry on a half way intelligent discussion! It seems like the Southern Baptist Sunday School Board pamphlets make up most you your scholarly reading and library (along with Holding’s website).

I don’t need to date the earth, I can simply defeat the Biblical text based on earlier and related Semitic texts.

JP Holding is great for the layman who thinks the Tekton website has all the apologetic answers, however, of all the academic meetings I’ve been to in the last 36 years, I never heard Holding cited even once!

Anonymous said...

Harry, buddy,
with all due respect, I don't think marys interested in the facts. I think marys just here to play around.

Drow Ranger said...

>Mary, please do some honestly objective reading. In 1982, noted Semitic scholar Jeffrey Tigay published his award winning book: Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic (paper 2005). This text proves that, just like the latter Hebrew Bible (JEPD), the ancient cuneiform text have been highly edited to keep the ancient story and religion in vogue.

You're going with JEPD? LAWL! Dude your credibility is SHOT.

>If you don’t do any reading in that book, at least read his “Empirical Models for Biblical Criticism” (paper 2005). Awake up Mary! DC is not a Sunday school class!

That's funny, because some people who run this joint seem to retain some beliefs they formed in Sunday School.

>I get soooo tried of trying to educate you in order to carry on a half way intelligent discussion! It seems like the Southern Baptist Sunday School Board pamphlets make up most you your scholarly reading and library (along with Holding’s website).

LOL! I am NOT Baptist; not even close. I have never even seen any Southern Baptist literature in my life.

> don’t need to date the earth, I can simply defeat the Biblical text based on earlier and related Semitic texts.

Uh-huh. Key word here is "text"--and there's no guarantee you've got the earliest Biblical text possible.

>JP Holding is great for the layman who thinks the Tekton website has all the apologetic answers, however, of all the academic meetings I’ve been to in the last 36 years, I never heard Holding cited even once!

Mhmmm...well what about NT Wright, Ben Witherington, and those other guys?

goprairie said...

Harry, Lee, I checked my internet personality ID guide and I think we have have one of these here:

"Trolling is the act of posting a comment or article in an open publishing forum that is intended to provoke and disrupt the discussion of users by producing a large volume of frivolous responses (Bond, 1999). The content of such a post may consist of a foolish contradiction of common knowledge, a deliberately offensive insult to the readers or a broad request for trivial follow-up postings (Bond, 1999). The person who participates in trolling is termed a troll."
"Foolish contradiction of common knowledge" is certainly an apt description of what is doing on in the discussion of evolution on another thread here.

Harry H. McCall said...

I agree Lee; but just want to show any objective reader who drops by how much of a nut case Mary / Marty is in these comments.

This so-called “Mary” tone of speech is that of a man; if not Holding himself, or that of a another male Tekton crony.

Hey Mary, the last picture I saw fat ass Holding, he looked like he had the sin of gluttony (Romans 16: 18, Phil. 3: 19).

Mary / Marty: “You're going with JEPD? LAWL! Dude your credibility is SHOT.”

Lets see then: Frank M. Cross (Harvard), John Van Seters (U.N.C. Chapel Hill), Mark Smith (Loyola University) , Philip Davies (University of Sheffield) , Dennis Pardee (University of Chicago), Karl Van Toorn (University of Leiden), P. Kyle McCarter (Johns Hopkins), Theo J. Lewis, Patrick D. Miller (Princeton), Ronald S. Hendel (U.C. Berkeley), John J. Collins (Yale), Jonas C. Greenfield (Hebrew University), Tjitze Baarda (University of Leiden) , Wilfred G.E. Waston (University of Newcastle upon Tyne), Jeffrey Tigay (University of Pennsylvania), and Nicholas Wyatt (University of Edinburgh) are, in your opinion, “Dudes” whose “credibility is SHOT.” BULL SHIT!!!!! This is news to me and it sure would be to them! But then I don’t get miss-information from Tekton Ministries website.

I reviewed all the books that Holding and his cronies have in alphabetical order and rated at Tektonic website. Hey, even Holding knows that to review any books authored by the any of the above scholars such as Frank Cross's “Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel” Harvard Press, 1973, Holding (or in cronies) would make a complete fool of themselves.


Marty / Mary: “Uh-huh. Key word here is "text"--and there's no guarantee you've got the earliest Biblical text possible.”

WRONG MARTY; the key word is SEMITICS, as in earliest languages!

Marty: “Mhmmm...well what about NT Wright, Ben Witherington, and those
other guys?”

The last I heard is that Aramaic scholar (translated a volume in the EJ Brill’s The Aramaic Bible)
Bill Chilton pointed out (on a post) that Ben Witherington could not read Aramaic and did not know what he was talking about. Is that your idea of a scholar?

NT Wright is differently not a Holding misinformation crony!

Marty / Mary: “and those other guys?”

Who, Mary? Bob Jones University professors? Yea, right!

Harry H. McCall said...

Below is an ending of a letter sent to the Tektonic Ministry website author, JP Holding:

"Mr. Holding,...

I strongly urge you to consider a brain exchange with a cabbage -- if you can find a cabbage willing to make the sacrifice."

AMEN!
Now there is a man that can really preach the truth!!!

Anonymous said...

Hi Goprairie,
bingo!

Harry H. McCall said...

I totally agree Lee, Goprairie nailed this one!

Thanks very much Goprairie! You save alot of wasted keyboarding time.

Drow Ranger said...

goprairie: Umm, no. Mkay? "Common Knowledge" isn't always correct--just remember, people believed in a flat earth at one time. Some still might. Don't mistake your own ignorance for an idea that I'm "trolling." I think you'd better get out more; you clearly have NO CLUE how to question "common knowledge" and for all you know, you could be the equivalent of a flat-earther. Would it KILL you to TRY to refute what I'm saying? Otherwise it just makes you look stubbornly closeminded.

Harry McCall's Bros:
This so-called “Mary” tone of speech is that of a man; if not Holding himself, or that of a another male Tekton crony.

AHAHAHAHAHA! Determining gender on the internet is so amusing. There is no tone in text. You simply cannot tell, and if you think you can, I have news for you: You're wrong. But hey, feel free to disbelieve me. It just makes me laugh harder.

Hey Mary, the last picture I saw fat ass Holding, he looked like he had the sin of gluttony (Romans 16: 18, Phil. 3: 19).

But how do you know that's *really* him?

Mary / Marty: “You're going with JEPD? LAWL! Dude your credibility is SHOT.”

Lets see then: Frank M. Cross (Harvard), John Van Seters (U.N.C. Chapel Hill), Mark Smith (Loyola University) , Philip Davies (University of Sheffield) , Dennis Pardee (University of Chicago), Karl Van Toorn (University of Leiden), P. Kyle McCarter (Johns Hopkins), Theo J. Lewis, Patrick D. Miller (Princeton), Ronald S. Hendel (U.C. Berkeley), John J. Collins (Yale), Jonas C. Greenfield (Hebrew University), Tjitze Baarda (University of Leiden) , Wilfred G.E. Waston (University of Newcastle upon Tyne), Jeffrey Tigay (University of Pennsylvania), and Nicholas Wyatt (University of Edinburgh) are, in your opinion, “Dudes” whose “credibility is SHOT.” BULL SHIT!!!!! This is news to me and it sure would be to them! But then I don’t get miss-information from Tekton Ministries website.


Yes, they're all shot. I didn't get my primary information from Tektonics. I have other sources that have nothing to do with Tektonics or any of that other stuff.

I reviewed all the books that Holding and his cronies have in alphabetical order and rated at Tektonic website. Hey, even Holding knows that to review any books authored by the any of the above scholars such as Frank Cross's “Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel” Harvard Press, 1973, Holding (or in cronies) would make a complete fool of themselves.
Hey, whatever dude. IMO, Cross has it back-diddly-ackwards. He's assuming some of the stuff from Canaanite religion went into what eventually became Judaism, but I don't think he's gone back far enough in history. Yes there are similiarities, but it also doesn't make sense that God (of the Bible) would get so mad at Canaanite religion, if in fact it was just a mere outgrowth of same.

Marty / Mary: “Uh-huh. Key word here is "text"--and there's no guarantee you've got the earliest Biblical text possible.”

WRONG MARTY; the key word is SEMITICS, as in earliest languages!


And you have no guarantee that you have the earliest one of those, either.

Marty: “Mhmmm...well what about NT Wright, Ben Witherington, and those
other guys?”

The last I heard is that Aramaic scholar (translated a volume in the EJ Brill’s The Aramaic Bible)
Bill Chilton pointed out (on a post) that Ben Witherington could not read Aramaic and did not know what he was talking about. Is that your idea of a scholar?

NT Wright is differently not a Holding misinformation crony!

Uh-huh...proof plz?


Who, Mary? Bob Jones University professors? Yea, right

Dude, I don't pay any attention to who's a Bob Jones University prof. I have different sources, most of whom are more likely to have gone to Concordia Seminary than Bobby Jones...

Harry H. McCall said...

Mary: “Yes, they're all shot. I didn't get my primary information from Tektonics. I have other sources that have nothing to do with Tektonics or any of that other stuff. …
Hey, whatever dude. IMO, Cross has it back-diddly-ackwards. He's assuming some of the stuff from Canaanite religion went into what eventually became Judaism, but I don't think he's gone back far enough in history.

Mary, For the fourth time, what is your source / sources?

Your statement “Yes there are similiarities, but it also doesn't make sense that God (of the Bible) would get so mad at Canaanite religion, if in fact it was just a mere outgrowth of same.” Shows me that you are your own authority.

Hey, Dude, name me one book of Frank Cross you own.

I’ve had Frank Cross for a class in Canaanite and Israelite religion, and he does NOT assume things, he dates the scripts on style and archaic language. You are in over your head here!