Hebrews vs Greeks
Another excerpt from my upcoming book, comparing the Ancient Hebrews with the Ancient Greeks.
While the Hebrews were content with being ruled by a so-called divinely appointed monarchy, the Greeks were advanced enough to have an aristocracy* (rule by the best) and a democracy (rule by the people). While the Hebrews were content with entertaining themselves by burning incense and dancing around campfires, the Greeks were busy writing stories for the theatre–having invented the genres of comedy, drama, and tragedy. While the Hebrews were content with their beliefs being guided by faith, superstition, and a violent god, Aristotle and other Greeks were discovering the principles of logic, reason, rational thought, and argumentation. While the Hebrews were content with believing that God was in control of all aspects of reality, Archimedes and other Greeks were laying the foundations of the scientific method. While the Hebrews were content with writing psalms that praise an egotistical god, the Greeks were busy developing musical theory. While the Hebrews were content with explaining their past by relying on myths, legends, and other oral traditions, Herodotus and other Greeks were establishing the principles of unbiased, unemotional, nonjudgmental, and factual documentation of history.
While the Hebrews were content with breaking bird necks to cure leprosy, topically applying animal dung to cure various skin ailments, performing exorcisms to cure epilepsy, and praying to cure a number of untreatable afflictions, Hippocrates and other Greeks were developing rational anatomy-based medicine that relied on experience and observation. While the Hebrews were content with building temples for their god to dwell in, the Greeks were producing innovative architecture, sculptures, and paintings.** While the Hebrews were content with mundane stories and the writings of prophets, Homer, Sophocles, Aesop, Sappho, and other Greeks were writing some of the most powerful works of literature that the world has ever known. While the Hebrews were content with counting how many people belonged to each of their tribes, Euclid, Pythagoras, and other Greeks were inventing geometry and other advanced mathematics. While the Hebrews were content with believing whatever God or their other leaders told them about reality, Thales, Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates were busy not only inventing philosophy, but also writing some of the greatest philosophical treatises that the world will ever know. Yet after comparing the innumerable accomplishments of the Greeks to the unenlightened barbarity of the Hebrews, are we still to believe that the creator of the universe was working through the latter to carry his timeless message of paramount importance to future generations? Something is definitely wrong with such a position.
I could elaborate on the difference between the Greeks and Hebrews for the rest of the book without adequately drawing deserved contrast between the two groups, pointing out for example how Plato and Aristotle argued for their positions while Jesus merely gave assertions and threatened those who did not accept them, or how Democritus appreciated the vastness of the universe while any Hebrew thought he was the center of it, but I will instead put the issue to rest with one undeniably moving final observation.
Hippocrates, the aforementioned father of medicine who lived from approximately 460-370 BCE, once said, “Men think epilepsy divine, merely because they do not understand it.” Yet four hundred years after the mortal Hippocrates realized that there had to be a natural, rational explanation for the mysterious medical condition, Jesus was allegedly curing epilepsy by casting out demons. Hippocrates realized that people attributed epilepsy to demonic possession only because they did not understand it. This leads us to perhaps the most important question I will pose in this book. How is it that the all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the universe sent a messenger, the savior of all humanity, who knew less than an ordinary man who had been dead for centuries? How could Hippocrates have a better understanding of the world than Jesus? Why should we hold Jesus as a superior teacher? It does not make sense.
* In my opinion, the best form of government. Not a traditional aristocracy of the wealthy, but one of the enlightened – the philosophers, as Socrates called them.
** None of the paintings still exists, but we have anecdotal reports of their appearance often being indistinguishable from reality.
While the Hebrews were content with being ruled by a so-called divinely appointed monarchy, the Greeks were advanced enough to have an aristocracy* (rule by the best) and a democracy (rule by the people). While the Hebrews were content with entertaining themselves by burning incense and dancing around campfires, the Greeks were busy writing stories for the theatre–having invented the genres of comedy, drama, and tragedy. While the Hebrews were content with their beliefs being guided by faith, superstition, and a violent god, Aristotle and other Greeks were discovering the principles of logic, reason, rational thought, and argumentation. While the Hebrews were content with believing that God was in control of all aspects of reality, Archimedes and other Greeks were laying the foundations of the scientific method. While the Hebrews were content with writing psalms that praise an egotistical god, the Greeks were busy developing musical theory. While the Hebrews were content with explaining their past by relying on myths, legends, and other oral traditions, Herodotus and other Greeks were establishing the principles of unbiased, unemotional, nonjudgmental, and factual documentation of history.
While the Hebrews were content with breaking bird necks to cure leprosy, topically applying animal dung to cure various skin ailments, performing exorcisms to cure epilepsy, and praying to cure a number of untreatable afflictions, Hippocrates and other Greeks were developing rational anatomy-based medicine that relied on experience and observation. While the Hebrews were content with building temples for their god to dwell in, the Greeks were producing innovative architecture, sculptures, and paintings.** While the Hebrews were content with mundane stories and the writings of prophets, Homer, Sophocles, Aesop, Sappho, and other Greeks were writing some of the most powerful works of literature that the world has ever known. While the Hebrews were content with counting how many people belonged to each of their tribes, Euclid, Pythagoras, and other Greeks were inventing geometry and other advanced mathematics. While the Hebrews were content with believing whatever God or their other leaders told them about reality, Thales, Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates were busy not only inventing philosophy, but also writing some of the greatest philosophical treatises that the world will ever know. Yet after comparing the innumerable accomplishments of the Greeks to the unenlightened barbarity of the Hebrews, are we still to believe that the creator of the universe was working through the latter to carry his timeless message of paramount importance to future generations? Something is definitely wrong with such a position.
I could elaborate on the difference between the Greeks and Hebrews for the rest of the book without adequately drawing deserved contrast between the two groups, pointing out for example how Plato and Aristotle argued for their positions while Jesus merely gave assertions and threatened those who did not accept them, or how Democritus appreciated the vastness of the universe while any Hebrew thought he was the center of it, but I will instead put the issue to rest with one undeniably moving final observation.
Hippocrates, the aforementioned father of medicine who lived from approximately 460-370 BCE, once said, “Men think epilepsy divine, merely because they do not understand it.” Yet four hundred years after the mortal Hippocrates realized that there had to be a natural, rational explanation for the mysterious medical condition, Jesus was allegedly curing epilepsy by casting out demons. Hippocrates realized that people attributed epilepsy to demonic possession only because they did not understand it. This leads us to perhaps the most important question I will pose in this book. How is it that the all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the universe sent a messenger, the savior of all humanity, who knew less than an ordinary man who had been dead for centuries? How could Hippocrates have a better understanding of the world than Jesus? Why should we hold Jesus as a superior teacher? It does not make sense.
* In my opinion, the best form of government. Not a traditional aristocracy of the wealthy, but one of the enlightened – the philosophers, as Socrates called them.
** None of the paintings still exists, but we have anecdotal reports of their appearance often being indistinguishable from reality.
23 comments:
ok. i'll bite on the point you make about epilepsy. you may want to rethink that as the main point in your book. hippocrates may well have had some interesting opinions about epilepsy, but he only "proposed" that it was caused by something rational, or natural. there are different types of epilepsy, idiopathic is likely the one you refer too. doctors to this day do NOT know the causes of it, nor is there a known cure. they think that it is possibly related to chemical inbalances in the brain, but even with todays technology, can't figure it out. so what does that tell us about hippocrates and jesus? obviously, you don't "believe" that jesus cured epilepsy by casting out demons. but, as there is no known cause or cure, and hippocrates didn't make any real assertions or advances of any substance, how can you claim it invalidates what jesus could have done hundreds of years later? you can't unless YOU happen to know what causes this illness, and have a cure somewhere. i'm not even making this argument on faith, but rather on what we know now about the illness, what hippocrates knew then, and what it is written that jesus did.
So many arguments over the dates and literary forms of the Hebrew writings which became the Old Testament. I would rank Job and Jonah with the best of the imaginative literature of the Greeks. And Ecclesiastes with the best of the philosophical speculation. And likely a dozen generations before the full flower of Classical Greek culture. And some splendid narration contemporary with or preceeding Homer.
The Hebrew scriptures did not give us such good science or engineering, true. But archaic and medieval Judaism, acculturated to the same, provided a beacon of rational empirical thought to the Pagan, Muslim and Christian cultures in which they dwelled.
Joshua, is your arguement that epilepsy, in any form, has a cause outside of the natural, meaning the "supernatural"?
If that is not your arguement, then why did you bother with this comment?
If that is your arguement, then you are not being honest when you claim that you are "...not even making this argument on faith, but rather on what we know now about the illness..." Please name one thing in science or medicine that was, for generations, thought to have a natural cause, then it was later discovered to have supernatural causes. Name just one.
Now, see if you can come up with one thing (or a hundred) in science or medicine that was thought to have supernatural causes, but it was later discovered to be a product of nature.
Hopefully you will come to realize that, if we do not know what natural cause there is for a desise (idiopathic epilepsy) then it is just a matter of time. But rest assured, we will never discover that demons are behind it. Trust me.
bob
that is indeed the rub. no one would scientifically discover "demons" or anything else supernatural, it if that were the case. i'm saying that nothing hippocrates did or said discredits the possibility of the validity of the workings and teachings of jesus. and epilepsy is a poor example as it is still an enigmatic issue. you would need some proof that discredits this particular argument. not just that hippocrates way of thinking is more in line with scientists.
clearly, there are innumerable instances of "supernatural occurrences" being proven to be natural through scientific explanation and discovery. for thousands of years people have had myths for what caused lightning, celestial occurrences, floods, what the sun is, etc. these have explanations. however this instance of epilepsy is not the same, because it is related to the inner workings of the brain of an individual. it hasn't been explained by science, therefore it can't be said (with certainty) that it discredits other explanations, as ludicrous as they seem. and no, even if it were supernatural, it would never be proven so by science. nor would anything else "supernatural" because by definition it can't be explained by science, so of course would be impossible, and thats where the issue of faith comes in. its not my argument to make, but hasn't been proven false.
That's a very interesting subject you chose for your book. It happens to be along the lines of what I'm doing these days too.
Did you know about the Greek Neo-Pagans, who are trying to bring the ancient Greek religion back to life? I find that extremely fascinating. And I know for a fact that they exist, I saw them when I was in Greece last summer. And as strange as it may seem, I was excited, I felt like I wanted to join them! And I am one of those extremist atheists, so... I still don't know what to make of the strange urge I felt then.
I got some of their magazines and if you think the difference between Ancient Greeks and Ancient Hebrews is big, try analysing the difference between Ancient Greeks and Christians. They do it a lot in those magazines I got.
Thinking about the difference between the Ancient Greek mentality and the Ancient Hebrew/Christian one I always find myself getting mad.
Hmmm...
Although I am an atheist and long-time reader of this blog (and currently reading John's book), I hope you are going to be more indepth, because so far I am reading only a lot of straw men. The book will be more scholarly, correct?
This post outlines a series of laughable over-generalizations and false contrasts. Especially now since I am taking a critical Hebrew Bible course at Princeton I can see it for the nonsense that it is. I don't have time to go through all the points so I'll just comment on one, which is most directly related to what I'm studying:
"While the Hebrews were content with explaining their past by relying on myths, legends, and other oral traditions, Herodotus and other Greeks were establishing the principles of unbiased, unemotional, nonjudgmental, and factual documentation of history."
History is a hard genre to define, but John Van Seters pretty much proved in In Search of History that history writing actually began in Israel, or at least was invented by both Greece and Israel around the same time. The Greeks were no less reliant on myths and legends for explaining the past and the origin of the world than were the Israelites. Hesiod's Theogony and Works and Days were long treated by the Greeks as their 'Bible' for explaining how the world came to be, along with Homer. Most Greeks including Herodotus took for granted the existence of a 'Heroic Age' when gods and humans coexisted and wondrous events were commonplace, much like the period before the call of Abraham in Genesis.
And have you even read Herodotus? His work is basically a mishmash of local legends, hearsay, copy-and-paste from previous pseudohistorical works like that of Hecataeus and even many facts and events of his own invention. Many scholars argue that his marks of authenticity (such as leaving it up to the reader to decide whether a particular event actually took place or not) are merely rhetorical devices to lend authenticity to his work, just as many skeptical scholars do for the Bible. Herodotus also took for granted the reality of divine retribution and providence throughout history.
In sum, Herodotus is far from the prototype for cool, dispassionate, factual historical investigation. In fact in terms of the basic outlook on the world there is little difference between his Histories and the various historical books of the Bible. His rhetoric of impartiality conceals his wholesale reliance on previous works of mythic history, reporting of hearsay and local legend and 'creation out of nothing' of many events. Conversely we see in the Bible substantial indicators that the authors and editors intended to report as accurately as possible what had been passed down to them. Richard Friedman not only thinks that Israelite history was the first history but also that it was "very good history." (Who Wrote the Bible?)
This absolute dichotomy between Greek and Hebrew thought is ironically a relic and anachronism from 19th Century liberal Protestant theology and biblical studies, which used the dichotomy in order to justify their demythologization of the Bible's dualistic tendencies. We have learned much since then. We understand that the Greeks (in general, as opposed to a handful of exceptional minds which crop up in every civilization, including the Israelite) are not the proto-Enlightenment poster boys that the philosophes took them to be. They believed in gods, omens, dreams, ghosts, myths and all the rest, including many of the more educated. Conversely the Hebrews were the violent, superstitious pastoralists that atheists like to imagine they were. On the contrary, monotheistic thought had a deeply demythologiziing and rationalizing influence on cosmology in general (see Baruch Halpern's article on Genesis 1 as an early scientific model of how the world works!).
It is true that Herodotus' work is far from what we would consider a reliable history work today. I read Herodotus, and some of the things he writes are right down laughable. The real history writing, as we know it, begins with Thucydides.
Still, the Bible is much worse than anything Herodotus could have written.
I inclined to believe that Heyzeus7 is J. D. Walters; a student at Princeton University.
A recent closing comment to an essay by Mr. Walters, he revealed his Christian faith:
“The Christian worldview has the "cultural capital" to unite the pursuit of learning with real service to humanity, to say nothing of an immensely satisfying conception of "all truth as God's truth," which makes all fields of inquiry valid and significant.”
Joshua wrote: dclearly, there are innumerable instances of "supernatural occurrences" being proven to be natural through scientific explanation and discovery. for thousands of years people have had myths for what caused lightning, celestial occurrences, floods, what the sun is, etc. these have explanations. however this instance of epilepsy is not the same, because it is related to the inner workings of the brain of an individual. it hasn't been explained by science, therefore it can't be said (with certainty) that it discredits other explanations, as ludicrous as they seem.
First, you seem to implying we need a 100% understanding and cure before we can discredit the Biblical claim that Jesus cured epilepsy by casing out demons.
While it would be possible that epilepsy would be the exception to these innumerable instances, why do you think it's plausible? Why do you expect epilepsy to be any different than lightning, floods or the sun? Because it's more complex?
It's clear that we're only in our infancy regarding how our brains work; just as we once were regarding lighting, the sun, conception, etc.
Second, while it might be true that we cannot cure epilepsy, over 50% can gain control over their seizures using drugs. However, the type and number of drugs that are most effective varies from person to person. In some cases, epileptic symptoms can have a specific focal point in the brain, which can also vary from person to person. Based on this information, doctors can provide a custom treatment that is most effective for each individual.
However, If demons were intentionally causing these wide range of unique symptoms, why wouldn't they intentionally change their approach as a direct response to counteract treatment?
For example, if treatment is focused on a particular region of the brain, why wouldn't a demon respond by switching to another location? If one series of drugs was effective in suppressing a particular individual's seizures, why wouldn't a demon respond by changing it's tactics so these same drugs would become less effective?
We wouldn't expect this sort of evasive behavior in a natural cause; but why would you expect a evil, supernatural entity to blindly continue manifesting the same symptoms even when they are successfully suppressed by a specific treatment?
Harry,
That's who I am. I opened a second blogger account for convenience and for variety. I haven't actually kept my Christian faith a secret. I publicly introduced myself on this blog and announced my intention to take on John Loftus's DC challenge. What has this got to do with the comments I made?
Being a philosopher is no guarantee of wisdom. Would you really want the Republic of Plato to be our government today? Not me.
Good point, Gadfly.
Our Philosophy prof called Plato "the world's first fascist.".
Jason, your book looks interesting.
Are you a historian, conversant in Hebrew and Greek?
I think Jason's representation of Greek "democracy" is as misleading of his representation of the Hebrews. He obviously has an underling problem with Jews.
Heyzeus7: While I agree with the prospective you made on ancient Greek historians and philosophers, as an Society of Biblical Literature member for 25 years
(1973 – 1998) who attended a number of national and regional meetings, I think your review of Hector Avalos is as one sided as you claim Jason Long’s post is.
Both you and Bart Ehrman are / were Princeton students. Bart now calls himself a “Happy Agnostic” while you still claim a positive Christian faith and I find that very interesting.
Christianity is, indeed, a vague term just by the fact that some twenty to forty thousand sects are all trying to define it while many condemn the other a heretical.
Since the Christian faith is strongly influenced by knowledge, I find Process Theology heavily at work in any Christian's faith that also chooses to continue in objective scholarship and your studies at Princeton will be no exception.
I’ll be interested to see how the DC Challenge affects you.
Regards,
Harry
Adam... for a great demythologizing look at Socrates, I recommend I.F. (Izzy) Stone's "The Trial of Socrates."
You oppose things which have a parallel in the other culture. (Pagans had a very rich religious world-view and life; they also burned incence; they also danced; their deities were also "brutal"; they also had kings, tyrants, and dictators; Semites have a special inclination to the art of story-telling and sapiential literature [they are especially remembered for their wits: "Noah gave Adam's head {wisdom} to Sem, his arms {power} to Japhet, and his legs {subjection} to Ham"]; or the character of Nastratin Hogea in Islam; etc). Your whole approach is very one-sided.
Just Us,
"It is true that Herodotus' work is far from what we would consider a reliable history work today."
Yes, that is absolutely true.
However, what makes Herodotus different from other historical sources of the time was his methodology. He was the first historian to actively seek corroborating evidence to support claims. He was also the first to give levels of confidence about his own claims (universally recognized by historians today).
So, does he measure up to a modern day historian in evidential reliability?
Absolutely not. But when weighing his analyses against any other of that era, he definitely deserves the preferred position.
Hope this helps,
Tully
Well, it looks like my post has generated a lot of feedback, but I'll be brief here. Joshua, bob and scott are correct by saying that if your point is moot unless you want to argue that epilepsy is supernatural. Justus, I didn't mean to imply the entire book was on the topic. Heyzeus, you are delusional if you believe there is a grain of advanced scientific thought in Genesis. I'm also glad you found my post laughable. I find educated people who believe in a god found in a book with a talking donkey laughable, so it looks like we both have something to laugh at. Gadfly, I am not arguing that the Ancient Greek government is better than anything we could develop today, but rather better than what the Hebrews had developed - but nice try though. Adam, yes I'm a bigot; that's the only reasonable conclusion from my post. Lvka, my point is that it is extremely odd to argue that the Hebrews were divinely guided when they were so far behind the Greeks. Tully, that pretty much sums up the point I was attempting to make. The methodology was much more sound than what the Hebrews were utilizing.
Justin,
I am not arguing, as do some Christian and Muslim apologists, that Genesis gives a metaphorical account of the Big Bang or that the Bible 'anticipated' any modern scientific developments. But the Genesis creation stories DO represent an attempt to think scientifically about the world, to delineate the mechanisms (not involving the whim of patron deities) by which creation works. You'll notice that whereas in Greek mythology the sun is Apollo's chariot riding across the sky, in Genesis the sun is simply a light in the heavens, put there to measure out times and seasons. In the article I referenced, Baruch Halpern compares the Genesis account with the Milesian cosmology of Anaximander, and concludes: "Genesis 1 is a pyrotechnics of cosmogonic speculation. Though rarely understood as such, it is comparable to the speculations of early pre-Socratic naturalists." The Genesis 1 creation narrative presents a demythologized, rational view of the world even if its content does not (understandably) match that of modern science.
P.S. I'm Heyzeus 7 but due to a mix-up with my Google account that username got deleted and I'm using my regular name account.
But in Genesis the entire world was created by a human-like conscience (conscience at best, it was more like a person), whereas for the Greeks everything emerged from Chaos. I think the Greeks were much closer to the Big Bang with that one.
Jason, there is whole different point of view if you just took the time to check out Christian, Jewish and for that matter most Western philosophy.
For example, the Hebrews introduced a demythologized world with regards a covenantal, personal relationship to God (and consequently relationship with one another). Nothing in Greek thought can touch the Hebrew mentality in relationship to God. Maybe that's beside the point, but it translates into different social life, with the Hebrew emphasis on the family, community, and education, contrasted with the Greek focus on the state.
I score the Hebrew's for the birth of "democracy" that makes sense, based on a society of equal individuals flowing from the institution of marriage and family life. The Greek's "democrazy" of the nation producing the individual haunts contemporary politics, as in the production and entrenchment of political elites.
In the Bible, no more mythological heros and demigods like in Homer, but real people in real biography i.e. Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus.
Jason, if you are interested in exploring a different point of view, I suggest reading Auerbach on this topic of Greek vs. Hebrew. If you do, let us know if you are willing to let go of some of your prejudices.
And then, when it comes to the mysteries of the brain and epilepsy, I suggest reading some Jung.
Of course such reading is perhaps superfluous to a life of faith. But it is in the interests of broad mindedness. And so, before you rush an under-researched book to publication, maybe you will take some of my advice and check out Hebrews vs. Greeks again from another perspective.
Jason, on second thoughts, publish whatever you want to publish on this topic and don't take it from me, you will add to the proliferation of views. There is interesting stuff out there. I personally have great respect for Hebrews past, present and future and dare I say I also greatly admire the ancient Greeks. So its all much of a muchness. However personally I prefer more balanced viewpoints to the kind of onesided picture you portrayed in your initial post.
I appreciate Greek myth as well as the Hebrew prophets, recognizing the differences and respecting this. I don't subsribe to Greek political thought because I disagree with Plato, i.e. I don't believe in the inherent good of the state.
Well, I'll keep waiting and see if you want to ask me any questions or challenge my way of thinking these things through. Bear in mind the Hebrews from Abraham were around from the beginning of the alphabet in Mesopotamia, so we can go back right to there if you wish. Maybe you will catch the beauty of the story.
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