NOVA is showing a new episode tonight, The Bible’s Buried Secrets. It doesn’t sound like the usual laudatory tripe we get on the cable documentary shows — in fact, it sounds downright skeptical:
A visually stunning two-hour special edition of “Nova” examines decades of archaeological studies that contradict much of what is in the Bible. The entire Exodus story is debunked, as is the idea that the Israelites were monotheistic following the contract made between God and Abraham. It turns out idol worship was common through the reign of King David and right up to the Babylonian exile.
I have to miss it, I’m afraid, since it’s another travel night and day and day and day for me. Let me know how it turns out, ‘k?
Can you shoot the runaway <i> tag with your AK-47 before you go?
Egads!! Run for yer life mateys. It’s the evil i
The NOVA podcasts have been touting this for about a week, now, and they seemed to be trying very hard to be accomodating.
But when they talk about recreating a Jewish temple that was meant for animal sacrifice, I can’t help but feel that hardcore Xians would definitely not approve.
The yahoo news piece gives me hope that it’ll get more of them to watch it.
Does anyone know if this will be shown in the UK?
You’re in luck PZ, it will be available free online as early as tomorrow at the NOVA website.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/
This is defiantly a must see program.
~Atomic Chimp
I’ll watch it as a Christian and let you know what I think.
Thanks for the tip.
I’ll be taping it tonight, but probably won’t watch it until next week when I am on vacation.
I guess PBS is part of the jihadists/hip subculture now, as they attacked the idiocy of Behe et al., and now are going to point out that although “the Bible tells me so,” it isn’t so.
It’s kind of a funny old book, after all, especially that whole “idols” and “other gods” stuff, because you get glimpses of good pious Israelite ancestors, like Rachel, with a horde of family gods. And unlike the telling of those in Judah, the horrible “idol-worshippers” in the ten tribes were good Yahwists (the Assyrians took note of that fact, according to the Bible), while indeed worshipping before idols (not worshipping idols, actually).
Anyhow, I don’t suppose PBS has much to worry about in the current climate, no matter that it’s bound to be tarred and feathered by many religionists.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Sounds fun. I’ll be sure to tune in.
In almost related news, a student has asked a member of our faculty if the class can watch Expelled as a group outside of class. She said yes, if a discussion is included on the film, it’s tactics, and how it compares with Expelled Exposed.
I’m looking forward to it, in an odd sort of way (as though I had a schedule of train wrecks and knew that a particularly bad one was coming up), since the college isn’t paying for the copy, I’m not paying for the copy, and the student in question is using a rental copy that he has already seen. Said student watched it after his parents suggested it to him, and I have a feeling that he is asking about it because it doesn’t mesh with what he has been exposed to in class.
I may make my copy of Flock of Dodos available for a showing after Thanksgiving.
Thoughts? Suggestions? Fhtagns?
#9
Yes, see what I wrote here.
It’s interesting enough that Behe wrote this:
By the way, that’s both in Darwin’s Black Box and where I linked in that post.
But then they wouldn’t even publish that comment on their blog. They’re the worst hypocrites.
Glen D
I’ll watch Looney Tunes before I watch that insane drivel.
Poking around their website, I found that on some of the later stuff (the period of the monarchy) they were more inclined to accept the Biblical story (e.g., asserting that Solomon really did rule over what the book says he did) than I would be. I mean, the Gezer gates? I thought at least a few of those sites had been dated to a later period, thus breaking the illusion that their commonalities indicated central Solomonic control. . . but hey, it’s not my field.
Thanks, Glen.
I’ll bring that one, plus Behe’s comment that his standard for science would allow astrology as well.
Same stuff I’ve been saying for years. Only with better production values. And a lot less attitude… :)
I’ll have to watch it online later this week. I work 4 – 11pm every night.
Shame on Nova, who denigrates a universal phenomena in it’s moniker, to display such dreck as a form of historical reality to the already deranged minds who will sit there with stupefied mouth agape and dead brains open to more insane crap. Oh, for the likes of H L Mencken, Richard Feynman, Jonathan Miller, Carl Sagan and countless others who managed to stem the tide of this moronic drivel.
Robster FCD #13 wrote:
I’ve never really thought that it’s wrong to include astrology as a science theory — because it’s testable, makes predictions, and can be falsified. We could imagine a universe where astrology worked, and there was some explorable mechanism which explained it. Astrology, however, is wrong. Those who continue to promote it are now dealing in pseudoscience.
But Behe is still being ridiculous. Intelligent Design isn’t as good a science theory as astrology.
Blake Stacey at #12:
You are correct. They span a wide-range of history, not the narrow range. They talk about that issue in “The Bible Unearthed” — the book and the documentary — and how it is proof of nothing, not proof of Solomon’s empire. An empire they don’t believe existed as portrayed.
I actually look at most of the Old Testament as the historical equivalent of John Lovitz doing “The Liars Club” on SNL. Somewhere in there are a few grains of truth and, as Lewis Black says, a lot of “bullshit.”
Moses:
Tell it to PBS.
Sigh.
I guess attacking the historicity of everything up to the Davidic dynasty is still a good beginning.
I just got done looking over PBS’s site on this. I wouldn’t get your hopes up. They have mini-interviews with their line-up of experts, and while some of them seem objective others bend a little or quite a ways over backward to cater to the non-thinkers. For example, “Just because there’s not one iota of evidence that the Exodus really occured doesn’t mean that a small group couldn’t have broken away and been the basis of the story.” No evidence, but that’s ok, I guess. Scientific objectivism is of uneven quality, depending on the expert. One says the Unified Kingdom was a small chiefdomship, another claims some ruins in Jerusalem are David’s Monumental Palace because the Bible says so.
They do make the point that there is no evidence supporting the idea that the Isrealites were an intrusive group; a theory is floated that an indigenous group broke away from decaying cities in the plain and set up shop in the hills for social, economic, or (of course) religious reasons. They don’t mention that at that exact time (around 1200 BCE) almost every major Late Bronze Age city was sacked by outside forces. Egypt had to fight three defensive battles against “barbarian” invaders to survive. Maybe folks in Canaan headed for the hills for safety.
I’m going to watch, but from what I’ve seen, there’s enough “maybe’s” to make sure those who don’t want to think critically won’t have to.
I exchanged emails with atheist Bible scholar Dr. Hector Avalos earlier today on this show (Avalos wrote “The End of Biblical Studies”), and he responded with this:
I plan to offer a commentary on DebunkingChristianity, where
I am a regular contributor:http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com. But
that may be in a few weeks because I am on my way to Boston for
the Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, which plans
a whole session on this NOVA special. Some of the principals interviewed will probably
be there.
You know, it might be rather interesting to see what Hector Avalos has to say about this show.
Holbach’s knee jerks:
to display such dreck as a form of historical reality to the already deranged minds who will sit there with stupefied mouth agape and dead brains open to more insane crap.
What are you saying? That archaeological investigation of the Levant is somehow invalid? Did you even read past “The Bible…” in the title of the program? For myself, I find the Archaeology of the area fascinating, and it has nothing to do with assigning historical reality to anything other than… historical reality. Whatever it was, we can investigate it, and the search need not be burdened by the mythology, any more than the excavation of a Mayan pyramid is beholden to Tlaloc.
WTTW in Chicago is playing it at 2:30AM tonight. DVRs are a glorious thing…
Greg Peterson:
D’oh — our comments crossed in the æther!
I may burst your bubble here. From the website:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/apsell.html
@Norman Doering: Even a stopped clock…
Agreed, this sounds more like Schlieman (sorry for not checking the spelling) excavating for Troy based on The Illiad. Nothing to do with proving the existence of Poseiden and Athena, just that the myth does have a basis in historical events. Surely we can also study the Bible from the perspective of archeology and anthropology and leave the theology aside.
Well, David may well have existed. Doesn’t mean he was anything more than a bandit chieftain. And, y’know, the Bible is pretty ancient. I fail to see how these statements pander to believers.
The idea is to find out the truth, to as close an approximation as possible. Just because a small subset of what we find out can be construed by believers as confirmatory of the historicity of their beloved fairy tales does not invalidate the enterprise.
hmmm… I might have to reconnect the TV for the evening. it’s rare enough to see Biblical archaeology that doesn’t completely pander to religion (I think the last one I’ve seen was about proving the James Ossuary was a fake)
CJO @ 23
Historical excavation is one thing; mythological excavation to state biblical nonsense is another and not worthy of research no matter how burdened your opinions on the matter are, jerky knees and jerky ideals notwithstanding.
PZ has no TiVo?
mythological excavation to state biblical nonsense
What the hell is “mythological excavation”?
Look, it’s TV, entertainment, with an audience that expects some connection to the Bible stories they know, whether they believe them or not. It is not “stating biblical nonsense” to say that a bandit chieftain, drunkard and womanizer named David made his fortress somewhere, based on archaeological finds x, y and z. It’s irrelevant whether any believers take comfort from that. It’s true or it isn’t.
>Let me know how it turns out, ‘k?
Nietzsche did it.
With knives.
At the festivals of atonement.
Or, it might have been a tweedy academic.
With a word processor.
No, wait, it was a militant popular atheist.
With a board game.
I agree that David may have existed, (the concept that many biblical stories many have a tiny bit of truth in them that’s been magnified by two orders of magnitude is a reasonable argument),but from the tenor of the web site I got the feeling the show is going to say, “So maybe David did exist with a huge palace and all the trimmings just like the bible says” and not list the other 10,000 possibilities that are equally probable. If they in fact do that I don’t think they are being objective. Then again, this is all speculation since we haven’t seen the show yet. I’m just annoyed that there will probably be just enough psuedo-factoids presented to feed the faithheads, and that just makes them more obnoxious.
“It turns out idol worship was common through the reign of King David and right up to the Babylonian exile.”
…Yea uh isn’t that why the guy supposedly slaps the israelites and enslaves them a few times? Cuz they worshipped idols?
I didn’t get that feeling. In fact, just the opposite, when they say the exodus of 35000 isrealite slaves from Egypt certainly did not happen, but maybe a small number of Canaanites did, it seems they will be emphasising evidence over speculation. What you describe is typical of the Biblical archeology shows on the History Channel, not Nova. I’ll wait until I see the show before condemning them.
“It turns out idol worship was common through the reign of King David and right up to the Babylonian exile.”
Hmmm… I seem to recall reading that somewhere… oh, wait — wasn’t that in the Bible?
CJO @ 33
Besides astronomy and several other science subjects, archaeology is another of my favorite interests, especially when carried out in the legitimate purpose of defining the past. Archaeology is a legitimate discipline, but when it is abused to perpetrate unscientific principles as when attached to biblical nonsense, then it ceases to be considered legitimate. Archaeology is involved with unearthing real past history and should not be debased in having “biblical” unreality attached to it for entertainment of those so inclined to mythological crap to give legitimacy to their irrational ideas. Saying that it is TV, entertainment, with an audience culpable to nonsense should not legitimatize its content. The bible is mytholgical nonsense and to enlist archaeology to give it credence is debasing that scientific principle for truth.
I’ve been waiting for this for months. The premire just so happens to coinside with my local atheist meetup, so I’m gonna get to watch it among friends and fellow atheists :)
Did you even look at the Nova site? I do not get the impression that they are trying to attach “biblical unreality” to the findings, but instead are trying to present the historical background against which the bible was written and the Isrealite culture developed. It does not sound like one the History channel’s “search for Noah’s ark” kind of shows that start with the assumption of the truth of the bible and distort all their findings to fit.
There is ample archaeological and historical evidence for both the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judea. The problem is that at some point in the past the early history of these political units shades off into legend. That there was once a united kingdom doesn’t strike me as particularly unlikely, but if there ever was a David and he had an empire, it evidently wasn’t much of an empire to judge by the scarcity of archaeological remains and the lack of references to a Jewish kingdom in the records of surrounding countries like Egypt. Also, as has been pointed out many times, the economic geography of the area seems to militate against a major power setting up in the Judean hill country. The Jews turned out to be a redoubtable force in ancient history, but not because of their chariot armies or monumental architecture.
Right on, Sastra. Astrology is, or at least could be formulated as, perfectly testable and falsifiable; it also happens to be false. Nothing unscientific about that.
That’s very different than ID, which is by its nature un-falsifiable.
From the FAQ quoted upthread by Norman Doering (#26):
Um, no: people have been saying for decades that the OT was reduced to writing from its various component traditions during or shortly after the Babylonian Exile, as early as the first half of the 500s BCE. However, even restricting our focus to passages which might conceivably describe historical figures, the content of those stories is set in periods as early as c. 1900 BCE (the putative age of Abraham). Your precious silver scrolls are about thirteen hundred years too late to testify to events whose historicity is actually in question; they demonstrate only what people were writing more than a millennium after the “fact”.
An archaeology NOVA? In the Middle East? One that isn’t trying to “prove the Bible’s right”? Woohoo!
I’ll watch, because I love archaeology and can’t help myself. as for the rest of it, I’m willing to see what they’ve got to say – even if what the producers of the show have to say is more of the same old “Naked Archaeologist” drivel.
It turns out bad.
Norman Doering @ #26 quotes from the PBS site:
“As it turns out, the film reports on a number of cases in which archeology backs up what we find in the Bible. For instance, we cover a discovery at Tel Dan, a site in Israel near the Golan Heights. Archeologists there found an Aramean victory stela proving to many scholars that King David really did exist. We also visit an archeological site where two tiny silver scrolls were found containing prayers from the Book of Numbers, prayers that are still recited today in synagogues around the world. The fact that these artifacts date to approximately 600 B.C. underscores the antiquity of the Hebrew Bible.”
Does anyone really have a problem with this? The Hebrew Bible is a collection of literature from antiquity, and some parts of it (Song of the Sea, Song of Deborah) are thought to be very early indeed (on linguistic grounds). The Tel Dan stele and the scrolls with the so-called Priestly Blessing have nothing to do with authenticating the theology of the Bible. They’re just archeological artifacts.
Not just “idol worship”, but the worship of multiple deities. By itself, “idol worship” could just imply a form of Yahwism to which the priestly class objected (Jehu and the kings who followed were accused of this, IIRC).
Sastra and gribley,
I would disagree. In principle, astrology is falsifiable, but if you try to talk to an astrologer, it becomes clear that anything outside of their predictions is due to “the planets,” keeping them and their predictions from ever really being falsified.
Beyond that, their predictions are a mix of generalized and specific, and like any good scam artist (or true believer), they only report the hits and never the misses.
In principle, ID could be falsified, if you could find a patent number in the DNA, or a trademark symbol, like the replicated animals in Blade Runner. Fantasy or not, proof of design is sort of falsifiable, hence the claims of finding irreducible complexity, which falls apart just as easily as the fallback position of blaming the planets when astrology fails.
“Try Abdul ben Hassan — he make the flagellum!”
This episode will show again at 3:00a.m. on PBS, Monday, November 24th.
Totally OT, but did anyone catch the History Channel special on Albert Einstein last night? I really enjoyed watching it, especially the world-wide race to find astronomical observation data to confirm his General Theory of Relativity. Good dramatic storytelling. I hadn’t intended to watch it, but I just kinda got sucked in and couldn’t stop watching it ’til the end.
Robster, FCD #50 wrote:
Right; that’s partly what makes it pseudoscience. Almost any failed science can turn into pseudoscience if people take strained, desperate, increasingly bizarre measures to rescue it from fail.
As for ID, given that it has no model, no mechanism, and no positive hypothesis behind it, its predictions are much less clear and I think harder to test than astrology. The claim “Leos disproportionately have a stronger interest in sports than those born at other times” immediately suggests an experimental set up. “We’ll never figure out how the flagella evolved” may be falsifiable, but I think the only direct experiment you’re going to get out of that one is to sit around and see if a real scientist eventually demonstrates you’re wrong. On that one.
How does it turn out?
He dies at the end … and then pops up again right at the very end, apparently.
Slightly off-topic, but to complement PBS for something else, a week ago this past Sunday, they had “Clever Monkeys” on Nature, followed by “God on Trial” on Masterpiece Contemporary, and while neither was really intended to promote atheism or skepticism, I can’t see how they could have failed to have that impact on any open-minded viewer. Despite some of the worst crap on TV during pledge drives (all that mystical feel-good junk), PBS is by and large a good friend to rationalism and science. If that goes without saying, I apologize–it’s just, it’s easy (and fun!) to complain about the myriad sources of stupidity and ignorance. It feels kind of nice to say something positive for a change.
They screened this a few weeks ago here at Harvard Divinity school, but I didn’t get a chance to do. I hear very good things, though. I took a class from one of the chief archaeologists from the video – Larry Stager – and he’s definitely in our camp. He’s from the Frank Moore Cross generation of Biblical scholarship – i.e. as skeptical as the discipline has ever been. Now, being a documentary and not a scholarly publication, I don’t hold out too many hopes for NOVA — but I can guarantee that the research behind the film is as scientific as the social sciences can be.
Whether youall know it or not, there’s a thriving community of atheists and skeptics in Biblical scholarship – we tend to be somewhat marginalized, but we’re the only ones worth reading.
In saying that “the Hebrews worshiped multiple deities up until the Babylonian exile…” (not an exact quote, sorry) I am wondering whether the point being made is saying that:
If #1 is the case, that is well documented in the books of Judges, Kings, Chronicles…that is not news. In fact, the insistence of worshiping other gods is THE primary reason given as to why Israel was sent into exile in Babylon. On the other hand, option #2 is like the red pill…
If #2, I have heard slight hints and hypothesizing, but no evidence has ever been available. If THIS is the case, then it is a huge blow to the historicity of the Torah. If it was written during or after the exile (I’m thinking Nehemiah’s time) in an attempt to unify the nation again…wow. I don’t think I need to state the impact a discovery like that would have.
#2 would also put to question the authorship/creation of Isaiah and Jeremiah, and parts of Daniel by someone other than the traditional authors. Those three bridge the years between “pre” and “post” exile Israel in history, including both historical writing (“Today we…) and prophecies (In seventy years…). Also some other books, but those three especially. A discovery demonstrating that the Torah was re-written during or just after exile…wow.
I guess we will see when the show airs!
Oh, you mean sorta like Fatal Attraction, only without the second death.
I should add to my comment (#59) that reality may well be a combination between numbers 1 and 2 that I list above, as the producer seems to be hinting at between the various discussions on the different sections of the film.
@Robster #50
In principle, ID could be falsified, if you could find a patent number in the DNA, or a trademark symbol, like the replicated animals in Blade Runner.
This would be strong evidence for ID, indeed, but is not relevant to its falsifiability. There is no evidence, short of possibly the fossils and DNA of every creature that has ever lived, that could falsify ID.
And even if you had that Dembski et al would probably come up with some ridiculous way of dismissing it as insufficient.
Pbs.nova website lists that it will be viewable online tomorrow night.
I lubs my interwebs!
Robert at 9;
I only made it 11 minutes in before I had to switch it off – I couldn’t take it any more.
“Whether youall know it or not, there’s a thriving community of atheists and skeptics in Biblical scholarship – we tend to be somewhat marginalized, but we’re the only ones worth reading.”
Ben 58–A few recommendations please. OT as well as NT. BTW, it seems WNED Buffalo is airing this at 1130pm Thurs, Nov20.
A discovery demonstrating that the Torah was re-written during or just after exile…wow.
You’re late to the party. What do you think that book was in Ezra’s hands as he comes back to Judea from Babylon? (And it’s not so much that the whole Torah was written during the exile, but that’s when the last big redaction was completed and what we call the Torah was whipped into shape from disparate materials under the polyglot influence of Babylonian religion.)
I don’t know if there’s much of a problem with Isaiah or Jeremiah –those books, Deuteronomy, and the associated court history are pre-exilic material by and large, and all roughly contemporary with each other, but Daniel? Where have you been? Daniel is 2nd century BCE at the earliest. (From the Wiki page: “Traditionally, the Book of Daniel was believed to have been written by its namesake during and shortly after the Babylonian captivity in the sixth century BC. Although this view continues to be held by traditionalist Christians and conservative Jews, it has been rejected by the bulk of the scholarly community since the end of the nineteenth century.”) Best way to prophesy accurately is, of course, after the fact. This was not lost on the ancients.
They’d just say that such evidence of complex evolution demands intelligence in the process.
The fact is that they have no independent means of determining whether or not something evolved or was designed, in spite of the considerable differences in effect between human designs and biological evolution. Once you’ve decided simply that (irreducible, etc.) complexity shows that design occurred, then you cannot distinguish between complex evolution of malaria pathogens gaining resistance to chloroquine, and the evolution of, say, the clotting cascade.
They just wave their arms and say that one evolved and the other was designed, simply because they need for something to be designed. And lacking any independent means of checking for “design” or evolution, it’s up to the priesthood of ID to decide which is which.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
More crap. The fact that we get fed so much of it is most likely true; a Sam Harris observation.
Countries like Norway, Iceland, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark and the United Kingdom are among the least religious societies on Earth. According to the United Nations’ Human Development Report (2005) they are also the healthiest, as indicated by measures of life expectancy, adult literacy, per capita income, educational attainment, gender equality, homicide rate and infant mortality. Conversely, the 50 nations now ranked lowest in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious.
There being a bit kind to the Abraham story. There is no reason to believe it the Israelites emigrated. I think the better presented argument is that he didn’t exist, except as a founder-myth, and the Israelites were local Canaanites that went through a religious schism.
They’re putting a bitch-slap on the flood story. Pretty good so far.
Interesting, PZ’s remark that “Idol worshipping was common through the reign of King David, and right up to the Babylonian exile”. Correct. What do you think was happening here? Of course, having never read the Bible, PZ would not know about the Israelites worshipping the idol of the Golden Calf, while Moses was bringing down the Ten Commandments. The Bible is full of stories about backsliding and idol worshipping. The point is the Bible faithfully relates these stories about the failure of men to understand the meaning of the existence of God. Take PZ for example, he is still one with these ancient tribes. It’s OK, PZ, just proves you are human. The Bible underscores and stresses the ignorance, violence, and stupidity of mankind, and relates this to a better way, a relationship with God. By the way, at one time the skeptics and rational historians in Europe, did not believe in any of these Biblical stories. They thought Sargon and Sennacherib, Nineveh and Babylon, were folk fables created to bring color to the underlying morality. The first Archeologists were then totally astonished to find that not only was the Bible correct about Nineveh, but also about many scores of historic dynasties and ancient cities. Better yet, the Bible could be used by Archeologists as a true and faithful guide to locate and help in the excavation and history of unknown sites. Learn a little Archeology. Read Biblical Archeology, or if you wish, any Archeological history. I wouldn’t question the accuracy of the Bible if I were you.
On to Exodus… No evidence for the migration of 600K Israelites. They put up a time line when it “had” to have happened. They don’t mention it doesn’t agree with the Biblical account that would have “had” to happen about 350 years earlier.
We’re at the Jericho story. Oh boy. I recognize this guy they’ve got on. He’s really into the “Old Testament is historically accurate.”
Killer blow. They’re showing the timeline of destruction of three cities supposedly conquered by Joshua. It spanned over 1000 years. Most of them that were destroyed, weren’t destroyed by the Israelites. Even more, most of the 30 towns that were supposedly destroyed weren’t.
More interpretation to internal issues and a declining Canaanite society that had already been breaking down. As well as Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Ah, they said it. The Israelites were the have-nots of the Canaanite empire and pretty much ran away from their over-lords and emerged as a new people, the Israelites. Really it was an outcome of the collapse of Canaanite society and government, not the cause of the end of the Canaanites.
Oh, Joe, I’ve learned more than a little. And you’re totally full of shit. Exodus is a complete fabrication. Genesis is stolen. So is the flood.
The Bible frequently DOES show us locations. But is completely wrong on the history. Cities supposedly in existence hundreds of years before the were. Cities destroyed hundreds of years before, or after, they were supposedly destroyed. And not by the Israelites.
I’ve been kind of dozing, but so far it’s pretty good. It’s pretty eye-opening, what they’ve shown about the true origins of the tribe of Israel.
Alright. Showing us the polytheistic Israelites. Woot!
This sounds actually worth watching, will grab it when I get home.
Yeah, same old crap. It’s nothing different from the History Channel’s bible-related productions.
Save a few lines, the whole thing – I think – essentially assumes that the Bible is true (or fact), but we just can’t find evidence of it.
I like this kind of history from an anthropoligical point of view, but this program does not even really address much of that.
On a slight tangent, I don’t think you can put much weight in the idea that the Bible occasionally features names or places that artifacts prove existed. Face it – Stephen King writes about real places and sometimes mentions real people, but that doesn’t make his stories true.
PD
So King’s Cross station is not proof of Harry Potter then?
Ah, they are on the six-chamber gates. Mr. Torah-is-true is pitching his case. I’m betting this bubble gets popped.
Kel,
I guess a made an obvious point, but people point to a rock with the name David on it and a David in the bible and say, “ah ha!”
Somehow the revelation that the Israelites were idolators until the exile seems less than exciting considering that is the background of the Book of Judges and many of the Judaean Kings reforms involved tearing down the high places.
Somehow the revelation that the Israelites were idolators until the exile seems less than exciting considering that is the background of the Book of Judges and many of the Judaean Kings reforms involved tearing down the high places.
Nope. They passed on the Gezer gates being common and having been around in cities for centuries before Solomon and David.
P.S.
PZ, if you like skeptical, there’s a great History Channel special that examines possible scientific explanations for the supernatural elements of the Bible. I can’t recall the exact name, but it explores ideas about how ecology could have caused the swarms of locusts and rivers turning to blood, how the bush could have been burning but not burnt, etc etc. I think it’s all fiction, but it’s thought-provoking.
If anybody knows the name, I’m sure you’d be interested.
Somehow the revelation that the Israelites were idolators until the Babylonian Exile seems less than exciting considering that is the background of the Book of Judges and many of the Judaean Kings reforms involved tearing down the high places.
Alright, seeing ancient sacrificial rights! Glad I’m not a sheep!
Kel@78,
Well King’s Cross may not be, but what about platform 9 3/4? Huh? Huh?
(For those who haven’t been there recently, there really is now a little plaque up on the wall somewhere inside King’s Cross reading “Platform 9 3/4”.)
The Bible frequently DOES show us locations. But is completely wrong on the history.
And, to go further with this, what’s interesting is which locations does it give us, and in which narratives. Exodus is a case in point. The named places in the narrative show no archaeological remains from the putative time of the 40 years’ flight through the desert, but they were inhabited and known places at the time the narrative was composed. They’re not historical places, they’re touchstones for the reader/hearer so he can understand what’s happening through his contemporary understanding of the political geography of the region.
The irony for me is that all this was probably much better understood by the sophisticated contemporary reader than it is now by credulous moderns with a deep need to see history in what can only be read as foundational myth.
I actually think the program will be very good. I don’t know who the experts are that they’ve chosen for the program, but I expect the program will present a few competent experts.
For those of you who have expressed negative feelings about the program because it does not pander to atheism, guess what: not everything you’ve been told by atheist speakers can actually be backed up by decent evidence. As an atheist, I believe that Jesus was a real person, that Moses, David, and Solomon were probably real people, and that some of the early Genesis stories may preserve some kernels of historical truth. I am also convinced that much of Judges and Kings and most of the Pentateuch and Joshua is complete fiction. I think that once you discover that the Bible is not the completely inerrant word of God, if you are still interested in studying the Bible, you have to be prepared to accept that as a ancient book it will preserve some aspects of real history and some aspects of fiction, and one of the purposes of biblical scholarship is to make these distinctions between real history and imaginative legend.
Arthur,
Nobody is quibbling with what you say. I think a few of us agree – I certainly do.
Our problem is not that segments of the Bible are backed up by fact, it’s the ASSUMPTION that because one area is backed up by fact, that other – more unbelievable – areas of the Bible are somehow truthful.
Re: the existance of Jesus, my understanding of the record is that although David and Solomon probably existed, there is little, if no evidence that a Jesus as Christians believe him to be existed.
This program is more or less, as one of the summaries above notes, a collection of the archaelogical evidence that some people/places actually existed.
Sorry, for the multiple posts, darn browser.
Yeah, it’s quite tragic that people do that.
Yes it is. Ignorance and/or stupidity is always tragic.
PD@84,
That’s not sceptical, it’s part of a desperate attempt to preserve the idea that the bible is historical. The sceptical approach to such stories is to note that every culture has its myths, and where unbelievable elements of these occur (burning bushes, rivers of blood…), there’s absolutely no reason to go searching for far-fetched “explanations” of how they could be true. If it seems unbelievable, that almost certainly means it’s fiction.
PD@90:
I have a difficult time believing that a NOVA program would be making the kind of assumptions you are talking about. I am on the West Coast, so it has still not aired here, and if the program does make assumptions of that sort, I will certainly submit a complaint to PBS, since I expect better. Since the program is focusing on archeology, I would expect them to show the parts of the Bible that can be backed up by archaeological evidence, but I would also expect a good discussion of which parts are not supported, and what the implications are for the overall historicity of the Bible. I have a difficult time believing that the same people who brought us the excellent program about the Dover intelligent design trial would bring us religious propaganda disguised as biblical scholarship.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the show basically declared that David and Soloman existed as real rulers based on nothing more than a Syrian fragment that refered to the “House of David”. Just because some later ruler claims some ancestry doesn’t mean that ancestor existed. Rulers often did this to legitimize their right to rule. Can you name a different House of rulers, named after a founder, where the founder is probably a legend set only a couple generations in the past? I can. Merovich, supposedly the founder of the Merovingian dynasty of Gaul/Francia/France. A major case of unjustified conclusions.
All that stuff about Early Isrealite society being egalitarian seemed rather silly, also. If you don’t have fancy pottery, it doesn’t usually mean you have created a revolutionary egalitarian society- it usually mean you’re dirt poor, which is exactly what you would expect from a group of refugees in the hills.
Joe #70
Fail.
Well, most of you are ignorant of Archeology. It’s clear from many archeological accounts, that the Biblical names PREDATED any serious excavations. As time passed, and the Tels were excavated, both Nineveh and Babylon located, and proved, from their numerous stele and records, as well as many other Biblical place names and kings. These are absolutely proved from an Archeological, meaning scientific standpoint. You cannot dispute this. It is proved. There are, for example, thousands of cuneiform tablets in existence, which spell out in detail, life in these ancient cities, as well as the names and dynasties of their Kings. Many of these Kings are mentioned in the Bible, PREDATING any archeology. This is not a matter of someone “picking up a stone”. It is proved from thousands of clay tablets, and the artifacts on City Walls. If you believe otherwise, you are ignorant. The Bible was essential for the first Archeology, and continues to be so, for excavations in the Middle East.
Joe@#98:
Yes, it’s true. Archeology has confirmed many of the locations and stories found in the Bible. It has also disproved others, such as the disastrously named Ai that was supposedly destroyed by the Israelites at the time of the conquest of Canaan. Basically, this story is an etiology, or tale of origin. Someone knew about an ancient ruin that was conveniently named Ruin, and they invented a story about how it was destroyed, and this story became popular enough that it was considered fact by whoever eventually wrote it down.
Just because archeology has confirmed some stories does not mean that the entire Bible is true.
i.e. if you roll a die 10 times and three of the results are 6, you don’t report the three rolls of 6 and from there infer that all rolls resulted in 6.
Joe @ 98
Of course archeologists have found some of the sites mentioned in the bible. But so what? We all know Egypt existed in the time referred to in Exodus, but that doesn’t prove anything about the book’s supernatural claims. Archeologists have also found sites mentioned in thousands of other ancient texts. The difference is that nobody tries to foist those texts on the 21st century world as prescriptions for living laid down by some malevolent deity.
So why don’t you piss off and take your faux intellectualism with you. Then you can preach to credulous morons who are too brainwashed not to know what bullshit smells like when it’s shoved up their noses.
I was just looking at the list of experts
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/ask.html
Which one is the “everything in the Bible is true” guy that people are talking about? I guess I’ll find out soon enough, since it will start in my time zone in a few minutes.
Just saw the program and it was a huge disappointment. Its attempt not to offend any believers verged on the scientifically obscene. One glaring example – in the first hour, after we are told of the archeological evidence for the early Israelite kings the narrator goes on to say that “early figures such as Adam and Eve, who because they are in the more distant past cannot be corrobarated for lack of evidence.” Really!!!! If NOVA cannot state the facts, namely that the mountains of evidence in cosmology, geology, anthropology, genetics and evolution, render the historicity of a 5,000 year old earth and human species an impossiblity, then we are in real trouble.
This attempt to continually pander to the religioulsy sensitive was evident throughout the program. For instance, each archeological discovery in support of the Bible text was presented as an “astounding” or “remarkable” find. The archeological evidence sometimes confromed to some Eyptian text as well. However, instead of exclaiming the “remarkable” historicity of the Egyptian text, it was always the Biblical text that was always praised (as though a nod to the religiously inclined that perhaps other parts of the Bible, such as the God parts are true as well). It seems to me the Egyptian text, with its references to gods and being written by persons with their own biases and political leanings, is no different than the Biblical text in that regard. Yet know one ever tries to express astonishment at the accuracy of Egyptian hieroglyphic histography. And no ever tries to say that since because the Egyptian histories are accurate then so to are the gods that are referenced therein.
This NOVA was a disappointment to say the least.
God had a wife! With big boobs!
i learned something tonight.
all in all i thought it was pretty interesting. I caught it half/way through.
Re: Steve #103.
I’m with you, there. I was also very disappointed at the pandering to the religious crowd, at the expense of precise language.
The general underlying tone was “well, obviously god is real, and there is only one of him” quickly grew tiresome to me. It was especially notable during the section that showed that the Israelites were polytheistic. The tone of the commentators was, “well, they just didn’t know better, not like we do NOW”. As result, they seemed to loose any objective perspective they may have had.
Very biased. Very disappointing, Nova.
joe @98 said:
“It’s clear from many archeological accounts”
Whenever someone says ‘it’s clear’ without explanation, it usually means it’s NOT clear and they just want to try to push that one by without question.
If it’s clear, then just say it clearly instead of telling us it’s clear.
Nope. It looks like Christians aren’t the ones who are familiar with the Golden calf.
Soapy Sam. I stand corrected. It’s commendable that PZ is reading the Bible. Happy Kiwi. I’ve mentioned a couple of times about the filthy language on this blog. I’ve never seen a single Scientific paper with any vulgarity, or obscene vocabulary. One tends to dismiss immediately, those who cannot discourse without obscenities, as being hopelessly unscientific, and also, lacking simple human courtesy, and the latter is probably the worst offense. It is quite possible that God exists, and there is some evidence that he does. I’m really sorry that you cannot puzzle this out for yourself. Some people pick up on it immediately, others are perhaps, tone deaf or color blind when it comes to God, so they can be forgiven. But there is no excuse for denying the possibility.
It was underwhelming. Lots of sappy emotional music and mostly conjecture.
I guess even Nova gets a dud now and then …..
Excellent, are you going to share that evidence with the rest of us?
And as for God, why not Mazda, Ra, Odin, Jupiter, Brahman, the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Xenu?
It was not up to Nova’s usual standards but it was not bad, especially if you compare it with the appalling “Naked Archaeologist” on the History channel. The script took great pains not to offend the faithful, which I found objectionable, but at the same time it slipped in some of the archaeological evidence (or lack thereof) of events which the minimalists like Finkelstein have verified. It glossed over completely the ancient myths that the fundies take literally. If I had to give it a grade it would be a B minus. Give it a grade, folks!
Joe #70,
1. Exodus 12:7
OK, we’ve got a troll insisting that because he saw a picture of a London street sign saying “Baker Street”, Sherlock Holmes was real and totally solved the mystery of the Sign of Four. I think it’s time for bed.
Let’s see: the Bible is worse than uninformative when it comes to Egyptian history, completely misses the Hittite Empire, bungles the history of Bronze Age Mesopotamia — the war fought by Abraham is farcically absurd — can’t get its Babylonian dynasties straight — Belshazzar was neither the son nor any other kin to Nebuchadnezzar — fabricates personages from Nimrod to “Darius the Median”, rips off Babylonian mythology for its plot lines — hint, hint, book of Esther — and in Daniel 11:30 confuses Cyprus with Rome. Nope, nothing to see here, move along folks. . . .
Feynmaniac:
To be fair, the “pi = 3” business could just mean they were sloppy in measuring and recording what they measured. The writers and editors of 1 Kings were not geometers; they just wanted to describe a ruttin’ big pot.
But you could also mention Genesis 30, in which Jacob controls the colour of a goat flock by magic (no joke). Oh, and contra Leviticus 11, hares and coneys are not ruminants, and bats are not birds. Et cetera, ad practically infinitum.
Tim H:
I like that analogy. Invention of ancestors is not so rare: A similar example is Banquo, the comrade of Macbeth who, according to Holinshed’s history, helped slay Duncan in battle and make Macbeth King. He was quite probably invented to give a noble ancestry to the Stuart house. Because Shakespeare wrote Macbeth during the reign of England’s first Stuart monarch, it is easy to see why he might have been inclined to draw the most favourable possible portrait of Banquo.
Kangaroo Joey (#108) dropped some nuggets,
One tends to notice that one does not dismiss immediately, but instead prattles on as if others are equally obsessed about others’ dirty pillows.
Is there also some evidence that he is a he?
.
“One glaring example – in the first hour, after we are told of the archeological evidence for the early Israelite kings the narrator goes on to say that “early figures such as Adam and Eve, who because they are in the more distant past cannot be corrobarated for lack of evidence.” Really!!!! If NOVA cannot state the facts, namely that the mountains of evidence in cosmology, geology, anthropology, genetics and evolution, render the historicity of a 5,000 year old earth and human species an impossiblity, then we are in real trouble.”
Um…Corroborate means to support. Basically they are saying that Adam and Eve cannot be supported due to lack of evidence.
No, wait, perhaps this summary dismissal of “those who cannot discourse without obscenities” is a good thing. Wouldn’t it let us dismiss God on account of Ezekiel 23?
So Yawh comes from Yahoo.
And they make fun of idol worship.
What a joke.
Otherwise too many discrepancy.
I would love to see no jewish/christian/muslim scholars
producing this kind of stuff. It just ends up being just
one more propaganda piece.
Blake Stacey (#116) has a plan,
We can go one step further and say that we dismiss anything intellectually offensive. Dilemna solved!
It might even be a helpful mantra against certain religionistas who complain of dismissal without reason. “Offensiveness” is about all they truly comprehend.
From what I understood of the OT, the Israelites and bible imply that there are multiple gods. See below, where old Yahweh says to ignore those other gods because he is an attention hog (jealous). It doesn’t say or even hint that those other gods are fake, not real.
They also wrote his wife out, Asheroth??, but didn’t quite manage to erase all of her.
Xianity is only nominally monotheistic anyway. That Trinity idea is one way out but even many xian sects are non-Trinitarian, JWs, Unitarians etc.. And the Mormons have a huge number of gods and goddess inasmuch as they can become gods themselves after death.
At least the show introduced Israel Finkelstein as “Token”
Some dude @ #115 wrote,
Ummm…but that’s not the problem. The existence of Adam and Eve is preposterous given the vast and diverse scientific evidence. To even pose it as a possibility in the way they did damages any credibility they may have had at presenting an objective, scientific look at the bible. There never, ever were only two individual parents of our species. We did not arise from ANY first parents named Adam and Eve or ANY other single couple. This is a fact NOVA’s producers and science advisors should know. To present it as they did was shameful pandering.
Joe @108 says:
“One tends to dismiss immediately, those who cannot discourse without obscenities, as being hopelessly unscientific”
Really, you do?
Maybe that’s you’re problem, you’re more concerned with style friendliness and warm fuzzy feelings than you are with actual content.
Damn me and me tendency lately to use you’re and it’s where I should be using your and its.
Maybe I’m just becoming too accusative :P
Nick Gotts @ 87
(For those who haven’t been there recently, there really is now a little plaque up on the wall somewhere inside King’s Cross reading “Platform 9 3/4”.)
It’s quite easy to find by simply looking for the small pile of concussed children that generally build up under it ;D
Sounds like it be an interesting watch. Will see if I can catch it online when it is available.
From reading the comments it sounds like it only touched on the Old Testament. Shame, it would have been interesting to see what they would have said about Nazareth, and whether it existed before the second century CE.
Out of curiousity: Does anyone know if there are any Roman records from the time of Jesus that survived? Given the actions of Jesus in the New Testament, especially his crucifiction, surely they would have documented something be it an arrest warrant or something similar. Might even have a physical description of him (and if there is/was I would guess it is nothing like the usual image of him).
It wasn’t the usual laudatory tripe you get on many documentary shows, but it was not, as PZ hoped, “downright skeptical.” It did, as JD noted, engage a bit of shameful pandering. But you were warned. In post #26 I noted that the producer said, “NOVA is certainly not out to disprove the Bible or to denigrate anyone’s religious convictions,” and that means: “yes, we are going to pander.”
If you want biblical archeology from a skeptical viewpoint you’re going to need to talk Dawkins into producing a series.
I remember years ago reading a book on the bible written by Isaac Azimov (a time when he seemed to write a book on virtually every topic under the sun!). I doubt it is a front-line scholarly work but I found it interesting as he tackled it purely as a historical document, saying when various bits were written, where stories in the bible had been adapted from other Middle Eastern myths, etc. It gets a bit of a bore when trying to analyse the inter-tribal rivalries that fill much of the text. Generally a bronze age pot-boiler.
I’m never going to waste my time reading much about the bible and wouldn’t encourage others to either but I remember that book being an easy read (but there were a lot of pages!). I recall it as a secular text and I seem to remember Azimov was an atheist (am I right?). So if it’s lying around your public library……
As it is was news… The problem with these programmes is that most often the ones who should be watching them will never do it, and the ones who watch them already know the contents.
There was a great British doco a few years back that did a decent job of the issue called “Who Wrote The Bible”. Done by a theologian, making it all the more impressive.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2061773048178434620
“If you want biblical archeology from a skeptical viewpoint you’re going to need to talk Dawkins into producing a series.”
Seems like that would be Hector Avalos’ bailiwick. Dawkins is a biologist, not an archaeologist, and people get on his case enough when he ventures away from biology to pontificate on matters of airy-fairy god stuff.
The Mayans didn’t worship Tlaloc. That was the Aztecs. Guess I’ll have to sacrifice you to Ix Chel now. :)
I thought the documentary was a little to careful not to hurt feelings. Guess I didn’t expect anything else. It was telling more of a “Just So Story” about how the Jews were conquered instead of giving any actual historical detail. IE. The show says that worship of Ashura stopped when Sheshonq attacked Jerusalem because people thought that god was punishing them. It doesn’t really address–it subtly implies–that only the STATE religion was monotheistic. This would be similar to other societies at the time. Amun and Min and Horus are gods of the aristocracy, but have very little to do with whether your crops turn out or your baby gets delivered.
It did not address this void left by Ashura nor cite any proof that the conquest of Sheshonq and then the Babylonians are what drove the jews away from polytheism. It also does not ask the obvious question of whether the upper class jews worshipped Ashura and El as well. I thought it needed to.
One of the main problems with the show was thrir attempt to make it a drama. Some of the claims about the Unified Kingdom are possible, but there are many other poosibilities as well, which don’t get covered because they don’t support the show’s plot. That’s not doing science.
The part that was supposed to be the most dramatic part wasn’t dramatic at all. Finding a prayer from Numbers dated 600 BCE isn’t surprising, other than its preservation. Few, if any, claim that the Torah was completely invented during the Babylonian Exile.
The show in the end did a good job supporting the Documentary Hypothesis, but the producers tried to put a spin on the motivations behind the writing of the bible that isn’t justified by the facts and shouldn’t have been attempted.
‘Biblical’ Archaeology is a big-bucks business. For anyone interested in some light reading about the Biblical Archaeology enterprise, I can recommend Nina Burleigh’s ‘Unholy Business’.
#3
Oddly enough, hardcore “end times are nigh” Xtians want the temple rebuilt. Why, it’s one of the signs of the second coming.
I always assumed the restoration of the temple meant full on Priestly Judaism and that was understood by both Jews and Christians. I think one of the biggest problem with a full restoration was only a certain tribe could perform as the priest and that tribe was one of the “lost tribes”.
The tribe of Levi (priestly tribe) wasn’t one of the ‘lost tribes’.
The ‘lost tribes’ are: Reuben, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim, East Manasseh, and West Manasseh.
The program was good, but not great. There were some interesting threads that were not pursued. One was the “evolution” of Yaweh from a Midianite god (and Mrs. Moses was a Midianite). Another was Yaweh’s wife.
The destruction of the Canaanite cities over a thousand years (instead of suddenly, by General Joshua) was also interesting. With that in mind, the rebellion of the lower classes may have been aided by earthquakes (the region has them). Michael Wood suggested as much in his series on Troy. Troy’s patron god, Poseidon, was also the god of the sea, (non-wooden) horses, and earthquakes; in short, the Greeks had a little assist. I’d like to see that pursued in the future.
The writer and editor of the bible was God! Actually this reminds of an old joke:
Biologist think they’re chemists
Chemist think they’re physicist
Physicist think they’re God
And God thinks he’s a mathematician.
I thought the show was great. I knew some of this stuff before, like the author groups e j d and p, but they really explained them much better here than I had understood. And, I really did not know that the monothiestic rule really didn’t set in untill the P authors rewrote everything.
I thought it was very interesting how King David’s proof was disected.
I was not aware that there was absolutely no proof, of the exodus as written. I liked thier explanation of what they think the exedus story is.
Being a recovering Baptist, it is actually really refreshing to find that these stories have a rational basis that is based on recoverable archeology and science.
I’ll have to watch this again to really absorb everythig prperly.
I thought if fairly interesting and well done. One part that raised my eyebrows was the conclusion that the Isrealites didn’t destroy the Caananites, but that the Israelites were Caananites. The destruction from outside story was just their way of breaking from their past. Apparently, Caananite society decayed away from within. That, and the monotheistic God thingie not really catching on until the Babylonian exile.
Ohh yes…and that God’s wife has some huge hooters.
Regarding the origins of the god Yahweh a decent book is one written by Mark S. Smith (see WIKI) called “The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities in Ancient Israel”
You’re going to ignore the last time you tried this crap and you were responded to, aren’t you? Once again. I know a LOT, for a layman, about Biblical Archeology. Your argument is extraordinarily flawed.
The bible, as we know this part of it, was written during the 7th-to-5th centuries BCE. The authors lived at that time. They, duh, took those names and places and incorporated them into the bible. Scores of them they got completely wrong. Not the place/name because those cities/ruins had been there for hundreds and hundreds (if not thousands) of years, for the most part and that was falling-off-a-log simple to get right.
What they got wrong was the history of these cities. Many were put back in time to when they didn’t exist. Or were continued to times long after they had been destroyed, sometimes by a 1000 years. Others were not destroyed, despite affirmative claims to the contrary.
That they incorporated well known contemporary cities into their fables, while (mostly) getting the history and origin of those cities wrong, doesn’t make the bible true. It just makes it a work of shoddily-researched historical fiction used to bind the Jews-in-exile together as a nation. It’s as historically accurate as DW Griffith’s “The Birth of Nation.” Which is to say, not really.
Ah… Let me put it in a different way in a perfectly understandable way that you don’t have to beat against your inability to accept the bible is just a bunch of stories with a sprinkling of historic facts:
That archaeologists found TROY doesn’t prove Greek Mythology was true.
Do you understand? Just because we found Troy, doesn’t make the Iliad true. It doesn’t mean Zeus really existed. It doesn’t mean Hercules walked the earth as a demi-god. It just means an ancient Greek man, writing a work of fiction featuring contemporary mythos, included the place of Troy in his story and, possibly, even incorporated historical figures into his otherwise work of fiction.
The Bible seems to help prove that God does not exist.
According to the Bible, God was quite capable of writing, at least on stone tablets. Since He knows all things for all time, had God actually written the Bible as a guide for humanity, He would surely have included knowledge beyond the horizon of nomadic desert tribes. He would have said something about continents, rain forests, galaxies, microbes, polar ice, dinosaurs, tsunamis, etc.
@Joe #70 & #98:
Joe, I have to take a moment to point out the flaws in your own argument. In post 98 you state that:
Well, most of you are ignorant of Archeology.
The problem is, not only are you ignorant of archaeology, you are equally ignorant of history. First, you claim:
By the way, at one time the skeptics and rational historians in Europe, did not believe in any of these Biblical stories.
When precisely is this? Any time someone makes an absolute statement like yours, you have to call “BS.” I’ve heard this claim made by numerous people who were insisting that the Bible (in its entire scope) is an historical document. The problem for them is, quite simply, archaeology doesn’t support that claim, in fact, for the most part it refutes that claim, along with history. So first, your claim that skeptics and rational historians in Europe didn’t believe any of the Biblical stories. Constantine’s mother searched through the holy land for relics of Jesus’ time. An early, albeit extremely primitive form of archaeology. From that time on the church dominated European thought. In the 12th century the Templars conducted primitive archaeological digs in Jerusalem, again attempting to find places and relics from the “historical Bible.” You have Ussher establishing the age of the Earth in the 17th century based on the Bible as an historical document. You have very early digs in Palestine in the 18th century and the “birth” of Biblical archaeology in the early-mid 19th century. So your claim is quite ludicrous. Skeptics and rational historians were very likely to have dismissed the stories of the Bible as true, that doesn’t mean they dismissed the presence of cities and ruins in the region. Again, the presence of Babylon doesn’t prove the Bible is true any more than the presence of Santorini proves that Atlantis existed as Plato described it.
It’s clear from many archeological accounts, that the Biblical names PREDATED any serious excavations. As time passed, and the Tels were excavated, both Nineveh and Babylon located, and proved, from their numerous stele and records, as well as many other Biblical place names and kings.
It’s clear from the Mayan codices, from Egyptian records, and Greek writings that numerous places existed. None of that means that Hunab Ku, Ra, or Zeus existed as their writings teach. The amusing thing is, Christians when they try to point to the Bible as accurate history, somehow manage to miss the numerous well documented places where the Bible has people, times, places, and events flat out wrong and focus on the instances where it is write claiming that these are unique proof of the truth of the Bible. The problem is they also seem to ignore the existing historical records that talked of those same places (Babylon, etc.) and actually got the people, times, places, and events correct (IE the Egyptians).
Finally, I assume you are referring to the Ebla tablets. Again the problem with those who argue that this is “proof” of the total veracity of the Bible is that they completely ignore when the names are wrong, out of order, misspelled, etc. They also take references to people to be de facto references to the Biblical figures when there is no evidence to support that assertion. Again, cherry-picking evidence and stretching it beyond what it actually says are no proof of the Bible’s “Truth.” They are proof that Christian archaeologists want to believe, and they are proof that the Bible was written in the region, at the time when these places existed, which is, to put it succinctly, “duh.”
The Bible has some things right and some things wrong, which makes the “ignorant” people here correct in their interpretation that it is an imperfect book of man.
As has been pointed out, finding a train station platform does not prove that Harry Potter is factual. Finding Troy or Atlantis doesn’t prove that the ancient stories of Homer and Plato were factual. Finding that the Bible has some place names and city names correct (while ignoring all of the cases where it is flat out wrong) doesn’t prove that the Bible is factual, it simply proves that there are some facts in the Bible. The two positions are not synonymous.
Better trolls please. I get tired of the whiney, simpering “you must be polite to me and respect my beliefs as true while I correct you godless heathen subhumans” crybabies.
It’s as possible as monkeys flying out of my ass while I accept an Oscar for Best Actor in a Foreign Film.
Now, if you want to back-up your extraordinary claim that God exists, put on proof. Real proof. Not your ‘feelings’ or ‘the bible exists so God exists’ crap.
I can get that from ANY religion that has a text and devout followers. I want tangible proof that cannot be explained away:
I want to see human limbs grow back. I want to see absolute proof of something than has never happened and violates the laws of nature.
I won’t accept cancer remission. Christian and heathen alike get that. I won’t accept surviving low-survival-probability events, that happens all the damn time and you never talk about the 1,000 who died for the one lucky bastard that didn’t.
If he can’t do that, maybe change some universal constants. Make gravity a bit stronger perhaps. Or flip the charges of protons and electrons. Make gamma radiation good for us. Something. Something outside the realm that is otherwise perfectly accomplish-able for the Creator of the Universe.
I read Finkelstein’s book a few months ago and am reading “rewriting the bible” at the moment. As always, the real archeology is far more interesting than the mythological version.
gazza:
That’d be Asimov’s Guide to the Bible. When I was in high school, I read it cover-to-cover (1230 pages). Later, I found a book of his correspondence which his brother edited after his death — Yours, Isaac Asimov. In it was a letter which Isaac wrote while working on his big Bible book, describing the brutal atrocity in the chapter he happened to be annotating at the moment, and going on to say, “Properly read, the Bible is the most potent argument for atheism ever conceived” (or words to that effect).
For reviews from academic biblical scholars, see:
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com
http://www.bib-arch.org/reviews/review-bibles-buried-secrets.asp
Hope to catch it later today.
Blake Stacey:
…
:D Love this blog.
What is also odd about the bible is how it clearly has been edited over and over, some minor, some major. The recent champion editor is Martin Luther who tossed out about a quarter of the OT. The last editors were probably The New International Version which I’ve read has been “corrected” in certain places.
The Catholic and Protestant bibles differ by 10 books. So much for biblical inerrancy.
PS Joe is just a programmed godbot with no conscious mind. It can be amusing to watch a robot fumble around but that is about it.
Could you tell me more about that?
Why do you attack how it is said, instead of what is said? That’s a logical fallacy.
Besides, a blog post isn’t a paper, and the comments are something else entirely.
Like what?
No Akhenaten, No Aten? How disappointing!
Of course not. About a thousand years too early.
Try Persian monotheism (Ahura Mazda). That one at least fits in time.
No, Jason; you just haven’t been reciting your Apostrophic Creed enough.
Good demonstration of proper biblical scholarship and biblical archeology, where faith and reason can work together. As a Roman Catholic, this supports my faiths understanding of biblical interpretation (historical critical, archeology, science, non-literal interpretation, etc). Yes, the Catholic Church has been attacked (wrongly many times–particularly on creationism–which the Catholic Church does not support) about its view on science but even before Galileo there was an understanding of faith and reason working together–most of the craters on the moon and asteroids were named after Jesuits.
This program opens a way of good discussion and dialogue between those of faith and athiests on the issue of faith and reason, something that gets lacked here since many want to just bash religion or a particular faith group. So hopefully polite discussion will follow with an openess and respect to opposing views and great dialogue on what we do agree on. I think that could happen, I always enjoyed the science posts, including the recent one Dr. Myers posted.
There are couple of things like this in the bible. The whole “God of Abraham” thing seems weird, until you understand the point: there were lots of gods floating around there at the time, and so Yahweh had to distinguish himself. He has to tell Moses, “I am the God of thy father, Abraham.” You’d think if there were only one god, he could just say, “I am God” and leave it at that. But no, he had to distinguish himself from the god of the tribe over the ridge, and whatnot.
Put that together with “Don’t worship the other gods before me” and it is clear that the bible was written from a perspective of lots of gods around.
Mathi Lusch,
Sorry, but I don’t respect your views as a Catholic – as opposed to your right to hold and propound them. I regard them as profoundly batty and anti-human.
Particularly for Glen #136
The period around 1200 BCE is one of the most fascinating in history, with many theories about what happened. Whichever theory or theories you like, whatever happened was huge.
Bronze Age Collapse gives an idea.
Filthy language? On this blog? Fuck me blind!
I love old stories and fairy tales, from those of the Grimm brothers up through Tolkien and Jim Butcher’s Chicago wizard books. I know they are fairy tales, but they entertain me. The problem with the bible and most religious works is that they are not even entertaining fairy tales. Plus, Tolkien demonstrates more consistent morality than the xtian bible. If you must put your faith in an invisible god, hoary thunderer or cosmic muffin of your choice, at least pick on that is consistent and actually wants you to be happy. It is all within your power to believe in whatever gods you wish. I am happy without one, but your mileage may vary.
Now, off to construct something fiendish with which to terrorize the good rev Cockshaw. Oh wait, atheists do not do that. Never mind.
Ciao y’all
Akhenaten lived arond 1340 BC. The Exodus happened in the reign of Ramses II, roughly 1280-1200 BC. Armchair science has it that Moses (an Egyptian prince!) was the leader of an Egyptian cult that still followed Akhenaten’s sun cult of the Aten. As far as I know the first monotheistic religion.
When Akhenaten died the old order was quickly restored. His followers went underground and were kicked out of Egypt lots of years later bij Ramses II.
It is a lovely theory, but alas, no proof or clue or hint whatsoever about its truth…
I think this theory (hum!) could be tested by looking at genetic similarities between Jews and Egyptians.
Moses says quite rightly of Joe:
I agree that he is a big baby, but there is something more to be said. Postel’s Law of how to implement interoperable software says:
Be conservative in what you do; be liberal in what you accept from others.
However, someone in a New York Times article on online trolling some months back pointed out that trolls follow an inverse version. They are liberal in what they do, while being conservative in what they accept from others.
Uh, yeah.
You know what’s hard to do? Write fiction without patterning it on actual people and places.
Since Bible writers did intend to pass along “really true stories” (whatever that might mean), they’d have had to have been crazy in order to keep from naming real places and real people.
Try the Epic of Gilgamesh. It’s probably more accurate in naming individuals and cities than the Bible is.
I suppose we’re to believe that Abraham lived 175 years, let alone Noah’s 950 years, and Methuselah…. I ran across one creationist who was telling me that the ante-diluvian accounts were true, because they could have been written down after only four generations. I knew, of course, that such a claim rested on “facts” like that Shem “lived for six hundred years” (well, something like that), which pretty much blew that nonsense out of the water (anyone who knows archaeology, which apparently does not include joe, knows that “naturally possible lifespans” have changed little during written history).
The truth is that one only needs a little knowledge about human limits to know that the Bible is wrong, even without archaeology. The latter is just the nail in the coffin of the bits and pieces that more rational folk than joe still cling to, like rats defending the kernels of corn found in some turd.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
If you really believed there were evidence of God’s existence, why would you only write that it was quite possible that he exists ?
Don’t confuse your wishes for evidences.
I pretty sure that modern Egyptians wouldn’t have much of their ancestry going back to the Egyptians of the time in question. There was a lot of settlement by Greeks and then the Roman and Arab conquests.
Except it didn’t. No fleeing slave people under Ramses II, no plagues, no dead firstborn son, nothing. And note how the pharaoh in the Bible is so nameless that his title is treated as his name — “Pharaoh, the king of Egypt”? It’s all just a metaphor for Babylon and the Babylonian exile. Compare Revelation, where “Babylon” means Rome.
No, not a lot actually. (Especially by the Romans. And the Greeks stayed mostly in Naucratis and Alexandria.)
Peoples don’t usually get replaced that way. What changed is the religion and the language.
Back when I was being raised Catholic, they taught us in CCD (catechism) that the ages in Genesis were actually a mistranslation of (lunar) months for years. While that doesn’t really work for Abraham, it would bring Noah back to a more reasonable 73. Is there any truth to this idea of mistranslation?
Armchair science has it that Moses (an Egyptian prince!) was the leader of an Egyptian cult that still followed Akhenaten’s sun cult of the Aten. – Eddie Janssen
“Armchair science”? The only place I’ve come across this idea is in the writings of the well-known pseudoscientist Sigmund Freud (aka “Signal Fraud”). Outside the bible, I know of no evidence whatever for the existence of Moses, or any such event as the exodus. Do you?
I would think there are bound to be genetic similarities between Jews and Egyptians, given that most Jews do indeed have middle eastern ancestry.
I pretty sure that modern Egyptians wouldn’t have much of their ancestry going back to the Egyptians of the time in question. There was a lot of settlement by Greeks and then the Roman and Arab conquests. – Matt Heath
I’m pretty sure you’re wrong here. The Nile valley has been a population centre for several thousand years. Invading armies, even if accompanied or followed by civilians, seem seldom to “swamp” the locals, judging by modern genetic studies. European conquest of the Americas and Australasia are exceptions, along with the Bantu conquest of central and southern Africa.
Back when I was being raised Catholic, they taught us in CCD (catechism) that the ages in Genesis were actually a mistranslation of (lunar) months for years. While that doesn’t really work for Abraham, it would bring Noah back to a more reasonable 73. Is there any truth to this idea of mistranslation? – SteveM
I’d be astonished if there were anything in this. sounds to me like yet another desperate attempt to make the bible “right”.
You mean they were skeptical of pagan claims? Damn them to hell!
But really, you show what an ignorant buffoon you are, Joe. There was a lot of skepticism of the Bible in the 19th century, probably somewhat more than was warranted–although this could be said of Homer just as easily.
Herodotus mentions Sargon, Sennacherib, Nineveh, and Babylon. And, unlike any Bible writers, he was an actual historian, wrong about many things, but an important source for ancient history (parts of the Bible are important sources, too, but hardly as history). And the hanging gardens of Babylon were one of the seven wonders of the world. Babylon, of all your retarded list, was well-attested, and not questioned by most educated Europeans. While I don’t know exactly what may have been questioned by whom, it’s fair to say that Herodotus was only questioned by skeptics, and not rejected outright by most of them.
Look up Berossus, tard, and learn a little about how well-known Babylon was in the ancient world, and in the ancient literature that scholars have long used and understood.
So you’re obviously an ignorant boob, joe. Many of us have actual knowledge of the world during the time of the Bible, including knowledge about lands beyond Palestine. And it is because we have such knowledge that we do not consider the Bible to be an accurate source of information about, well, much of anything. By sifting, yes, we can gather some useful knowledge from the Bible, but skepticism is necessary for finding any bit of truth in the Bible.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
OK. I yield to you on this. To be honest I regretted how confident I made myself sound as soon as I hit “submit”.
I thought the term “armchair science” meant stating a hypothesis that is possible in the sense that it is not impossible and doiing nothing in trying to match it with facts.
Then you repeat it a lot of times and after a while present it as a possible theory. ID is a fine example.
The Mayans didn’t worship Tlaloc.
Ah, right you are. Chaac, then. So many bloodthirsty rain gods. Hard to keep ’em straight.
Out of curiousity: Does anyone know if there are any Roman records from the time of Jesus that survived? Given the actions of Jesus in the New Testament, especially his crucifiction, surely they would have documented something be it an arrest warrant or something similar.
Plenty of records, but nary a contemporary mention of ol’ Yeshua. The earliest mentions from Roman historians are those of Josephus and Tacitus. The Josephus passage is widely regarded as a later Christian forged interpolation. Tacitus is just reporting the beliefs of early 2nd Century Roman Christians. The passage also gets Pontius Pilate’s administrative title wrong, so there’s reason to wonder if it hasn’t been Christian-ified a little as well.
‘Doesn’t work for Noah,’ I think you meant to write. But no, it still doesn’t seem to work out, because a lunar year is something like 354 days, 11 1/4 days less than a solar year.
Probably not the only thing wrong in the CCD.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Thought so, although I thought it more an attempt at making it not so obviously wrong. After all, they were also teaching that Genesis was largely metaphorical, and not to be taken (too) literally. (It was the 60’s after all)
Eddie Janssen@172,
Oh, thanks – the term wasn’t familiar to me, but fits old Signal Fraud pretty well!
No, I meant what I said. There are about 13 lunar months in a year. Noah’s 950/13 = 73. Abraham’s 175/13 = 13.5 obviously doesn’t work.
I don’t have the biblical archeology chops to comment on the entire show, but I was struck by the praise of the ten commandments. Many of the commandments have nothing whatever to do with morality, the few that do relate to morality are blindingly obvious (prohibitions against lying, theft, and murder could not have been ethical innovations or humanity would have perished in the caves), and some commandments were downright immoral, in the way they, for example, treated women as property. What is more, it is tacitly immoral to neglect including, say, an injunction against slavery and other unethical practices.
The commandments no doubt had the effect of promoting societal cohesion, but as an expression of moral excellence they are far from ideal. And nothing was made of how much the ethical content of the Hebrew Bible likely owes to other ethical codes of the region, from which it appears the Israelites borrowed.
Most of the rest of the show I thought was quite good.
On the program, I was optimistic. But no. It was largely crap. Too much pandering. It was cool to see some of the reconstructions and artifacts, but as a straight piece of documentary film about the current state of biblical archaeology, I have to give it a D. What skeptical perspectives that were entertained were mostly overshadowed by “Gee whiz, maybe the Bible is true after all!” I guess parts of it could serve as a decent introduction to the Documentary hypothesis, so for a viewer less familiar with that maybe it would have greater value.
While I agree with that, to be fair, this idea of the extreme longevity of the people in Genesis being a substitution of “years” for “months”, I don’t think was actually part of the CCD curriculum. It was, i.i.r.c., an informal discussion with our priest during CCD class. Memory is a little fuzzy but I don’t think it was necessarily church doctrine.
Oh, right, sorry about that. I glossed over the “(lunar) months” and took it as lunar years because that really is an issue in “Bible prophecy”.
As to people having their ages counted in months, that just seems too weird. And not only doesn’t it work for Abraham, the fact is that there’s an “evolution” of ages downward in Genesis, so that you go from 950 years for Noah, I believe his son Shem lived for 600 years, and there’s a quick progression downward from there–and Shem apparently lived past Abraham’s death.
So the writers seemed to know what they were doing, counting years which declined swiftly past the time of the glorious ancients. I believe that something similar happened in the Babylonian kings’ list(s), a swift decline in length of years after a mythic past.
And anyhow, most of the “liberal” theologians, as well as scholars, will tell you that those extremely long lives were a means of exalting mythic figures, since the good lived long (didn’t die young). It’s a familiar theme in “records” of the past, and I can think of no reason to think that anyone ever confused years with months in those lists.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Here are the lifespans of Shem (son of Noah) and his descendents in a straight line to Abraham. It’s Genesis 11, but I took the text from the Skeptics’ Annotated Bible (minus the laughing faces):
Shem lived 600 years.
Arphaxad lived 438 years.
Salah lived 433 years.
Eber lived 464 years.
Peleg lived 239 years.
Reu lived 239 years.
Serug lived 229 years.
Nahor lived 148 years.
And Nahor was Abram’s (Abraham’s) father.
I just thought it well to show how the Bible indicates the declining ages from Noah (950 years) to Abraham (175 years).
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
And just note how odd the numbers are:
600 years, exactly. 239, 239, and 229, in a row. And Abraham was 175 years.
If the numbers weren’t enough, the lack of randomness of the numbers gives away the game.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
I’ve been watching it online. It’s . . . tame. I think Nova knew that if they really came out and said all the things that should be said, they were gonna receive a lot of backlash. The first 10 minutes got kind of annoying (i.e. the claim that the hebrews were the first monotheists, cities and places match up!!!, look! the Egyptians mention Israel!!), but things got better after that, even if they still had to drag in the apologetics.
I’d also like to offer the website “Rejection of Pascal’s Wager” ( http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/index.html ) to the post who wanted to know about the historical documents of Jesus. (aka, there are none. As in zilch. As in no historian who lived at the same time and could have been an eye-witness to Jesus ever mentioned him . . . as in they said nothing. Nada)
> 600, 438, 433, 464, 239, 229, 148 years.
All of the odd numbers in this list are prime. What are the odds of that?
John
Joe@108
Timezones are out of sync and I’ve just had another look at this. So Joe, although you’ve probably found a new venue to be pompous and superior, just in case you’re sniffing around here out of some masochistic need to be scorned and reviled let me say that your whingeing about my bad language cuts no ice. I wasted three decades of my life listening to opinionated bigots like you perpetuating lies and slagging off other humans simply because they don’t buy in to your superstitions. My “language” is honest and direct (concepts I imagine you’re unfamiliar with) as a personal antidote to the holier-than-thou bigotry your type inflict upon children and the weak-minded. I’d have no problem sounding as pompous and supercilious as you–but I find you too stupid and boringly predictable to waste my time with. You don’t deserve a reasoned response when you can’t climb out of your wallow of unreason. If you really want to do something ‘christian’ you could practice humility and fuck off.
If you doubt people 6,000 years ago could live to be 950 how do you explain JOHN + MCCAIN????
A bit on Akhenaten — I beleive that jan osman and eric hornung also address akhenaten and his reign in cultural memory as inspiration for Moses. One thing that seems fairly certain is that there were were people of Canaanite descent holding office in Egypt at this time and throughout the new kingdom. Aper-El was a vizier early in the reign of Akhenaten. Another is Panehesy, a high official at this time whose father’s name was semitic. So, far from being slaves, it seem like migrants from this area were fairly integrated into normal Egyptian society. As a side note, one should note the similarity between parts of Akhenaten’s hymn to aten and psalm 104.
Also, most of Palestine was controlled by Egypt through instated warlords until around the 20th dynasty. Escaping from egypt into palestine under rameses II would have been like fleeing to tibet to escape the Chinese!
Finally, regarding Egypt today, many people seem to think of the Egyptians as a lost race. True,the Greeks and Romans colonized heavily, but at least under the ptolemies they considered Greek culture superior and didn’t intermarry with the locals. Perhaps things were different in the poorer classes. There has always been some intermarriage between Egypt and the rest of the middle east… New kingdom culture was fairly cosmopolitan among upper classes. The Egyptians of today consider themselves to be the descendants of the egyptians who built the pyramids, share traditions with them and are probably genetically very similar.
I realized last night that the thing I hate about biblical archaeology documentaries is that the try so hard to make archaeology fit the bible. Most arghaeologists use ancient texts as a rough guide but these guys use it as a framework. I consider that to be an inherent weakness in this field.
I know next to nothing about archaeology. Perhaps that’s why I found this special more interesting than most of you.
Certainly, there were times that NOVA attempts to be a little gentle, but I didn’t feel that they were realy pandering to any great degree.
I actually learned quite a bit.
There was an awful lot here for the deluded to be enraged by. No real way to avoid that. And I wouldn’t expect Nova to rub it in their faces.
Overall, I’d give it a B.
Interesting stuff.
Naughty beast that I am, I fell asleep about 10 minutes into the program, missed the rest of it.
ben @58 – Lovely wedding! Reminds me of every pagan wedding I’ve been to so far.
Moses @145 -…monkeys flying out of my ass… first laughed out loud of the day.
Dr. Hector Avalos @148 – wow.
There we go, then. I double yield.
@CJO/66
I think you mistook, or I mis-wrote what I was trying to say. I agree with what you were saying.
What I was suggesting is that if what I wrote in hypothesis #2 of my post (59) is that if the Hebrews did NOT do the monotheism thing up until they were in exile, then the Torah and much of the per-exilic history would have to have been made up or re-written BEFORE the Israelites returned from their captivity.
Nehemiah makes it pretty clear that the city was to be rebuilt. The synagogue system was started, and the temple was rebuilt. This is the Judaism that Jesus would have been born in to–or something like it.
All the work he did was based on resurecting an OLD system and tweaking it in a new way. If archeology is showing that those old ways did NOT exist before exile, then the question must be asked “Where did those ideas come from and how did they come to be accepted by all who returned from Babylon?”
But it was only a hypothetical question. I’m not ignorant on the origins or times of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, or their contemporaries (you mention Ezra, for example)–I grew up having that stuff crammed down my throat and up the nose too. In fact, it is because of that experience that I threw the hypothetical scenario #2 out there.
I am aware Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, etc were written during or sometime after exile; what I was trying to hint at is IF indeed the Torah was only a random collection of stories BEFORE that time (like our fairy tales today) with no formal, widespread religion around them, then we have to question whether our understanding of the origin of the Torah and its impact on the Isrealites is correct. Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel come into the picture because they were the most prominent Hebrews of the day in terms of religion, and would likely have played some role (or at least been aware of) the collecting, editing, and publishing of the Torah as we see it in the Dead Sea Scrolls and today. And that, in turn, would warrant (in my mind) another look at their books and lives as well. That’s all.
Here is an example: What I had in mind when I wrote that post is this–imagine a preacher in the 1870s speaking to his congregation, disproving evolution based on what he had: the works of Darwin. Their work and words are read all over the country. A few years later, said preacher and congregation eat Snow White’s apple (play along here) and fall asleep for one hundred years (go into exile). While they are asleep, two things happen. One, scientists are working feverishly to expand on Darwin’s work. Two, other churches are continuing “the work” against the scientists. When the group awakes in the 1980s (returns from exile) wanting to continue their work (rebuild the city), they study up on the accumulated information and are persuaded of the Theory of Evolution. Wanting to distinguish themselves from the stupidity of what they started, they not only renounce it, but carefully rewrite their original works to better reflect their “newfound truth” and leave those who initially followed them hanging. This doesn’t mean change EVERYTHING, or “make it all up”. It means doing just enough edits to reflect “this is what we and always have believed” despite that not being the case.
Anyone affected by that group would have the right to ask, “Hey, weren’t you claiming…(fill in the blank) before?” Not that changing the mind is bad, but rewriting your history to ‘prove’ you didn’t change it is bad form. Does that make what I was going after any clearer? I apologize for the confusion, I was trying to keep the post short.
In the end it turns out that option #2 I posited is not the case, it is a false hypothesis, if you will. After watching the program I realize that is NOT what the producers are saying. So in reality, it is a non-issue, or at least not as much of an issue as it potentially might have been.
Bleh. Sorry for the long post!
Guess I’m biased, since I happen to love NOVA, but I thought it was quite good. The plot line was, “Jewish-style monotheism has about half the human race as believers now – how’d it first come about?” Conclusion re that main thesis is, Israelites got their butts kicked by the Babylonians, had two choices: (1) Our god ain’t as strong as their gods, or (2) God’s in charge, but doesn’t like us any more. Why? ‘Cause we trucked with other gods. So the Israelites (née the Canaanites) chose #2, anthologized/edited/rewrote their existing sacred texts with that in mind, and voilà! – a bestseller is born.
A thought – If one considers philosophies of the ancients as analogous to later attempts to gain knowledge via the scientific method (I said analogous, not equivalent), might one think of monotheism as sort of an ancient Theory of Everything?
Not that changing the mind is bad, but rewriting your history to ‘prove’ you didn’t change it is bad form.
Again, look at Deuteronomy. They conveniently “find” a lost book of the law that just happens to enshrine the virtues of the temple state and the monolpoly on sacrifice that the Jerusalem elites are pushing for. Quite obviously Deuteronomy was written to order to serve this purpose. It seems like “bad form,” but I think we have to reconcile ourselves to the idea that, in the ancient world, it’s just how it was done. History is written by the winning side, and, as Orwell wrote, “those who control the past control the future.”
And I wouldn’t be too sure about the program and your h2. It didn’t try to absolutely overturn the idea, and I think it made it pretty clear overall that monotheism was not normative for Israelite religious practice until after the exile. By which I mean that polytheism WAS normative, not a furtive practice that needed to be rooted out by the righteous.
IF indeed the Torah was only a random collection of stories BEFORE that time (like our fairy tales today) with no formal, widespread religion around them, then we have to question whether our understanding of the origin of the Torah and its impact on the Isrealites is correct.
“Random collection” is probably misleading; the rest of this is pretty much the state of things at this point in scholarly understanding. Misleading because you have to remember that there were certainly traditions and collections of texts that rose above the level of “fairy tales,” but that’s with emphasis on the plural. Many traditions, many collections, even many versions of the same texts. A new kind of tradition and a new collection came out of Babylon with Ezra, and that became the foundation for normative Second Temple Judaism, which is at that time in essence a new, monotheistic faith tradition.
I am really confused by the religious leaders’ comments here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/perspectives.html
They seem to really like the show, that some of them admit, is about made up stories, and STILL remain religious?
Am I missing something?
I take offense to that, Moses.
There is excellent evidence for the existence of monkeys (albeit I’m not interpreting “flying” as “winged”, but merely as “being expelled forcefully from”), foreign films, the oscars, and possibly even your derriere. It therefore represents a far greater possibility than god, as all we need to do is collect all those things together.
What cheeses me off about this is that, instead of its usual 8:00pm time slot, this particular episode of NOVA is being aired at midnight by Georgia Public Television.
*sigh*
Welcome to the Bible Belt.
culmastadm @#196
Am I missing something?
yes, you are missing blind faith and gullibility
Watched it as soon as it became available online. It was a mixed bag. A bit heavy on the pandering, IMHO.
I thought that was Rage Against the Machine’s “Testify”.
kids these days…
Holbach says, “I’ll watch Looney Tunes before I watch that insane drivel.”
I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever. Daffy Duck and Porky Pig are right up your alley.
What I’ve always found interesting is that archeology manages, even as it is handicapped by some 2000 years and vexingly fragmentary evidence, to spin a yarn from just those little bits that beats the wet crap out of the in situ writers who pretended to be witness-journalist-historians on the strength of a conviction that they were good at sounding authentic and truthful while making things up.
I mean, you know, that not even 2000 years can erase so many cheap fibs, no matter how craftily embellished…now THAT ALONE is pretty flaming interesting.
I tried to watch it, but it isn’t available up here in Soviet Canuckistan, although they do appreciate the money we send to the border stations. How nice.
Oh. OK, rp. I assume by your politicized take on this matter, you are maybe libertarian from the US of Alberta. Otherwise, if you are in the neighborhood of the evil, communist Toronto to Buffalo corridor, you could try WNED.
I don’t know about that but I do reference a genetic study of a marker common to Jewish males from the priestly lineages like Levi and Cohen. I had the opportunity to write an article for Debunking Christianity and wrote about what archaeology has to say about the exodus (nothing much) but also about what clues we have available to us when we take off our “Biblical blinders” and look at the archaeological evidence as it presents itself sans Scripture. I would appreciate a few sharp minds reading my offering and commenting on it. I would especially like to hear from anyone who has read “Secrets of the Exodus” by Messod and Roger Sabbah which forms the backbone of this article. It seems too few have heard of these French authors.
Sorry, I forgot to link the article.
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2008/06/comparison-of-exodus-to-egyptian.html
@CJO/195
I have never seriously considered Dueteronomy as a book written much later. I say written as in composed, not compiled–I have no issues with a late compilation.
I grew up in one of those churches for whom the whole thing is rather literal–the sort of churches PZ rails against. It has just been the last couple years I have been able to get away from it.
I have done a fair amount of study into other views, but am far from having seen all of them. I will look into this in more detail. Other than that bit being new to me, I have no real argument with or against what you are saying. Thanks for that. Also, apologies as I am not always the clearest–I am glad you got the gist of what I was thinking.
Hey guys, i was wondering if you could destroy this for me; it was written by some evangelical wingnut named phillysoul
(sorry about the length):
-Historical Accuracy-
Sir William Ramsey (one of the most eminent authorities on geography and history of ancient Asia Minor) with much skepticism undertook an extensive research of the Gospel of Luke and acts later stated, “I take the view that Luke’s history is unsurpassed in regard to its trustworthiness…you may press the words of Luke in a degree beyond any other historian’s and they stand the keenest scrutiny and the hardest treatment.”
Dr. William F. Albright (6 doctorate degrees – one of the most respected oriental scholars who ever lived): “The reader may rest assured: nothing has been found to disturb a reasonable faith, and nothing has been discovered which can disprove a single theological doctrine….We no longer trouble ourselves with attemts to ‘harmonize’ religion and science, or to ‘prove’ the Bible. The Bible can stand for Itself.”
Dr. Robert Wilson (expert in the language, history and archeology of the OT): “I have devoted myself to the one great study of the OT, in all of its languages, in all of its translations, and as far as possible in everything bearing upon its text and history….The result of my 45 years of study of the Bible has led me all the time to a firmer faith that in the OT we have a true historical account of the history of the Israelite people….”
#2 Prophetic Accuracy in scripture that could not have been fulfilled without an omnipotent and omniscient being
the book of Ezekiel makes certain prophecies concerning the destruction of a city named tyre. There are claims that Ezekiel makes that I think should be taken note of.
-Many nations would come against Tyre (Ezek. 26:3)
-The walls of Tyre would be broken down (Ezek. 26:4)
-Dust would be scraped from her, and she would be left like a bare rock (Ezek. 26:4)
-Tyre would be a place for the spreading of nets (Ezek. 26:5)
-Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, would build a siege wall around Tyre (Ezek. 26:8)
-Nebuchadnezzar would plunder the city (Ezek. 26:9-12)
-The stones, timber and soil of Tyre would be cast into the sea (Ezek. 26:12)
-The city would never be rebuilt (Ezek. 26:14)
So what lets now take a look at what happens to Tyre shall we?
After the destruction of Jerusalem and the carrying away of her king Zedekiah into captivity, “Nebuchadnezzar took all Palestine and Syria and the cities on the seacoast, including Tyre, which fell after a siege of 13 years (573 B.C.)” (E. A. Wallis Budge, Babylonian Life And History, p. 50). The inhabitants of Tyre fled to a rocky island half a mile offshore. The walls on the landward side of the island were 150 feet high. “The channel between Tyre and the mainland was over twenty feet deep, and frequently lashed by violent south-west winds. Their fortifications, they believed, would resist the strongest battering-ram yet devised. The city-walls stood sheer above the sea: how could any army without ships scale them? Shore based artillery was useless at such a range.” (Peter Green, Alexander of Macedon, p. 248).
So Nebuchadnezzar has now destroyed the city of tyre as the prophecy had said he would but there was still the fortress which is where Alexander The great comes into play
On his way towards Egypt, Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) led his Macedonian troops to victory at Sidon and then continued south towards Tyre. Tyrian envoys met with Alexander and assured him that their city was at his disposal. “However, he put their goodwill to the test by expressing his wish to sacrifice at the shrine of Heracles inside the city; for the Tyrians recognized a Phoenician god who was identified by the Greeks as Heracles, and from this deity Alexander claimed descent. Tyrian goodwill unfortunately did not extend so far as to grant him the permission he sought In short, they would not admit him into the city.” (David Chandler, Alexander 334-323 B.C., p. 41).
Alexander was tempted to bypass the island fortress and continue his march towards Egypt. He sent messengers to Tyre, urging them to accept a peace treaty. Believing themselves to be safe on their island, the Tyrians killed Alexander’s ambassadors and threw their bodies from the top of the walls into the sea. This act served only to anger Alexander and embitter his troops.
Alexander determined to build a mole to get his troops from the mainland to the island. The mole is said to have been at least 200 feet wide. It was constructed from stones and timber from the old city of Tyre on the mainland. In fulfillment of Ezekiel’s prophecy, the very foundation stones, timbers and dust of the city was cast “in the midst of the water” (Ezek. 26:12).
For a while the Tyrians laughed at Alexander’s project. At first they would row boats across the channel and harangue the Macedonians. Their laughter turned to concern when they saw the mole was going to be completed. The Tyrians ignited a barge and drove it into the first mole. The towers on the mole caught fire and several of Alexander’s men lost their lives. Alexander gave orders for the work to continue, and that the mole itself should be widened and more protective towers be built.
Alexander was able to obtain ships from Sidon, Greek allies and Cyprus to form a blockade around Tyre. When the mole was within artillery range of Tyre, Alexander brought up stone throwers and light catapults, reinforced by archers and slingers, for a saturation barrage. Battle engineers constructed several naval battering rams which smashed through the walls of Tyre. Though courageous, the Tyrians were no match for Alexander’s troops. Over 7,000 Tyrians died in the defense of their island. In contrast, only 400 Macedonians were killed.
The seven month siege, from January to July 332 B.C., was over. “The great city over which Hiram had once held sway was now utterly destroyed. Her king, Azimilik, and various other notables, including envoys from Carthage, had taken refuge in the temple of Melkart, and Alexander spared their lives. The remaining survivors, some 30,000 in number, he sold into slavery. Two thousand men of military age were crucified. Then Alexander went up into the temple, ripped the golden cords from the image of the god (now to be renamed, by decree, Apollo Philalexander), and made his long-delayed sacrifice: the most costly blood-offering even Melkart had ever received.” (Green, p. 262).
Philip Myers (secular historian) “Alexander reduced it to ruins (332 B.C.). She recovered in a measure from this blow, but never regained the place she had previously help in the world. The larger part of the cite of the once great city is now bare as the top of a rock – a place where fishermen that still frequent that spot spread their nets to dry.”
“If Ezekiel had looked at Tyre in his day and had made these seven predictions in human wisdom, these estimates mean that there would have been only one chance in 75,000,000 of their all coming true. They all came true in the minutest detail” (Peter Stoner, Science Speaks).
Another Example
Daniel 9:24 “Seventy weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy place. 25 “So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; it will be built again, with plaza and moat, even in times of distress. 26 “Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing, and the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood; even to the end there will be war; desolations are determined. 27 “And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate
First we will separate the prophecy into three parts:
1. The “7 sevens” in Daniel 9:25.
2. The “62 sevens” in Daniel 9:25.
3. And the 70th “seven” in Daniel 9:27.
now we combine the first two periods for a total of 69 “sevens.”
(The “7 sevens” + The “62 sevens” = 69 Sevens.)
we combined the first two periods because it is at after the completion of those two periods that the anointed one appears, and that’s what we are trying to calculate – when the anointed one was supposed to appear.
Next, we do a little research on what “sevens” are and the obvious conclusion is that we interpret the “sevens” as “seven years” or periods of seven years, rather than a period of seven days or seven weeks or seven months. Part of the reason that this is interpreted as “years” is because of the reference to “years” in Daniel 9:2. (Daniel 9:2 refers to the “seventy years” prophecy that Jeremiah spoke of in Jeremiah 25).
At this point, we’re adding the 7 “sevens” and the 62 “sevens” for a total of 69 “sevens”. And we are interpreting the 69 “sevens” to mean 69 periods of seven years, for a total of 483 years. So, we are saying that there would be a period of 483 years from the time that a decree is given to rebuild Jerusalem to the time that a Messiah is to appear.
Prophetic year has 360 days (Gen 7:11; Rev 11:3; 11:2; 12:6; 13:5).
483 x 360 = 173,880 days
Now, we want to apply these 173,880 days to our calendar, which has 365.25 days to a year. Why? So that we can use our calendar in trying to figure out the year that this part of Daniel’s prophecy was to begin its fulfillment and when this part of Daniel’s prophecy was to be completed. So, we divide the 173,880 days into years of 365.25 days. And, that equals 476 (solar) years. Now, we need to figure out when this 476 year period was supposed to begin!
Edict of Artzxerxes (Neh 2:1). On Nisan I, in the 20th year of the reign of Artaxerxes – a decree was issued to restore and rebuild Jerusalum.
“Encyclopedia Britannica – Artaxerxes’ ascension was 465 B.C. So his 20th year would be Nison 1, 445 B.C.”
Nisan I, equates to – March 14, 445 B.C., this date is the starting point
Christ’s ministry began in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar (Luke 3:1,2).
The beginning of His reign was August 19, A.D. 14.
A. D. 14 + 15 years = A. D. 29 =the time Christ entered public ministry.
The triumphal entry was four days before, Nisan 10th, or April 6th, A. D. 32
From B. C. 445 to A. D. 32 is 476 years, 173,740 days
Plus 116 days for leap years.
From March 14th to April 6th = 24 days
173,740 + 116 + 24 =173,880
Oh c’mon. That is so simple it is insulting. McCain is a zombie. An undead. He died a long time ago and is just lurching around in a poor imitation of life. Not his fault, death happens.
well if Senator McCain is indeed undead, he and Jesus must be great pals! But still, how do you explain McCains mother?
@209- I don’t know enough about the dates of Ezekiel’s (or Daniel”s) or anyone’ else’s prophecies, but think, man. The so-called proof of these kinds of prophecies lie in the dating of texts compared with the events. No one has that information but I could be wrong. It’s simply not good enough to throw in a few quotes from “scholars” (I always had a place in my heart for Budge, and love to see him quoted; not that he was always wrong but his hieroglyphic dictionary certainly was way off). Anyway as a layman, I would recommend doing the research yourself about dating and “prophecy”, remain the sceptic until otherwise proven, and avoid getting involved in numerological debates (that’s certainly pulling stuff out of one’s ass). Nothing there. Those books of the OT were rich in tales, but accepting tales as prophecy without some accurate archeology and timeline… meh. You might as well accept Sylvia Browne as a prophet. Crap, that bottle of cheap Italian is empty…
yeah, first off, it seems to be an argument to authority. fail. then he mentions 1 success of the historocisity (it’s 1:20 am, i don’t give a fuck if it’s spelled wrong) of the Bible, which deserves a Yawn. Then he talks about the prophecy, which falls right on it’s big nose (lol), if Christ is not the Messiah.
But, i want to see it be completely butchered before i put the response to phillysoul on Suddenly Athiest. have fun guys!
The Book of Daniel is the one which confuses Rome with Cyprus [Chittim], and which erroneously states that Belshazzar was the son of Nebuchadnezzar, when he was actually the son of Nabonidus, no relation. In fact, the very first verse in Daniel is an anachronism — Jehoiakim was not king in Jerusalem when Nebuchadnezzar came to power in Babylon. I don’t think we have to worry about its prophetic value when it can’t get history right.
It’s extremely probable that Daniel was written circa 165 BCE. Parts of it are written in Aramaic, which points to a late date of composition, when Aramaic was widely spoken; references to earlier times are vague or just wrong, suggesting that the writer was working with a loose grasp of history, but knew his more recent past much better (as is only natural).
Ezekiel doesn’t really have a good track record, either. In chapter 29, he predicts that Egypt will be destroyed, which didn’t happen.
Yadda, yadda. Suffice to say that there has never been a forty-year period in which Egypt was an uninhabitable wasteland.
While we’re at it:
Nebuchadnezzar did lay siege to Tyre for thirteen years, but he failed to sack the city. After thirteen years, the Tyreans under Ithobaal II worked out a compromise treaty and got off with paying Nebuchadnezzar tribute. Alexander the Great managed to conquer the city centuries later, but he was too busy conquering the rest of the known world to bother destroying it utterly. After his death, his former general Antigonus, founder of the Antigonid Dynasty, had to besiege and conquer Tyre again in 315 BCE.
St. Paul spent a week in Tyre after visiting Cyprus on his third missionary journey (Acts 21:3). Crusaders captured Tyre in the 1100s and held a few coronations there; the PLO used it as a military base in the 1980s; etc., etc.
You inveterate Bible-bashers are so bloodthirsty for total victory, you gloss over the triumph of this Nova doc.
This program:
* Without taking three religions head on, opened the possibility that the Hebrew one god was derivative of prior mythology.
* Addressed archaeological corraboration with the Bible without pointing itself out in blinking neon as a challenge to fundamentalism.
* Seriously undermined the concept of Israel as chosen people.
* Constructively laid out the writing of the five books of Moses as the product of multiple authors separated by ideology and time.
* Presented the exodus as a parable, or a backwards-engineered explanation to fit the outcome.
* Nudged believers into seeing that the believers of an earlier time practiced a vastly different religion that was “refined” by revisionists who arbitrarily shaped the faith.
Darwin probably thought he was uncovering the fingerprints of God. Progress follows a tortuous path. Don’t be snooty about how far ahead you are.
Darwin probably thought he was uncovering the fingerprints of God. – R. Reece
It’s always a good idea to do a little research before posting. The following are culled from http://thinkexist.com/quotes/charles_darwin/. Took about 5 minutes.
“The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic”
“I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created parasitic wasps with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars.”
“The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference”
“What a book a devil’s chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horribly cruel work of nature!”
While s/he is wrong about Darwin in that concluding bit of rhetoric, his/her point is taken.
While I gave it a D, for excessive pandering and being mealy-mouthed about some fairly straightforward conclusions, most other such productions I’ve seen (on the History Channel and the like) rate an “incomplete” for not even addressing the assignment, so, sure, let’s call it progress.
I cannot pretend to know, regardless of what I read in first- and third-person sources, what Charles Darwin believed at the time he initiated his studies. What he wrote later, was it prose or from his heart, who knows. History tells me he was raised Unitarian and Anglican. What a recipe for confusion. I have no idea what he believed. I very much doubt he set out in his research to undo religion, as his unearthing of a monumental theory was pure scientific method. I have no faith in your certitude.
Upon reflection, it appears to me you believed my Darwin comment to be about the conclusion of his work and not what I was trying to say, which was at the beginning–Paley fresh in his mind–Darwin by all accounts was enthused about natural theology. Why did he feel the area was ripe for study, enthusiasm to prove or disprove? How did his inner beliefs change over time? All I can tell is what was written, and what people wrote about their religious beliefs in such times was not necessarily undiluted. Surely later in life the backlash he encountered from religious forces colored his written statements, too.
Watch Online!
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/program.html
NOT that good, and as an atheist with a graduate divinity degree, I’m academically qualified to comment.
It’s too “old-school consensus” driven.
A lot of old-timer mainstream historical-critical scholars are quoted, and archaelogists who support them.
They’re often quoted dissing biblical minimalists, who argue that not only was Abraham not historical, but even David and Solomon weren’t.
But… none of the minimalists were interviewed.
Imagine (for the sake of analogy) a story done 20 years ago on evolutionary biology where a bunch of old-timers criticize Steven Jay Gould, but he and his followers never get a second of camera time.
More on Moses (the biblical personage, not the poster here) and Tacitus.
Freud actually was on linguistically strong ground. “Moses,” in addition to the botched pun in Hebrew, where it is a verb meaning “to draw out,” in ancient Egyptian, means “son of.”
Rameses, Tutmose, etc., were claiming Ra, Thoth, etc., as their patron divinities in New Kingdom times, taking “styles,” similar to that of popes, when they took the throne.
That said, we still have no evidence of an Egyptian prince, or a would-be prince, leading a revolt against the Pharaoh at anywhere near the time in question.
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Tacitus also shows what he doesn’t understand about Christianity. He doesn’t even use the word “Christos” but rather, the similar Greek word “ChrEstos” which occurs nowhere in the Christian New Testament nor the Septuagint Greek translation of the Tanakh. It IS, however, a common appellation for Apollo, though.
Tim H @ 216 —
Luke is HUGELY unhistorical. Try as fundies will, there is simply no way to reconcile Luke 2 with actual history, for example. Start with the fact that a still-independent Galilee wouldn’t even be doing a Roman census and you go downhill from there.
As for Acts? The “We” passages are nothing more than a literary fiction. Roman historian A.N. Sherwin-White, in a book almost totally overlooked by liberal NT scholars as well as conservative ones, points out that switching to the third-person plural for narrative was a common first/second century CE literary device in Greco-Roman heroic romance literature.
Read Acts, and you’ll see that every “We” passage starts and stops within a verse or two of Paul embarking/disembarking a ship.
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R. Reece @ 217 –
Nothing of the sort. The program NEVER questioned Israel’s belief in itself as a “chosen nation,” just how that arose.
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Midianites and Yahweh –
The Mark Smith that someone above mentions believes that Yahweh came from the old Midiante verb HWY (trilateral root, Google that phrase plus the word Hebrew). It’s a much better pun than the one presented in the Burning Bush story.
HWY means, “to storm/blow/thunder.”
In other words, Yahweh was a Midianite Zeus and Mt. Sinai, like Olympus, was an extinct, or inactive at least, volcano.
Which would tie in with the depiction of Yahweh as a storm god in the older passages of the Bible. For example, in Judges 5,
Sorry, on my post #225, I forgot to say that Sherwin-White pointed out that switching to third-person plural narrative was a literary commonplace during shipboard voyages in 1st-2nd century CE Greco-Roman romance novels, hence the importance of the fact this is exactly what we see in Acts.
Great story!
I have no idea what he [Darwin] believed. I very much doubt he set out in his research to undo religion – R. Reece
Well if you don’t know, why comment on it? There’s a good deal of evidence from his private correspondence that at the time of the Beagle voyage he was a conventional Christian, but that both his scientific work and personal tragedies shifted him steadily toward agnosticism. I never said he did set out to undo religion, but nor, so far as I know, is there the slightest reason to believe he thought he was “uncovering the fingerprints of God”.
to whomever,
has anyone bothered to read job26;7 where it speaks of god as”hanging the world upon nothing.”also isaiah40;22 where it says”there is one who is dwelling above the circle of the earth,the dwellers in which are as grasshoppers.”can anyone explain how these primitive people knew this or is this to hard a question for the great minds of this
world to answer ?.also who on this earth is so knowledgeable so as to be able to discredit all those many old civilizations who have legends of the big ole number one flood on our planet,the people who lived in our long ago past history had a closer time line to those who viewed events that happened on this earth in their past. i find no intelligent reasoning for the view held by the scholars of our generation except blatant arrogance.so i prefer to believe in our ancestrals’ belief of the flood story even though it may now have many versions.i keep praying that the ark might get found and who’s to say it won’t for sure. pam
Pam,
All ancient civilizations had their ancient ideas in their ancient books, their ancient papyrus and tablets. What makes the Christian version the truth? Or are you a polytheist?
SIWOTI!
Nope. It’s so simple that I am surprised you even think it’s a question.
1) People, even primitive people, can look up. They can see that the planets are distant, and the stars are even more distant. There is clearly space between the surface of the earth and the planets, and more space between the planets and the stars.
Hence, they can thus conceive that the earth is “suspended” in that empty space, on “nothing”.
2) People, even primitive people, can climb towers and mountains, and look down. They can see that from that height, people and animals down in the distance, look small. It doesn’t take a whole lot of imagination to conceive that humans would look small to someone in the sky looking down.
Primitive does not mean stupid, or unimaginative.
Neither does modern mean intelligent or imaginative, as you and your fellow believers so consistently demonstrate.
Actually, they did not. They had no understanding of the true age of the earth, either wildly underestimating it as being a few thousand years old, or wildly overestimating it as being infinite.
The earth is 4.5 billion years old, and we can examine the evidence of the earth itself to demonstrate this.
It is indeed arrogant for creationist so-called “scholars” to claim knowledge of geology and biology and cosmology that they so clearly do not have.
But the real geologists and biologists and cosmologists can demonstrate their knowledge with evidence.
And that is indeed an arrogant belief.
People who actually study the earth? You know, geologists?
I finally got around to watching the doco, got to say thanks for Dr Hector Avalos for posting those links to reviews of the doco.