ONCE AGAIN! Facts in the Bible is supported by archaeology.

[Altfish]

So you say it's ME that needs educating because I point out how people misread science?

There's general agreement there was a house of David. David is a dynasty - and the first of
the dynasty usually holds the eponymous name, in this case, a king called David.

NO. It is the people who misread it.

David, is well covered in the Bible, but not much outside it... a bit like Jesus.

 

[PruePhillip]

NO. It is the people who misread it.

David, is well covered in the Bible, but not much outside it... a bit like Jesus.

Okay, we know there was a dynasty known as the House of David
from extra-biblical sources.
So that is evidence of a King David.

And other things once-not-believed and maybe even
still-not-believed
that there was a capital of Jerusalem in David's time
and a Jewish language and literature
and real genetic Jewish people (not just a religion)
and even a genetic line to the tribe of Levites, the priestly tribe.
Furthermore we continue to find evidence for Judean and Israeli kings
and some of the prophets.
And from the royal archives of Mari we get confirmation for the culture,
kings and cities mentioned in early Genesis - something utterly unknown
to any fiction bible writer in Greek times, 1800 or so years later.

 

[Altfish]

Okay, we know there was a dynasty known as the House of David
from extra-biblical sources.
So that is evidence of a King David.

And other things once-not-believed and maybe even
still-not-believed
that there was a capital of Jerusalem in David's time
and a Jewish language and literature
and real genetic Jewish people (not just a religion)
and even a genetic line to the tribe of Levites, the priestly tribe.
Furthermore we continue to find evidence for Judean and Israeli kings
and some of the prophets.
And from the royal archives of Mari we get confirmation for the culture,
kings and cities mentioned in early Genesis - something utterly unknown
to any fiction bible writer in Greek times, 1800 or so years later.

Yes, it is evidence but not overwhelming. Like I said the jury's out.

 

[PruePhillip]

Yes, it is evidence but not overwhelming. Like I said the jury's out.

Note: a different degree of evidence for one over the other.

 

[Altfish]

Note: a different degree of evidence for one over the other.

Yes, but I'm still open minded; more evidence may convince me.

 

[PruePhillip]

Yes, but I'm still open minded; more evidence may convince me.

We are content to believe there was an African general named Hannibal
invaded Rome itself, from the Alps with elephants - despite there being
only two people who mentioned him.
The gospels have, what, eight or nine authors, and they changed the
whole of Europe - but people will say Jesus never existed.

 

[Altfish]

We are content to believe there was an African general named Hannibal
invaded Rome itself, from the Alps with elephants - despite there being
only two people who mentioned him.
The gospels have, what, eight or nine authors, and they changed the
whole of Europe - but people will say Jesus never existed.

I stand to be corrected (and I will look into it) but there is a lot more evidence for Hannibal than you indicate. The Punic Wars and Carthage are well documented; even his enemy, Rome, accepts his existence and in fact learnt from his military methods.
I don't dispute that the gospels have changed Europe but I reiterate, outside of The Bible what evidence is there of Jesus' existence?
There are 6 Harry Potter books - does that prove his existence? There are 33 Hercule Poirot novels, is that proof of his existence?

 

[PruePhillip]

I stand to be corrected (and I will look into it) but there is a lot more evidence for Hannibal than you indicate. The Punic Wars and Carthage are well documented; even his enemy, Rome, accepts his existence and in fact learnt from his military methods.
I don't dispute that the gospels have changed Europe but I reiterate, outside of The Bible what evidence is there of Jesus' existence?
There are 6 Harry Potter books - does that prove his existence? There are 33 Hercule Poirot novels, is that proof of his existence?

How many Harry Potter authors?
What is deeply impressive about the bible is the number of people who
wrote of the Messiah before he even arrived. This includes Jacob's
vision of the Messiah ending a future nation of Israel; David's vision of
the Messiah as the rejected and reigning king; Job vision of the Messiah
as Redeemer; Zechariah's vision of the Messiah coming first as Redeemer
and again as King - and so on.

 

[Altfish]

How many Harry Potter authors?

Only one, but we have films, evidence of Platform 9 and 3/4, The Hogswart Express has been seen, etc, etc

What is deeply impressive about the bible is the number of people who
wrote of the Messiah before he even arrived. This includes Jacob's
vision of the Messiah ending a future nation of Israel; David's vision of
the Messiah as the rejected and reigning king; Job vision of the Messiah
as Redeemer; Zechariah's vision of the Messiah coming first as Redeemer
and again as King - and so on.

Most of the prophecies have been debunked and there is a lot of cherry picking as many other prophecies were not fulfilled.
Here is an example...

 

[gnostic]

Okay, we know there was a dynasty known as the House of David
from extra-biblical sources.
So that is evidence of a King David.

Not really.

Alexander serious believed that he was a descendant of Achilles and Neoptolemus, the Greek warriors who thought at Troy.

Julius Caesar and Augustus believed that they were descendants of Venus (Aphrodite) and her son Aeneas, the Trojan warrior who fought for the other side at Troy.

Many of (Celtic) Welsh rulers as well as later medieval English monarchs thought they were also descendants of Aeneas too, and sometimes they thought they were descendants of King Arthur.

And let’s not forget the ancient Egyptian kings who thought they were descendants of Horus or of Amun, or sometimes they thought they were “incarnate” of one of these 2 gods. And the pharaohs of the Old Kingdom period thought they were sons of the sun god Re.

Are you getting the picture here, PruePhillip?

The people who wrote the Kings and Chronicles about the kings of Judah were no better at distinguishing actual history and myths, than those examples I have given.

It is not much of evidence, PruePhillip.

Until you have actual contemporary historical records (to David) or some archaeological evidence on the existence of David himself, I would suggest that you do not take this claim of the “House of David” too seriously.

 

[Looncall]

How many Harry Potter authors?
What is deeply impressive about the bible is the number of people who
wrote of the Messiah before he even arrived. This includes Jacob's
vision of the Messiah ending a future nation of Israel; David's vision of
the Messiah as the rejected and reigning king; Job vision of the Messiah
as Redeemer; Zechariah's vision of the Messiah coming first as Redeemer
and again as King - and so on.

It sounds to me more like the gospels were concocted so as to match the prophecies and are fiction.

 

[PruePhillip]

It sounds to me more like the gospels were concocted so as to match the prophecies and are fiction.

The Jews rejected Jesus, and then they rebelled against Rome.
Jacob said there would be an Israel UNTIL the Messiah came,
and then the Gentiles would believe on Him.

So let's imagine - the Jews HAD to reject their Messiah because
the OT said they would. And then they HAD to fight a series of
hopeless wars against Rome because the OT said they HAD to.
And the Jews HAD to craft a new Jewish religion to conform to
the prophecies that the Gentiles would trust in this Messiah.
Finally, the Jews had to be outcast from their nation and suffer
for two millennium to conform to the OT writings.

What did the Jews expect to get out of this?

 

[PruePhillip]

Until you have actual contemporary historical records (to David) or some archaeological evidence on the existence of David himself, I would suggest that you do not take this claim of the “House of David” too seriously.

It's a dynasty, for crying out loud.

noun
noun: dynasty; plural noun: dynasties
a line of hereditary rulers of a country.

 

[gnostic]

It's a dynasty, for crying out loud.

noun
noun: dynasty; plural noun: dynasties
a line of hereditary rulers of a country.

The Bible has some historical events, but it isn’t a history book.

And genealogy that mixed real line, with claiming a mythological ancestry, are quite common with ancient genealogy.

That same line of the kings of Judah, go all the way back to the mythological Judah, a son of Israel-Jacob, back to Abraham (more myth), back to Noah (again, more myth), back to Adam (with even more myth), and ultimately back to dust that Adam was transformed from...which (ie dust-to-Adam) is the nothing but myth.

In the gospel of Matthew, its tree started with Abraham, but in the Luke gospel, it goes alway back to Adam and to God. Plus, both trees of Joseph, showed that Joseph have different fathers, with 2 different lines Joseph to David, and those lines with Matthew’s line having go back 27 generations, while Luke’s genealogy has 42 generations.

Now I know it is possible to have a gap of 1, 2 or even 3 generations when comparing two different family trees, but the gap between the 2 gospels, is 15 generations. That not likely possible.

But I know that some people give the explanation that tree given in the Luke gospel was Mary, but it actually stated that Joseph’s father was Heli, not Mary’s.

Mary’s father was never mentioned. And the first time, Christians given the Mary-Heli connection was the early 4th century Eusebius. Did Eusebius have any literary record that explicitly says Heli was really Mary’s father, not Joseph’s father?

The answer to that is, a “No”. Eusebius used fabricated excuses, not any lost record of Mary’s line to David.

Beside that, Mary in the gospel of Luke, made it very explicit that she was related to Elizabeth (Luke 1:36), the mother of John the Baptist, and that Elizabeth was a descendant of Aaron (1:5).

Which would mean Mary was most likely a descendant of Aaron too, not to David or to Judah. Joseph has been referred to as “son of David”, but Mary was never called “daughter of David”. And the story of travel to Bethlehem, stated that Joseph was of the line of David, not Mary.

As I said, the whole Mary being daughter of Heli was made up, with Eusebius first coming up with this idea, but he has nothing to verify his claim about Mary’s alleged line, let alone the identity of her parent.

But the problem isn’t just with Matthew and Luke. There is also the problem with the gospel of Matthew when you compared the lines of 1 & 2 Kings (OT), in which the the gospels are missing 4 generations. I would guess that 3 of omitted names (Ahaziah, Joash & Amaziah) were made in the gospel, because the author want to use the magic number “14 generations”.

As you see, people make up all sort of myths when it concern family trees, even in the gospels.

 

[PruePhillip]

The Bible has some historical events, but it isn’t a history book.

And genealogy that mixed real line, with claiming a mythological ancestry, are quite common with ancient genealogy.

That same line of the kings of Judah, go all the way back to the mythological Judah, a son of Israel-Jacob, back to Abraham (more myth), back to Noah (again, more myth), back to Adam (with even more myth), and ultimately back to dust that Adam was transformed from...which (ie dust-to-Adam) is the nothing but myth.

In the gospel of Matthew, its tree started with Abraham, but in the Luke gospel, it goes alway back to Adam and to God. Plus, both trees of Joseph, showed that Joseph have different fathers, with 2 different lines Joseph to David, and those lines with Matthew’s line having go back 27 generations, while Luke’s genealogy has 42 generations.

Now I know it is possible to have a gap of 1, 2 or even 3 generations when comparing two different family trees, but the gap between the 2 gospels, is 15 generations. That not likely possible.

But I know that some people give the explanation that tree given in the Luke gospel was Mary, but it actually stated that Joseph’s father was Heli, not Mary’s.

Mary’s father was never mentioned. And the first time, Christians given the Mary-Heli connection was the early 4th century Eusebius. Did Eusebius have any literary record that explicitly says Heli was really Mary’s father, not Joseph’s father?

The answer to that is, a “No”. Eusebius used fabricated excuses, not any lost record of Mary’s line to David.

Beside that, Mary in the gospel of Luke, made it very explicit that she was related to Elizabeth (Luke 1:36), the mother of John the Baptist, and that Elizabeth was a descendant of Aaron (1:5).

Which would mean Mary was most likely a descendant of Aaron too, not to David or to Judah. Joseph has been referred to as “son of David”, but Mary was never called “daughter of David”. And the story of travel to Bethlehem, stated that Joseph was of the line of David, not Mary.

As I said, the whole Mary being daughter of Heli was made up, with Eusebius first coming up with this idea.

But the problem isn’t just with Matthew and Luke. There is also the problem with the gospel of Matthew when you compared the lines of 1 & 2 Kings (OT), in which the the gospels are missing 4 generations. I would guess that 3 of omitted names (Ahaziah, Joash & Amaziah) were made in the gospel, because the author want to use the magic number “14 generations”.

As you see, people make up all sort of myths when it concern family trees, even in the gospels.

The genealogy would have been quoted from temple records.
Can't comment on them other than that everybody notices the disparities,
most likely even when they were first written down.
But I know that if they panned out there would be no comment upon them.

The "mythological Judah" is the one who's father gave the amazing prophecy
of the future Israel and the Messiah (Gen 49:10)
and the mythological Levi is still with us today, ascertained through modern
genetics.

 

[ecco]

"There is no evidence of King David" carried with it the weight of science,
the new authority.

Specifically what science came to the conclusion that there was "no evidence of King David"?

 

[ecco]

What is deeply impressive about the bible is the number of people who
wrote of the Messiah before he even arrived. This includes Jacob's
vision of the Messiah ending a future nation of Israel; David's vision of
the Messiah as the rejected and reigning king; Job vision of the Messiah
as Redeemer; Zechariah's vision of the Messiah coming first as Redeemer
and again as King - and so on.

How many of them would have accepted that Jesus was the Messiah?

 

[gnostic]

We are content to believe there was an African general named Hannibal
invaded Rome itself, from the Alps with elephants - despite there being
only two people who mentioned him.

Actually, Hannibal wasn’t first foreign general to bring elephants into Italy.

Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, brought a lot more elephants against Rome, about 60 years earlier, and won 2 indecisive and very costly victories against the Roman army. He had 20 elephants in his campaign.

Since Hannibal’s defeat in 202 BCE, the Romans brought all sort of exotic African animals to Italy, including elephants, but not to fight in wars, rather more like pet farms or zoo.

Second, other Greek-Macedonian kings during the Hellenistic period (3rd to 1st century BCE), in the Ptolemaic Egypt and Seleucid Syria.

So it is really far-fetched as you make it out to be.

 

[joelr]

The Jews rejected Jesus, and then they rebelled against Rome.
Jacob said there would be an Israel UNTIL the Messiah came,
and then the Gentiles would believe on Him.

So let's imagine - the Jews HAD to reject their Messiah because
the OT said they would. And then they HAD to fight a series of
hopeless wars against Rome because the OT said they HAD to.
And the Jews HAD to craft a new Jewish religion to conform to
the prophecies that the Gentiles would trust in this Messiah.
Finally, the Jews had to be outcast from their nation and suffer
for two millennium to conform to the OT writings.

What did the Jews expect to get out of this?

First of all Isaiah, Solomon, Zac and Daniel are clear proofs that the NT was using OT sources as material to create new myths.
But also you are cherry picking prophecies so bad?
People rejected messiahs and had wars all over the place. Not a surprise.
But god made so many promises that never came to be, over 200 failed prophecies, and you think a few ambiguous happenings shows the hand of a supernatural agent?

Not only that but the OT has endless stories that we now know cannot be historical, Moses is an Egyptain copy and Yahweh started out as an average Egyptain deity? But because of King James the OT is real. Even though it's not written as historical?


"The Israelites initially worshipped Yahweh alongside a variety of Canaanite gods and goddesses, including El, Asherah and Baal.[37] In the period of the Judges and the first half of the monarchy, El and Yahweh became conflated in a process of religious syncretism."



The Jews needed an updated theology to replace having sins forgiven every year and also wanted their own savior god.
Early church fathers and writers like Justin Myrter didn't claim they had a "new" demigod they claimed to have the "best" one.

 

[joelr]

We are content to believe there was an African general named Hannibal
invaded Rome itself, from the Alps with elephants - despite there being
only two people who mentioned him.
The gospels have, what, eight or nine authors, and they changed the
whole of Europe - but people will say Jesus never existed.

Paul mentions only scripture and revelation.
The 4 gospels are far too mythological to be history and are accepted in the historicity field to be myths written around a man.

In 3AD Christianity was 4% of Rome.
It was made the state religion and later became law. Then through enforcement and evangelizing it spread.
So your points are not relevant as historical facts.

The hannibal argument is disingenuous. No one is claiming he is the god of the universe.

People do think Jesus existed. Historians consider him to have been a man who was mythicised as a god-man.

"The historicity of Jesus is distinct from the related study of the historical Jesus, which refers to scholarly reconstructions of the life of Jesus, based primarily on critical analysis of the gospel texts.[18][19][20] Historicity, by contrast, as a subject of study different from history proper, is concerned with two different fundamental issues. Firstly, it is concerned with the systemic processes of social change, and, secondly, the social context and intentions of the authors of the sources by which we can establish the truth of historical events, separating mythic accounts from factual circumstances.[21]

Little in the four canonical gospels is considered to be historically reliable.[45][46][47][48][49]"
Historicity of Jesus - Wikipedia
The mythicist theory has been put forth but is still a minority in the PhD bible history community.

But almost all historians are really mythicists because even though they consider Jesus to have been a man they consider the supernatural stories, resurrections and miracles to be myth. So it's really no different.