Morality of the Old Testament

[Audie]

Very good. The brain is to be used. Very good.

Sarcasm?

 

[Kathryn]

@Kathryn
@DavidSMoore

Regarding the flood, you might find the following interesting:

The Flood Story in its Ancient Near Eastern Context​

Let me know what you think.

Thank you!

 

[Kathryn]

Sarcasm?

I doubt it but what do I know?

 

[dybmh]

Here's my previous response: DSM previous response

Thank you, and, I'm sorry that I missed it. Here is my reply to the points you've raised there:

I must not be understanding your thinking. I always assumed that the law was considered the core teaching of Yahweh. Here's a short excerpt from Zechariah:

OK. I'm holding this in mind: " ... the law is the core teaching ... " "law". Now I'm going to read the passage that you brought:

Then all who survive of the nations that have come against Jerusalem shall go up year after year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the Festival of Booths. If any of the families of the earth do not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, there will be no rain upon them.
(Zechariah 14:16-17, NRSVue)[/quote\

For me, the key word is emphasized above. The passage from Zechariah does not mention the law. "The nations will worship". Maybe the assumption that the law is its core teaching is, forgive me, not exactly 100% correct? I would say it this way: "Some of the greatest teachings come from studying the law. The study of the law is central in the daily practice of many orthodox Jews."

 

[dybmh]

The point is that I find it hard to believe that God would decide to starve people just because they don't observe the Festival of Booths. It seems to me that he would be much more concerned that the people of the world would follow the laws that he established.

Who are getting starved and why? I'll re-read Zechariah and report back.

Yes, I'm okay with the idea that there are multiple sides to every issue. But lawmakers in a democratic society are required to consider all sides when writing legislation to ensure that the result is actionable, but not draconian. That's why modern laws tend to have many clauses for special cases or unusual circumstances. Laws that lack such nuance aren't especially helpful in the modern world.

I agree 100%. Although from my point of view lawmakers are not required to consider all sides. I would prefer that they do, but I am rather confident that they do not. Both sides get an opportunity to be heard. None are required to listen and consider it. It takes practice, effort, and motivation to judge fairly.

 

[shunyadragon]

I did not say "choosing". I said "looking". Not clear. but yes for over fifty years of study on my part there is no question that the academic references die not "look" at and study all the scriptures.

View attachment 91282

Looking at BOTH text-a AND text-b are required else it is conjecture at best. This is a very simple idea. Please let me know that you understand?

Spoiler: an exaggerated example demonstrating my point of view

Assertion: "Text-A evolved from Text-B".

Question: "Do you have a copy of Text-B?"​

​

Answer: "No. I heard it from a credible source."

I do not hear it I read it from credible academic scoures.
Make mistakes? Contemporary Research relies on redundancy and critical review over time. Yes there are differences in their conclusions and of course mistakes (?) at times, but the history of academic research, and archaeological finds are on from ground.

Not relying on any one reference, but the accumulated knowledge over time. The same procedures as done in academic science.

How is that accomplished accurately without looking at what is **actually** written in the text?

Many many years of published research by Christian, Jewish and secular scholars, and extensive archaeological and historical research.

​

Do you have access to a copy of the "Babylonian Code of Hammurabi"?

Yes. and all the scholars I have cited have studied them for many years going back to before either of us were born. You have failed to provide anything contrary to the sources I have cited to back up your objections.[/spoiler]

 

[shunyadragon]

So you don't think subjectively?

Like everyone I 'think both objectively and subjectively.

P.S. Since you emphasize academic, why do you make so many grammatical errors? "idolatry requires judgements form different cultural perspectives", 1) "Other religious perspectives define the Roman Church use of imagery and struary as idolatry", 2) "Different religions and their variations like Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and the various Vedic beliefs called Hinduism (no verb)", 3) "I define the universal independent perspective is the universal is beyond any religious or cultural perspective".

My academic references do not depend on my errors in grammar. Your failure to respond to the references reveals your avoidance of the facts and your emphasis on the fallacy of judgement based on your annal view of grammar.

Your premise that "Nobody truly understands the scriptures unless they believe as you do," eliminates any possible constructive dialogue.

The other premise that determine your stoic stonewalling against information is your ancient perspective of the argument is Academia versus God.

 

[shunyadragon]

When it comes to the flood, it sure seems like something significant happened in that region, involving water. During that time, wouldn't it have been as if the entire earth was covered in water? Rather than just a region?

Anyway, it's a cool story.

Yes it is in the original version as part of the oldest written stories in the world. It is terribly unfortunate that many Christians believe the Pentateuch is a literal recorded history mostly by Moses.

 

[shunyadragon]

My argument stands that the Pentateuch, as well as the whole Bible is a collection of ancient tribal narratives with little or no relevance to the morality, ethics, and science of our contemporary world. Like all ancient scriptures their is elements of human wisdom and guidance for today, but as a whole it presents a lesson of the consequences of ancient tribalism impact on todays world.

Yes, like all ancient cultures have systems of moral and ethical beliefs similar to the Bible which reflect their culture and the evolving nature of morals and ethics.

 

[metis]

Albert Einstein had No Understanding of the Bible. You should read and/or listen to Einstein's "God Letter".

Natural Men, such as, Albert Einstein and Baruch Spinoza cannot Understand the Bible. Karl Marx is another that didn't have a clue about the Bible.

Both posts above are categorically false. Some make the mistake that Einstein knew science but not religion is 100% nonsense.

There are several books on Eistein and religion, so maybe google them and maybe select one to read for yourself. My favorite is "God In the Equation: How Einstein Became the Prophet of the New Religious Era" by Corey Powell. Another good one is "Einstein and Religion" by Max Jammer.

Here's a Wikipedia source: Religious and philosophical views of Albert Einstein - Wikipedia

 

[metis]

Small correction. Vesto Slipher measured the spectra of several nebulae in the 1920s. At that time there was much dispute as to whether the nebulae were inside the Milky Way or outside. He found that the spectra of the nebulae were shifted-- some toward the red and some toward the blue. When Hubble found out he interpreted Slipher's findings as being the result of a Doppler shift-- meaning that they were due to relative motion between observer and observed. Larger surveys showed that the majority of nebulae were shifted toward the red, and that led to the realization that the universe is expanding. I bring this up not to quibble with your thoughts but to give Mr. Slipher his due.

The premise we now know is correct, and thanks.

 

[SkepticThinker]

You see, you rely on academic information; I rely on God. Your information "swells your head". I have faith that results in eternal life.

Which god? How does this god provide you with information? How do you know the information you have comes from any god(s)? How is faith a pathway to truth?

 

[SkepticThinker]

I do not have to respond on your terms. You lack true understanding, so why should I accept your opinion?

How do you know what the true understanding is?

 

[shunyadragon]

Yeah, you're completely objective, right?

Thanks for the laugh!

Wrong?!?!?! No I do not make that claim.

 

[dybmh]

Yes

May I please see the version of the Code of Hammurabi which can be used for comparison with the law of the Hebrew Bible?

 

[dybmh]

The same procedures as done in academic science.

Your position would be stronger if examples from the original texts are included, agreed?

 

[shunyadragon]

Your position would be stronger if examples from the original texts are included, agreed?

Actually some of my references did reference text particularly in comparison to Canaanite text. I am more than comfortable with my references Christian, secular and Jewish. They were sound academic references.

I may cite more.

 

[shunyadragon]

May I please see the version of the Code of Hammurabi which can be used for comparison with the law of the Hebrew Bible?

First I do not believe there are many translations. Likely a few academic versions likely what is favored is the latest, These are translations of bothe the Dead Sea Scrolls and Nag Hammurabi texts by academic universities, which was important in comparing to the Torah. Reference follows.

The Nag Hammadi Codices and the Dead Sea Scrolls | Department of Religion

Humboldt-Universität, Berlin July 20-22, 2018 Conference Description

religion.fsu.edu

Conference Description​

Two archaeological discoveries from the 1940s irrevocably changed the study of early Christianity and ancient Judaism: the unearthing of the Gnostic codices found near Nag Hammadi (Upper Egypt) in 1945, and of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the first of which turned up at Qumran (Israel-Palestine), in 1947. Students of ancient religion in general and the New Testament in particular were electrified by these newly available works. The Nag Hammadi Codices may have been produced in the fourth century CE, but they preserve—it was maintained—hitherto-unknown Christian works from the second and even the first century CE. The Dead Sea Scrolls, on the other hand, were ostensibly the products of a Jewish sectarian group resembling and perhaps even contemporaneous with the Jesus Movement itself.

The excitement of these parallel discoveries, and the initial interest in relating both of them to earliest Christianity, led to scholarship that engaged the Nag Hammadi Codices alongside the Dead Sea Scrolls. For instance, lectures on Qumran were delivered at the famous Messina Colloquium on Gnosticism (1966), and published in its highly influential conference proceedings. However, subsequent research from the 1970s to today lost interest in engaging the Nag Hammadi and Qumran corpora next to one another. The artifacts are of very different provenance and material form (Christian codices vs. Jewish scrolls); the languages needed to work at the appropriate philological level are different as well (Greek and Coptic vs. Aramaic and Hebrew). Most importantly, the emergence of the study of Early Christianity in the longue durée (reaching to the rise of Islam) freed the Nag Hammadi works from the governing context of earliest Christianity, situating them rather in Late Antiquity; similarly, the Dead Sea Scrolls rightfully have become viewed as sources for developments in Judaism in its own right, rather than simply a window into the sectarian environment of Jesus’ day. Specialists of both corpora have, for the most part, ignored one another’s work for nearly half a century.

Given the transformation of the disciplines of early Christian Studies, ancient Judaism, and biblical studies over the last half-century—where we no longer look for the “parting of the ways” of ancient Judaism and Christianity, but seek to explore the porous boundaries between these religious traditions, as they developed along, aside, and within one another—engagement between Qumran and Nag Hammadi scholars appears necessary. It has become clear, for example, that the Nag Hammadi texts draw upon Jewish, scriptural traditions, our understanding of which has been transformed over the last 15 years by the contribution of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Conversely, scholars of ancient Judaism are increasingly aware that later, Christian texts—especially Christian apocrypha—preserve traditions that help us understand Judaism better—yet by and large, they have worked little with the Nag Hammadi texts, which have only recently been recognized as a goldmine of Christian apocrypha of late antiquity.

This conference arises out of the conviction that researchers of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi Codices can acquire a better understanding of their main corpora of study and the broader context of antiquity in which they were produced by engaging in conversation once more.

The following is very current 2009 translation:https://www.amazon.com/Nag-Hammadi-Scriptures-Translation-Complete/dp/0061626007

 

[shunyadragon]

More on the relationship to the Torah. This reference as long read and very well documented.

https://brill.com/display/book/9789004517561/BP000019.xml?language=en

Chapter 8 From Adam to the Patriarchs: Some Biblical Figures in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi Library​

In: The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi Codices
Author:
George J. Brooke

1 Introduction​

It is not possible in a short essay of this kind to review all of the principal scriptural figures named in both the Qumran corpus of the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Nag Hammadi texts.1 The focus of this study is on the major figures named in the book of Genesis.2 Much work on those figures has been presented most recently by Jaan Lahe in his 2012 monograph and it is not necessary to repeat most of that descriptive work here.3 In his book Lahe’s overall conclusion is that any comparison between the Nag Hammadi texts and Jewish sources really only points to shared sets of traditions between Judaism and Gnosis in various common cultural milieux. Obviously, he has been careful to avoid falling into the trap of thinking that in relation to any particular topic a single-line trajectory might be described to explain the view of one aspect of Jewish tradition in later Gnostic sources, even though his analysis shows a continuing interest in the Syro-Palestinian Jewish background of much that is Gnostic.4 I too have wished to avoid that trap, but I have been trying to piece together some perspective, a line of argument, for making sense of at least some of the similarities and differences between the scriptural figures in the non-scriptural scrolls from Qumran and the references to them in the Nag Hammadi texts.5

The purpose of this paper, then, is not to provide comprehensive descriptive and analytical detail on individual figures from the Hebrew scriptures as they appear in the two literary corpora. Rather, the purpose is to provide some more general observations on the use or non-use of such figures to see whether some greater specificity might be given to the widely acknowledged view that both literary corpora are variously dependent on a wide range of passages from the Hebrew Bible, specificity both in terms of which figures are selected for reference and re-use and why, and also in terms of how such figures were transmitted into their new contexts, whether directly or indirectly. The dominant sense that I have of the differences between the corpora concerns the place of worship, and more specifically the role of the priesthood as an institution in the community and non-community compositions from the Qumran caves. This seems to be not just a matter of differences in topic and theme, resulting in the use of different literary genres in the two corpora, but a more fundamental variation of perspective.

 

[Ajax]

The only thing simple is your understanding of the verses, so allow me to quote a couple of excepts by Nahum Sarna on Exodus 21:20-21.

But first, a note on the rendering Exodus 21:20. You offer ...

• Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result,

The following is from Robert Alter and the JPS [ibid] respectively.

• And should a man strike his mail slave or his slavegirl with a rod and they die under his hand, they shall surely be avenged.
• When a man strikes his slave, male or female, with a rod, and he dies there and the, he must be avenged,

And now, Sarna:

Injury to a Slave (vv. 20-21)​

​

This law -- the protection of slaves from maltreatment by their masters -- is found nowhere else in the entire existing corpus of ancient Near Eastern legislation. It represents a qualitative transformation inn social and human values and expresses itself once again in the provisions of verses 26-27. The underlying issue, as before, is the determination of intent on the part of the assailant at the time the act was committed. ...​

​

he must be avenged -- The master is criminally liable and faces execution, in keeping with the law of verse 12. Rabbinic tradition prescribes decapitation. This interpretation -- that the Hebrew stem n-k-m means the death penalty -- is supported by the early tradition behind the Samaritan version, which, in place of our received Hebrew text, actually reads here, "He must be put to death" (mot yumat).​

​

21. Should the beaten slave linger more than a day before succumbing, certain new and mitigating circumstances arise. The direct, causal relationship between the master's conduct and the slave's death is now in doubt, for there may have been some unknown intermediate cause.​

​

As for verse 12:

• He who fatally strikes a man shall be put to death.

Do I "believe in these verse"?

• I believe that a person should demonstrate a genuine effort to understand the verses.
• I believe that a person should demonstrate a genuine effort to understand the societal context.
• And, most importantly, I believe that a person should make a genuine effort to understand what he or she doest not understand.

Otherwise, "simple" rhetorical questions are effectively disingenuous.

I think you missed my point which is that God allows the beating of slaves because they are considered "property", as long as they do not die as a result of the beating. The slave owner will not be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two.
Unless you don't agree with the translated wording.