[b-hebrew] Joshua 15: 52-59: Hill Country Cities?

K Randolph kwrandolph at gmail.com
Sat Jan 3 16:45:01 EST 2009


Jim:

The text that has come down to us has a certain unity that can either be
accepted as written, or called distorted legends written far later. That is
the literary and linguistic framework within which we as a group operate.

You keep referring to the "well documented secular history" as defence of
your theories. That is a statement that shows ignorance, not knowledge. That
is championing dates whose most famous supporter is Prof. Kitchen. But as he
enters his dotage and his disciples circle the walls to preserve his legacy,
those dates and that view of history is crumbling because it has been shown
to have more holes than a slice of Swiss cheese, some of which were known
even before Prof. Kitchen finished grad school. One of the leaders of that
assault is David Rohl, a trained Egyptologist and scholar in his own right,
and there are many others even within the scholarly world who are joining
him. Bottom line, you can't use "secular history" as a defence.

I personally am not a professional historian, so I just sit on the sidelines
merely watching the various scenarios as they develop. All I want to
emphasize here is that your calls for "secular history" to back you up ring
hollow in view of the great disarray that exists among historians.

On Sat, Jan 3, 2009 at 8:49 AM, <JimStinehart at aol.com> wrote:

>
> Karl:
>    1.  You  wrote:  "[V]erses 48 – 60 [of  Joshua] make up a complete
> section. There is no indication in the text that any of the sites listed are
> anywhere other than in the hill country, which would be needed for your
>  theory to stand on linguistic and literary grounds.  … Then you agree that
> it is wrong to insist  that Rubutu in the Thutmosis list must be the same as
> Rabbah in the Joshua  list. The same with the other names."
> This is an important issue for us to discuss.  As I read Joshua 16: 5-10
> and 19: 40-48, neither Rubutu in the south-central Aijalon Valley, nor any
> town in the  southeast quadrant of the Aijalon Valley, is portrayed in
> Joshua as being  assigned to Ephraim or Dan.  It  makes all the logical
> sense in the world for Joshua to portray Rubutu and the  towns in the
> southeast quadrant of the Aijalon Valley as being assigned to  Judah.  That
> part of the Aijalon  Valley area is next to the hill country south of
> Jerusalem, and is fairly close  to the city of Hebron.  Thus it  makes
> perfect sense for Joshua 15: 48-60 to assign both the hill country south  of
> Jerusalem, and the southeast quadrant of the Aijalon Valley as far west as
>  the major city of Rubutu, to Judah.  Only the cities at Joshua 15: 48-51
> are explicitly stated to be in hill  country. The towns at Joshua 15:  52-60
> logically are located both in the hill country south of Jerusalem, and in
>  the southeast quadrant of the Aijalon Valley as far west as Rubutu.  I
> myself see "Arab" at Joshua 15: 52 as  being historical Rubutu.  Magaroth,
>  Halhul and Jokdeam are small towns in the southeast quadrant of the Aijalon
>  Valley, as we know from items #100 - #106 on the Thutmosis III list from
> the  mid-15th century BCE.
>

Now you move Thutmosis III from the 14th to the 15th century BC. According
to those who are re-examining the data, that is going the wrong way. It is
probably more accurate to put him in the 10th to 9th centuries BC. As such,
his list refelcts an Iron Age reality, making your theory hardly
distinguishable from other "mainstream" reconstructions, that the text that
has come down to us records distorted legends that may have a kernel of
truth.


> On  the traditional view, either (a) Joshua "forgot"...


In view that you think that the Exodus and invasion didn't occure, your
reference to Joshua as a credible source is illogical.


>    1.  As to the rest of your post, let me try to explain my  view of the
> Bible in a slightly different way.  I plead "guilty" as charged to your
>  claim that I basically follow mainstream scholars as to my view of whether
> the Hebrews were in bondage in Egypt for 400 years, whether there was an
> Exodus as described in the Book of Exodus, and whether there was a Conquest
> as described in Joshua.  My views on those  subjects are totally
> un-original, and simply follow mainstream modern secular  scholarship.
>  Perhaps what has  irritated you all this time is your perception that I was
> trying to "dodge"  that tag.


On the contrary, I have no problem with "mainstream" scholars. I just
disagree with them. At least they are intellectually honest.

What bothers me is your willful and continuous violation of literary and
linguistic analysis of the text, of your reliance on untrustworthy
extra-Biblical sources as being relevant to a study of the language of
Biblical Hebrew, and most of all on your intellectual dishonesty of saying
that the text doesn't mean what it clearly says. If you knew anything about
Biblical Hebrew and could show from within the language that what we thought
was there really isn't, then you would earn a right to be heard. But you
have admitted ignorance on that subject....

...

> Why don't we just agree to disagree as  to the historical time period of
> the Patriarchal Age?


I have no problem with that. I do that all the time with "mainstream"
scholars like Yigal Levin.


>  My view of that may be wrong, but it is  not illogical, much less is it
> "nonsense".
>

First of all, history is a subject that has been deemed off limits for this
group. That you keep bringing it up shows disdain for this group.

Secondly, as I said at the outset of this posting, the text as it has come
down to us has a certain story according to its literary and linguistic
analysis. Some people accept it as accurate history. The "mainstream"
scholars counter that that story is "legend" or "myth" that might have a
kernel of truth. But the "mainstream" scholars don't make the illogical
claim that the text is accurate yet says something other than what it
clearly says, which is nonsense.


> Jim Stinehart
> Evanston, Illinois
>

Karl W. Randolph.

Ps. for a revolutionary view of ancient history, look at
http://www.specialtyinterests.net I don't know if they are right or not.


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