[b-hebrew] theories and standards

George Athas George.Athas at moore.edu.au
Wed May 20 00:44:51 EDT 2009


Karl,

Thanks for your thoughts. I enjoy sparring with you.

Our conception of history is different to the ancients, even though there is significant overlap (both are trying to understand the past). When we construct the past, we do not normally resort to the categories of folklore or myth. If anything, we try to get behind these. The ancients didn't have the investigative paraphernalia that we possess today to do this, and so their investigative paraphernalia were popular memory, myth, and creative imaginations. They didn't have teams of archaeologists digging up the past in a controlled dig for academic purposes. They did not have archives of daily newspapers, encyclopaedias, museums, the internet, or large popular cemeteries with headstones and detailed information. They didn't have publishing houses, a 'media', universities, and democratic governments with freedom of information. They didn't possess the scientific and technological knowledge we have today. Just think about Gen 1 - the sky is a hard dome! But it actually isn't. If the ancients could have blasted off into orbit, Gen 1 would have looked vastly different, even though the basic message might have been the same.

Put all that together, and I think it's safe to say that the ancients conducted history in a very different way to us today. Ancient documents tell us how people conceived of history, but not always about the actual history itself.

Finally, your argument about the paucity of documents from the 15th century BC is an argument from silence. Yes, you're right - there could be a whole lot of Deuteronomy-like documents from the 15th century BC that have been lost. But how would we ever possibly know? That's a claim that cannot be reasonably tested, and so is purely speculative. I wouldn't be basing much at all on it. As such, your final sentence is very apt:

"Any attempt to date Deuteronomy based on highly speculative musings that
contradict clear statements to the contrary are going to be rejected by
many."


Regards,

GEORGE ATHAS
Moore Theological College (Sydney, Australia)
www.moore.edu.au



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