Biblical Hebrew Forum

["George Athas" <gathas AT mail.usyd.edu.au>]

> [...] If you actually read all the post you seem to be responding to I did 
> give
> George some other indications for my reasoning. However, George accepts the
> status quo for some reason and I was fishing for some relevance for
> accepting that status quo by asking for some dating. You also accept the
> status quo and are liable to provide dating rather than hiding behind
> authority.

Well, Ian, we do have differing views on the dating of various biblical 
books. You're
dating most texts to the Hellenistic era, whereas I'd date most of the 
'Former Prophets'
to the Persian Era (but with a few elements perpetrated from before 586 BCE). 
That,
however, IMHO, is fairly irrelevent to the Sabbath=New Moon debate. 
Regardless of when the
texts were written, I still can't see a concrete connection between the 
Sabbath and New
Moon. I can certainly see where you're coming from and it's an interesting 
proposition.
However, it just doesn't quite reach the line. There seem to me to be bricks 
missing in
the wall. Perhaps the bricks are out there and perhaps the Sabbath was 
originally a New
Moon festival or a lunar festival of some sort. However, going from the 
texts, I don't see
the connection being quite made.

Best regards,
George Athas
 Dept of Semitic Studies,
 University of Sydney
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