Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Ian Hutchesson" <mc2499 AT mclink.it>]

>>I don't believe this is a salient point. You can't date those sources
>>either. You may not have a particular reason for doubting the truthfulness
>>of these sources, but if you are doing history, you cannot assume the
>                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>truthfulness of them.
>
>That's the problem. Not everyone is "doing history".

The methodology is not particularly different if you are doing text analysis
or perhaps linguistic analysis. It involves being able to show your
foundations in the data you are using. It's about what comes out of the
data, not what you put into it.

>I do some work
>as a semi-professional photographer, but I don't assume that everyone
>with a camera is trying to take photographs for sale.

But you would probably assume that people with cameras would like to take
the best pictures they can for their own personal needs.

>It seems to me
>that history, as we understand it, wasn't the primary reason the texts
>were written. If your can find history in them, well and good, if not
>then it's no big deal.

I think there might be some problem over the use of the term history.
Hopefully the comments in my first paragraph clarifies the situation a
little.

>You might be a professional historian

I'm not.

>and beleive your work is of
>great importance. It's not a personal insult if others don't share
>your view.

You're definitely right.


Ian