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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Exodus Miracles and 'elep

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
  • To: "Kevin P. Edgecomb" <kevino AT bombaxo.com>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Exodus Miracles and 'elep
  • Date: Tue, 03 Aug 2004 21:10:37 +0100

On 03/08/2004 20:57, Kevin P. Edgecomb wrote:

I'd like to suggest another possibility for explaining the range of impossibly large
numbers not only in the Exodus and Numbers texts, but throughout the Hebrew Bible. I
think it more likely that late in the Persian period or early in the Hellenistic
period, and editor or editors consistently altered the numbers included in the
historical texts by factors of either 10 or 100. The idea was suggested by what appear
to be a few "misses" and by the similarly motivated alteration of numbers in
earlier Assyrian texts as described in Marco De Odorico's _The Use of Numbers and
Quantifications in the Assyrian Royal Inscriptions_ (Helsinki: Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus
Project, 1995). I've put my notes on this idea online here:

http://www.bombaxo.com/numbmult.html


Kevin wrote there:

Another option is that it suggests that the Multiplier, without understanding of the factors of population and econcomic growth in the region, could not believe the smaller, original numbers to be correct, and set about to remedy the perceived errors.


Another option is that it suggests that Kevin Edgecomb, without understanding of the factors of population and econcomic growth in the region, could not believe the larger numbers in the surviving text to be correct, and set about to remedy the perceived errors.

For why do we assume that we know better than the ancients how large the population was at any particular time? The actual archaeological evidence is rather sparse. And populations can rise and fall very quickly in some circumstances, without necessarily leaving much trace 3000 or so years later.

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/






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