Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Read, James C" <K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk>]

Peter wrote:
>>> And what do Cyrus and Nebuchadnezzer do to prove the Bible's account 
>>> of Israel's history? ...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> They are part of the Bible's account of Israel's history. They are 
>> themselves something in the Hebrew Bible. And this confirmation of 
>> the general accuracy of part of this history tends to suggest the 
>> reliability of more of it.
>
>
>
> No they are not.  They are proof only that the biblical authors knew 
> their names.  That's all.  Nothing more.
>
No. The biblical authors say a lot more about these kings, and several 
other archaeologically attested Assyrian, Babylonian and Persian kings, 
not to mention the Moabite Mesha` and various others, than just their 
names. In the Bible there is quite a lot of archaeologically confirmed 
information about their territories, their careers, their military 
campaigns etc etc.
END QUOTE

I should expect that now he will answer something like 'This only proves 
that they knew their names and certain details about their territories,
their careers...'.

It appears that they want external evidence for every single word of every
book just because it now belongs in the canon and this seems to make them 
distrust it as a reliable source.
If only other historical sources were so complete and so honest about the 
failings of their kings. 

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