Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

George:

On Tue, Feb 3, 2009 at 4:22 PM, George Athas <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>wrote:

> Come on, Karl. You might not agree with the source critics (I find myself
> disagreeing largely with them), but surely you know the arguments for source
> criticism.


Yes, I do. That's why I call it "faith" and "belief".


> The evidence is the text of the Hebrew Bible itself. Of course they use
> interpretation - you have to. You cannot say or do anything without
> interpretation.


Disagree. See below.


> Yet, even the position which disagrees with source criticism uses
> interpretation.


Agreed!

That's why I say it is equally invalid as an evidential position.


> It cannot be escaped.


Depends on what you are talking about.

If we look at the Westminster text, either it has a certain set of dots, or
it doesn't. There's no interpretation there. Either the text carries a
certain message, or it doesn't. It's a yes / no question, no maybes. The
same goes back through the DSS and LXX.

We can extend these questions to literary styles, grammar aspects,
lexicography, euphemisms and other such speech, and so forth. All of these
are based on evidence that people can point to. There's disagreement on some
of it, but ultimately either the text has certain words, or it doesn't.

On the other hand, did Moses write Exodus about 1440 BC, or did an editor
about 300 BC put the finishing touches on a composite work? Both are
interpretations built on pre-chosen ideologies / religious beliefs. Until
that is recognized, neither can convince the other of the correctness of its
position, and then all we can hope for is tolerance and understanding. To go
beyond that is proselytism.

One example, do the different words for God refer to different sources of
documents, or did even the earliest documents indicate  that the people
recognized one God, but that he had a few titles besides his name? The
answers to that question shows how the different ideologies interpret the
same data. And the different ideologies / faiths predetermine the answers to
those questions.

This is what I understand Rolf Furuli suggesting as a third way to discuss
the text.


> The interpretation argument is a straw man.
>

Straw man of what?

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

Respectively, Karl W. Randolph.