Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yitzhak Sapir <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>]

On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 6:45 AM, K Randolph wrote:

> Did I? Didn't you say not finding those bones is evidence against the
> veracity of the text?

That is exactly what I didn't say.

>> Iron smelting was not known in the ANE prior to the 12th century.
>
> I looked up online sources, and find they are all over the map. Some say
> that smelted iron was known as early as 3000 BC, and in Egypt by 1500 BC.
> Others agree with you.

Your source of Egypt is probably referring to a dagger from Tutankhamen's  
tomb.
But they describe simple wrought iron.  Not smelt iron.  If your
websites say it is
smelt iron, they are wrong.  A website can't make evidence that doesn't exist.

>> or a the material of which a yoke is made (Deut 28:48).
>
> Look at the context, is this a literal yoke, or metaphorical?

To make a metaphor, one needs something real to compare it to.  It would
make no sense to describe an iron yoke when the yokes are made of wood,
and iron is soft and brittle.

>>  Num
>> 35 is particularly interesting since it is clear, as you say, that it is
>> meant
>> for boasting, because people who had such special tools like iron, wood,
>> or rocks were too egotistical and if they used it to kill someone they must
>> be put to death, but someone who used a humble weapon made of bronze
>> could go free.
>
> What? I don't see your logic here. Or are you deliberately making a crazy
> statement for effect?

I am following your claim about boastfulness to its logical conclusion.

>> The only thing unsound is the proposition that the Pentateuch was
>> originally a unitary work.

>>  For example, what evidence do you have that
>> Deuteronomy was ever part of the same work as Gen - Num?
>
>
> What evidence do you have that it wasn't? Especially after it was listed
> that Moses (the same author) was listed as the one who wrote it and
> delivered it?

Since it appears in a separate book, all the way back to the DSS, I have
no reason to think it was part of the same book.  We see that Moses
wrote and delivered the book -- but which -- Deuteronomy or the whole
set of five books?  The book of Deuteronomy is self contained, and
always appears as a separate book.  So there is pretty reasonable
evidence that it is not part of the same work.  The question has to be,
why should we see it as part of the same unitary composition in the
first place?

Yitzhak Sapir