Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Gabe Eisenstein <gabe AT cascadeaccess.com>]

George:

If I understand what you say about the ancient concept of history, it 
seems to be about what I envisioned by calling it a mix of history with 
legend and literature. The question is, what criteria of validity did 
the audience apply? I suggested that a narrative could have been 
considered valid in virtue of expressing things about national identity, 
sociological realities, etc., rather than in terms of historical 
verifiability as we understand it.

Regarding Deuteronomy and Esarhaddon:

The point isn't just that there is some vague similarity but that a 
number of aspects of the former text that are mysterious unto themselves 
are explained by the latter, including the ordering of the curses and 
the meaning of obscure terms.
Furthermore, there is no evidence for the idea that these specific 
curses were around for a thousand years, or indeed that they represent 
formulas at all, apart from the ordering of the associated deities. It's 
entirely possible that they are unique creations, and therefore most 
logical to assume that one text influenced the other or were both 
influenced by a common source.

If Copenhagen boys have something illuminating to say about this I'd 
like to hear it.

Karl:

I guess I still haven't understood how biologists studying evolution 
could maintain that science can't investigate the past. I said that 
biology, geology, etc. deal with past events and you called it a 
self-contradiction. How so?
You give the example of the sun going backwards. What about other 
non-repeatable events like the formation of the solar system or  the 
creation of the Rocky Mountains? Scientists give accounts of these 
events using causal mechanisms that can also be observed at work 
elsewhere; but there is no repeatability because the events take 
millions of years to unfold.
Generally speaking, a complete causal account of what is observed 
includes an account of how it got that way. Is that illogical to you?

You suggest that there is another, nonscientific, way of investigating 
the past by "different rules". I'm sure I don't understand this, but it 
must allow you to come up with stuff like Adam and Noah writing parts of 
Genesis. I'll stick with one set of rules for investigating both present 
observables and their causal histories.


Gabe Eisenstein