Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Bryant:

On Tue, Apr 13, 2010 at 7:30 AM, Bryant J. Williams III <bjwvmw AT com-pair.net
> wrote:

> Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> Calling some one a "nobody" is out of bounds (since I also officiate high
> school
> basketball that would be a "technical foul for unportsmanlike conduct).
>
> I do think that Karl is trying to say that quoting some one who is an
> authority
> does not cut it with him. To him it is what does the text say regardless of
> what
> one's views are on the historicty of the text (if previous posts are any
> indication of this thoughts on the matter).


You hit the nail on the head here.

As a linguist, it is my duty to find out exactly what the text says,
accurately. This is irrespective of whether it is true or a lie, history or
myth, description or fable. Only by accurately understanding the text’s
claims can we accurately study the language.

If the Biblical message is accurate history, then Kitchen is a bumbling old
fool and his disciples misled (do not take this as a personal attack, rather
on his teachings), and we need to rewrite the history textbooks.

The other option is that the Bible is a book of lies, myths and fiction,
often made up long after the purported events listed in the book. This is
the 19th century German view. While I disagree with it, at least it does not
violate a careful linguistic study of the text. What it does is to study the
text accurately, decipher its message correctly, then throw the message down
as a bunch of rot and lies.

Then along comes this Jim Stinehart, someone who obviously does not know
Hebrew language, who comes out with this claim that we don’t understand the
text. The text doesn’t mean what generations of scholars have studied and
understood. In support of his contention, he uses logical fallacies, two
most prominent are the appeal to authority logical fallacy, and the argument
from silence logical fallacy. Not counting the most basic of all logical
fallacies, contradicting oneself. To date, he has yet to provide a shred of
linguistic evidence to back up his claims.

While I can respect option two above, while yet disagreeing with it, I
cannot respect this mishmash of illogic and linguistic ignorance.


>
> Rev. Bryant J. Williams III
>

Karl W. Randolph.