|
Source: (consider it)
|
Thread: Did Moses exist and does it matter?
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
I was struck by Mudfrog's comment on the thread about the Simon Schama series on the history of Jewry that it had the same-old, same-old academics on insisting that Moses didn't actually exist.
His comment made me chuckle and I remembered our suspicion in a Baptist church back in the South Wales Valleys during an interregnum when a visiting preacher made the off-hand comment, 'If Moses hadn't have existed it would have been necessary to invent him ...'
We were horrified. It probably hadn't occurred to most of us that there was any doubt about the issue. I was aware of liberal theology but that was something that happened somewhere else.
30 years later, I find myself wondering what difference it actually makes whether Moses was an historical figure or a 'mythical' one in the C S Lewis sense ...
I mean, if it is perfectly possible to be a Christian and not sign up for Young Earth Creationism - and I certainly don't - then why should it be so outrageous to suggest that some of the OT characters may combine mythic and 'historical' aspects - or even be completely mythic.
How does that alter or undermine anything?
I s'pose I'm not interested here in discussing the old canard that because Jesus refers to these people as if they were 'real' then they must have been - the idea of 'kenosis' enables us to handle that one adequately, it seems to me.
Neither am I suggesting that it is completely outside the realms of possibility that Moses was an historic figure in the accepted contemporary sense.
I'm easy either way.
I don't have any problem accepting that the Patriarchs, for instance, were actual people but with 'mythic' elements in the stories about them - nor Job, or Jonah, Noah or anyone else in the OT for that matter.
But I find myself wondering why it would be necessary to INSIST on the absolute historicity of the Exodus account or an a Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch ... with Joshua conveniently writing the coda at the end in order to sidestep the issue of how Moses could have written about his own death ...
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
I mean, what do we lose exactly? What unravels and falls apart other than an overly literal viewpoint in the first place?
In what way does it or doesn't it affect our salvation and the way we conduct ourselves in the workaday world?
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ahleal V
Shipmate
# 8404
|
Posted
Well, the non-existence of Moses does make exposition of the Transfiguration a little tricky...
x
AV
Posts: 499 | From: English Spires | Registered: Aug 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
|
Posted
If we can handle the mythic value of Genesis, or the uncertainty about Abraham (let alone the rather childlike boasting about "our Methuselah is older than any of your old guys, so boo!Yeah!)then I'm sure the mythic value of Moses will carry us along.
There does seem to be a certain vagueness about who actually went across the Red Sea, given the lack of any Egyptian mention of the disaster of the killing of Pharaoh and his army, or of the loss of all the first-borns.
But, whatever floats your boat...oh, that was Noah, wasn't it?
--------------------
It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Indeed Ahleal V - unless one takes the story of the Transfiguration in more 'mythic' terms too, of course.
But that causes just as many problems as it resolves.
Ever wondered how the disciples knew that they were apparently seeing Moses and Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration? Was it obvious from the conversations?
These things are profound mysteries, of course, and I can live with that and with the ambiguity.
Just as I can live with the possibility that Moses was an actual bloke and with the possibility that it's all part of an elaborate foundation myth developed by the Hebrew people ...
Either view seems to 'fit' to me.
I s'pose what I'm angling at is what, if anything, do we actually lose if we regard it as the latter - ie. mythic - rather than in 'physical' historical terms?
Ultimately, it's all a question of faith and although I don't doubt that there is an historical background out of which these stories emerged, do we have to believe that they happened in the way they are recounted?
I'll hold up my hand - it's work in progress. I can live with a certain level of agnosticism on this one. But you're right, Ahleal V, the Transfiguration is an intriguing one in the light of this. And indeed in many ways besides ...
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
I mean, what do we lose exactly? What unravels and falls apart other than an overly literal viewpoint in the first place?
In what way does it or doesn't it affect our salvation and the way we conduct ourselves in the workaday world?
There is the small problem of whether what we believe is actually objectively true. If some Christians are happy to regard salvation is just a nice bit of subjective comfort as we all head towards everlasting oblivion, then fine. If we are all actually just "atheists in denial" and the Christian life is really nothing more than spiritual masturbation, then of course we can live with a Bible that makes truth claims that are actually not true. And we can live with a grotesquely deceived Saviour (who himself could be a myth, if Moses is a myth), none of whose words we can actually trust.
I prefer to take the 'literal' approach. If that is regarded as unsophisticated and naive, then so be it. Given that I have never seen any evidence to support the mythology claims, then I guess I'll just have to go with my 'delusion', until such time as compelling evidence is presented.
"Everyone to their own" or "YMMV", I suppose...
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Bostonman
Shipmate
# 17108
|
Posted
The most plausible idea to me would be a later, non-Mosaic authorship of the Torah, which added certain elements of the narrative (e.g., the parting of the sea) onto a real, historical, political figure with some sort of Egyptian origins named Moses who played a major role in uniting the Hebrew tribes.
EE, evidence for mythology claims is extremely hard to come by in any case, because it tends to rely on an argument from absence, which by no means logically implies presence. What I mean by that is that the argument "Historically and archaeologically, we have reconstructed the history of Egypt very well, and at no point is there evidence of any mass exodus of slaves or of Pharaoh and his army being drowned in the Red Sea." Now that argument can always be invalidated by a single piece of very strong evidence; the strength of its claim rests on the decreasing probability of there being such a piece of evidence as our knowledge of ancient Egypt increases. So of course we won't find evidence that it IS a myth (a single Egyptian inscription telling us there's no such man as Moses? What would that evidence even look like?) but a continuing absence of evidence suggests it isn't a fact, or at least that it wasn't a fact that anyone found particularly significant at the time (such as the existence of Jesus!)
And so we soldier on in faith. Living within a faith whose scriptures and traditions hold that Moses lived, I'm very comfortable accepting that claim as true.
Posts: 424 | From: USA | Registered: May 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Something doesn't have to be objectively true to be true, EE ... as you well recognise. Or at least, I assume you do.
To say that something is mythic doesn't mean that it isn't true.
So your 'small problem' is only a problem if you insist on the story of Moses, say, as necessarily having to be objectively and historically true in every respect.
So I don't see how accepting some elements of the scriptures as having mythic status in any way undermines its truth.
Why should it?
Is Shakespeare's King Lear or Hamlet any less true to human experience if the incidents represented in the plays didn't actually happen?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the Exodus didn't take place. All I'm asking is whether it would make any substantial difference in salvific terms if it didn't. Because the 'theological' truth of it would still apply even if the historicity were in question.
The same applies to the creation stories in Genesis.
Ok, I could then be accused of a pick-and-mix approach where I might be saying:
'Hmmm ... Genesis creation account = myth, Noah's flood = myth, the Exodus = Hebrew foundation myth ... the New Testament and the Gospel accounts = objectively true ...'
Or some combination along those lines.
As it happens, yes, I do believe in the Gospel accounts and in the Resurrection and so on ... but I'm open to the possibility that some of these stories may have 'mythic' or allegorical properties too - such as the story of the Gadarene swine for instance ... or the story in Acts of Herod being struck by an angel etc ...
None of this implies that the Christian life is nothing more than 'spiritual masturbation' of course. Why should it?
Nor does it mean that salvation should be regarded as simply a nice bit of subjective comfort.
How does that follow?
Nor do I see how it means that anyone who doesn't take what you would regard as an 'objectively literal' approach is somehow an atheist in denial.
How do any of the issues I've postulated here imply that the Bible makes 'truth claims that are actually not true'?
It only necessitates that, it seems to me, if one lacks the imagination to see the whole thing in broader terms.
Of course, I'm aware of the danger that if we regard Moses as mythic then we could take the same kind of approach to Christ. But again, how does that necessarily follow? One being mythic - in the terms I'm thinking of here - doesn't necessarily mean that the other is.
Ultimately, it's a faith thing - and yes, faith is based on substance. There are good, substantial claims that we can trust. But if we are looking for hard and fast objective evidence for Moses and the Exodus in historical terms then so far there's been none forthcoming.
That isn't to say that evidence couldn't emerge in the future. Of course it could. Which is why I've couched my post in more 'open' terms.
What I'm not doing is closing my mind.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
|
Posted
The question would depend on how much of the story was true and how much of it you'd need to be true to say Moses existed. Making up an example off the top of my head, if Pharoah Rameses II settled a group of freed Hebrew slaves in Israel at some period and the story developed - it wasn't the Pharoah, it was his son and his name was just Meses, and he came with us, and he wasn't even really an Egyptian he was just adopted - would that count as Moses existing?
It seems unlikely that the story was entirely made up: but what the core of historical truth was behind it is probably irrecoverable.
--------------------
we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
Posts: 10567 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
Of course, I'm aware of the danger that if we regard Moses as mythic then we could take the same kind of approach to Christ. But again, how does that necessarily follow? One being mythic - in the terms I'm thinking of here - doesn't necessarily mean that the other is.
You are mixing up logical arguments here. It certainly does follow that if we regard one historical figure in this way then we could take the same approach to another historical figure (especially given that the existence of both are affirmed by the same body of ancient writings). But you are suggesting that that does not follow by arguing on a completely different basis, namely, that the belief that one is mythic does not necessarily mean the other is.
The words "could" and "necessarily" are not equivalents in modal logic.
If Moses did not exist, it does not follow that Jesus did not exist.
But if we believe that Moses did not exist, despite the Bible giving the opposite impression, then we could argue the same for Jesus.
Presumably you can see the difference?
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
PaulBC
Shipmate
# 13712
|
Posted
For the record I am not an biblical literalist. But I would have problems reading scripture if everything gets made "mythic" . Otherwise
we can pick & choose what we believe , or not . And I believe that items such as the 10 commandments have to be accepted as hard & fast facts . Now how we live our lives under those facts that is working out our own salvation. As for the people of the O.T. they existed .
--------------------
"He has told you O mortal,what is good;and what does the Lord require of youbut to do justice and to love kindness ,and to walk humbly with your God."Micah 6:8
Posts: 873 | From: Victoria B.C. Canada | Registered: May 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Trickydicky
Shipmate
# 16550
|
Posted
PaulBC: quote:
But I would have problems reading scripture if everything gets made "mythic" . Otherwise we can pick & choose what we believe , or not
You're right. Picking and choosing is utterly subjective. But scholarship isn't.
--------------------
If something's worth doing, its worth doing badly. (G K Chesterton)
Posts: 57 | From: Greater Manchester | Registered: Jul 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Yes, I can see the difference and the point you are making. Of course we could, if we wished, argue that if Moses were mythic then Christ could be mythical too. But that's not what I am arguing.
Nor do I see Christ's historicity being dependent on the historicity or otherwise of Moses - except insofar as Christ was operating in the context of a paradigm that derived from those original Hebrew 'foundation myths' (for want of a better term) and stories. The figure of Christ certainly doesn't make a great deal of sense outside of the context of the Pentateuch and all that flows from that.
We could argue as you have suggested but I'm not - because I don't quite see it that way. If that means that you believe I'm flouting modal logic then so be it. But I don't see how that follows either.
It'd be like saying that because tales of Robin Hood were circulating in medieval times and that Geoffrey of Monmouth's Histories are clearly mythical, then it somehow follows that we can't trust Froissart's Chronicles or Adam of Usk or any other medieval commentator on historical or contemporary events. It doesn't work that neatly.
Can you see the pattern, though, that I am attempting to establish or recommend - that just because something may not be objectively true in historical terms it does mean that it cannot be spiritually true, theologically true or true to human experience etc?
I'm not postulating oppositional ideas here ie. that if you believe that Moses was a genuine historical figure it necessarily means that you are deluded.
I would not make that accusation.
Why not?
Because for all I know, Moses was an actual historical figure and therefore you are correct.
But the point is we can't know for sure as there isn't sufficient historical evidence either for his existence or non-existence.
So, as has been said upthread, if we adhere to a belief system - such as the Judeo-Christian tradition - whose scriptures assert his historicity then it's perfectly reasonable to accept that - with certain caveats perhaps.
I'm more than willing to accept the historicity of Moses. Just as I am willing to accept that aspects of the story have a mythic quality. As my mantra increasingly becomes on these boards, both/and not either/or.
So yes, I can see that it can follow that if we regard one Biblical or historical figure this way then we could take the same approach to another - and especially as the existence of both is affirmed by the same body of ancient writings (accepting that the OT and NT do 'belong' together of course, which thee and me would both do).
I can't see where I suggested otherwise.
But there is a subtle difference between accepting that possibility and making a dogma out of it.
I'm not setting it out in tablets of stone that Moses was or wasn't historical.
I'm open to the possibility that he was and open to the possibility that he wasn't.
What I'm interested in exploring is whether it makes any real difference either way and if so, how.
On the issue of the historicity of Moses it seems to me that there are various possibilities all ways round.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
|
Posted
No, it doesn't matter if the accounts were literally true. It's the story and what we learn from it that matters.
This is true of the gospels too.
We are too far away from them to ever know whether events actually happened as written, however scholarly we are.
But it's how we live now that matters, in my not at all humble opinion.
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Scholarship shifts and can be subjective too.
Under current scholarly thought there's no evidence for the Exodus outside of the OT. That doesn't mean that it didn't happen, of course. But nor does it mean that the Bible isn't true if it contains mythical and allegorical events as well as objectively historical ones.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
|
Posted
Scholars can do what they like, of course. For me, the question is what impact their work has on the faith community.
In a secular society can the life of the religious community be sustained if almost everything is explained as mythology? It might work in cultures where myth is valued, but the Western world doesn't easily nurture such cultures. Church authority and authenticity seem to be undermined when the churches admit that their teachings are based on myths. We may wish this weren't so but it's what seems to happen. The churches best able to tolerate the process of 'mythologisation' are perhaps those that build up a powerful cultural presence and heritage rather than relying on theological 'truth' to keep people interested. The CofE is the obvious example.
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Trickydicky
Picking and choosing is utterly subjective. But scholarship isn't.
Yet isn't it interesting how experts disagree on how we should define 'evidence', interpret it and how we should assess the validity of our presuppositions?
For example, some scholars act as though absence of evidence is evidence of absence. Others disagree, either as a point of principle, or by arguing that, in the general framework of the body of evidence for a particular subject, an event, though lacking in supporting evidence, is plausible (especially if it is accepted that the process of the discovery of relevant evidence is by no means complete, as in the case of Near Eastern archaeology).
So the general, unqualified appeal to 'scholarship' does really mean a lot.
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Well, yes, SvitlanaV2 ... although from how it appears to me from visiting Orthodox discussion boards, in Greece, the Balkans and elsewhere you have an established Church which accepts a certain amount of 'mythological' overlay but a peasant-based laity on the ground which seems to lap up stories of bees respecting icons or self-generating religious imagery and so on.
Conversely, in the West we see attempts - such as the largely US-led Creation Science stuff - to find hard and fast apparent scientific evidence for a young earth and so on.
So there are tensions all ways round.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
the existence of both are affirmed by the same body of ancient writings
I'm not sure that I'd accept the Pentateuch and the Gospels as being part of 'the same body of ancient writings', given that one was written some centuries before the other.
(Well, I mean obviously they are all part of the Bible. But the books of the Bible weren't compiled on the basis of a common purpose, period, cultural context or genre.)
[ 08. September 2013, 15:46: Message edited by: Ricardus ]
--------------------
Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
Posts: 7247 | From: Liverpool, UK | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
The element of human psychology cannot be ignored in this discussion. Those who make the claim that the exodus from Egypt was a myth need to ask why the writers of the biblical accounts felt the need to refer to an event, which they knew to be a fantasy. Or perhaps one could argue that they themselves were deceived into thinking it was true. That latter point may be fine for an atheist (although if he is consistent he must assume that all ancient writers were deluded), but anyone who claims to be a Christian must ask himself why God would perpetuate what he must have known was a flagrant lie. What does this say about the nature of God? After all, if God can lie about the exodus, then he could be lying about salvation!
Throughout the OT, God appeals to the exodus to urge his people to repent of their evil. There are frankly so many references to this, that it is difficult to know where to start, but here are a few examples (from 1 Samuel 8:7-8; Jeremiah 31:31-32, Amos 2:10 respectively) :
quote:
And the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day—with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also.
...
“Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord.
...
Also it was I who brought you up from the land of Egypt, and led you forty years through the wilderness, to possess the land of the Amorite.
It is recorded that this event was the main act of deliverance to which God appealed in seeking to admonish his people. Just what sort of perverted set of books is the Bible, that it presents a God who flagrantly lies to his people in order to command them to live righteous and upright lives? If the event of the exodus from Egypt never actually happened then the Bible is worse than useless, and certainly there is no salvation on offer within its pages, because who in their right mind would want to be saved by a serial liar?
So yes, the historicity of the exodus does matter. The entirety of God's plan of salvation cannot be explained without reference to it.
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
|
Posted
Gamaliel
What are the tensions in the Orthodox Church or the Creation Science arena? Are Orthodox clergy and laity at odds with each other, or do they accept that each has a different way of believing? Do the creation scientists come from denominations that normally accept evolution (in the CofE they do, but elsewhere?)?
[ 08. September 2013, 15:49: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
Those who make the claim that the exodus from Egypt was a myth need to ask why the writers of the biblical accounts felt the need to refer to an event, which they knew to be a fantasy. Or perhaps one could argue that they themselves were deceived into thinking it was true.
Was Homer deluded, or a liar?
--------------------
Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
Posts: 7247 | From: Liverpool, UK | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Schroedinger's cat
Ship's cool cat
# 64
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
No, it doesn't matter if the accounts were literally true. It's the story and what we learn from it that matters.
I don't think I can quite accept this. I think a lot of the early OT material classifies as "mythical" in the true sense, of stories that are built on truth and reality, but actually represent the interpretations of truth by the writers, and the writings that exist are to help us learn from the true events that happened. But it is important that the core of the stories is true, even though the events may not have occurred as we read them.
What is important is that the biblical writers all treated Moses as if he existed (all those written after he lived). I think we need to acknowledge and deal with the stories as if he existed too, otherwise we are reading the material with a different perspective from the writers. So we have to deal as if Moses was a real character, because that is how all of the biblical writers dealt as if he was a real character.
However, it is also important that we accept this may not be accurate. That is, if Moses didn't exist, how would that affect the bible as we read it (and our faith as we live it)? I don't think it would, because his physical existence is actually not a necessity to the stories. This is different from Jesus, because Jesus actual existence is critical - he is God incarnate, and so if he was not incarnate, this is meaningless. Moses was not the incarnation of God, so if he is a concept and didn't really exist, that would not impact the writing and theology we have.
--------------------
Blog
Music for your enjoyment
Lord may all my hard times be healing times
take out this broken heart and renew my mind.
Posts: 18859 | From: At the bottom of a deep dark well. | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
|
Posted
Svitlana - could popular history count as myth, if its historicity is dubious?
--------------------
Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus
Was Homer deluded, or a liar?
I would certainly regard him as one or the other, if he were presenting a scheme of salvation dependent on a God, who is affirmed to be both real and utterly righteous, but who appeals to an imaginary event as if it were true.
(In other words, your question is irrelevant in the context of this discussion).
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
[QUOTE]
(In other words, your question is irrelevant in the context of this discussion).
No, it isn't. I'm asking you if you see the value of myth, given that every ancient culture seems to have indulged in it.
If myth is valuable, then the Pentateuch is valuable for that reason, which I shall call reason V.
As for the prophets referring to the exodus, if it's legitimate for the writer of the Pentateuch to refer to it for reason V, then as far as I can see it's also legitimate for the prophets to refer to it for reason V.
--------------------
Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
Posts: 7247 | From: Liverpool, UK | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
@SvitlanaV2 - I could supply links if you like but it would be a tangent or else material for another thread - but suffice to say for now that the Orthodox don't 'require' a belief in Young Earth Creation or an anti-evolution stance.
That said, the authorities do seem concerned that populist US Protestant material on these subjects are catching on in Russia and elsewhere.
As ever, they are suspicious of anything with a 'Western' import tag ...
From my own real-life contacts with the Orthodox, it strikes me that some take a line on these things which is similar to that of some Protestant fundamentalists and others don't.
Pretty similar, really, to what you find in Western churches only with some extra spice.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus
No, it isn't. I'm asking you if you see the value of myth, given that every ancient culture seems to have indulged in it.
If myth is valuable, then the Pentateuch is valuable for that reason, which I shall call reason V.
As for the prophets referring to the exodus, if it's legitimate for the writer of the Pentateuch to refer to it for reason V, then as far as I can see it's also legitimate for the prophets to refer to it for reason V.
Yet again you've missed the point.
Could you please explain why God would refer to an imaginary event as if it were true? And why would God command his people to repent of their evil (which includes "bearing false witness") by means of a lie?
Of course, if you don't believe in God, then I suppose you can concoct any explanation you like for this*, but then we would be talking at cross purposes. The point of this discussion concerns whether belief in the historicity of Moses - and the events of his life - are necessary or important for our spiritual lives.
* Although even an atheistic interpretation makes the Israelites look bloody stupid, considering that they spiritually beat themselves up in relation to a (projected) God who appeals to their gratitude for his wonderful work in pretending to deliver them from an imaginary period of slavery! And if the Israelites were really so utterly moronic, then where does that leave all the other inhabitants of the Ancient World?
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
EE, you appear to be under the impression that the author/s of the Pentateuch and the Gospel writers and those who wrote the Epistles and so on all had the same purpose and that there is a single 'mind' and intention at work throughout the scriptures.
Well, so would I in the sense that I believe that God the Holy Spirit was working in and through the writing and the collation and editing and so on ... but not in a 'dictation' type way of course.
You also clearly do not understand how 'myth' works and seem to regard it in the same way as contemporary fiction.
Ancient histography works in a very different way to ours. Tacitus, for instance, has no qualms about ventriloquising what he thinks the Pictish leader might have said on the eve of his battle with the Romans - nor for putting words in Caractacus's mouth.
That's not to say that Caradoc/Caractacus didn't exist nor that the Battle of Mons Graupius didn't take place between the Caledonian tribes and the Romans. Of course they did. But no-one was there to take a transcript of what was actually said beforehand.
Whoever wrote down the stories we now have as the Pentateuch would have not had the same view of 'fact' and 'fantasy' as we do. Besides, they were probably writing down strands of oral tradition and collating elements from various sources. Whether they took these literally or not is difficult to say. Nor, would I submit, is it that important.
I've recently returned from Florence and was struck by the various depictions of Hell on church frescoes and so on. I was reading Dante's Inferno while I was there. It struck me how much humour there was in it all - as well as horror - demons farting and so on - all good, knock about medieval stuff.
Now, are you suggesting that Dante was deluded or lying or trying to con us because he has his demons farting? Do demons fart?
No, the point isn't whether demons have that capacity or not - the point is that he was imagining a scene of chaos where the divine order breaks down.
It was clear to me by the end of the Inferno that Dante was using allegorical language to present a vision of Hell as a state of non-being, if you like - a place of anti-good, of anti-matter to some extent - that evil has no substantial existence in and of itself but only a parasitical one on the absence and opposite of good.
It's not human psychology that's the issue here, so much as the theological intentions of the writers. They weren't writing history or reportage in the modern sense.
Obviously, when we get to the Gospels (rather than the Pentateuch) things are different as we are dealing with accounts of events that the writers were involved with. But even there they have 'designs' upon us - 'these things were written so that you might believe'.
Fine, I don't have an issue with that. Nothing that is written is purely objective. It all has an 'angle'.
We're not talking about anyone being 'deceived' into accepting things - that's not what all this is about.
I submit that you are applying a very 'modernist' and anachronistic approach to these ancient writings and thereby missing the point to a certain extent on the historicity aspect. The scriptural writings were not intended as reportage in the modern sense.
And once again, because something might be mythical it doesn't make it untrue.
Of course God isn't a liar and of course God isn't lying about salvation. For reasons best known to himself, the Almighty has chosen to put these things forward in narrative form - he tells us a story. Christ - God incarnate - did the same in his parables. God tells stories. He knows what we are like - he formed us after all - and knows that stories and poetry, allegory and song are the ways to engage us.
Of course the story of the Exodus is referred to by the prophets and so on all the way down to Christ - how could it be otherwise?
The whole thing serves as an immense parable or picture of salvation and deliverance - the people are taken from slavery into freedom, they pass through trials and testing ... they are transferred from one condition or domain into another.
That's what makes the story so rich and so resonant.
So yes, you are right that the 'entirety of God's plan of salvation cannot be explained without reference to it' but does that mean that it requires the story to have the kind of historicity one might apply to the Holocaust, say, or to the Norman invasion or WW1 or whatever else?
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
Of course God isn't a liar and of course God isn't lying about salvation. For reasons best known to himself, the Almighty has chosen to put these things forward in narrative form - he tells us a story. Christ - God incarnate - did the same in his parables. God tells stories. He knows what we are like - he formed us after all - and knows that stories and poetry, allegory and song are the ways to engage us.
Of course the story of the Exodus is referred to by the prophets and so on all the way down to Christ - how could it be otherwise?
The whole thing serves as an immense parable or picture of salvation and deliverance - the people are taken from slavery into freedom, they pass through trials and testing ... they are transferred from one condition or domain into another.
That's what makes the story so rich and so
resonant.
So when God categorically and repeatedly says that He led His people out of Egypt and through the desert for forty years, He knew that it never actually happened? This is absurd and makes a mockery of the entire witness of the Old Testament - and the New Testament in fact, because the NT affirms the importance of "The Holy Scriptures" (obviously for them the series of books we now call the Old Testament).
To suggest that this was just a parable is stretching credulity to the limit. It was abundantly clear to Jesus' hearers when He spoke in parables, as they asked him why He did so. But there is no suggestion at all that the events of Moses' life were merely parables or 'myths'.
Perhaps all the events of Jesus' life were parables? His birth perhaps? His passion? The resurrection?
If you then come back to me and say "no! These were not parables", then I could simply tell you that you don't understand and appreciate the literary forms of the Ancient World. You don't understand that the "richness and resonance" of the events of Jesus' life and their meaning for us today require them to be a pack of lies. What is good for the goose is good for the gander, don't you think?
Furthermore, you take an extremely bipolar view of the exodus. You seem to give the impression that it has to be either one thing or the other: either boring prosaic history or exciting meaningful myth. What ever happened to both ... and?
The claim that an idea can only be rich and meaningful (or 'resonant') if it is a product of someone's imagination, and therefore not objectively true, is weird, to put it mildly. Do you really find reality so grim, Gamaliel?
[ 08. September 2013, 17:03: Message edited by: EtymologicalEvangelical ]
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Church authority and authenticity seem to be undermined when the churches admit that their teachings are based on myths.
But Church authority can also be undermined when the Church insists on the literal truth of things that most people think are nonsense. Do you really think a church that states publicly that Adam and Eve existed, with Eve being formed out of Adam's rib, will be taken more seriously than one that admits that the first two chapters of Genesis contain two different creation myths?
--------------------
"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged
|
|
Dave W.
Shipmate
# 8765
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
* Although even an atheistic interpretation makes the Israelites look bloody stupid, considering that they spiritually beat themselves up in relation to a (projected) God who appeals to their gratitude for his wonderful work in pretending to deliver them from an imaginary period of slavery! And if the Israelites were really so utterly moronic, then where does that leave all the other inhabitants of the Ancient World?
It seems to me your position also assumes that all the other inhabitants of the Ancient World were "morons" for believing in and sacrificing to "projected" gods. On this point, the only difference between your position and that of an atheist is that you think the Israelites were uniquely not deluded in their faith; the atheist doesn't need a special explanation for why the Israelites were different.
Posts: 2059 | From: the hub of the solar system | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
moonlitdoor
Shipmate
# 11707
|
Posted
I wish I had a better knowledge of the ancient classical world to go on but I am inclined think Gamaliel is the modernist here rather than Etymological Evangelical, because the idea that the ancients didn't have a strong distinction between things considered true in a factual sense and things considered true in a mythical sense seems to me to have been invented in the 19th and 20th century by people for whom it was inconvenient to have to believe the same things the ancients believed.
--------------------
We've evolved to being strange monkeys, but in the next life he'll help us be something more worthwhile - Gwai
Posts: 2210 | From: london | Registered: Aug 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Come, come, EE, if anyone is bipolar around here is certainly isn't Gamaliel. I'll stop there before a Host intervenes.
Read what I've written.
I've not categorically stated that the Exodus didn't happen and that Moses didn't exist. I've simply said that I am open to the possibility of the story having mythic properties. I really don't see what is so contentious about that.
Most people accept that the Creation account contains mythic elements and isn't a daily six-day blow-by-blow account of what happened on any one particular 'day'. I thought we'd all moved beyond that.
Why should it be so extraordinary to take a similar approach to Exodus - with the caveat and proviso that there may well be historical events behind the stories themselves.
Other posters here have suggested as much.
How does that make a mockery of the entire witness of the OT?
I won't start a tangent on which scriptures were believed to constitute the canon when the NT was written - because there wasn't a clearly defined OT canon at that stage - as we can see by the references to non-canonical books (such as the Book of Enoch) in some of the NT epistles.
But sure, there was the 'Law, the Prophets and the Psalms' and these were considered authoritative.
But to be authoritative, why does something have to be literally true?
Even at the time of Christ not all the Rabbis took the OT stories entirely literally. Some took a more allegorical approach. There was no one, set, definitive approach to these issues then any more than there is now.
Even if all the events of Moses's life were parables or allegories and so on, how does it then follow that the same is true for the stories of Christ?
That would be like saying that because Charles Dickens wrote novels then the work of all 19th century writers were also in fictional form. So Ruskin's 'The Stones of Venice' or Carlyle's philosophical works or Newman's 'Apologia pro Vita Sua' or the poems of Browning or Hopkins should be read in the same way that we read Dickens.
How does that follow?
As it happesns, I believe in the Incarnation, passion and Resurrection. I've never said otherwise anywhere on this thread.
Who is saying that the Pentateuch is a 'pack of lies'? I'm certainly not.
Read.my.lips. If something is mythical it does not necessarily mean it is untrue. C S Lewis held that 'myth' often conveys deeper truths than objective history.
It's not a case of:
The Pentateuch may contain mythical elements therefore it is a pack of lies and completely unreliable.
How does that work?
It's more a case of:
The Pentateuch may contain mythical elements but it contains and conveys within that marvellous unveilings of the way of salvation ultimately realised in Christ.
It's not me who is being bipolar round here.
Where have I said it either has to be one or the other?
I keep chanting the both/and mantra until people nod off ... you obviously haven't been listening.
For the record, yes, I believe that there probably are historical elements in Exodus but the period is so remote and mysterious that we'll probably never unravel what those elements actually are.
Nevertheless, where there is prosaic history (and history is never prosaic, I would submit) and mythical elements combined the whole thing unfolds a marvellous plan of salvation that is ultimately outworked through the whole divine economy.
Let me turn this thing around, as it may help you ...
Furthermore, EE takes an extremely bipolar view of the exodus. He seems to give the impression that it has to be either one thing or the other: either boring prosaic history or exciting meaningful myth. What ever happened to both ... and?
The claim that an idea can only be rich and meaningful (or 'resonant') if it is objectively and historically true in the modernist sense rather than the product of someone's imagination, is weird, to put it mildly. Do you really find reality so grim, EE?
![[Biased]](wink.gif) ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
That's precisely because you could do with more knowledge of the ancient classical world, Moonlitdoor - as indeed do I ... a little knowledge is a dangerous thing in all cases.
On the modernist charge - well, yes, I'll own up to that. We're all products of our environment. At least, though, I will admit to the influences that have shaped my thinking. I don't think of them as dropping down out of heaven without any contextual aspect whatsoever.
It's simply not true that people didn't have any concept of myth and so on until the 19th and 20th centuries when it became inconvenient to believe the same things as the ancients believed.
Even St Augustine of Hippo and some of the other early Fathers - of both East and West - didn't always take a straightforwardly literal approach.
It's difficult to prove one way or another, but it has been suggested by some historians that the Egyptians didn't always understand their views of the afterlife in literal terms but may have had a more nuanced or allegorical understanding of some of their burial rituals and so on.
That's the point I was making about Dante's Inferno. Dante clearly believed in Hell but I doubt he really thought of it as a place with farting demons.
It's also been suggested that not all of the Greeks and Romans took the stories about Zeus and Hermes and so on literally. I don't know that much about the Cynics and Stoics and all the other 'movements' and things that went on back then but it strikes me that there were a wide range of views on these things.
As for what Gamaliel may or may not believe that is 'inconvenient' - well, we all have ways of filtering out those things we don't want to do or to take sufficiently seriously - 'sell your possessions and give to the poor' is probably the paradigm example for most of us.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
quote:
Originally posted by EtymologicalEvangelical:
* Although even an atheistic interpretation makes the Israelites look bloody stupid, considering that they spiritually beat themselves up in relation to a (projected) God who appeals to their gratitude for his wonderful work in pretending to deliver them from an imaginary period of slavery! And if the Israelites were really so utterly moronic, then where does that leave all the other inhabitants of the Ancient World?
It seems to me your position also assumes that all the other inhabitants of the Ancient World were "morons" for believing in and sacrificing to "projected" gods. On this point, the only difference between your position and that of an atheist is that you think the Israelites were uniquely not deluded in their faith; the atheist doesn't need a special explanation for why the Israelites were different.
The point I was making is that atheists cannot assume the worst of the Israelites without applying the same criterion to all other inhabitants of the Ancient World. Therefore the events recorded in the Bible have no less veracity than events recorded in any other source from that period of history. If the Israelites were so deluded - or were collectively wilful liars - and were willing to project that onto their God, whom they viewed - to their considerable hurt - as the source of all righteousness, then where does that leave other peoples? On what basis can we believe anything at all from the Ancient World?
You claim that I am suggesting that the other inhabitants of the Ancient World were 'morons' on the basis of what I have said about the views of those who don't give any credence to the history recorded in the Bible. There is absolutely no logic to that view at all. Given that I do not regard the Israelites as morons, then why should it be assumed that I think that about other peoples of the period? Don't impute to me views which are the very antithesis of what I believe, and what I have clearly expressed on this thread.
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by moonlitdoor:
...the idea that the ancients didn't have a strong distinction between things considered true in a factual sense and things considered true in a mythical sense seems to me to have been invented in the 19th and 20th century by people for whom it was inconvenient to have to believe the same things the ancients believed.
Hear hear!
--------------------
Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
moonlitdoor
Shipmate
# 11707
|
Posted
quote:
originally posted by Gamaliel
It's simply not true that people didn't have any concept of myth and so on until the 19th and 20th centuries when it became inconvenient to believe the same things as the ancients believed.
of course that's not true, but that's not what I meant at all. For sure they had a concept of myth, what I was suggesting was that they had distinct concepts of myth and history, by and large. More distinct at any rate than you were suggesting in what you wrote to EE.
What I was suggesting is modernist is the idea that because they had both myths and history, they couldn't tell the difference between them.
--------------------
We've evolved to being strange monkeys, but in the next life he'll help us be something more worthwhile - Gwai
Posts: 2210 | From: london | Registered: Aug 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
Come, come, EE, if anyone is bipolar around here is certainly isn't Gamaliel. I'll stop there before a Host intervenes.
Read what I've written.
Which is exactly what I have done!
You have set up a false dichotomy, based on "either ... or" rather than "both ... and":
quote:
Of course God isn't a liar and of course God isn't lying about salvation. For reasons best known to himself, the Almighty has chosen to put these things forward in narrative form - he tells us a story. Christ - God incarnate - did the same in his parables. God tells stories. He knows what we are like - he formed us after all - and knows that stories and poetry, allegory and song are the ways to engage us.
Of course the story of the Exodus is referred to by the prophets and so on all the way down to Christ - how could it be otherwise?
The whole thing serves as an immense parable or picture of salvation and deliverance - the people are taken from slavery into freedom, they pass through trials and testing ... they are transferred from one condition or domain into another.
That's what makes the story so rich and so resonant.
Yeah. Great. And it also happened as an historical event. BOTH history AND story. After all isn't God the God of reality, or is he so embarrassed by reality that he has to resort to fantasy in order to be "rich and resonant"? That doesn't sound like a God who actually really exists!
But this "both ... and" approach is not the position you take, because in the same post you also wrote (with a very obvious rhetorical question):
quote:
So yes, you are right that the 'entirety of God's plan of salvation cannot be explained without reference to it' but does that mean that it requires the story to have the kind of historicity one might apply to the Holocaust, say, or to the Norman invasion or WW1 or whatever else?
Now the only way you can defend yourself against the charge of indulging in a false dichotomy in the context of this particular discussion, is by acknowledging that the answer to your (apparently rhetorical) question in this quotation is 'yes'.
OK, so if you affirm that the answer is 'yes' (with reference to the subject under discussion, namely the exodus from Egypt), then I will happily retract the "bipolar remark".
How about it?
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
Ok, fair enough, Moonlitdoor, I think we were at cross-purposes to a certain extent.
But to accept that the ancients could and did distinguish history and myth doesn't tell us much, one way or another, about the apparent historicity or otherwise of the Exodus story.
From what I can gather, although everyone in the 1st century would have operated within the context of a 1st century cosmology, the extent to which they took the pantheon of gods and so on literally did vary. The same applied within Judaism. Some Rabbis were more literal in their approach than others. Some took a more allegorical or 'mythological' approach.
The same came to be the case in the early Church too, of course, with varying emphases across the different Patriarchates. Alexandria, for instance, tended to go for a more allegorical approach than Antioch ...
I think we've got a bit cross-threaded to some extent on this thread ... it's easily done.
I could blame EE for that ... but this wouldn't help.
I am tempted to direct at him the self same sentiments he has directed elsewhere:
'Don't impute to me views which are the very antithesis of what I believe, and what I have clearly expressed on this thread.'
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
Au contraire, EE, you clearly haven't read what I've written. You've been highly selective. And indeed, as belligerent as ever.
I'm not going to rise to the bait nor pick the fight you are obviously trying to provoke.
Read what I've written. I am quite willing to accept that there are historical elements in Exodus. I am quite willing to accept that there are mythological elements in Exodus. I believe that both are true.
I believe that mythological elements can be true in a different way to historical elements but they are none the less true for all that.
I've said that consistently all along. By isolating some of my comments out of context you are simply not detracting from that but pursuing some agenda of your own and for reasons best known to yourself.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by moonlitdoor
What I was suggesting is modernist is the idea that because they had both myths and history, they couldn't tell the difference between them.
You're absolutely right.
The Bible is chock full of the distinction between history, on the one hand and story / parable, on the other. Even as far back as Genesis, we can see the distinction. For example, the dreams that Joseph interpreted, when he was captive in Egypt, makes clear the distinction between fantasy visions and interpretations relating to reality. And then later in the gospels: the disciples asked Jesus why He spoke in parables (Matthew 13:10). Why bother asking this question if everything is just one big parable!
The views expressed by certain people on this thread about the peoples of the Ancient World are incredibly patronising, and typical of those who take a naturalistic view of the development of human life, in which we are apparently more evolved than those 'primitive' people. CS Lewis referred to it as "chronological snobbery" - the idea that the more recently an idea or practice was introduced, the more true and valid it therefore must be. All utter hogwash, of course!
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
You obviously haven't been reading what people on this thread have written but what you think they've written EE.
I've made it very clear all along that ancient peoples took a more sophisticated view of these things than might appear at first sight.
I've mentioned Dante and his farting demons, the ancient Egyptians and their burial rituals - how they may have necessarily understood these things in literal terms ... and much else besides.
It's not me who is being patronising around here.
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
|
Posted
The irony here, of course, is that C S Lewis saw much of the OT as myth and regarded myth as capable of conveying the highest form of truth - irrespective of its connection with verifiable historic facts (although, like me and the rest of the myth brigade here, he didn't regard the OT as being completely divorced from historic reality).
![[Votive]](graemlins/votive.gif)
--------------------
Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
|
Posted
It's mythic by definition. What's the problem? From the word go here I totally agree Gamaliel. I've rotted that far. Even this year. It's just ALL so irrelevant whether any of it is true or not in any degree. The Flood certainly isn't true. Unless it is. And if it is, like a seven day creation, God has gone to inordinate lengths to deny it. To Adam and Eve it you have to go to ... absurd lengths. I know.
As for the myth of Moses, that Jesus had NO option but to utterly completely, unquestioningly accept, what of it? And if it's all true, what of it? And therefore obviously if God the Killer was right on with it? What of it?
Nowt ter do wi' us. We're Christians. Follewers of Jesus ... Ohhhhhhhh! So we have to be early first century Jews and ... transcend that?
--------------------
Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
You obviously haven't been reading what people on this thread have written but what you think they've written EE.
I've made it very clear all along that ancient peoples took a more sophisticated view of these things than might appear at first sight.
So that's presumably why you think that the Israelites couldn't cope with God referring to historical reality when speaking to them about the covenant and about their need to return to Him in repentance? Apparently these people were so stupid that they just could not relate to the real world but had to be spoken to in "rich and resonant" words of fantasy by a God who told them that "this is what I did for you" ("even though you know, I know and everyone knows that I didn't actually do it!"). Come off it, Gamaliel.
It's abundantly clear from the Bible that there are parables, visions and dreams, on the one hand, and that there are interpretations of the same, on the other. It's clear that the Bible is full of accounts of detailed historical events, as well as references to symbolism, poetry and the like. All this is clearly laid out in a way that any intelligent person can understand - with the possible exception of the Book of Revelation, where the distinction between symbolism and actual events does, admittedly, get a bit blurred (but that is hardly surprising given that the book itself makes clear that it contains a vision).
As for appealing to the creation account (or accounts), this is a DH subject, but I will say that not even the scientific method - properly applied - can give us absolute certainty about origins. There are hypotheses, which may be testable up to the point of saying "this could have happened", but it stands to reason that events of the distant past are beyond the scope of the method of direct observation and repeatable experimentation. All we can rely on is inference based on certain interpretations of empirical evidence with reference to certain assumptions about the nature of reality. So the best we can do is remain agnostic about the details of creation, rather than make throwaway remarks like "I thought we'd all moved beyond that" (I don't know who the 'all' are that you referred to in this comment, given that some people are indeed biblical literalists on this issue, as you must know. Or are they just personae non gratae?).
To use a controversial passage of the Bible to reason that other passages should be questioned, does not seem to me to be a fair-minded method of hermeneutics, because where will it end? On the basis of the six day creation account, can we not argue that the gospel accounts are all mythic and never actually happened? Why not? Why do you believe in Jesus? Why do you not call His existence into question? I am just using the same reasoning that you apply to Moses. Come on, be honest and consistent. If you are going to fly the flag for this wonderful mythology trip, then why hold back and not apply it to the very core of your faith? What are you so afraid of? If myth is so great and so effective in communicating truth, then wouldn't it be a good idea to apply it to every aspect of the Christian faith?
If you are such a champion of 'myth', then surely it would be in your spiritual interests to interpret the heart of the Christian faith according to this method! Just imagine what amazing truths will be revealed if we could just demolish the stultifying superstructure of historical reality!!!
Come on, Christians! Let's all go the whole hog... ![[Snigger]](graemlins/snigger.gif)
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel
The irony here, of course, is that C S Lewis saw much of the OT as myth...
Citation please.
--------------------
You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
Posts: 3625 | From: South Coast of England | Registered: Sep 2009
| IP: Logged
|
|
HCH
Shipmate
# 14313
|
Posted
This is an OK thread.
Here is an aside about the Transfiguration: If you want to take it as a literal event, then you need to explain how the witnesses (Peter, James and John) were able to identify Moses and Elijah by name. Were they known to the disciples by description? Were they identified by name in the conversation?
Returning to the topic: It seems reasonable to ask whether Moses existed, or Noah, or Job. Turn it around: who, among the patriarchs of the O.T., is definitely known to have existed?
Posts: 1540 | From: Illinois, USA | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by JoannaP:
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Church authority and authenticity seem to be undermined when the churches admit that their teachings are based on myths.
But Church authority can also be undermined when the Church insists on the literal truth of things that most people think are nonsense. Do you really think a church that states publicly that Adam and Eve existed, with Eve being formed out of Adam's rib, will be taken more seriously than one that admits that the first two chapters of Genesis contain two different creation myths?
What does it mean for a church to be 'taken seriously' when it comes to faith positions as opposed to demonstrable facts? Every church is presumably taken seriously by its members. Should it concern itself with what its critics think?
If our clergymen have a list of Bible stories they believe to be myths they should perhaps make this clear to their congregations. It would be very interesting; their sermons would surely be much more memorable. Holy Moses indeed!
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Truman White
Shipmate
# 17290
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Indeed Ahleal V - unless one takes the story of the Transfiguration in more 'mythic' terms too, of course.
But that causes just as many problems as it resolves.
Ever wondered how the disciples knew that they were apparently seeing Moses and Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration? Was it obvious from the conversations?
Obvious from the subsequent conversation (Mk 9:9 et al). Nice answer Ahleal V.
Posts: 476 | Registered: Aug 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
Printer-friendly view
