The Religion of Atheism

Me either. But some folks take it as such.

 

Again, so what?

 

Harry Potter and Universe don't claim to be history.
It was asserted without evidence that there was no biblical House of David.
Then we found the evidence for the House of David.
So what do we do? Admit that we dismissed without evidence something
which was proven to exist?

As an aside - for each proclamation that such and such "didn't exist" there
would have been so many more Christians and Jews lose faith in the bible.
Upon the discovery of such and such there is no evidence that people
regained their faith. As if to say - it wasn't the evidence which I took issue
with.
Fact is this dusty book is the foundation of Western society. Some thought
that getting rid of it would usher in an age of peace and enlightenment. They
thought this back in 1900. The world has grown a more brutal and dysfunctional
place since then, by almost all metrics you care to mention.

 

Okay. To the Jews their history is the story of Abraham and Moses, slavery in Egypt
and the rise of the Judean kings. Get any history book on the ancient Jews and it
will mention these. History is what you believe to have been true.
A myth on the other hand is like what the Greeks and Romans had. "If they stop
believing in us we cease to exist" was a common refrain of these gods from Mount
Olympus.

 

We have come a long way from "David didn't exist" to "He was just a tribal leader."
Actually David's story is utterly believable. The bible even records the story of David's
rape of Bathsheba and the murder of her husband. Towards the end of his life we read
that he gradually lost connection with his own family and royal duties, which was to bring
great sorrow to David.
Nothing has been glorified with this man.

"Tribal leader" means what? That Israel was a tribe?
Some dispute Israel, the Jewish nation or Jerusalem on the basis of population size. That's
bad science. We don't know the real size, and size is relative. Also population sizes trend
upward with study, ie Egypt and its hidden cities from satellite radar.

The following would have been controversial 20-30 years ago when "Jew" was suspected
of meaning someone of the Jewish religion only. I find it marvelous.

Cohen Zadokites in the https://www.familytreedna.com/groups/cohenbrazil/about/background

"Int'l Association of Kohanim: our mission is to offer Cohanim worldwide a FREE DNA test in
order to indentify Cohens from the lineage of Zadok (J2a4), the great-grandson of Pinchas
Ben El' Azar in order to build the genalogical tree with members who share the same common
ancestral in a time frame of 3,300 years, the precisely time of birth of Pinchas Ben El' Azar, the
grandson of Aaron HaKohen."

 

So whether a historical account is true equals belief in God? Wow, that is confusing. What are you saying?

 

I am saying that the bible holds the claim of historic truth.
Most religious texts do not have such a claim.
The bible says that in such and such a year a certain king reigned.
I am fine that this is history.

This year a royal seal was found bearing the inscription
“Belonging to Hezekiah, (son of) Ahaz, king of Judah.”
Image below.

So now we have provided independent corroboration for the
existence of King Hezekiah and Ahaz.

There is no evidence that there exists a "real" Mount Olympus
where the twelve gods live.

 

Meh, I do not believe history lessons is the main point of the Bible.

 

Correct. I believe that history was INCLUDED in the bible for the essential
purpose of preserving the text down through the millenniums. If the bible
was SOLELY a spiritual tract then at times in Israeli history when the nation
was essentially pagan then the bible would not have survived.

 

Think of this: If the Bible was a history book that included everything from the beginning of time until after the death of Jesus it would be volumes of books. Who would read thru all that? How would it serve its purpose?

 

There's just enough history to help the bible survive, and give answers
to some of its critics. It doesn't give everything. There are huge gaps in
it, particularly from Babylon until the Romans.
And crucially, it writes history in theological terms (note Genesis 1.)

 

The "History" found in the Bible(s) are very clear indicators of humans writing it as it changes with the times. Edits and additions correspond to societal change worldwide and regionally and documented council/manmade revisions create the impossibility of supernatural authorship.

 

They would say that, of course.
You must appreciate that no-one is free from bias, and the bible, more than
most other documents, is a battleground of ideas and beliefs.

But if we have learned anything from the Dead Sea Scrolls is that the biblical
texts have changed remarkably little.
Earlier texts were translated from generation to generation on the basis of
meaning (sense for sense I think they call it) and only after Jesus did scripture
employ word for word. So sense for sense can change more readily. But I
suspect it wasn't much.

 

Yes...clearly bias is heavily in play.

 

And if there is a claim of bias then it has to be shown.
Attempts to see the New Testament as a document
crafted over the centuries have not been successful
as older and older documents have come to light.
I wouldn't be surprised if the same is found for the Old
Testament also. Certainly the Dead Sea Scrolls show
the Jewish bible hasn't changed since at least the 1st
Century BC.

 

How do you know about David and Bathsheba? How do you know about his life? Where is the evidence? Archaeology doesn't help. In fact archaeology hinders. Things attributed to David - and Solomon in particular - are now attributed to later kings like Ahab. And they make more sense. All you have is the Biblical story. Many exploits attributed to David to make him a Jewish hero have no relevance of basis in history. Of course the story has sorrow. All the more reason to see that Psalm 22 is David talking about his life. You are simply relying on the Bible without understanding the background.

We have a very good idea of the size and population of Israel. Partly through archaeology and geology. The ability of the land to support a population is a determining factor. And Palestine of the day was ruled by primitive agriculture practises. It could not support the amount of people mentioned in the Bible. One man today can, using modern machinery, do in 1 hour what it would take several men a week to do then.
Egypt is no different. The Nile could only support a limited number of population. It was primitive agriculture, though they had the advantage of irrigation from the Nile. The Nile delta had a static population and a transient population of tribes visiting to feed their flocks.
The pictures you see from satellite photos make little difference. They are deceiving in the sense that these 'towns and cities' did not all survive at the same time. The Nile and its tributaries at times changed course. A town on the Nile would then be left 'high and dry', and its citizens would have to move. That's been the puzzle up to fairly recently as to why these places existed and were deserted. They also show the change of courses of the Nile.
Using the same technique we can see the old watercourses across the Arabian Peninsula - which is now a desert, but one time fertile.

By Tribal leader I mean just that. There were many tribes in Palestine. David was probably one of these. Leader of the strongest tribe that conquered other tribes.

And if you accept the 3,300 year old 'genealogical tree' of 'whoever' good luck to you. We don't have the DNA of any relevant person, let alone Zadok. Genealogical trees are notoriously difficult. Jesus' genealogy in Matthew and Luke are both wrong. But that's another matter.

 

The Dead Sea Scrolls certainly help with our knowledge of Christianity and Judaism. . It's a non-rabbinic form of Judaism. It also shows parallels movements to the Jesus movement of the time. . It shows Christianity stems from Judaism.
If you are comparing the Dead Sea Scrolls and the OT why does the OT not contain the Psalms attributed to David found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, or the stories of Abraham, Enoch, Noah found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Or even the prophecies of Ezekiel, Daniel etc found in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The Old Testament may not have changed but it is not obviously complete. In fact, coupled with the absence of the priestly rule after the Babylonian exile and the Absence of the Maccabean period - it is far from complete.

 

In the bible. Samuel and Chronicles mostly.
David was king of the United Monarchy. Those in Wikipedia who dispute this
don't have much evidence for it.

1st Century population was between 0.6 - 1.1 million. Could have been similar
in 1000 BC. Not that this changes much - did agriculture change much in this
period?

Re Wikipedia. Never read about David in Wiki before. It takes the "minimalist"
approach. I am sure objections have been brushed aside. Certainly my attempts
to update the camel entry were removed.

This:
"The Books of Samuel were substantially composed during the time of King Josiah
at the end of the 7th century BCE, extended during the Babylonian exile (6th century
BCE), and substantially complete by about 550 BCE, although further editing was done
even after then—the silver quarter-shekel which Saul's servant offers to Samuel in
1 Samuel 9 "almost certainly fixes the date of the story in the Persian or Hellenistic period".

"almost certainly" isn't proof. As with "Ur of the Chaldeas" terms can be translated as
they are today. In fact, if they aren't translated people wouldn't know what was written, ie
"Abraham came from Sumer" ... uh, where is Sumer???!!!!!
As an aside to an aside, the thirty pieces of silver given for Jesus didn't change over the
centuries from Zechariah's day.

 

Yes, Christianity stems from Judaism. No issue there. Some argue that the principles of Christianity
predated the law of Moses. There's a good argument for that - many in the bible lived before or outside
the law of Moses. The OT is "complete" in the theological sense. To be honest, it's clear that most of
its authors cared little for world events. That wasn't the bible's brief.
But I recall people telling me that some of the biblical books were written centuries into AD. Not anymore.

 

What is the 'United Monarchy'? The Bible gives is as the 2 Kingdoms united by David. But how big was this 'Monarchy'. Not as big as claimed in the Bible for sure.

You say the population was 0.6 to 1 million. I wouldn't dispute that. In fact I've already posted that Palestine would be pushed to support anything over 1 million. That makes nonsense of the claim that 600,000 men over the age of 20 entered Palestine after the Exodus. That would put the Hebrew population at around 3 million when you include wives and children (large families). Palestine already had an indigenous population of possibly 1 million. It could never accommodate anywhere near such a population.
David is supposed to have conquered from the borders of Egypt to the Euphrates in the north, and the east bank of the Jordan. (It's all in the Bible) Given the actual population of say 1 m there is no way he had an army large enough to conquer and maintain such an area. Biblical figures are nearly all fictional. 800,000 Israeli's to fight 500,000 Judeans - complete nonsense. There probably was a battle of some kind - we would probably call it a skirmish today.

Your quote from Wiki was near the truth.

As to Sumer. The people would have known about Sumer-ia. They would have known the history of the city of Ur that still stood in their time. They even used the code of Ur-Nammu, as well as other codes - in their writing of the Pentateuch.

30 pieces of silver. The small sum paid when a servant was gored by an ox. And the Priests of Jesus day bought a field with it? Zechariah? Jeremiah? They both bought fields.

 

Not many educated in the Bronze Age. Sumer slipped from living memory,
in fact it largely slipped from history too. That's strange. If a nation is known
by another name for a thousand years, you tend to call it by that "new" name.
(I struggle with Abyssinia and Ceylon for example.)
Most likely early texts would have said Sumer, later translations said Chaldea
or Babylonia. Wouldn't be surprised to see Iraq pop up somewhere.

By Babylonian times many of the customs of the OT would have seen bizarre,
such as the taking off of a shoe in a legal contract, or offering up a son as a
sacrifice.

Another aside. More than half of all Jews don't reside in Israel. To accomplish
a full migration there must be more persecution. I watch the stats on this - won't
live to see it, but I tell people that I expect there will be considerable antisemitism
in the future. It's like a little science test - do a prediction. Also, there won't be any
sustainable peace treaties between Israel and the Palestinians/Arabs.
To fully see, in a historic sense, the truth behind the grand claims of the bible in
relation to Jews and Israel just read the Roman Jewish War by Josephus, and the
1948 and 1967 wars - one cannot help but see the hand of God in those events.

 

United means Judea and Israel.
If you couldn't purchase a grave site for 30 pieces of silver
then it would have been noted by readers of the Gospels.
We do know a crude approximation of the kingdoms - there
are tons of bible maps. This included what is today part of
Jordan.

 

Apparently historical facts are not that central to tje effectiveness. If some find it troubling it is because they are looking for any reason to dismiss it. Of course some folks will not want to be constrained by any type of morality.

 

It's not troubling to find history different from mythology. That particular set of documents isn't exactly a proper structure for morality, or even useful ethics beyond a couple of simple points.

 

According to your opinion.