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Extraordinary Claims => Religion General Discussion => Judaism => Topic started by: Baruch on April 01, 2018, 07:03:23 PM

Title: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on April 01, 2018, 07:03:23 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZECezMYug8c

This is pretty much current secular scholarship.  Monotheism developed gradually, particularly after the return of the Judahites from Babylon circa 500 BCE.  I would think this process was still underway when Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: GrinningYMIR on April 03, 2018, 08:13:38 AM
(https://i.pinimg.com/736x/3e/0c/44/3e0c440cd769508c774384483e378898--joshua-graham-fallout-new-vegas.jpg)

In the land of Zion the burned man lives.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on April 03, 2018, 02:36:45 PM
Is that your mummy? ;-)
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 11:22:19 AM
Freud is the first modern person who tied Pharaoh Akhenaten to Moses ... but theologically, this is consistent with gnosticism going back millennia ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1dy-tPjBgI

Pharaoh Akhenaten was the first monotheist, and of a non-anthropomorphic/naturalist vision as well.  Not quite atheist.  He was originally named Amunhotep after his father, the previous Pharaoh.  His mother was a commoner, Queen Tiy, and her parents were Yuya and Tuya.  It has been proposed by an modern Egyptian scholar that Yuya was Joseph.  Don't think of the connections as literal, but "based on a true story" like in Hollywood.  We don't have Akhenaten's mummy, or his wife Nefertiti.  They were an odd couple, he was something of a soy-boy, with part feminine body characteristics ... maybe some kind of genetic hermaphrodite.  As a youth, he was excluded from public view and public role, because of his odd appearance.

Ironically his wife Nefertiti, is often called one of the most beautiful women of all time (classic looks still admired today).  We do have the mummies of his son, Tutankhamun (originally named Tutankhaten) .. the most famous of all Pharaohs.  And we have the mummies of Queen Tiy's parents, Yuya and Tuya.  Genetic analysis shows that Yuya was not Egyptian, but Hurrian (from what the Bible called Padan Aram).  In Genesis, Padan Aram is the point of origin for Abraham (not Ur in Sumeria).  So Yuya wasn't Semite, but he came from an area later associated with Semites (Amorites, Arameans, Arabs).  The traditional story of Noah, in that area, targeted a mountain in Padan Aram .... not Ararat further NE.  Yuya was the master of Pharaoh's chariot force and other offices.  He was a mercenary which in ancient Egyptian was called Apiru which is cognate to Hebrew.  The actual Yuya was a polytheist who honored the traditional Egyptian gods.

So "inspired by" not "literally" ... the three Abrahamic religions all stem from a mutant revolutionary Pharaoh, with a determined mother who was not of royal blood (Pharaohs often married their own step sisters).  Tutankhaten changed his name, because when he came to the throne he reversed his father's policies and restored the rights and income of the traditional priesthoods (who were the only literate people, the bureaucracy).  After this short lived Pharaoh passed from life, he and his family entered into folk stories, and those led to religions dominating 1/2 of the human race today.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: SGOS on July 01, 2018, 11:42:04 AM
Catholicism evolved from an Egyptian religion, then?  Then the Egyptians said to Hell with the bullshit, and followed Mohammed.  Then the Baha'i' combined them together again.  Modern religions are confused, although adamant about forcing their confusion on everyone else.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 11:53:06 AM
Quote from: SGOS on July 01, 2018, 11:42:04 AM
Catholicism evolved from an Egyptian religion, then?  Then the Egyptians said to Hell with the bullshit, and followed Mohammed.  Then the Baha'i' combined them together again.  Modern religions are confused, although adamant about forcing their confusion on everyone else.

Yes.  There are three sources for the predecessors of official Christianity ... Antioch in Syria, Jerusalem in Judea, and Alexandria in Egypt.  And Damascus and Petra were also involved (Petra may be the original Mecca) with Pauline views.  Paul was from Tarsus, NW of Antioch.  The Catholic/Orthodox churches (aside from the Armenian, Nestorian and Ethiopian branches) are the creation of Emperor Constantine.  Marian cultus comes from Alexandria, from Bishop Cyril less than 100 years after Constantine, as a way of continuing the old worship of Isis and the infant Horus (see Nativity in two gospels, but absent in the other two, not counting the Gospel of Thomas (certainly Antiochian or Alexandrian).

Yes, the Egyptians had a Hell, 3000 years before Christianity even was dreamed of, let alone made official.  Horus is the good son, and Set is his evil uncle.  The Horus/Osiris story is all about resurrection ... as was Ba'al in Syria (where Antioch later was built).  There is even an official theology of "second death" which leaves readers of Paul confused (because they won't look outside the Bible for information, because they don't dare to).  Apep is the great evil serpent of Genesis, though Satan also appears in the Gilgamesh epic from pre-Babylon/Sumeria.

Yes, the Egyptians were imperialist ... Hamites who were anti-Semite, anti-Nubian, anti-Libyan (Berber).  Their imperialism continues thru the three Abrahamic religions, much mutated after 5000 years.  The only comparable influence on Western/Middle Eastern culture is Babylon.  Egypt represents chauvinistic empire, Babylon represents melting-pot empire.  The differences between globalists and nationalists date all the way back to the Bronze Age.

Bronze Age race theory:

(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Egyptian_races.jpg)

A Libi, Nubi, Shosi and Kemeti.  Notice the Shosi/Semite has tzitzit.  Still worn by Orthodox Jews.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 12:20:09 PM
The Great Hymn to the Aten, composed by the Pharaoh himself, is a thematic predecessor to Psalm 104 in the Bible.

http://wsrp.usc.edu/information/REL499_2011/Hymn%20to%20Aten.pdf

The Pauline emphasis on Last Judgement, and potential Second Death are taken directly from the Egyptian Book of the Dead.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: PopeyesPappy on July 01, 2018, 12:59:03 PM
I like the late 18th early 19th dynastic period for an origin of the Exodus legend. The city of Amarna collapsed very quickly after the death of Akhetaten. There would have been a large number of one true god types looking to relocate. They were all Phararoh's slaves because everyone living in the Egyptian empire around this time were Pharaoh's slaves. Many of elites, the priests in particular, would not have been welcome in the rest of Egypt.

One big problem with this hypothesis is the Jews wouldn't adopt monotheism for nearly another thousand years or so.     
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 01:10:51 PM
Quote from: PopeyesPappy on July 01, 2018, 12:59:03 PM
I like the late 18th early 19th dynastic period for an origin of the Exodus legend. The city of Amarna collapsed very quickly after the death of Akhetaten. There would have been a large number of one true god types looking to relocate. They were all Phararoh's slaves because everyone living in the Egyptian empire around this time were Pharaoh's slaves. Many of elites, the priests in particular, would not have been welcome in the rest of Egypt.

One big problem with this hypothesis is the Jews wouldn't adopt monotheism for nearly another thousand years or so.     

Well not quite ... the idea that Jews are monotheist is propaganda ... same with Christians and Muslims.  But where did the puritanical propaganda of the official Torah come from?  This was circa 500 BCE ... whereas Akhenaten was circa 1350 BCE.  The origin of the Israelites (officially a tribal confederacy in Palestine circa 1200 BCE) was complex.  And until about 650 BCE, the Solomonic temple was polytheist (until the death of Canaanite queen Athaliah, daughter of Jezebel).  So Akhenaten is even more remarkable ... but only the folk memory would have survived.  A few people would still have written copies of the Great Hymn to the Aten.

Pure monotheism only dates to about 1000 CE, again among puritanical heretics.  Sufis, Kabbalists and proto-protestants.  Part of my study of Spanish Judeo-Arabic culture.  I am not sure that the adoption of strict monotheism is all that good an idea even now.  Orthodox Abrahmics are arguably not strict monotheist.  This is difficult even for more advanced Hindus and Buddhists.  And more than 500 years ago, the universe was a much smaller place ... Cosmos wasn't as big as it is now.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: PopeyesPappy on July 01, 2018, 01:26:27 PM
I was under the impression that monotheism among Jews was well established by the start of the Christian era. Exactly when that started is up for debate, but at least one primary source, the Elephantine Papyri, are pretty good evidence that at least some Jews accepted the existence of multiple gods in the 4th century BCE. 13th century BCE to 4th century BCE = about a thousand years is where I got about a thousand years.

What have you got that says Jews were polytheistic until near the end of the first millennium CE?
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 01:44:42 PM
Quote from: PopeyesPappy on July 01, 2018, 01:26:27 PM
I was under the impression that monotheism among Jews was well established by the start of the Christian era. Exactly when that started is up for debate, but at least one primary source, the Elephantine Papyri, are pretty good evidence that at least some Jews accepted the existence of multiple gods in the 4th century BCE. 13th century BCE to 4th century BCE = about a thousand years is where I got about a thousand years.

What have you got that says Jews were polytheistic until near the end of the first millennium CE?

Moses as a historical figure, would have been a henotheist under the tutelage of Jethro, priest of Midian (El Shaddai or Yah) ... with a strong Egyptian polytheist education.  Nomads tended to simplify their religion down to a few deities.  Not unlike a combination of Yuya the Apiru and The Story of Sinuhe ... the folk tale of an Egyptian doing Dances With Wolves among the Semites (an a precursor of Exodus).  Claims for monotheism came later in reaction to the destruction of the 2nd Temple ... but among the priesthood, monotheism was well established, starting with the puritanical racism of Ezra under Persian rule.  Among the common people, most never left Judah.  The Samaritans (who are called mud bloods by the Slytheren) are closer to Moses than either the Sadducees or Pharisees.  Of course the original Israelites were "a mixed multitude).  The regular folks never left Judah to Babylon or Assyria, they are the Am HaEretz ... people of the land aka 90% of the population, pagani (rural bumpkins).  See The Hebrew Goddess by Raphael Patai for more real history of the persistence of old Judean religion into  the Roman era.  From the Roman era forward it is called Kabbalah.

Christians in general and Catholics/Orthodox in particular, are henotheist, not monotheist.  What with "trinity" and demonology and angelology (important in Kabbalah and some parts of Islam).
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: PopeyesPappy on July 01, 2018, 03:15:10 PM
Quote from: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 01:44:42 PM
Moses as a historical figure, would have been a henotheist under the tutelage of Jethro, priest of Midian (El Shaddai or Yah) ... with a strong Egyptian polytheist education. 

Assuming the historical figure wasn't a of priest of the Great Temple of the Aten...  :wink:
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 04:43:49 PM
The Hebrew Goddess by Raphael Patai and the Aggadah (stories) in the Talmud (demonology and angelology).  One can cast doubt on the earliest document of Kabbalah, but not that rabbis were discussing it in the 1st and 2nd century CE.  And those were the puritans, not the common people.  There is anecdotal evidence that there was pluralistic worship at Abraham's tomb before the advent of official Christianity.  The influence of Greco-Roman hellenism is not only great (Pharisee argumentation, the NT etc) but the use of the Zodiac (originally Babylonian) in synagogue decoration and other violations of the anti-iconic policy at Dura Europus.

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/angels-and-angelology-2

https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/astrology-in-the-ancient-synagogue/

http://www.thebyzantinelegacy.com/dura-synagogue

Jewish practice was anything but uniform in the 1st century CE at least ... Josephus mentions over 20 different sects.  Certainly the Mandeans and the Samaritans are remains of those "variants" though it is said that in the 1st century CE, there were as many Samaritans as there were Judean zealots.  It took centuries for the Pharisee party (and Sadducee remnant allied to it) to apply its homogenizing policy (and it never quite succeeded).  There was a major break with the Karaite faction during the hey-day of Abbasid Baghdad, the Karaites rejecting rabbinic authority, under the loosening of support for the Babylonian community that had been so strong under the Persians.  And then the problem of what to do with all the illegitimate children (in Ezra's law view) of most of the Jewish people in the Roman Empire during the great oppression there.  Only the Kohanim were able to maintain purity.  And the few rare royal converts had to be dealt with (The Kurzari).  Kabbalah would have dated back to the "community of prophets" in Bible times, then controversial under the Persian/Greek/Roman domination (maintain status quo at all costs).  Like Sufism and Gnosticism generally, it had to be kept quiet about if it were practiced at all.

Of course Judaism in its many forms was never in a vacuum, it arose out of that came before it, in context with the powerful cultures around it.

Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:31:56 PM
Quote from: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 11:53:06 AM
(Petra may be the original Mecca)
You mean the Ka'aba might be this "Petra"!? Interesting! So "the Rock" is literally a rock. I like that idea.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:44:18 PM
Quote from: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 01:10:51 PM
And more than 500 years ago, the universe was a much smaller place ... Cosmos wasn't as big as it is now.
Contrary to popular belief, the universe isn't really getting any bigger. It's always been infinitely large. But its density and temperature are decreasing, which does look to us like an expansion. Even our finite observable universe isn't growing, since the horizon is fixed. Eventually there will be only a single particle, if that, in all that space as the density and temperature decrease to very near zero (10^-29 degrees K). But the universe won't be any bigger.

:-)
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 06:07:50 PM
Quote from: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:31:56 PM
You mean the Ka'aba might be this "Petra"!? Interesting! So "the Rock" is literally a rock. I like that idea.

We had a whole series on that, under Islam.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9GckIWAnYw

A short version, showing that clergy simply are disingenuous, if they are even educated enough to be aware.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 01, 2018, 06:09:21 PM
Quote from: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:44:18 PM
Contrary to popular belief, the universe isn't really getting any bigger. It's always been infinitely large. But its density and temperature are decreasing, which does look to us like an expansion. Even our finite observable universe isn't growing, since the horizon is fixed. Eventually there will be only a single particle, if that, in all that space as the density and temperature decrease to very near zero (10^-29 degrees K). But the universe won't be any bigger.

:-)

Tricky to define "big" with nothing to compare to.  You might be bigger than me (taller etc) ... but to what can we compare the universe?  So yes, just another example of sophistry.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 06:14:45 PM
Bigly...
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: SGOS on July 01, 2018, 06:40:20 PM
Quote from: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:44:18 PM
Contrary to popular belief, the universe isn't really getting any bigger. It's always been infinitely large. But its density and temperature are decreasing, which does look to us like an expansion. Even our finite observable universe isn't growing, since the horizon is fixed. Eventually there will be only a single particle, if that, in all that space as the density and temperature decrease to very near zero (10^-29 degrees K). But the universe won't be any bigger.

:-)
Does this mean that infinity, or at least its perception, has less to do with size than it does with energy?  This is interesting.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Cavebear on July 02, 2018, 12:52:04 AM
Quote from: Unbeliever on July 01, 2018, 05:44:18 PM
Contrary to popular belief, the universe isn't really getting any bigger. It's always been infinitely large. But its density and temperature are decreasing, which does look to us like an expansion. Even our finite observable universe isn't growing, since the horizon is fixed. Eventually there will be only a single particle, if that, in all that space as the density and temperature decrease to very near zero (10^-29 degrees K). But the universe won't be any bigger.

:-)

That one is pretty complicated.  It is hard to say the universe is "expanding" because that suggests there is something the universe is expanding "into".  And, at any "size", the universe is all that is.  The "infinite" part bothers me sometimes.  And I get annoyed when some scientists refer to "seeing to the start of the universe", when what they mean is "as far as we can see" via light.

Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: SGOS on July 02, 2018, 05:43:46 AM
Quote from: Cavebear on July 02, 2018, 12:52:04 AM
I get annoyed when some scientists refer to "seeing to the start of the universe", when what they mean is "as far as we can see" via light.
You get used to it.  I attended a lecture put on by some Cal Tech guys that used the "looking into the past" description, rather than the "far away" description.  It was disconcerting to me, but by the end, it made perfect sense.  These guys were studying the formation of galaxies, where you have to look into the past to see what galaxies look like in their early stages.  Then looking at things far away becomes looking into the past.  In fact, everything far away is the past, and what you see is not even there today, or at least in a different form.  The fact that it's far away is really of little importance beyond party conversation:  "I once saw a star that was 13 billion light years away."  Big whoop.  "What does it look like?"  "I don't know.  I can only see what it looked like 13 billion years ago.  I don't even know if it's still there."

Astronomy is about looking at the past.  No matter how far away something is, it's all in the past.  You can't see the present when you look far away.  You can only see the past.  And looking at a far away galaxy tells you nothing about the present.

It's true that both perspectives amount to the same thing, but which perspective is better is only a matter of someone's perspective.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Cavebear on July 02, 2018, 06:12:41 AM
Quote from: SGOS on July 02, 2018, 05:43:46 AM
You get used to it.  I attended a lecture put on by some Cal Tech guys that used the "looking into the past" description, rather than the "far away" description.  It was disconcerting to me, but by the end, it made perfect sense.  These guys were studying the formation of galaxies, where you have to look into the past to see what galaxies look like in their early stages.  Then looking at things far away becomes looking into the past.  In fact, everything far away is the past, and what you see is not even there today, or at least in a different form.  The fact that it's far away is really of little importance beyond party conversation:  "I once saw a star that was 13 billion light years away."  Big whoop.  "What does it look like?"  "I don't know.  I can only see what it looked like 13 billion years ago.  I don't even know if it's still there."

Astronomy is about looking at the past.  No matter how far away something is, it's all in the past.  You can't see the present when you look far away.  You can only see the past.  And looking at a far away galaxy tells you nothing about the present.

It's true that both perspectives amount to the same thing, but which perspective is better is only a matter of someone's perspective.

I used to get people annoyed decades ago saying we saw 13 billion years into the past.  A slight science knowledge as filtered in though.

Bit by bit, knowledge accumulates in spite of so many people fighting against it.  And time is relative at even local distances.  If I look at a person, technically, I am seeing the nose fractionally sooner than the rest of the face.  Fortunately, it doesn't matter much.  But it is real.

Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 02, 2018, 06:47:45 AM
Quote from: SGOS on July 02, 2018, 05:43:46 AM
You get used to it.  I attended a lecture put on by some Cal Tech guys that used the "looking into the past" description, rather than the "far away" description.  It was disconcerting to me, but by the end, it made perfect sense.  These guys were studying the formation of galaxies, where you have to look into the past to see what galaxies look like in their early stages.  Then looking at things far away becomes looking into the past.  In fact, everything far away is the past, and what you see is not even there today, or at least in a different form.  The fact that it's far away is really of little importance beyond party conversation:  "I once saw a star that was 13 billion light years away."  Big whoop.  "What does it look like?"  "I don't know.  I can only see what it looked like 13 billion years ago.  I don't even know if it's still there."

Astronomy is about looking at the past.  No matter how far away something is, it's all in the past.  You can't see the present when you look far away.  You can only see the past.  And looking at a far away galaxy tells you nothing about the present.

It's true that both perspectives amount to the same thing, but which perspective is better is only a matter of someone's perspective.

But idealists can see the future, from the porch, like Palin could see Russia from her porch ;-)

Also physics is complicated ... group velocity vs phase velocity and quantum entanglement (that works outside of any velocity).

Physics (the kind that is always in the perfect future) is god, bow down and worship the academics who preach it.
Title: Re: Canaanite etc origins of the Bible
Post by: Baruch on July 02, 2018, 06:49:40 AM
Quote from: Cavebear on July 02, 2018, 06:12:41 AM
I used to get people annoyed decades ago saying we saw 13 billion years into the past.  A slight science knowledge as filtered in though.

Bit by bit, knowledge accumulates in spite of so many people fighting against it.  And time is relative at even local distances.  If I look at a person, technically, I am seeing the nose fractionally sooner than the rest of the face.  Fortunately, it doesn't matter much.  But it is real.

Yes, for most people, physics doesn't matter much, but it is real.  Newton mostly works.  You won't hit a brick wall at near the speed of light, ever.  And at any velocity, your odds of quantum tunneling is very small.  For electrons in transistors, the odds are more in favor.  Don't get me started on how speculative physics has lost its branes in the multiverse.

You monkeys could have tried to divert a lone string with cooking, chess or something else.  Robots, sex robots ... that diverts anyone!