2010-11-08

On eating babies and the pagan’s faith in history, too

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

by Neil Godfrey

Dr Jim’s Thinking Shop is too quiet lately, but when it speaks it makes up for ages of silence with a good belly laugh with a dash of cerebral acuity.

His photo of the atheist BBQ [Link //drjimsthinkingshop.com/2010/10/11/a-snap-from-this-summers-atheist-bbq/ and blog is no longer active… Neil, 23rd Sept, 2015] is a must-see, and his previous article Cooking the Book . . . how not to do religious studies [Link //drjimsthinkingshop.com/2010/07/03/cooking-the-book-on-the-bible-and-how-not-to-do-religious-studies/ and blog is no longer active… Neil, 23rd Sept, 2015] is a perfect companion to my earlier posts on the historicism of much Historical Jesus scholarship:

I’ve run completely out of patience with the almost impossible to avoid rubbish that Livingston repeats here (he certainly did not invent this idea!). “Yawheh was revealed to Israel through her historical experience” What frikkin’ theistic religion (other than deism) DOESN’T think that their deities show their power in historical events? And didn’t the Israelites think that big storms, famines, locust swarms, etc. were the will of their God? Didn’t Babylonians interpret their military history as being influenced by their deities?

And as for the “uniqueness” of the Israelite religion:

Certainly, the ancient Israelite and Judean worldviews were NOT identical to that of their neighbours, but then the Babylonians’ were NOT identical to that of the Assyrians, Hittites, Egyptians, Persians and so forth. Too often, scholars construct lump together non-Israelite cultures and religions as one part of a dichotomy with Israel and the Bible on the other. This polarity does not help the cause of understanding any of these ancient people, religions or texts. “All non-biblical religions look the same” and “All god are created equal but Yahweh is more equal than that others” are biases that biblical and world religions scholars must overcome.

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Latest posts by Neil Godfrey (see all)

Is Everything a Question of Probability? - 2024-12-15 03:04:03 GMT+0000
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0 thoughts on “On eating babies and the pagan’s faith in history, too”

Dr. Jim says:

2010-11-09 01:03:04 GMT+0000 at 01:03

I have cerebral acuity?

Reply
1. Steven Carr says:
  
  2010-11-09 01:19:37 GMT+0000 at 01:19
  
  If you have to ask what cerebral acuity is, then you ain’t got it.
  
  Reply
  1. Neil Godfrey says:
    
    2010-11-09 04:17:35 GMT+0000 at 04:17
    
    But the Viking hat compensates.
    
    Reply
    1. Anonymous says:
      
      2010-11-09 06:33:41 GMT+0000 at 06:33
      
      Spear and magic helmet?
      
      Reply

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Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I re-read my earlier reply and can see how you took it as “emotional” — but I can assure you…” Dec 18, 02:43
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I simply asked you to tell me what it is that you think I misunderstand or what, specifically, I am…” Dec 17, 20:26
Petr Jancar on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “Neil, I have no interest to engage in an emotional discussion. I felt indebted to you, since I read many…” Dec 17, 19:21
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “Why do you ask? What are you trying to argue? I agree and acknowledge that Bayes theorem is a valid…” Dec 16, 09:22
Petr Jancar on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “My sentence “I voice several assumptions, testing if we all agree on them:” was meant as a yes/no question; let…” Dec 16, 08:57
Clarke W Owens on Is Everything a Question of Probability?: “Well, the distinction between “public knowledge” and the knowledge of professional researchers is not always crystal clear. For example, western…” Dec 15, 22:34
Neil Godfrey on Is Everything a Question of Probability?: “I spoke of public knowledge but afterwards wondered if I missed your point. You may have been thinking of knowledge…” Dec 15, 22:05
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I don’t think the scholars who do this are engaging in “nonsense”. I think they are genuinely trapped in thinking…” Dec 15, 21:52
Neil Godfrey on Is Everything a Question of Probability?: “Empirical knowledge is different from Bayesian probabilism, but so is most all other knowledge, because knowledge is socially determined. I…” Dec 15, 21:31

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