Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
Neils Peter Lemche (link is to my posts referencing NPL) has reviewed archaeologist Yonatan Adler’s The Origins of Judaism (link is to my post on Adler’s book) and related its evidence and argument to the work of Russell Gmirkin’s Plato and the Hebrew Bible. — on which I have posted in depth here. Lemche’s review … Continue reading “Archaeological Support for Gmirkin’s Thesis on Plato and the Hebrew Bible”
Bryn Mawr Classical Review has published a review by Nicholas Banner of Russell Gmirkin’s Plato’s Timaeus and the Biblical Creation Accounts in addition to giving space for Gmirkin to post a reply. Last year and early this year I posted a series on the same work: Plato and the Biblical Creation Accounts (Gmirkin). Banner’s judgment … Continue reading “BMCR Review of Russell Gmirkin’s Plato’s Timaeus and the Biblical Creation Accounts”
1. Biblical Creation Accounts and Plato – 1 2022-09-25 In his opening chapter RG explains how he will go about identifying the sources behind the Primordial History gives an overview of the history of the scholarly views of Genesis 1-11 and where his own research fits(hint: it all started with the Copenhagen school of biblical … Continue reading “Plato and the Biblical Creation Accounts (Gmirkin)“
. . . with Russell Gmirkin’s book, Plato and the Hebrew Bible These three Vridar posts have been translated into Polish and posted on the Testimonia blog: 1. Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible 2. The Pentateuch’s Debt to Greek Laws and Constitutions — A New Look 3. David, an Ideal Greek Hero — … Continue reading “Vridar Goes to Poland with Russell Gmirkin, Plato and the Hebrew Bible”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9znMWH3LC9E Vridar posts on Russell Gmirkin’s books discussed in the podcast: Berossus and Genesis, Manetho and Exodus: Hellenistic Histories and the Date of the Pentateuch Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible .
1. Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible (2016-10-16) Russell Gmirkin in his new book, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible draws attention to striking similarities between the Pentateuch (the first five books of the “Old Testament”) on the one hand and Plato’s last work, Laws, and features of the Athenian constitution … Continue reading “Plato and the Hebrew Bible (Gmirkin)“
A week ago we saw Stéphanie Anthonioz‘s review of Russell Gmirkin’s Plato and the Hebrew Bible on The Bible and Interpretation. See Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible – review. Today we can read Russell’s response: A Response to Stéphanie Anthonioz, “Review of Russell E. Gmirkin, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew … Continue reading “Hebrew Bible of Hellenistic Origin – Gmirkin responds to Anthonioz’s review”
I originally wrote the following as an introduction to my next post on Russell E. Gmirkin’s new book, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible. On reflection, it was too long to be part of a post addressing the book so here it is a separate introductory post instead. Our historically conditioned deafness to … Continue reading “Some preliminaries before resuming Gmirkin’s Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible“
Having surveyed what the archaeological evidence tells us about religious practices of the Judeans in Elephantine (see the previous post) let’s now compare the evidence for Judah and Samaria in the same period. This time I am quoting only two sources, a chapter by Reinhard G. Kratz in A Companion to the Achaemenid Empire and … Continue reading “Judah and Samaria in Persian Times — the Evidence (and a way out of a quandary)”
My title refers to the anonymous texts in both the Old and New Testaments and why among those anonymous works we encounter numerous contradictions, even within the same works. I came across one of the clearest explanations to this question in David’s Secret Demons by Baruch Halpern. Halpern explains why “Near Eastern” writing is so … Continue reading “Why Bible Authors Wrote Anonymously and with Contradictions”
Continuing from Why Josiah’s Reforms “Must Have Happened” – part 2 The Deuteronomistic History (DH) is a modern theoretical construct holding that behind the present forms of the books of Deuteronomy and Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings (the Former Prophets in the Hebrew canon) there was a single literary work. In the late 19th century, … Continue reading “Why Josiah’s Reforms “Must Have Happened” – part 3 (conclusion)”
Continuing from Why Josiah’s Reforms “Must Have Happened” – part 1 Rainer Albertz is disputing the arguments of Philip R. Davies that the book of Deuteronomy could not have been written as early as the time of King Josiah. Argument 1: According to Davies, since Deuteronomy uses the name “Israel” to refer to all of … Continue reading “Why Josiah’s Reforms “Must Have Happened” – part 2”
In this post I will explain “my personal reason” for strongly suspecting a Hellenistic origin of the biblical literature — though I am sure I have come across the same ideas throughout different books and articles over the years. It follows on from #5 in the preceding post. When I wrote that I was expecting … Continue reading “Why (to me) the Old Testament “Feels” Hellenistic”
Imagine digging down through centuries of layers at an archaeological site and suddenly finding an old smartphone. You would know it must have been planted there by some trickster. You would know that it could not be more than a few years old despite uncovering it in a layer supposedly centuries old. I believe it … Continue reading “The Problem with an Early Date for the Hebrew Bible”