Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
Were the first books of the “Old Testament” composed by “redactors” piecing together stories from different sources (that has long been the predominant view) or is it possible that they were composed by a single author or “school of authors”? The former is the documentary hypothesis. For a background on the documentary hypothesis refer to … Continue reading “Another look at the Documentary Hypothesis. An alternative proposal.”
I am copying here a comment that Philippe Wajdenbaum made in relation to another post. (I have reformatted the original.) Many thanks for this post, and for the quality of your blog. Russell Gmirkin’s “Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible” is a most important book that will elicit a paradigm shift in biblical … Continue reading “Genesis to Kings, the work of a single authorship?”
I have made a correction to a serious error in my recent post How Plato Inspired Moses: Creation of the Hebrew Bible. In that post I took credit for identifying many parallels between the Hebrew Bible and Plato’s Laws prior to reading Russell Gmirkin’s book. I should have acknowledged — and I have now made … Continue reading “Correction to my latest post on Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible“
Plato’s Laws provides the only example in antiquity of an ethical or national literature comparable to the Hebrew Bible. . . . . . . . One may therefore reasonably propose that the biblical authors not only found in Plato’s Laws a blueprint for the creation of a persuasive legal code, but a mandate and … Continue reading “How Plato Inspired Moses: Creation of the Hebrew Bible”
Here are all the posts I have completed so far on Russell Gmirkin’s book, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible. You can also read an extended abstract or chapter by chapter outline by Gmirkin himself on his academia.edu page. As you can see I have not yet begun to post anything on the … Continue reading “Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible – Post #32”
A first century Greek named Strabo documented an account he heard or read on the founding of a colony at present day Marseilles, southern France. The founders were from the Greek city-state of Phocaea, present day Foça on the Turkish coast. The date of the founding was around 600 BCE. In 2005 Vetus Testamentum published … Continue reading “Two Foundation Stories: Dan by the Danites, Massilia by the Greeks”
. Russell Gmikin’s Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible led me to another work, one cited by Gmirkin, Weinfeld, Moshe. 1993. The Promise of the Land: The Inheritance of the Land of Canaan by the Israelites. Berkeley: University of California Press. The opening pages describe a typological comparison of the roles of the … Continue reading “Rome’s and Israel’s Ancestor Traditions: How Do We Explain the Similarities?”
There is a review by Stéphanie Anthonioz of Russell Gmirkin’s Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible on The Bible and Interpretation site. Review of Russell E. Gmirkin, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible I have been discussing this book — see Archives: Gmirkin: Plato and Creation of Hebrew Bible — and … Continue reading “Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible – review”
In some texts written by authors who had lost their state and been conquered by others, as may have been the case with the Yahwist, one can also see evidence of culture myths being used to delegitimize the conquering state. McCants, William F.. Founding Gods, Inventing Nations: Conquest and Culture Myths from Antiquity to Islam … Continue reading “Christianity as a counter-cultural myth to delegitimize Rome”
One of the oddities for us moderns of the Genesis creation account is that the sun, moon and stars are not created until the fourth day of the week even though light was created on the first day and vegetation on the third. How can light exist without the sun? That’s our first thought. (If … Continue reading “Why the Sun, Moon, Stars Were Created So Late in the Week”
Continuing directly on from my previous post I address here the two most well-known Athenian trials that mirror the Pentateuchal laws against private and innovative religious practices and deities. We saw that biblical law condemned all worship that was not centred on the official public shrine or temple. Any form of insult towards the gods … Continue reading “Socrates as Anti-Hero according to Biblical Law”
Posts in this series are archived at Gmirkin: Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible –o0o– Popular culture presents us with an image of ancient classical Athens, the days of Pericles, of Socrates, the mocking playwrights and the democratic assemblies, as a time of free-thinking, exploratory enlightenment. It is difficult to imagine some of … Continue reading “The Law of Moses, a Reflection of the Law that Condemned Socrates and Other Greek Philosophers”
We think of Hellenism as the enemy against which the Maccabees fought to the death. But consider the following . . . . To celebrate the recapturing and re-dedication of the Jerusalem Temple in 164 BCE the Maccabees instituted the festival of Hannukah [=Dedication]: Judah and his brethren and the whole congregation of Israel ordained, … Continue reading “Those Hellenistic and Hellenizing Maccabees and Pharisees”
Continuing from previous posts, the following draws upon a secondary source used by Russell Gmirkin in Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible in his discussion of military law as set out in Deuteronomy. The extracts that follow are from Anselm C. Hagedorn’s Between Moses and Plato: Individual and Society in Deuteronomy and Ancient Greek Law. … Continue reading “Deuteronomy’s Military Law — So Very Greek”