Yeah, we’re kind of full of ourselves. If everything could just be a fact then we’d have an easier time being in charge. Of course life tends to be livelier than facts.
On the one hand, the Old Testament is not modernistic academic history. Even those parts that are focused on reporting historical events are selecting events that illustrate theological points, not merely recounting the history of ancient Israel. On the other, however, the historical claims that it makes are well-supported. It is, after all, an authentic collection of ancient Near Eastern documents. The picture of the geography, politics, and cultures is correct, not just generally for the region but also for the changing times within the narrative. For example, the alliance of Mesopotamian kings taking on Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 14 reflects the early 2nd millennium political situation in Mesopotamia; later there was generally just one dominant leader at a time. It is not particularly plausible as much later invention - how would they have done the archaeological research to accurately use names current a thousand years before? This is a culture where literacy was easy and financially advantageous, so anything important got written down.
The current traditions questioning biblical accuracy largely trace back to before the availability of archaeological data. Obviously a prejudice that the Bible can’t be true is not a valid logical basis for assessing its accuracy. Similarly, a bias against the possibility of supernatural activity cannot be the basis of proof. All ancient Near Eastern cultures attributed events to supernatural causes; this does not show that the events were fictional, though conversely the events being true does not show that their theological interpretation was correct.
We do have ancient Near Eastern examples of historical figures being invoked in a fictional setting, but these are characteristically fairy-tale type settings - mountains of precious stones and the like. The Old Testament is quite mundane - these are quite realistic people in regular settings, complete with human failings, not idealized myths. I am unaware of any actual scientific evidence to support the late dates claimed by critical scholarship. We do not have the comparative data to give precise dates to stylistic elements, and we do have evidence of editorial updating of the vocabulary. Claims that particular ideas must be late are even less well justified - people think of all sorts of ideas at various points, and many supposedly “late” ideas are found early on in ancient writing.
Sorry, but I would like to clarify. In the Gospels, the genealogies of Jesus are listed and there they fulfill the names from the Old Testament (Abraham and others). Even in the Old Testament, they predict the coming of the Messiah. How to deal with this?
Don’t you dare apologize to the likes of me Alex 
The genealogies of Jesus don’t fulfil anything apart from attempts to make Jesus (and a million other if not all contemporary Jews) of Davidic royal blood. There is no significance to them.
The OT is messianic from its post-C6th Exilic cut, aye, but again Jesus taking that cultural mantle upon Himself is not the fulfilment of prophecy.
It couldn’t work in modern culture.
And I really, really want the Incarnation to be true. But these things prove nothing at all.
Altair,
The better question would be how do we verify the existence of any person who lived say 100 years ago then keep going backwards say 1000 years than 2000?
What evidence or type of evidence would convince you?
1 Like
thanks for the answer! I am not an expert in archeology, I do not know how scientists define the historicity of people. I am more worried about the problem of understanding, if indeed some biblical characters are all fiction, how should Christians understand this? does not this refute Christianity?
They generally don’t (not from recently recorded history, anyway). That’s more the bailiwick of historians.
If people like Jesus or Paul or Peter never existed, that would indeed fatally undermine Christianity. But why are you supposing that historicity must be the only important type of truth that must be satisfied? Wouldn’t you agree that the prodigal son character is almost certainly a fictitious character? And if so, are we forced to conclude that Jesus’ use of such fictions empties his teachings of truth? Surely not. So I’m not sure why some insist that historicity is the sole, or even primary linchpin on which all truth must hang. Jesus’ teachings alone deal the fatal blow to that blanket assumption. That alone is enough answer for some of us. But even so …
Perhaps, edging closer to more controversial questions, would stories like Jonah or Job be suddenly shorn of their message-content if they proved to be “mere” parables? And also note, there is an entire world, too, of other possibilities in between total non-historicity, and historical down to every detail. All in between there would be real figures and real events that existed historically but on and around which narratives and hyperbole were later accreted. How a story is re-told is itself an important part of the process and, in fact, is a major part of where legitimate (even Divine) inspiration almost certainly comes into play.
2 Likes
thanks for the answer! I have no problem with Job or Jonah. I can accept them as literary images. But what about the statements of historians, for example, that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses are just literary images and symbols? should they be treated like Jonah and Job? thank you!
I think those were all historical, even if every detail we have about them doesn’t bear the weight of what we now pack into the descriptor: “historical”. I think even Noah … and all the way back to Adam could well have been historical, though I would invest less and less probability and insistence on it the farther back they recede before Abraham. And I feel no need whatsoever to think of Adam, Eve, and their fall in literalist terms. I think the meaning of the narrative is much deeper and more profound than that. I think literalists do a disservice to scripture when they try to imprison an otherwise profound narrative, as if it should be containable as some sort of a one-off journalistic event. I reject that. I think it’s a story, first of all about the children of Israel, and then finally through them, about all of us. That’s my opinion on it, anyway. I think scripture is ultimately for and about all of us.
1 Like
It is the same question of ANY historical person, say 50 years ago - Written and signed documents, videos, or pictures, eye witnesses and written records. You are looking for the same evidence of any person.
Written records their quality, quantity and the time between the event and writing about them. The persons, places, and events listed during the different periods of Old Testament history match up well with the facts and evidence from history and archaeology.
The Hittites were painted as a bible fabrication until Sayce identified them from a non-biblical source, the monuments in 1876. Others have said Moses could not have written the first five books of the Old Testament because ‘writing’ was virtually unknown.
Excavations at Ugarit reveal a high material and literary culture in Canaan prior to the emergence of the Hebrews. The educational system was so advanced that dictionaries in four languages were compiled for the use of scribes, and the individual words were listed in their Ugaritic, Babylonian, Sumerian, and Hurrian equivalents. The beginnings of Israel are rooted in a highly cultural Canaan…Canaan in the days of the Patriarchs was the hub of a great international culture. That is one example.
What about Jesus?
Jesus is mentioned in quite a few non-Christian texts from ancient times. For economy of space and time, I won’t reproduce every early source that attests to Jesus’ existence. Still, I’ll list some of the significant references and provide the quotations scholars use when looking into the existence of Jesus.
Roman: PLINY THE YOUNGER (AD 62–113) Epistles 10.96
Roman: TACITUS (AD 60–120) Annals 15.44
Roman: SUETONIUS (AD 75–160) Life of Claudius 25.4:
Roman: MARA BAR SERAPION (2nd or 3rd century)
Jewish: FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS (AD 37–100),
None of which attest the claim let alone prove He was God incarnate.
You know me Mr. Moderator, what could be historical - methodologically natural - about any of them?
Oh - I don’t know - maybe that they were real people that actually lived? It seems likely to me that narratives have at least their seeds, if not their entire substance from reality itself. But I don’t insist on it, any more than I would (like you) insist that they couldn’t be sourced in something historical. I don’t traffic in rational “certainty” about everything like you do.
I traffic in rationality period. And faith. The Patriarchs and Moses are certainly based on legendary, mythical, traditional figures set 1500 years before they were finally edited by a culture with Saxon historiography. Rational certainties apply to rational certainties, like the infinite, eternal multiverse, which is a methodological AND religious naturalistic certainty. They don’t exclude the possibility of King Arthur. But they do exclude the Lady in the Lake. So what could be left of the Patriarchs and Moses shorn of fantasy? And what difference do they make to faith in Jesus’ faithfulness either way?
Why should I worry about “what is left” of them? I have “what is left” of them to me … left to me by the old testament prophets, and redactors - passed along by translators since; including what Christ taught of them as well. What more should I want?
2 Likes
Best possible answer.
As long as faith doesn’t depend on or include it all being woodenly literally, inerrantly, infallibly so. Not that such stories are errant or fallible actually, but declaring that they are is. Once that is out of the way we can address Jesus’ enculturated, redacted epistemology and semiotics freely.
[And contrary contrarian as I be Mervin, I’m fascinated first by any reality behind the stories, the origin of them, because they obviously orally and writtenly pre-date their final publication by 900-1500 years. Are the Israelites Canaanites (80%)? Or Babylonians (20%)? What are the actual stories of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, if any? AND where is God in all of this? The God who clothed Himself in these myths (80%…98%…99.8%)?]
1 Like
This topic was automatically closed 6 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.