Job and Dinosaurs

[T_aquaticus]

@adamjedgar

You base all of that on this in your referencing of a ridiculous article…God is talking about a penis via a poetic statement of a Cedar tree like gigantic tail?

Calling it ridiculous does not make it untrue. This interpretation has been circling around in theological circles for a while now. Also, a human wrote Job.

It seems rather odd to talk about stones of the loin, or the power of the muscle in the belly. If you saw a dinosaur, why in the world would you talk about a muscle on its belly? What in the world would that be?

The NRSV translation:

Look at Behemoth,

which I made just as I made you;

it eats grass like an ox.

Its strength is in its loins,

and its power in the muscles of its belly.

It makes its tail stiff like a cedar;

the sinews of its thighs are knit together.

Its bones are tubes of bronze,

its limbs like bars of iron (vv. 15-18).

The strength is in its loins? Its power is in the muscles of its belly? Don’t you those are rather strange areas to focus on?

[adamjedgar (adam james edgar)]

@T_aquaticus

Calling it ridiculous does not make it untrue.

calling it ridiculous??? at least my view here stays consistent with what is actually written. I am not the one searching blindly in order to make stuff up that simply isn’t there.

[quote=“T_aquaticus, post:86, topic:50617”]
The strength is in its loins? Its power is in the muscles of its belly? Don’t you those are rather strange areas to focus on?
[/quote]No i do not because the literary writing of Job here is describing a number of aspects of the animal specifically…its tail, its legs, its bones, it belly…i have no issue with any of that…its a rather solid description that one can paint a rather accurate picture of.

When i look at images of a hippo, i see two problems…

1. the tail is obviously not representative of the description in Job
2. the legs are not representative of the description either. A hippos legs in contrast to its body are stumpy and undersize.

I think its a very poor comprehension of writings and an even worse application of the imagery scientifically to make the claim the image below is the massive graceful animal job refers to?

This second image far better fits the wording of Job

“Look at Behemoth,
which I made along with you
and which feeds on grass like an ox.
16 What strength it has in its loins,
what power in the muscles of its belly!
17 Its tail sways like a cedar;
the sinews of its thighs are close-knit.
18 Its bones are tubes of bronze,
its limbs like rods of iron.

I ask you, which one looks more like the description in Job Chapter 40…image 1 or image 2? When i read this, it is very clear that this is a very very large animal with a huge tail. Obviously, it does not need to have a long neck, there are other massive dinosaurs with big tail that do not have long necks…the point is here, clearly in Jobs time, they had intricate knowledge of not only dinosaurs but knowledge even of muscles and tendons and bones …the inner workings of the body are also described 3 times (muscles, sinews & bones)

The point here is this, you cannot accept dinosaurs because you cannot accept that there are any ancient writings that suggest that man lived with large animals like this because scientists have not found them in the same layers in fossil deposits. Thats your reasoning. So because of this, anything written must be wrong despite that information being at least 2500 years old and clearly not corrupted in over 2000 years (as proven by the dead sea scroll find)…not forgetting we also have quite a number of rock drawings and various other archeological artifacts outside of Christianity/religion, that clearly show images of humans with and of massive dinosaurs.

BTW What scholars are you referring too who think this way about the Behemoth description (ie that the passage in job is referring to it penis)?

[T_aquaticus]

@adamjedgar

I am not the one searching blindly in order to make stuff up that simply isn’t there.

But it is there.

@adamjedgar

the tail is obviously not representative of the description in Job

Unless tail is a euphemism for something else.

@adamjedgar

BTW What scholars are you referring too who think this way about the Behemoth description (ie that the passage in job is referring to it penis)?

It’s in the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament. It’ a peer reviewed academic journal.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/03090892211040537?icid=int.sj-full-text.citing-articles.3&

The author is Laura Quick who is a professor at Oxford University in the Theology and Religion department. It’s not like this is some random person off the internet.

@adamjedgar

The point here is this, you cannot accept dinosaurs because you cannot accept that there are any ancient writings that suggest that man lived with large animals like this because scientists have not found them in the same layers in fossil deposits.

I would be ecstatic if dinosaurs were found in modern times. I have no problem with it at all. It is entirely possible for a few non-avian dinosaurs to have snuck through the K/T extinction event and made it to modern times. However, there just isn’t any evidence that they made it. Posting pictures of known fakes like the Ica stones isn’t going to change that.

[Buzzard]

@rsewell

. I have never confused behemoth with leviathan, the multi-headed, fire breathing, sea monster.

I completely understand why someone devoted to scientism would want to avoid discussing the fire-breathing monster described in Job 41.

[T_aquaticus]

@Buzzard

I completely understand why someone devoted to scientism would want to avoid discussing the fire-breathing monster described in Job 41.

Quite a few of the scientists I know are big Game of Thrones fans, and they had no problem discussing fire breathing monsters.

[Klax (The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)]

@Buzzard

@rsewell

. I have never confused behemoth with leviathan, the multi-headed, fire breathing, sea monster.

I completely understand why someone devoted to scientism would want to avoid discussing the fire-breathing monster described in Job 41.

Why? What’s the problem?

[jammycakes (James McKay)]

@adamjedgar

I ask you, which one looks more like the description in Job Chapter 40…image 1 or image 2?

Neither.

The only thing about Behemoth that is more like a sauropod than a hippopotamus is the size of its tail. At the same time, the reeds and ferns are more like a hippopotamus than a sauropod. Everything else could apply equally to both.

Even then, there are other animals that have large tails. Like, for example, the crocodile. Which also makes its home in the reeds and ferns, and apart from eating grass, fits the description to a “T”.

And you still haven’t addressed the possibility that Behemoth could be a generic term for large land animals in general, and that the description could just be a mishmash of different traits from different species.

@adamjedgar

Obviously, it does not need to have a long neck, there are other massive dinosaurs with big tail that do not have long necks…

Nonsense on stilts. A long neck is the single most distinctive feature of a sauropod. Even more so than its big tail. The fact that Behemoth’s neck isn’t even mentioned would be a massive omission if it really were a sauropod.

@adamjedgar

the point is here, clearly in Jobs time, they had intricate knowledge of not only dinosaurs but knowledge even of muscles and tendons and bones

This must be some new meaning of the word “intricate” of which I was not previously aware.

All animals, large and small, have muscles and tendons and bones.

@adamjedgar

The point here is this, you cannot accept dinosaurs because you cannot accept that there are any ancient writings that suggest that man lived with large animals like this because scientists have not found them in the same layers in fossil deposits. Thats your reasoning.

No Adam, the point is here that we cannot accept dinosaurs because the quality of the evidence that you are providing for them is a joke. The drawings and descriptions that you are giving are extremely ambiguous, and a sauropod dinosaur is not only one of several different possible interpretations; it is the one that is most completely out of touch with reality.

And remember what scientists are going by. Measurements. High precision measurements. Hundreds of thousands of them, taken over the course of many decades. It’ll take much more than a tiny handful of vague, ambiguous descriptions and drawings to substantiate a claim that they could all be out by six orders of magnitude yet all be giving the same sets of wrong answers as each other. Especially when you consider that being wrong does not work like that.

@adamjedgar

The Ica stones? Seriously? You really are scraping the bottom of the barrel here.

They were actually admitted to be fake by the person who claimed to have discovered them. He even went on TV to demonstrate how he made them by using a dentist’s drill and baking them in cow dung to give them an aged appearance.

[rsewell (RON SEWELL)]

@Buzzard

I completely understand why someone devoted to scientism would want to avoid discussing the fire-breathing monster described in Job 41.

For the record, I hold that all truth is God’s truth. I would remind you that forum guidelines are to not attribute beliefs to others. More to the point of this discussion, I have no aversion to discussing leviathan, and would maintain that this is not any sort of reference to a marine dinosaur.

[beaglelady]

Technically, according to evil, secular dinosaur paleontologists, dinosaurs are descendants of the most recent common ancestor of Iguanodon, Diplodocus, and Megalosaurus. Not sure how Job’s beast fits in here. But these guys study dinosaurs so what do they know?

[beaglelady]

@rsewell

I have no aversion to discussing leviathan, and would maintain that this is not any sort of reference to a marine dinosaur.

You mean marine reptiles? They were very cool!

[beaglelady]

@T_aquaticus

Posting pictures of known fakes like the Ica stones isn’t going to change that.

What about the Jurassic Park/Jurassic World documentaries?

[rsewell (RON SEWELL)]

@beaglelady

You mean marine reptiles?

Yes. Noted.

[cewoldt (Craig Ewoldt)]

When was this? Really, I would like to know. My understanding is that it is at least an open question. Here’s one problem:

Before there were any reports of dinosaur skin with circles on them, the person making the “fakes” illustrated them very accurately.

And he must have gotten immunity from prosecution for previously selling them as genuine. Or maybe he was under pressure to change his narrative.

Yes, the provenance of ica stones is problematic. But Cabrera , the owner of the stones, has submitted them for testing in qualified laboratories and and the patina is natural oxidation, and there are no scratch marks on them.

So skepticism can be allowed. But scaping the bottom of the barrel? I don’t think so.

[beaglelady]

@cewoldt

Yes, the provenance of ica stones is problematic. But Cabrera , the owner of the stones, has submitted them for testing in qualified laboratories and and the patina is natural oxidation, and there are no scratch marks on them.

What qualified labs? Are these findings written up in professional journals?

[Buzzard]

@anon61138028

The ancient Hebrews, like all the people in their time and place, thought the earth was a flat disk

Reminds me of the time I got kicked out the local chapter of the Flat Earth Society simply for suggesting that the earth might be slightly curved. Those people are so intolerant.

[adamjedgar (adam james edgar)]

[quote=“Klax, post:91, topic:50617, full:true”]

@Buzzard

@rsewell

. I have never confused behemoth with leviathan, the multi-headed, fire breathing, sea monster.
[/quote]

I completely understand why someone devoted to scientism would want to avoid discussing the fire-breathing monster described in Job 41.

Why? What’s the problem?

As a rational human being, and as a Christian, i have difficulty in reconciling multi-headed fire breathing dragon. I will grant this one has me still sitting in no man’s land. A couple of reasons why:

1. I cannot reconcile that a biological creature is able to withstand the temperatures of fire coming out of its mouth
2. Do we have any biological examples where a creature could ignite such a fire without “lightning striking down from heaven” to achieve such a task?
3. Are multiple heads an improvement in our observations in life?

See even i can be a science-driven skeptic of biblical interpretations. One theory i have heard is that perhaps the fire breathing is more representative of the liquid that such a creature may have “spat out” at its prey or in defense or itself. (we have examples of this today)

I am actually really keen to hear ideas on whether or not God would have created multiple-headed animals given that we seem to see this kind of thing as being degenerative (siamese twins etc)

[cewoldt (Craig Ewoldt)]

Yes. You can read a peer reviewed article here: Journal of Creation 30 (3):67–73, December 2016 Can the Ica Stones be independently authenticated?. Read the article before dismissing it.

[Buzzard]

@rsewell

I have never confused behemoth with leviathan, the multi-headed, fire breathing, sea monster.

Speaking of confusion, I can’t find anything in Job about Leviathan being “multi-headed”. Which verse is that?

[Buzzard]

@adamjedgar

As a rational human being, and as a Christian, i have difficulty in reconciling multi-headed fire breathing dragon

Me too … mainly bcoz I can’t find a verse in the Bible that describes Leviathan as being “multi-headed”.

The description of fire-breathing may be an example of Hebrew “poetic licence”.

[Buzzard]

@rsewell

For the record, I hold that all truth is God’s truth.

Glad to hear it, amigo. Same here.

I would remind you that forum guidelines are to not attribute beliefs to others.

Did I attribute a belief to you? In my post I referred to “someone devoted to scientism”.