Your quote above is no different from your earlier quote:
How is it that this paragraph doesn’t explain the “why”?
“None of the books from Genesis 12 to the end of 2 Kings show any knowledge of Adam, Eve, the garden, the serpent, the fall, Cain and Abel, the flood, or the tower of Babel, the sabbath memorializing the creation (Moses explicitly says the sabbath memorializes the exodus from Egypt), or any of the events of Genesis 1-10. It’s not merely that these chapters aren’t quoted, it’s that most of the Old Testament shows no knowledge of them at all.”
After reading his explanation, you should be able to grasp the mechanisms that his analysis engages:
My analysis of what Jonathan describes:
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If in Deuteronomy [my first version erroneously mentions Exodus here] Moses specifically states: “the sabbath memorializes the Exodus from Egypt…”, and if Moses had also written the story of the Creation Week (the other reason for the Sabbath?) as it is suggested in Exodus, don’t you think he would have mentioned it instead? - - or mention it along with his other statement he makes in Deuteronomy?
On the other hand, if someone was writing a section of Genesis as part of a long set of telescoping backstories for Exodus, and inserts a post-exilic comment in Exodus to support the Genesis Back-story, it would be understandable that the scribe of Deuteronomy doesn’t make any effort to Creation or the Exodus reference to creation, because that would prove this part of Genesis was written after Exodus.
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After reading Jonathan’s explanation (with the implicatinos they entail) the only remaining question should be “Who agrees with this?”
That’s pure circular reasoning there, pal. The reference to the creation week in Exodus is an addition. Why? Because Genesis 12-2 Kings doesn’t have any knowledge of the primeval history. Therefore, the reference to the creation week in Exodus must be a later addition.
The entire consort you’re promulgating is an exercise of circular reasoning.
If in Deuteronomy [my first version erroneously mentions Exodus here] Moses specifically states: “the sabbath memorializes the Exodus from Egypt…”, and if Moses had also written the story of the Creation Week (the other reason for the Sabbath?) as it is suggested in Exodus, don’t you think he would have mentioned it instead? - - or mention it along with his other statement he makes in Deuteronomy?
Argument from silence. I’ve seen the chaos that happens when atheists try to explain why this or that in the Bible “should” have mentioned this or that given a certain hypothesis, and this type of psychoanalysis of what the author “should” have written always leads to nonsense conclusions. In the end of the day, you aren’t atheists and neither am I, but the chaos that occurs as a result of this chaotic reasoning is no less subtle.
And, again, are you going to address my most recent comments on the etymology of Moses name or do you agree with me now? I might as well be told what’s on your mind since getting that screenshot of the Pennsylvanian Sumerian Dictionary wasn’t easy.
Your image of “mus” = snake is a very impressive database on the actual cuneiform symbols, rather than on the words (whether transliterated or translated). So your observation that there is only one attested example under 1500 BCE (compared to 97 under 2000 BCE) shows an interesting extinction of the use of that particular cuneiform. Since “snakes” themselves probably still had a robust presence in the ANE, I can confidently suggest that some other sign was becoming more common while the one we see here (which looks a bit like an oboe?) was becoming less common.
In your more recent post, you suggest that I am using circular reasoning.
Text-Critical analysis can have the appearance of circularity, but it’s really about the psychology of story telling and composition. Naturally, people can go overboard on such things.
But in this case, @Jonathan_Burke makes an awfully good point about Moses. If he wrote Deuteronomy, Exodus and Genesis, you would not expect him to formulate two different reasons for the Sabbath. When a writer comes up with a 2nd reason for something, they frequently find a way to dovetail the new reason into a discussion of the old reason.
But this is not what we see… plus the sheer oddity of the Deuteronomy explanation. If the Exodus explanation about the Creation story was generally known, I don’t see any sense in the Deuteronomy explanation.
Here’s a broad range of Google Book pages … offering various views on the “MS” cuneiform on any or all of these meanings:
Priest
Hero
Illustrious
Leader
Expert
In some discussions, the term is a duplicative: “mas-mas” or “mas-masu”, which is an obvious “intensification” of whatever the meaning of “mas” is assumed to be originally.
Naturally, it would be a neater picture of “Mus” or “Mas” were identical, but considering even the same word had more than one way of being represented in cuneiform, it’s not going to be too tidy.
So, if cuneiform instructors taught Hebrew scribes that “mus” meant one thing, and “mas” meant another thing, the vowels were always going to drop out when it came to putting something in writing (if you are using the Semitic scripts).
Before I advance anything, I need to quickly address something you mentioned on the side:
But in this case, @Jonathan_Burke makes an awfully good point about Moses. If he wrote Deuteronomy, Exodus and Genesis, you would not expect him to formulate two different reasons for the Sabbath.
Moses did not write Exodus or Genesis. Moses may or may not have written some form of Deuteronomy that we can’t exactly know of today. But the traditional idea of Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch is impossible to maintain in light of recent scholarship, and the fact that, as many have shown, the Pentateuch itself says that Moses did not write the Pentateuch. Christopher Rollston from George Washington University wrote this important piece that has convinced me of this:
By the way, I must once again draw to the claim that Genesis 1-11 was never referred to until the exile. I cited Exodus to refute this, but Jonathan claims it’s a later addititon and so now we wait to see his references. Since then, in my research, I have come across another reference to Genesis 1-11 (which is VERY early) by mere coincidence. In the Old Testament, there are a number of songs and poems which are very archaic. It’s like in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, where we find an early creed in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7 dating to the earliest days of Christianity. In the Old Testament, we have old songs/poems like the Song of Deborah, Song of the Sea, Blessing of Jacob, and another one which I will draw from here, the Song of Moses (Deuteronomy 32:1-43). According to Richard Elliott Friedman regarding this song, a major scholar in the field, “Near the end of the Torah comes a song. The text atttributes it to Moses. It may not in fact be by Moses, but it is in fact very old” (The Exodus, HarperCollins, 2017 p. 169). This song dates may date somewhere from the 10th-8th centuries BC, anyhow some centuries before the exile and predating Deuteronomy itself, and says:
“When the Highest gave nations legacies, when He dispersed humankind, He set the people’s borders to the number of the children of Israel” (Deut. 32:8).
The dispersion of humankind is clearly referring to the belief that God, after what happened at the tower of babel, confused the languages of the people and dispersed them across the world. This is recorded in Genesis 11, part of the primeval history. So, this is a clear reference/allusion to the primeval history before the exile. I don’t know when @Jonathan_Burke will be back but let’s see how he addresses this and the Exodus passage.
I will write in response to your recent notes on similiar words mas/mus in Hittite, Akkadian etc in a future comment.
@Jonathan_Burke is probably going to tell you that you reading of the text is misleading.
You provide this quote:
“When the Highest gave nations legacies, when He dispersed humankind, He set the people’s borders to the number of the children of Israel” (Deut. 32:8).
Your version includes the term “dispersed” … and you don’t even try to include the phrase “Sons of Adam”.
If we look at multiple translations, we see slightly different things:
Translations for Deu 32:8
KJV
When the most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.
NKJV
When the Most High divided their inheritance to the nations,
When He separated the sons of Adam,
He set the boundaries of the peoples
According to the number of the children of Israel.
NLT
When the Most High assigned lands to the nations,
when he divided up the human race,
he established the boundaries of the peoples
according to the number in his heavenly court.[fn]
NIV
When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.[fn]
ESV
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
when he divided mankind,
he fixed the borders[fn] of the peoples
according to the number of the sons of God.[fn]
CSB
When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance[fn]
and divided the human race,
he set the boundaries of the peoples
according to the number of the people of Israel.[fn]
NASB
“When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,
When He separated the sons of [fn]man,
He set the boundaries of the peoples
According to the number of the sons of Israel.
NET
When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided up humankind, he set the boundaries of the peoples, according to the number of the heavenly assembly.
RSV
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of men, he fixed the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.
ASV
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
When he separated the children of men,
He set the bounds of the peoples
According to the number of the children of Israel.
YLT
In the Most High causing nations to inherit, In His separating sons of Adam – He setteth up the borders of the peoples By the number of the sons of Israel.
DBY
When the Most High assigned to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the peoples According to the number of the children of Israel.
WEB
When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.
VUL
quando dividebat Altissimus gentes quando separabat filios Adam constituit terminos populorum iuxta numerum filiorum Israhel
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So what version is Friedman using? None of the usual versions use “dispersed”. They use the more generic term for “separation” , or “assignment”, or what he “gave” them. And even if they did use it, I would be suspicious of a reference like this that seems to intentionally exclude any mention of the drama of the Tower’s construction!
And the reference to “Adam” is only used a few times, apparently under the impression that it is “generic mankind”, rather than a specific reference to the companion of Eve who we would call “the” Adam.
Before I deal with the rest I’ll address this quickly.
I don’t know where your quotation comes from, but I own Friedman’s book Exodus and it isn’t there (in fact the book doesn’t even have 169 pages). Nor is it in his earlier work “The Bible With Sources Revealed”. Can you find any evidence that Friedman believes this verse in Deuteronomy is evidence that Genesis 1-11 is pre-exilic?
The word for dispersed/divided in Deuteronomy 32:8 is not used anywhere in the tower of Babel narrative, so there isn’t even a linguistic connection.
I cannot find any commentator who suggests that Deuteronomy 32:8 is a reference to the tower of Babel; they all say it is a reference to the believe that God established areas where each nation should live, at creation, before nations even existed.
So far you’ve been able to assert evidence for only two references to anything in Genesis 1-11, in the entire body of text from Genesis 12 to the end of 2 Kings. That really says it all; there’s just no evidence that Genesis 1-11 were known before the exile. I was hoping you would address my entire argument about the Exodus passage but since it seems you’re not going to, I only need to reply to your comments on the small bit you did mention.
Even though this comment is in response to gbrooks, I need @Jonathan_Burke to read it as well. I’ll deal with gbrooks comments first.
Richard Elliott Friedman, being the renowned scholar he is, takes to translating the verses for himself. (This is something I’ve seen pretty much most top scholars do in their books. Bart Ehrman translates the verses for himself. So does Richard Hays. Significant scholars don’t think they have much need for translations since they can simply read the original text.) Anywhere, all cited translations you provide support me, and you’re certainly wrong. A quick check will make it clear that every commentary ever written, and scholarly analysis ever written, understands this verse the same – it’s taking about the dispersion of humanity in Genesis 10-11. As I said earlier, all the translations you provided support me, since, for example, when the NASB translates “separated” (instead of dispersion apparently) in Deuteronomy 32:8, it also translates “separated” in Genesis 10:32, since both verses use the same Hebrew word פָּרַד (parad, see Strong’s Hebrew #6504 and click on the concordance). It’s the same in the Hebrew, being picky about English synonyms won’t get you anywhere. Again, there’s not even a dispute among scholarship whether or not the Song of Moses alludes to the dispersion/separation/whatever word you want to use of humanity in Genesis 10-11, it’s a pretty obvious fact. In fact, this is Friedman’s interpretation as well.
In fact, to confirm this, in the last minute of typing this I simply went to Google Scholar, typed in and enterred ‘Deuteronomy 32:8’ and clicked on the first thing that popped up. What came up was an exposition on this passage by Michael Heiser, and he practically presupposes this is talking about what’s happening after the confusion of languages in the Tower of Babel. See his full paper: http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1278&context=lts_fac_pubs
Trying to find a way around this passage isn’t going to end well.
As for the mas/mus thing again, it appears the word has relatives in and among other Semitic languages that aren’t too far from Israel in time, certainly a lot better than Sumer. Nevertheless, I still see a weak connection – one of the translations is priest, though Moses wasn’t a priest. Some others are ‘lord’ and ‘illustrious’, although the Bible never appears to ever identify Moses with lordship or someone being magnificent or illustrious. Rather, when God tells Moses he will bring His people out of Israel, Moses actually asks “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” Moses considers himself of low ability, in fact, unable to bring Israel out of Egypt at first. I don’t find this supposed root having any connection to the actual Moses. Secondly, I’ve already explained why Egyptian is a much better source of influence than these other Semitic languages – Moses is born in Egypt, he’s raised by Egyptians, the entire story is about him getting from Egypt to Israel. Where does Hatti or Akkad ever come to play? And, furthermore, besides the fact that the entire thing is about Egypt, there are hundreds of Egyptian loanwords in the exodus and wilderness narratives alone as I have already explained, and there’s a bunch of characters in the exodus and wilderness narratives we already know to have Egyptian names. Why not also Moses? And wouldn’t an Akkadian name appearing out of the sudden be an obvious anamoly? Even the Hebrew midwife Puah has an Egyptian name! And, if you actually look at all the Egyptian names in the Old Testament, you’ll realize that all of them belong to members of the Levite tribe. Not a single person with an Egyptian name in the entire Old Testament is not part of the Levite tribe. And, lo’ and behold, Moses is a Levite. I think the case is so overwhelming that to consider these other (weak to begin with) possibilities is really jusg trying to overcomplicate an otherwise straightforward etymology (backed up by scholars anyways).
Now, regarding Jonathan Burke. I was initially confused by this:
I don’t know where your quotation comes from, but I own Friedman’s book Exodus and it isn’t there (in fact the book doesn’t even have 169 pages). Nor is it in his earlier work “The Bible With Sources Revealed”. Can you find any evidence that Friedman believes this verse in Deuteronomy is evidence that Genesis 1-11 is pre-exilic?
I’m not sure if Friedman has an earlier book called Exodus. I’m talking about the one published, like, in the last few months or something by HarperCollins. I came across it in my bookstore a few days ago so I just picked it up and read it. Click here if we have some sort of confusion about which book I’m talking about. Published September 12, 2017 by HarperCollins, some 281 pages long. If we are still mixed up about this I’ll take a picture of my copy in my next response if we’re still mixed up about this.
Friedman cites the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy as an ancient poem predating Deuteronomy itself by some centuries, and understands it as a reference to the dispersion of humanity recorded in the Genesis story. He even cites Genesis in his analysis of what he’s talking about. I’m rather certain Friedman makes it clear in his book that he thinks J, E, P, and D (J and P are the important ones here since they are what compose the primeval history of Genes) are all pre-exilic. In fact, I think he dates the P source about a century before Deuteronomy (in his book he even calls the people who try to push back their dates ‘late daters’ who ignore the fact that all these books are written in pre-exilic Hebrew). I don’t have an exact quote right now, but suffice it is to say, Friedman considers Deuteornomy 32:8 to regard the dispersion of humanity after the story of the tower of babylon and he thinks the entire thing is pre-exilic anyways. I might search for a quote and post is later in this comment. But first;
The word for dispersed/divided in Deuteronomy 32:8 is not used anywhere in the tower of Babel narrative, so there isn’t even a linguistic connection.
Actually, they’re the exact same word. Here’s the word-by-word Hebrew in Deuteronomy 32:8. Here’s the word-by-word Hebrew in Genesis 10:32. Both Hebrew words are different forms of the same Hebrew word, parad, or Strong’s Hebrew #6504. Simply click on the Hebrew words in my links and you’ll realize they both quickly go back to parad/strong’s hebrew 6504.
I cannot find any commentator who suggests that Deuteronomy 32:8 is a reference to the tower of Babel; they all say it is a reference to the believe that God established areas where each nation should live, at creation, before nations even existed.
Besides Friedman already mentioned, most actual analyses I’ve seen make it clear this goes back to what happens right after the tower of babel conundrum. In response to gbrooks comment, I directed him to this paper from Michael Weiser who places this event right after the tower of babel incident, since, well, it appears to be talking about the exact same thing. He basically presupposes this is what’s happening and shows no knowledge of even the idea that it could be talking about something else. Friedman, too, seems to simply presuppose this. I was stranged to see you say no commentaries mention it, since when I simply go to the list of commentaries on Deuteronomy 32:8 on BibleHub a lot of them have it. Elliott’s commentary, Bensen’s commentary, Jamieson-Fausset-Brown’s commentary, John Gill’s commentary, etc (besides already mentioning Friedman, Weiser etc). Also see this one. I don’t think any scholar denies this connection, it seems quite obvious to me. Where else does a dispersion of the languages actually ever happen? Is Deuteronomy referencing Enermaker or something?
I was hoping you would address my entire argument about the Exodus passage but since it seems you’re not going to, I only need to reply to your comments on the small bit you did mention.
I don’t know if you missed my last response to you, but I tried to address your entire comment. Click here to see my last response (I admit me and gbrooks fattened up the thread since you last posted).
So far you’ve been able to assert evidence for only two references to anything in Genesis 1-11, in the entire body of text from Genesis 12 to the end of 2 Kings. That really says it all; there’s just no evidence that Genesis 1-11 were known before the exile.
Firstly, my research is ongoing. I may find more. Secondly, even if there are only two, that’s enough to plunge a spear into the idea that Genesis 1-11 isn’t referred to all. We can’t exactly speculate all too much here on why these authors aren’t very interested in Genesis 1-11. This text is entirely allegorical to begin with, the OT authors seems more interested in the actual history of Israel and so I don’t find it surprising that Genesis 1-11, by my count so far, is only mentioned on two passing occasions. Right now, I’m toiling with a passage in Job where God sets the boundaries for the waters after the flood and whether it may or may not allude to God setting the ‘boundaries’ of the waters after the flood in Genesis 9 so it no longer destroys humanity. This one is pretty vague so I’ll keep it at rest. As I see it, two mentions is enough, the real oddity is why these authors aren’t interested in the primeval history.
That is the book I am talking about. My edition has only 158 pages.
I would like to see direct quotations please.
If you don’t have a direct quotation, where are you getting all that information from Friedman? You may not be aware of these facts.
Friedman identifies two levels of Deueteronomist composition; Dtr1 (pre-exilic), and Dtr2 (exilic).
Friedman identifies a later redactor, R, who revised and compiled the earlier sources, in the exilic era.
Friedman identifies the reference to the creation in Exodus 20:11, as the work of the exilic redactor, not a pre-exilic writer.
Friedman identifies the song of Moses as an independent poem which was inserted into Deuteronomy by Dtr2, the exilic writer.
So he does not actually believe that the entire Pentateuch is pre-exilic. His view is a lot more complicated than that.
That’s a word in Genesis 10, not the Babel narrative (which is in Genesis 11). As I said, the word is not used in the Babel narrative to describe the scattering of people. Modern scholars typically note the same word in Genesis 10, but do not say it is in Genesis 11.
[quote=“ManiacalVesalius, post:51, topic:37158”]
I was stranged to see you say no commentaries mention it, since when I simply go to the list of commentaries on Deuteronomy 32:8 on BibleHub a lot of them have it. Elliott’s commentary, Bensen’s commentary, Jamieson-Fausset-Brown’s commentary, John Gill’s commentary, etc (besides already mentioning Friedman, Weiser etc).[/quote]
I note that you’re citing scholarship from well over 100 years ago. I also note you’re not reading the commentaries very closely.
Bensen cites Genesis 10 and says nothing about Babel.
Gill cites Genesis 10 and says that the separation was the work of the sons of Noah (not that it was the product of Babel).
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown cites Genesis 10 and says that the separation was the work of the sons of Noah (not that it was the product of Babel).
Barnes and Ellicott (not “Elliot”), are the only two which actually say this is a reference to Babel. I think you’re doing the same with more modern commentaries in at least several places, assuming that when they cite Genesis 10 they are referring to Babel. And by the way, it’s Heiser, not Weiser.
Yes that’s the post I mean. You didn’t address my entire argument about the Exodus passage, you just took one small part of it and replied to that. But if that’s all you’re going to write, I’ll respond to that.
Well no, if we have only two apparent references, it doesn’t help your case at all. Occam’s Razor tells us that there is a more efficient explanation than that Genesis 1-11 were all prexilic but people just chose not to talk about anything in them except for about twelve words, on just two occasions.
What you’re doing right there is assuming Genesis 1-11 were pre-exilic, and then saying that we can’t speculate on why pre-exilic authors aren’t very interested in them. This is ad hoc reasoning to support a conclusion you’ve already arrived at.
Because it didn’t exist. This is the more efficient explanation.
Yes, yes… it’s obvious to Friedman. But not to any of the other top-flight translators that aren’t trying to cherry-pick the scriptures.
I’m from the translation school that thinks when something is omitted it is usually not an accident.
I’ll let @Jonathan_Burke tend to your assertions. There’s no point in my attempting it. You haven’t agreed with a single one of my proposals. But I’ve been discussing them with you because you seem interested in the evidence involved. Needless to say, I believe you have concluded that the evidence is minimal.
This is how you straight arm your way through a discussion?
You say Moses is “no priest” … and yet he is the Leading Levite in all Exodus?
He is not categorized as “Illustrious” … and yet Exodus describes his face as literally “glowing”. And if you don’t like the literal use of “lustre” … he is certainly the leader of Exodus.
I don’t think you and I are very good research partners. Your tolerance for novel ideas is pretty low, and my tolerance for rejecting everythiing that isn’t the status quo is pretty low too.
This is how you straight arm your way through a discussion?
You say Moses is “no priest” … and yet he is the Leading Levite in all Exodus?
He is not categorized as “Illustrious” … and yet Exodus describes his face as literally “glowing”. And if you don’t like the literal use of “lustre” … he is certainly the leader of Exodus.
To be quite honest, I’m going to reevaluate this. It appears that the parallels are, at least, not non-existent. So for this, I’ll make a concession. I don’t think it’s as good as mose in Egyptian (which we know was part of Egyptian names, I don’t see evidence that mus/mas was part of any names at the time). And I’ve already frequented enormous other sums of evidence why I overall conclude Moses name is of Egyptian etymology. You haven’t convinced me otherwise, it looks like you’ve simply described me as part of the “status-quo” (even though a lot of my opinions are anything but majority scholarship) and left it at that.
I guess I should ask you myself. What do you think there is more evidence for, Egyptian mose or semitic mus/mas? Taking into account that Egyptian had vastly more influence over the Levant than Akkad/Hatti/etc, and that the entire exodus story is Egyptian, and that there are hundreds of Egyptian loanwords in the books of the Bible describing the exodus and wilderness narratives, and a bunch of those characters themselves have Egyptian names, do you still conclude that there’s more evidence for mus/mas which seems to have no evidence besides having the same spelling (which is also covered by mose anyways)? This is an honest question.
Your tolerance for novel ideas is pretty low, and my tolerance for rejecting everythiing that isn’t the status quo is pretty low too.
Quite frankly, I don’t appreciate the disrespect from this statement.
Yes, yes… it’s obvious to Friedman. But not to any of the other top-flight translators that aren’t trying to cherry-pick the scriptures.
Apparently, you’d also like the disrespect Friedman. Please, tell me, in what conceptual way does Friedman’s argument cherrypick anything? The book is $30 books and worth buying, I’ll wait to see you explain this. Friedman, in his book, wasn’t even looking to “prove” Genesis 1-11 is pre-exilic or something, in fact that had literally nothing to do with the topic of his book or his argument. This is an off-the-cuff connection he made in the biblical text.
By the way, your statement that I haven’t agreed to a single one of your proposals is incorrect. I’ve accepted that there does appear to be more similarity from mus/mas to Moses than I’ve seen before, and once you’ve shown that the word mus extended outwards from Sumerian language to Hittite/Akkadian/etc languages, that still existed during Israel’s time, I also dropped my argument that this word and nation has zero continuity with Israel.
At the very least, I’ve learned a lot more through this conversation, hopefully you have as well.
You said that I did not reply to your entire argument regarding the exilic/post-exilic dating of the Exodus 11 passage, but quite frankly, I can’t see it. I’d be content if you linked me to the post of your argument or just copied and pasted it again, you needn’t re-type the full thing. As for the book, I’ve taken a video and uploaded to YouTube the copy of Friedman’s book I have, and I’ve recorded the table of contents to show how many pages are in my volume. Click here to see it. Or just watch this:
I don’t know why yours has 158 pages, I picked mines up from the bookstore not even a week ago. If you go to this Amazon page and click ‘look inside’ and go to the table of contents, it is identical to my copy.
I would like to see direct quotations please.
Thank God there’s an index otherwise I’d be looking through that forever. On pg. 70, Friedman writes
These scholars have made no attempt to account for this. Our main sources–the Song of the Sea, the Song of Deborah, J, E, P, and most of D (the law code called Dtn in Deuteronomy 12-26; and the songs in Deuteronomy 32 and 33)–all come from before the end of the eighth century BCE, and some come from as early as the twelfth century BCE.
You later explained that Friedman dates two portions of D, some pre-exilic and some exilic. Looking back at this quote, you are in fact right about that as well, here Friedman explains the pre-exilic portions of D and I’m assuming the chapters he doesn’t mention (1-11, 26-31, 34) are exilic in his view. Note, the Song of Moses which I quoted earlier (which I argue alludes to Genesis in Deuteronomy 32:8) is clearly part of his “maximum end of the 8th century [700] BCE”. Furthermore, Friedman here, clearly puts both J and P as pre-exilic works as well, which are what compose Genesis 1-11. I also will provide a quote of some of Friedman’s comments on the date of the Song of Moses, from pg. 156;
Another early composition is the Song of Moses (Deuteronomy 32). Some scholars have dated it to the eleventh or tenth century BCE.[footnote 11] Noel Freedman wrote that “the dating of this poem has proved a difficult problem to scholars, who have tested an assortment of dates from Moses to the exile and beyond.” But he went on to list considerable evidence that it was archaic, and he concluded that he would date it to the latter tenth century BCE at the earliest or in the ninth century.[footnote 12] Others have shown that the song is quoted by the prophets Hosea and Jeremiah.[footnote 13] That is, the Song of Moses had to be an earlier work, already written in an archaic Hebrew before the Babylonian exile.
Let me know if you need other quotes for other things. Point is, Friedman clearly dates the Song of Moses (the passage I quoted) as pre-exilic, in fact significantly pre-exilic, and he dates Genesis 1-11 as pre-exilic as well. Anyways, since you’re asking for quotes, I might as well do the same. You have claimed that Friedman considers the Song of Moses a later insertion, but I have demonstrated that he considers it very pre-exilic, so I’d like to know where you got that claim from. You also said this;
Friedman identifies the reference to the creation in Exodus 20:11, as the work of the exilic redactor, not a pre-exilic writer.
I’d like a citation here as well.
So he does not actually believe that the entire Pentateuch is pre-exilic. His view is a lot more complicated than that.
Fair.
That’s a word in Genesis 10, not the Babel narrative (which is in Genesis 11). As I said, the word is not used in the Babel narrative to describe the scattering of people. Modern scholars typically note the same word in Genesis 10, but do not say it is in Genesis 11.
Chapters were added in the 15th century. And even if Deuteronomy refers to Genesis 10:32 instead of Genesis 11:8-9, that’s rather insignificant to the point that it refers to the primeval history. And in fact, it refers to Genesis 11:8-9, where God scatters humanity across the whole world. That a different word is used is hardly relevant. One says;
When the Most High apportioned the nations, when he divided humankind, he fixed the boundaries of the peoples
Is that at all different from the following in concept?
Therefore it was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.
Both verses tell us God seperated/dispersed/scattered/insertsynonymhere the peoples of the earth into their own nations. If Deuteronomy isn’t talking about Genesis 10:32 or 11:8-9, then what is it talking about? There’s literally nothing else besides Genesis 1-11 that could be anything regarding what Deuteronomy is discussing.
Well no, if we have only two apparent references, it doesn’t help your case at all. Occam’s Razor tells us that there is a more efficient explanation than that Genesis 1-11 were all prexilic but people just chose not to talk about anything in them except for about twelve words, on just two occasions.
According to Occam’s Razor, the most simple explanation is preferable. That wont help you here, in fact it looks a bit like circular reasoning to me (genesis 1-11 is exilic, therefore deuteronomy 32:8 probably is not referring to it, therefore there are no pre-exilic references to genesis 1-11, therefore genesis 1-11 is exilic). If there’s a single reference to the primeval history in the entirety of the pre-exilic Israelite corpus, then the conclusion is that the stories are pre-exilic, not that we should dismiss it “because that sounds more simple to me.” Also, “Because it didn’t exist” is hardly a more efficient answer.
Regarding my citations of the commentaries, you do note that some of them (not all) are over a century old. Unfortunate me doesn’t have a commentary so I rely on the internet for that. I did cite, of course, a number of recent treatments. Regarding my commentaries, you also said this:
Bensen cites Genesis 10 and says nothing about Babel.
Gill cites Genesis 10 and says that the separation was the work of the sons of Noah (not that it was the product of Babel).
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown cites Genesis 10 and says that the separation was the work of the sons of Noah (not that it was the product of Babel).
I mean, is it really relevant whether or not they find it an exact reference to Babel rather than just the scattering? And either way, they all consider it to go back to something having to do with Genesis 1-11 anyways, so they still all support me, including Heiser, Friedman, Miller, etc. Can you find a scholar that argues against this general identification? According to Miller (pg. 417), Deuteronomy 32:8-14c is a section that recounts Yahweh’s acts. So what act is exactly being recounted in 32:8 if it’s not Gen. 10:32 or 11:8-9?
Since I included myself in a parallel category, I would have thought this fairness of treatment would have easily protected you from any special hurt. And here you are telling me that I disrespected you.
So why don’t we stop right here.
Your previous post, you actually had the fortitude to tell me that Moses, the man who spoke to God, the man who did serpentine combat against the Egyptian priests, the man who brought down commandments straight from God, the head Levite of all the Hebrew, just wasn’t a Priest.
And yet here we see quite clearly that whatever title Aaron enjoyed, Moses was by far more than Aaron:
Num 12:5-8
“And the LORD came down in the pillar of the cloud, and stood in the door of the tabernacle, and called Aaron and Miriam: and they both came forth. And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. < Just by visions / dreams.
My servant Moses is not [such a one], . . . With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the LORD shall he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?”
Frankly, I don’t think you have much instinct for text critical analysis.
Let’s use the “draw out” explanation for Exodus 2:10 -
“… she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I “drew him out” of the water.”
How does this make any sense at all? My rejection of this scenario is more because of what Moshe really meant in Egyptian, than being opposed to Egyptian influence.
The Pharaoh is looking for Hebrew who will tear down his kingdom. Do you think he would knowingly allow one to be raised in his midst? If you adopted a child that you knew was the very enemy Pharaoh sought out, would you really give a Hebrew meaning as the reason for his name? It would be like Hitler’s neice adopting a swarthy infant and telling the Fuhrer that you were going to name him Solomon.
At the URL below, we get a persuasive range of possibilities, with the most logical one being:
Here we have “Mes - Sha” (rhymes with Moshe) meaning “Born of Water”, with additional word play, “Prince of Water”.
Now that is a believable story. And it has one last strange coincidence about it that makes it a truly interesting scenario:
The Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian “Divine [Prince] of Water” was known either as Enki or Ea. And this God’s symbol, as well as “associate deity” was Ningishzida, the literal “snake man” of the ANE pantheon. Could it be that the authentic core of this weather worn Moshe Origin story is that he was named after his future role? In the wilderness of Midian, God teaches Moshe to be a Mesha - - by showing him how to turn a stick into a snake.
Since the Persians actually had an aversion to snakes - - “the only good snake is a dead snake” - - it wouldn’t be surprising for Moshe/Mesha to get a face-lift … so that he was no longer a “Snake Man” … but a Man with some odd powers.
I certainly agree with you that Egypt had a tremendous influence over Canaan. In fact, so much so, that it was only after the Philistines entrenched in their Pentapolis on the coast that Egypt could no longer influence Canaan to the same extent. This would have been from around 1130 BCE and after. Even if we arbitrarily changed Exodus to 1180 BCE (which is very generous indeed), it still means that Abraham was meeting with Philstines about 700 years before they arrived. And that the timeline of Exodus > Numbers > Joshua > Judges > Samuel up to the start of Kings (when David is on the verge of death) has to be compressed into the space of 1180 BCE (but really more like a 1130 BCE) to around 950 BCE (when Solomon implausibly receive’s the Pharaoh’s gift of Canaanite Gezer) - - or just 230 years!
This is approximately half of the 450 years (or more) attributed to the timeline from Exodus to Solomon’s temple.
By your own admission, Egypt’s role in Canaan was overwhelmingly influential. Beth She’an was regional administrative city for Egyptian emissaries and troops. There is no way Exodus could have happened as long as all this was going on.
You can’t pick and choose what influence you want and don’t want. The Exodus has to occur after the arrival of the Philistines.
Mine is the electronic edition, and all I can guess is that they numbered it differently.
Unfortunately Friedman is well outside the consensus here, in particular because of the characteristics of the Hebrew of P, which is very obviously not Archaic Biblical Hebrew, and shows it is in a transition stage from Classical Biblical Hebrew to Late Biblical Hebrew.
The two-source-hypothesis appears to remain a valid model to explain the origins of the biblical Primeval History, albeit with some medications. There is little need to correct the literary-historical data for the priestly texts that we only mentioned in passing. Concerning the identification of priestly—and thus also non-priestly—texts, the consensus remains well founded. The same can be said of dating P to the end of the Exilic period or to the beginning of the Second Temple period. Equally undeniable is the fact that P is a source that begins in Gen 1 and moves beyond the Primeval History.", Ronald S. Hendel, “Historical Context,” in The Book of Genesis: Composition, Reception, and Interpretation, ed. Craig A Evans, Joel N Lohr, and David L Petersen (2017), 132.
Most of Genesis 1-11 is written in Classical Biblical Hebrew, with few exceptions. But the fact that it contains some Late Biblical Hebrew indicates that parts of the text were written at the end or after the exile.
“Outside of these few texts with features of Archaic Biblical Hebrew or Late Biblical Hebrew, the language of Genesis belongs to the period of Classical Biblical Hebrew, which ranges roughly from the ninth-sixth centuries BCE. This is the language of Hebrew inscriptions from this period and is very close to the contemporary language of Moabite and other Northwest Semitic inscriptions.”, Ronald S. Hendel, “Historical Context,” in The Book of Genesis: Composition, Reception, and Interpretation, ed. Craig A Evans, Joel N Lohr, and David L Petersen (2017), 56.
This language distribution pattern is in agreement with the hypothesis of an exilic writer.
These are not incompatible. This is what he says.
“'The long poem that takes up Deuteronomy 32, known as the Song of Moses, is an independent poem that was inserted by the Deuteronomistic historian in the Dtr2 edition of the work.”, Richard Elliott Friedman, The Bible with Sources Revealed: A New View into the Five Books of Moses (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005), 361.
He believes the Song of Moses is an independent archaic text which was not originally part of Deuteronomy, but which was known to, and inserted by, am exilic scribe.
Sure. He says right here that the reference to the creation in Exodus 20:11 is the work of the exilic redactor.
“The text of the Ten Commandments here does not appear to belong to any of the major sources. It is likely to be an independent document, which was Inserted here by the Redactor.”, Richard Elliott Friedman, The Bible with Sources Revealed: A New View into the Five Books of Moses (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005), 153.
So he’s another scholar on my list of those who understand the reference to the six days of creation in Exodus 20:11 to be an exilic expansion of the text.
It’s here. Note in particular this part of the argument.
It has long been recognized that there are differences between the Exodus and Deuteronomy versions of the Decalogue.
Examining the Exodus version, it is clear that the narrative switches back and forth between God speaking in the first person, and someone speaking of God in the third person. This reads naturally as someone adding their own comments to what God said.
When the sections in the third person are removed, the Exodus Decalogue is virtually identical to the Deuteronomy Decalogue. This corroborates the hypothesis that the third party sections were added to the Exodus Decalogue at a later date.
See the following commentary.
Hossfeld contends that the variations (major or minor) are deliberate and accord with the perspective from which each composition was made. Specifically, zkr (Exod 20:8) is a secondary development from the original šmr (Deut 5:12) under cultic influence typical of the exilic and post-exilic period. The reduction of the animal participants in Sabbath observance from “your ox, or your ass, or any of your cattle” (Deut 5:14) to “your cattle” (Exod 20:10) matches the usage of the priestly creation account. The conclusion “that your manservant and your maidservant may rest as well as you” (Deut 5:14) is an indigenous deuteronomic expression that contributes to its unique rationale for the Sabbath (Deut 5:15). The rationale for the Sabbath in Exod 20:11, on the other hand, draws upon Exod 23:12; Deut 5:12–15 (for the verb nwh) and upon Gen 1:1–2:4a, and it is thus secondary to that of Deuteronomy.", N. E. Andreasen, “Review of Der Dekalog: Seine Späten Fassungen, Die Originale Komposition Und Seine Vorstufen, by Frank-Lothar Hossfeld,” Journal of Biblical Literature 103 (1984): 441.
“To be sure, I am prompted by the tension to explore the matter, but grammatically one can see a distinction is being made by the reference to God in first person in Exod 20:2 and by the reference to him in third person in Exod 20:9–11, especially in the conclusion: “Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” Is it not more plausible that this statement is made by the narrator rather than God? To make the matter clearer for students, I may put vv. 9–11 in parentheses.”, Bruce K. Waltke, “Review of Interaction with Peter Enns,” Westminster Theological Journal 71, no. 1 (2009): 121.
I will address this again later.
Of course the chapter breaks aren’t important. But the fact that these are separate narratives is important. Previously you based your case on the claim that the same word is used in both the Babel narrative and the Deuteronomy narrative. But now I’ve shown you that the word in Deuteronomy isn’t actually used in the Babel narrative, you say “That a different word is used is hardly relevant”. Of course it’s relevant, because it makes any connection between the two even more tenuous and even less likely.
Yes it is, because neither Genesis 10 nor Genesis 11 actually mention the important content of Deuteronomy. Let’s look at the entire passage in Deuteronomy.
Deuteronomy 32:
8 When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,
when he divided up humankind,
he set the boundaries of the peoples, according to the number of the heavenly assembly.
Whoa, see that part in bold? You missed that part out. Where do we find that part in either Genesis 10 or Genesis 11? Nowhere. Nor is there any account in either Genesis 10 or Genesis 11 of God giving the nations their inheritance, and setting up their boundaries. In Genesis 10 we have the migration of the sons of Noah before Babel, and in Genesis 11 we have a small group of people scattered from a local area. No reference to nations at all.
Sure there is, there’s the widespread idea in the Ancient Near East that the territory occupied by humans was appointed by the gods.
“32:8. deity granting nations inheritance. In Israelite theology Yahweh had assigned each nation its inheritance (5:2, 9, 19; Amos 9:7), though there is also some accommodation to the concept that each god gave territory to his people (Judg 11:24).”, Victor Harold Matthews, Mark W. Chavalas, and John H. Walton, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament (electronic ed.; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000), Dt 32:8.
“32:8 Deuteronomy 32:8 may reflect the old mythology of the divine council assembled at New Year under the tutelage of Elyon (“Most High”) to determine the destiny of the nations for the ensuing period (see above on 13:1–5; cf. Ps. 82). In the demythologizing process, Elyon has become a title of Yahweh, who is alone supreme.”, Ian Cairns, Word and Presence: A Commentary on the Book of Deuteronomy (International Theological Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI; Edinburgh: W.B. Eerdmans; Handsel Press, 1992), 282.
And what do you know, there are 70 gods in the Ugarit pantheon, just like there are 70 elohim mentioned here.
“The equivalent term in other Canaanite languages is benei ʾel(im), and according to Ugaritic mythology there are seventy such beings.”, Jeffrey H. Tigay, Deuteronomy (The JPS Torah Commentary; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1996), 514.
So yeah there’s a very simple explanation outside Genesis 10-11, and that explanation actually accounts for all the data, not just a little bit of it.
According to Occam’s Razor the simplest explanation accounting for all the data is preferable. The great strength of my argument is that it accounts for all the data in the simplest way. The greatest weakness of your argument is that it fails to account for most of the data.
But that is not the argument at all. The argument is this.
Genesis 1-11 is exilic, based on multiple lines of independent evidence.
Deuteronomy 32:8 does not contain any clear reference to any part of Genesis 1-11.
The idea that Deuteronomy 32:8 cites Genesis 10 or 11 does not account for all the data in Deuteronomy 32:8.
An alternative explanation for Deuteronomy 32:8, accounting for all the data in the passage, is a more efficient explanation.
This alternative explanation for Deuteronomy 32:8 also harmonizes with all the evidence for an exilic Genesis 1-11.
Ok you need to demonstrate that, instead of just asserting it. To do this you will need to conduct a literary examination of the texts, preferably in the original languages. Now let’s move on to your other arguments.
Point one. You objected to the idea of an exilic Hebrew writer sitting down with 20 or so cuneiform texts and copy/pasting from them all. I am so glad you raised this, because there is clear evidence that Genesis 1-11 has a primary literary relationship to just one text, the Atrahasis Epic. In fact the number of texts required to account for all the indications of literary intersection in Genesis 1-11 is very small.
(a) Atrahasis Epic
(b) Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta
(c) Sumerian King List
This substantiates the exilic authorship hypothesis, rather than detracting from it.
Point two. You claim that the following stories “appear in hundreds of different near eastern compositions”.
(a) flood
(b) genealogies
(c) creation from primordial chaos
(d) eating fruit from a sacred tree
(e) confusion of languages
Please list five texts for each of these stories. That shouldn’t be difficult given all the hundreds you have to choose from. I rather think you’ll be uncomfortably surprised. For example, a flood narrative is attested in the Eridu Genesis, Atrahasis Epic, and the Epic of Gilgamesh (the Sumerian King List mentions the flood incidentally, as a method of dating the kings, and assumes the reader is already familiar with the narrative. Additionally, the Epic of Gilgamesh flood narrative is a copy of the narrative in the Atrahasis Epic, and the Atrahasis flood narrative is dependent on the Eridu Genesis flood narrative.
As another example, the confusion of languages appears in Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta, but where else does it appear? The Sumerian genealogies are found in the Sumerian King List, and in the Rulers of Lagash (a text which is dependent on, and parodies, the Sumerian King List), but how many other texts are there with these genealogies in them? I am sure you must know.
Point three. You claimed Eridu Genesis doesn’t use the phrase “breath of life”, while the Bible’s Genesis does. In actual fact the Bible’s Genesis doesn’t have a word for “of” in the phrase translated “breath of life”. It uses two words for “life breath”, just as the Eridu Genesis uses two words for “life breath” (I note the source to which you linked didn’t actually make the argument you’re making). So the correspondence is very strong.
You also claimed this “breath of life” phrase in Genesis, is also found in Job. But when we turn to the two passages you cited (Job 12:10; 33:4), we don’t actually find that either of them use the term “life breath/breath of life”. In Genesis 2:8 the phrase is neshamah chayyim (life breath, breath of life), but in Job 12:10 the phrase is ruah kal besar (life/breath of all humans), and in Job 33:4 the two phrases are ruah el (breath of God), and neshamah shadadai (breath of the Almighty). Neither of these verses uses the distinctive phrase neshamah chayyim (life breath, breath of life), which we find in Genesis 2:7; 7:22. Only one of them even uses one of the Hebrew words in this phrase.
Point four. Now you have finally found raqia in Strong’s (just as I said it was), and you have acknowledged that it is derived from raqa (just as I said it was). But you say “raqa is not a ‘form’ of raqia (or vice versa), raqa is a different word altogether”. This is just a confusion about how words are defined. As I said previously (and as you have now acknowledged), raqia is derived from the older word raqa. The word raqa is a verb, and the word raqia is a noun. Of course they are two different words in the sense that they are spelled differently and you cannot use them as synonyms, but at the same time raqia is the noun form of raqa, just like “speed” is a noun, and “speedily” is the adverbial form of the noun, while at the same time they are different words. It doesn’t really matter if you want to deny that “speedily” is the adverbial form of “speed”, the point remains the same.
Point five. I did not say that if my first two arguments for the dating of Genesis 1-11 are correct then the others are also. I pointed out the inconsistency of accepting the first two points, while rejecting subsequent points which use the same reasoning and form of evidence. As I have said before, the force of those two points is that they establish a terminus ad quo, which is essential to establishing the case for exilic authorship.
Point six. You asked for citations from scholarship arguing that the reference to the creation week in Exodus 20:11 is a later addition. Behold.
“P makes little change in the Decalogue except in the law of the sabbath, which is now grounded in the six days of creation and the sabbath rest (20:11).”, John Van Seters, The Pentateuch: A Social-Science Commentary (London; New York: T&T Clark, 2004), 173.
“Indeed, the rationale behind the commandment in Exodus about the Sabbath is based on the premise of the Creation story (Gen 2.2, 3) from the Priestly Source,”, Seizo Sekine, Transcendency and Symbols in the Old Testament: A Genealogy of the Hermeneutical Experiences (Walter de Gruyter, 1999), 16.
“If Exod 20:11 and 31:16–17 are from P rather than H, as appears to be the case, the validity of Knohl’s further point that P nowhere “explicitly” proscribes Sabbath labor, in alleged contrast to H, is also called into question.”, Saul M. Olyan, “Exodus 31:12–17: The Sabbath according to H, or the Sabbath according to P and H?,” Journal of Biblical Literature 124 (2005): 202.
“The Sabbath commandment which exhibits a good number of variations may serve to illustrate the procedure. How are the two recensions of this commandment related to each other? Hossfeld contends that the variations (major or minor) are deliberate and accord with the perspective from which each composition was made. Specifically, zkr (Exod 20:8) is a secondary development from the original šmr (Deut 5:12) under cultic influence typical of the exilic and post-exilic period. The reduction of the animal participants in Sabbath observance from “your ox, or your ass, or any of your cattle” (Deut 5:14) to “your cattle” (Exod 20:10) matches the usage of the priestly creation account. The conclusion “that your manservant and your maidservant may rest as well as you” (Deut 5:14) is an indigenous deuteronomic expression that contributes to its unique rationale for the Sabbath (Deut 5:15). The rationale for the Sabbath in Exod 20:11, on the other hand, draws upon Exod 23:12; Deut 5:12–15 (for the verb nwh) and upon Gen 1:1–2:4a, and it is thus secondary to that of Deuteronomy.”, N. E. Andreasen, “Review of Der Dekalog: Seine Späten Fassungen, Die Originale Komposition Und Seine Vorstufen, by Frank-Lothar Hossfeld,” Journal of Biblical Literature 103 (1984): 441.
“The version of the Decalogue in Deut. 5:6–21, shorn of its features as ‘retrospect’ (especially the recurring phrase, ‘as the Lord your God commanded you’, e.g. Deut. 5:12), is likely to give good evidence for the D-version of the Decalogue which once stood in Exod. 20:2–17 before the final redaction of the P-edition. The major contribution of the P-edition’s revision of the D-version of the Decalogue is the motive for keeping the sabbath in IV.”, W. Johnstone, Exodus (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 97.
“Exodus gives the reason for sabbath observance as being the memory of God’s ‘rest’ from his great work of creation. Deuteronomy 5:15 regards sabbath as commemorating the ‘rest’ that came to the Israelite slaves in Egypt, when freed by YHWH, and (typical of Deuteronomy) as offering an opportunity of similar ‘rest’ to Israel’s slaves now (Deut. 5:14). These explanations are not mutually exclusive, since both deal with ‘rest’; but they do tend to reinforce the view that the shorter form of the commandment was the original, perhaps ‘Remember the sabbath day’ alone.”, R. Alan Cole, Exodus: An Introduction and Commentary (vol. 2; Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1973), 165.
Your comments on the ‘priest’ thing, I would assume, have been taken care of after I simply told you that I reevaluated it and concluded you were right. And yes, you quite clearly did disrespect me. Your “parallel category” for yourself was saying that “I don’t immediately discount anything that isn’t status quo”, basically an implication that I throw off everything that isn’t status quo, which is false. Indeed, you disrespect me a second time in this new comment of yours;
Frankly, I don’t think you have much instinct for text critical analysis.
Perhaps we could put this all behind us if you simply apologized, rather than trying to claim that you didn’t put me in a “special hurt” or whatever else you were on about. In fact, you said the above comment on the priest thing, something that I had already made clear that I changed my mind about. Anyways,
“… she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I “drew him out” of the water.”
How does this make any sense at all? My rejection of this scenario is more because of what Moshe really meant in Egyptian, than being opposed to Egyptian influence.
Perhaps you forgot that I said Moses comes from Egyptian mose, meaning to be born of, not mushay, the Hebrew for “I drew out” from Exodus 2:10. I quite literally never claimed that this was the correct etymology. It appears as if you’re strawmanning my position.
The Pharaoh is looking for Hebrew who will tear down his kingdom. Do you think he would knowingly allow one to be raised in his midst?
Exodus never says pharaoh is looking for Hebrews who will “tear down his kingdom”, you appear to be confusing pharaoh with Herod. Pharaoh tries to get the sons killed in Exodus because the Egyptians are getting concerned over how much the Israelite’s are multiplying and growing in number. And this could be entirely ahistorical anyways, I never actually defended the historicity of that event to begin with. That yields another strawman on your position.
At the URL below, we get a persuasive range of possibilities, with the most logical one being:
I’d hate to tell you that I don’t consider ‘biblehistory.net’ a reliable website. I scrolled to the bottom of the website, and the guy claims to get his sources from E.A.W. Budge’s hieroglyph dictionary, however I can’t verify if the website is properly using this source, and the source is almost a century old anyways. Presuming all the words, translations etc are correct, citing this website is literally suicide for your position, since it is arguing Moses name is Egyptian. All those translations you posted from the website were Egyptian. Not Hittite, not Sumerian, not Akkadian, not Ugaritic, Egyptian. I appreciate it if you’re helping me prove my position for me, but believe me, I can take care of that for myself. So, it appears you have a bit more explaining to do if you think those translations are valid.
Even if we arbitrarily changed Exodus to 1180 BCE (which is very generous indeed), it still means that Abraham was meeting with Philstines about 700 years before they arrived.
Another red herring. What does the Philistine chronology have anything to do with the etymology of Moses name?
By your own admission, Egypt’s role in Canaan was overwhelmingly influential. Beth She’an was regional administrative city for Egyptian emissaries and troops. There is no way Exodus could have happened as long as all this was going on.
Another red herring, the debate has nothing to do with whether or not the exodus happened either. The argument doesn’t make any sense here, anyways. I’ll see if you can articulate the argument better in your next response, but so far you’ve said “Beth She’an was a regional administrative city for Egyptian emissaries and troops… therefore the exodus didn’t happen.” Huh? Is this a really big non-sequitur or are there some details you haven’t mentioned yet? I would also deal with the unsubstantiated claim that “The Exodus has to occur after the arrival of the Philistines”, but at this point, everything is going way off track. Let me draw back to the point, I’ll make sure to ignore any of your remarks about anything irrelevant to Moses’ name in my next comment.
So far, you’ve not provided any new evidence. All you did was apparently use a probably unreliable website to prove that Moses name is of Egyptian etymology, which is something I didn’t expect. You didn’t strengthen th shockingly weak case for Semitic etymology, nor did you address the arguments for Egyptian etymology. Will you simply concede, finally, that Moses name is of Egyptian etymology?
Okay. I am very sorry that I wrote “Your tolerance for novel ideas is pretty low!” And I’m equally sorry that I wrote about my lack of tolerance of people " rejecting everythiing that isn’t the status quo."
Part of my regret is that now I have to evalute alternative syntax and grammar that are even less savage, but still express some measure of disappointment in the outcomes of discussion. Fortunately, few people are offended by the subjunctive mood . . . and so I have some optimism for refuge there.
Egypt ceased being a major influence in Canaan shortly after the arrival of the Sea People, especially the Pelest (now referred to as the Philistines). This means the whole time frame of the Old Testament is thrown into doubt.
@ManiacalVesalius, you have demonstrated great zeal in defending the idea that many Old Testament names were influenced by Egyptian culture. And I can only assume you champion this idea because this fits your view that the Hebrew spent 200 years (or was it 400 years) in the land of Egypt.
And yet, in that process, the Hebrew supposedly leave Egypt without adopting Egyptian circumcision practices, and without the greatest cultural export Egypt ever produced: the hope and optimism for an immortal existence in some otherworldly realm. There is really the tiniest trace of these Egyptian ideals in the Old Testament. And the New Testament quite forcefully tells us that the very top of the Jewish elites (the families of the High Priest) they think the notion of an afterlife is a pile of rubbish.
The ANE reality seems to be much more complex: Egypt dominated Canaan as a literal “tax farm” for some 400 years (between the expulsion of the Hyksos and the arrival of the Sea People). When the Persian Empire extended even into Egypt’s homeland, we have a second wave of Egyptian influence from the Jeremiad communities that appear to have headed back to Palestine once the international border had been eliminated.
And then after the Persian interval, the Greek period brings the Ptolemaic (i.e. Egyptianizing) sphere of influence once again into Palestine. Egyptian culture ruled (albeit with some frequent but short-lived interruptions) for more than another century, all during the formative times for editing and smoothing the Old Testament narrative, culminating with the Maccabees.
I mention the Maccabees because it was really just a fairly brief interlude when the Seleucid Greeks took control of Palestine back into their hands … and drove the newly devout Jewish population into wild rebellion.
