Is the Bible Infallible or totally subject to man's interpretation.

[Dracil]

Ok, I guess I'm not getting through to you. So where exactly does God say in the Bible that the writing down of Genesis came before the Babylonian myths?

Actual chapter and verses please. This is the second time I've asked you for it.

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

That's really awesome man, well I can tell you the Catholic church is the purest form, cause that's where it all came from, read some St. ignatius of Antioch.

Another topic for another day

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

Ok, I guess I'm not getting through to you. So where exactly does God say in the Bible that the writing down of Genesis came before the Babylonian myths?

Actual chapter and verses please. This is the second time I've asked you for it.

Ok, let's make it simple. Genesis 1:

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

In the beginning seems clear enough to me.

 

[Dracil]

Someone is definitely not understanding. That is the Genesis creation story. Hey look, the other creation stories say the same thing too. That's why they're creation stories.

But that's not the question. The question is, how do you know this story was written down before the Babylonian one?

 

[Dracil]

BTW, I guess hermeneutics *was* the wrong word. The word should be bibliology (and even that might not be the best definition still [it's supposed to be whatever the word is for the study of how the Bible came to be]).

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

Oh, I see. But what does the date that Genesis was written have to do with anything? My guess would be when Moses was wandering around in the desert, which is quite far before Babylon is even mentioned.

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

BTW, I guess hermeneutics *was* the wrong word. The word should be bibliology (and even that might not be the best definition still [it's supposed to be whatever the word is for the study of how the Bible came to be]).

It doesn't matter how it came to be. It is all God breathed and it cannot be broken. We need to understand the context in places, but for other purposes it is almost useless.

 

[Dracil]

Ah, now we're getting somewhere.

Well, the date is important because that's what you were originally responding and disagreeing to. And I wanted to see why you said that.

Even whether or not Moses is the actual (and only) author of the complete Pentateuch is a matter of debate for example.

 

[Dracil]

Basically, I'm looking for your reasoning behind your statement "Notice that this was the first story, so it couldn't be like the Babylonians'. Also, it was written before captivity." in response to boughtwithaprice's post. To back that up, you would need actual dates to show that Genesis was written down before the Babylonian creation stories AND that it was written before their captivity.

Simply saying "it's the first story, because it's the first story" doesn't really mean anything, because the other creation stories can claim that too.

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

Ah, now we're getting somewhere.

Well, the date is important because that's what you were originally responding and disagreeing to. And I wanted to see why you said that.

Even whether or not Moses is the actual (and only) author of the complete Pentateuch is a matter of debate for example.

I seriously think you need to do some research on these things if you are interested. It was determined, by Jewish scholars using a special computer program, that only one author wrote the first 5 books of the Bible. Secondly, it doesn't matter if it was written before or after Babylon, because it was well known, through oral tradition and other records, who the true God was and what He did. It is obvious that Babylon turned the account into their myth, not the other way around.

 

[Dracil]

So what's your evidence against the Documentary Hypothesis?

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

So what's your evidence against the Documentary Hypothesis?

The what?

 

[Dracil]

Oh, come now, I seriously think you need to do some research on these things if you are interested.

You really never heard of it?

 

[Dracil]

Here you go. Who Wrote the Pentateuch?: The Documentary Hypothesis

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

Oh, come now, I seriously think you need to do some research on these things if you are interested.

It is not an area I have questions in my faith about. It doesn't really interest me.

 

[Late_Cretaceous]

We are aruging over a book that Jesus never wrote, and never told anyone to write.

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

Ok, just read through it. Seems very contradictory to the recently unbiased analysis conducted. One person definately wrote it, whether it was Moses or not is another question

 

[Dracil]

Ok, just read through it. Seems very contradictory to the recently unbiased analysis conducted. One person definately wrote it, whether it was Moses or not is another question

I'd be interested in reading about this analysis. Do you have a link to it?

 

[Bizzlebin Imperatoris]

No, I don't. I'm sure you can Google it. Some of the highest Jewish scholars in Israel conducted the analysis using a computer.

 

[PaladinValer]

Dracil's nailed it on the head. If the Babylonian version of the Creation story, which if I might add, is pretty much the same story as the Hebrew one, is older, than the Hebrew one is based on it given the similarities and geological fact that an immense flood of Mesopotamia did indeed occur.

And when it does come down to dates, the "Epic of Gilgamesh" is quite a bit older than the Hebrew story of Noah by several centuries.

What happened? After the flood, survivors passed the story orally down through the generations. With the advent of writing, one culture wrote down their Flood myth. Through cultural contact, they came in touch with another people whose descendents also were survivors or had survivors of that Flood. They take the basic story and change the characters to suit their different religious beliefs. The story is written down by the Babylonians before the close of the 2nd millennium BCE and is picked up by the Hebrew people centuries later, who write of it during the 1st millennium BCE by "mutating" the story again. The number of "mutations" between the "Epic of Gilgamesh" and the Bible's account are very minute when you remember the centuries between.

Does this mean we can throw away the Bible? Nope. As I've said many times before: a myth is a story that teaches a religious or moral truth. Just because it isn't literally true doesn't make it insignificant or less meaningful.