Thus, it is believed that the first Genesis account was written during the second exilic era (when the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem).
This idea is further bolstered by the inclusion in the first Genesis account of the story of the 'Nephilim'--the offspring of fallen angels and human women. The account of the Nephilim is very, very similar to Persian, Zoroastrian, Babylonian, Kurdish and Sumerian legends, not Egyptian.
In the Persian myths, they are the Djinn or Ifrit that was incorporated in the Koran.
These similarities have caused me to believe that the story of the 'Djinn' and Genesis I came from the same place: Somewhere in the north of what is now Iraq.
01: Site that debunks virtually all of creationism's fallacies. Excellent resource.
02: Creation "Science" Debunked.
03: Creationi sm and Pseudo Science. Familiar cartoon then lots of links.
04: The SKEPTIC annotated bibliography. Amazingly great meta-site!
05: The Evidence for Human Evolution. For the "no evidence" crowd.
06: Massi ve mega-site with thousands of links on evolution, creationism, young earth, etc..
07: Another amazing site full of links debunking creationism.
08: Creationism and Pseudo Science. Great cartoon!
09: Glenn R. Morton's site about creationism's fallacies. Another jennyp contribution.
11: Is Evolution Science?. Successful PREDICTIONS of evolution (Moonman62).
12: Five Major Misconceptions about Evolution. On point and well-written.
13: Frequently Asked But Never Answered Questions. A creationist nightmare!
14: DARWIN, FULL TEXT OF HIS WRITINGS. The original ee-voe-lou-shunist.
The foregoing was just a tiny sample. So that everyone will have access to the accumulated "Creationism vs. Evolution" threads which have previously appeared on FreeRepublic, plus links to hundreds of sites with a vast amount of information on this topic, here's Junior's massive work, available for all to review: The Ultimate Creation vs. Evolution Resource [ver 15].
Now what is myth? The dictionary definition of a myth would be stories about gods. So then you have to ask the next question. What is a god?
--Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
Any such person (ie Ezra) would have been a mere editor and redactor, of epic poetry and legends, stories handed down for centuries and millennia. There is nothing to say that Hebrews per se would have had to be the originators of these oral histories: --they would have simply adopted, adapted, and/or translated this literature of nearby more advanced peoples...just as the Bible stories today are in the hands of remote tribes in Africa or New Guinea and there are being passed on as oral history.
In fact, the Hebrew language of the book is far more antique than the 5th century date would indicate: persons who look at the language tend to say it was put into virtually its exact present words in the TENTH century BC, not the fifth.
It is a hobgoblin of small minds to claim that whenever an editor of some ancient work supplies the modern terms for cities or states, therefore the book must date from now. The Living Bible says that Paul preached in "Turkey"! Does that mean that Paul lived in the last century or two?
As place names changed, or as other spots with similar names that might cause confusion arose...the editor would have used terms, or even changed names, to make clear what city or country was meant, at least unless the term was so antique that he himself was at a loss. All of this argues FOR, not against, the antiquity of the document.
On another thread 3 or 4 days ago, I state that the mere fact that Genesis says that when Abraham arrived in Israel, "the Amorite was in the land,"...that ALONE would establish that we are dealing with a string of history going back to the very time itself. The Amorites were so forgotten, that no one living in David's or Ezra's or Jesus' time, much less the KJV era or Jefferson's day-- would have had any idea who or what they were.
Only very recent archaeology, well within my lifetime, established who and where they were, and that they ruled suddenly from about BC 2210 to BC 2020, then vanished without trace.
This both dates Abraham quite securely, and also rules out that the [Abraham/Genesis] story was written from scratch at any time much after BC 1900. Everything subsequent to that must be rather incidental literary redaction.
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
The GGG Digest -- Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)