Posted on 07/22/2008 8:35:47 AM PDT by Between the Lines
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - Abraham didn't exist? The Exodus didn't happen?
The Bible's Buried Secrets, a new PBS documentary, is likely to cause a furor.
"It challenges the Bible's stories if you want to read them literally, and that will disturb many people," says archaeologist William Dever, who specializes in Israel's history. "But it explains how and why these stories ever came to be told in the first place, and how and why they were written down."
The Nova program will premiere Nov. 18. PBS presented a clip and a panel discussion at the summer tour of the Television Critics Association.
The program says the Bible was written in the sixth century BC and that hundreds of authors contributed.
"At least the first five books of the Bible come together during the Babylonian exile," says producer Gary Glassman.
The program challenges long-held beliefs. Abraham, Sarah and their offspring probably didn't exist, says Carol Meyers, a religion professor at Duke University.
"These stories are unlikely to represent real historical events, but rather there's some kernel of ancient experience in there which has survived and which helps give identity to the people at the time the Bible finally took shape centuries and centuries later," Meyers says.
There's no archaeological evidence of the Exodus, either, she says, but "it doesn't mean that there's no kernel of truth to it."
Nova series producer Paula Apsell says she found it "extremely shocking" to learn that monotheism was a process that took hundreds of years.
"I was always brought up to believe that the minute Abraham and the patriarchs came on the scene, the Israelites accepted one God and there was just always one God and that was it," Apsell says. "I think people are going to really be stunned by that."
(Excerpt) Read more at orlandosentinel.com ...
Heresy, plain and simple. These people will burn for eternity.
I guess she never actually read the Bible before. Just like real life, the Bible people are real human beings and could be swayed by the popular religions of their day. Witness the story of Jacob and his father-in-law's household idols or the Hebrews at Mt. Sinai creating an image of the Egyptian Apis bull to worship. Another attack on the Bible- how original.
And can we safely assume that PBS will never see fit to produce “The Koran’s Buried Secrets.”
They string together this possibility, and that conjecture, and they think that maybe it happened this way and note that this could have been caused by that ...
And why do they jump through such hoops? Because they have an overwhelming need to attack any worldview which is based on Faith.
Irony, anyone?
I’m glad archeologists don’t let a little thing like heresy get in the way of genuine research.
This is true, if one ignores the evidence. Josephus was closer to the Exodus than we are to Julius Caesar. Maybe Caesar didn't exist either? There is also the Papyrus Ipuwer discussed by Velikovsky in his Ages in Chaos.
The table below summarizes the correspondence between this Egyptian document and the Book of Exodus. (Conventional Wisdom, suggests that these two were describing events several hundred years apart. Velikovsky suggests otherwise.)
ML/NJ
IPUWER PAPYRUS - LEIDEN 344 TORAH - EXODUS 2:5-6 Plague is throughout the land. Blood is everywhere. 2:10 The river is blood.
2:10 Men shrink from tasting - human beings, and thirst after water
3:10-13 That is our water! That is our happiness! What shall we do in respect thereof? All is ruin.
7:20 …all the waters of the river were turned to blood. 7:21 ...there was blood thoughout all the land of Egypt …and the river stank.
7:24 And all the Egyptians dug around the river for water to drink; for they could not drink of the water of the river.
2:10 Forsooth, gates, columns and walls are consumed by fire. 10:3-6 Lower Egypt weeps... The entire palace is without its revenues. To it belong [by right] wheat and barley, geese and fish
6:3 Forsooth, grain has perished on every side.
5:12 Forsooth, that has perished which was yesterday seen. The land is left over to its weariness like the cutting of flax.
9:23-24 ...and the fire ran along the ground... there was hail, and fire mingled with the hail, very grievous. 9:25 ...and the hail smote every herb of the field, and broke every tree of the field.
9:31-32 ...and the flax and the barley was smitten; for the barley was in season, and flax was ripe.
But the wheat and the rye were not smitten; for they were not grown up.
10:15 ...there remained no green things in the trees, or in the herbs of the fields, through all the land of Egypt.
5:5 All animals, their hearts weep. Cattle moan... 9:2-3 Behold, cattle are left to stray, and there is none to gather them together.
9:3 ...the hand of the Lord is upon thy cattle which is in the field... and there shall be a very grievous sickness. 9:19 ...gather thy cattle, and all that thou hast in the field...
9:21 And he that did not fear the word of the Lord left his servants and cattle in the field.
9:11 The land is without light 10:22 And there was a thick darkness in all the land of Egypt. 4:3 (5:6) Forsooth, the children of princes are dashed against the walls. 6:12 Forsooth, the children of princes are cast out in the streets.
6:3 The prison is ruined.
2:13 He who places his brother in the ground is everywhere.
3:14 It is groaning throughout the land, mingled with lamentations
12:29 And it came to pass, that at midnight the Lord smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne to the firstborn of the captive that was in the prison. 12:30 ...there was not a house where there was not one dead.
12:30 ...there was a great cry in Egypt.
7:1 Behold, the fire has mounted up on high. Its burning goes forth against the enemies of the land. 13:21 ... by day in a pillar of cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night. 3:2 Gold and lapis lazuli, silver and malachite, carnelian and bronze... are fastened on the neck of female slaves. 12:35-36 ...and they requested from the Egyptians, silver and gold articles and clothing. And God made the Egyptians favour them and they granted their request. [The Israelites] thus drained Egypt of its wealth.
In the mean time don’t forget to send PBS a check during their next pledge drive...
Archeology for the most part has supported the Biblical record where proof has been found. Being a book of faith, I don’t get worked up over every detail being precise, but as one noted, I would like to see some of this same academic exercise aimed at Islam.
Where have they looked ?
Probably don’t figure there,s much of a demographic for something like that.
Very interesting. Thanks for the info!
You aren’t really serious are you? Do you really believe this will happen?
A statement born of ignorance and arrogance.
Great. Your tax dollars at work.
LOL...what a poster! :)
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