Posted on 03/09/2002 6:05:30 AM PST by eddie willers
braham, the Jewish patriarch, probably never existed. Nor did Moses. The entire Exodus story as recounted in the Bible probably never occurred. The same is true of the tumbling of the walls of Jericho. And David, far from being the fearless king who built Jerusalem into a mighty capital, was more likely a provincial leader whose reputation was later magnified to provide a rallying point for a fledgling nation.
Such startling propositions — the product of findings by archaeologists digging in Israel and its environs over the last 25 years — have gained wide acceptance among non- Orthodox rabbis. But there has been no attempt to disseminate these ideas or to discuss them with the laity — until now.
The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, which represents the 1.5 million Conservative Jews in the United States, has just issued a new Torah and commentary, the first for Conservatives in more than 60 years. Called "Etz Hayim" ("Tree of Life" in Hebrew), it offers an interpretation that incorporates the latest findings from archaeology, philology, anthropology and the study of ancient cultures. To the editors who worked on the book, it represents one of the boldest efforts ever to introduce into the religious mainstream a view of the Bible as a human rather than divine document.
"When I grew up in Brooklyn, congregants were not sophisticated about anything," said Rabbi Harold Kushner, the author of "When Bad Things Happen to Good People" and a co-editor of the new book. "Today, they are very sophisticated and well read about psychology, literature and history, but they are locked in a childish version of the Bible."
"Etz Hayim," compiled by David Lieber of the University of Judaism in Los Angeles, seeks to change that. It offers the standard Hebrew text, a parallel English translation (edited by Chaim Potok, best known as the author of "The Chosen"), a page-by-page exegesis, periodic commentaries on Jewish practice and, at the end, 41 essays by prominent rabbis and scholars on topics ranging from the Torah scroll and dietary laws to ecology and eschatology.
These essays, perused during uninspired sermons or Torah readings at Sabbath services, will no doubt surprise many congregants. For instance, an essay on Ancient Near Eastern Mythology," by Robert Wexler, president of the University of Judaism in Los Angeles, states that on the basis of modern scholarship, it seems unlikely that the story of Genesis originated in Palestine. More likely, Mr. Wexler says, it arose in Mesopotamia, the influence of which is most apparent in the story of the Flood, which probably grew out of the periodic overflowing of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The story of Noah, Mr. Wexler adds, was probably borrowed from the Mesopotamian epic Gilgamesh.
Equally striking for many readers will be the essay "Biblical Archaeology," by Lee I. Levine, a professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. "There is no reference in Egyptian sources to Israel's sojourn in that country," he writes, "and the evidence that does exist is negligible and indirect." The few indirect pieces of evidence, like the use of Egyptian names, he adds, "are far from adequate to corroborate the historicity of the biblical account."
Similarly ambiguous, Mr. Levine writes, is the evidence of the conquest and settlement of Canaan, the ancient name for the area including Israel. Excavations showing that Jericho was unwalled and uninhabited, he says, "clearly seem to contradict the violent and complete conquest portrayed in the Book of Joshua." What's more, he says, there is an "almost total absence of archaeological evidence" backing up the Bible's grand descriptions of the Jerusalem of David and Solomon.
The notion that the Bible is not literally true "is more or less settled and understood among most Conservative rabbis," observed David Wolpe, a rabbi at Sinai Temple in Los Angeles and a contributor to "Etz Hayim." But some congregants, he said, "may not like the stark airing of it." Last Passover, in a sermon to 2,200 congregants at his synagogue, Rabbi Wolpe frankly said that "virtually every modern archaeologist" agrees "that the way the Bible describes the Exodus is not the way that it happened, if it happened at all." The rabbi offered what he called a "litany of disillusion" about the narrative, including contradictions, improbabilities, chronological lapses and the absence of corroborating evidence. In fact, he said, archaeologists digging in the Sinai have "found no trace of the tribes of Israel — not one shard of pottery."
The reaction to the rabbi's talk ranged from admiration at his courage to dismay at his timing to anger at his audacity. Reported in Jewish publications around the world, the sermon brought him a flood of letters accusing him of undermining the most fundamental teachings of Judaism. But he also received many messages of support. "I can't tell you how many rabbis called me, e- mailed me and wrote me, saying, `God bless you for saying what we all believe,' " Rabbi Wolpe said. He attributes the "explosion" set off by his sermon to "the reluctance of rabbis to say what they really believe."
Before the introduction of "Etz Hayim," the Conservative movement relied on the Torah commentary of Joseph Hertz, the chief rabbi of the British Commonwealth. By 1936, when it was issued, the Hebrew Bible had come under intense scrutiny from scholars like Julius Wellhausen of Germany, who raised many questions about the text's authorship and accuracy. Hertz, working in an era of rampant anti-Semitism and of Christian efforts to demonstrate the inferiority of the "Old" Testament to the "New," dismissed all doubts about the integrity of the text.
Maintaining that no people would have invented for themselves so "disgraceful" a past as that of being slaves in a foreign land, he wrote that "of all Oriental chronicles, it is only the Biblical annals that deserve the name of history."
The Hertz approach had little competition until 1981, when the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the official arm of Reform Judaism, published its own Torah commentary. Edited by Rabbi Gunther Plaut, it took note of the growing body of archaeological and textual evidence that called the accuracy of the biblical account into question. The "tales" of Genesis, it flatly stated, were a mix of "myth, legend, distant memory and search for origins, bound together by the strands of a central theological concept." But Exodus, it insisted, belonged in "the realm of history." While there are scholars who consider the Exodus story to be "folk tales," the commentary observed, "this is a minority view."
Twenty years later, the weight of scholarly evidence questioning the Exodus narrative had become so great that the minority view had become the majority one.
Not among Orthodox Jews, however. They continue to regard the Torah as the divine and immutable word of God. Their most widely used Torah commentary, known as the Stone Edition (1993), declares in its introduction "that every letter and word of the Torah was given to Moses by God."
Lawrence Schiffman, a professor at New York University and an Orthodox Jew, said that "Etz Hayim" goes so far in accepting modern scholarship that, without realizing it, it ends up being in "nihilistic opposition" to what Conservative Jews stand for. He noted, however, that most of the questions about the Bible's accuracy had been tucked away discreetly in the back. "The average synagogue-goer is never going to look there," he said.
Even some Conservative rabbis feel uncomfortable with the depth of the doubting. "I think the basic historicity of the text is valid and verifiable," said Susan Grossman, the rabbi of Beth Shalom Congregation in Columbia, Md., and a co-editor of "Etz Hayim." As for the mounting archaeological evidence suggesting the contrary, Rabbi Grossman said: "There's no evidence that it didn't happen. Most of the `evidence' is evidence from silence."
"The real issue for me is the eternal truths that are in the text," she added. "How do we apply this hallowed text to the 21st century?" One way, she said, is to make it more relevant to women. Rabbi Grossman is one of many women who worked on "Etz Hayim," in an effort to temper the Bible's heavily patriarchal orientation and make the text more palatable to modern readers. For example, the passage in Genesis that describes how the aged Sarah laughed upon hearing God say that she would bear a son is traditionally interpreted as a laugh of incredulity. In its commentary, however, "Etz Hayim" suggests that her laughter "may not be a response to the far- fetched notion of pregnancy at an advanced age, but the laughter of delight at the prospect of two elderly people resuming marital intimacy."
In a project of such complexity, there were inevitably many points of disagreement. But Rabbi Kushner says the only one that eluded resolution concerned Leviticus 18:22: "Do not lie with a male as one lies with a woman; it is an abhorrence." "We couldn't come to a formulation that we could all be comfortable with," the rabbi said. "Some people felt that homosexuality is wrong. We weren't prepared to embrace that as the Conservative position. But at the same time we couldn't say this is a mentality that has been disproved by contemporary biology, for not everyone was prepared to go along with that." Ultimately, the editors settled on an anodyne compromise, noting that the Torah's prohibitions on homosexual relations "have engendered considerable debate" and that Conservative synagogues should "welcome gay and lesbian congregants in all congregational activities."
Since the fall, when "Etz Hayim" was issued, more than 100,000 copies have been sold. Eventually, it is expected to become the standard Bible in the nation's 760 Conservative synagogues.
Mark S. Smith, a professor of Bible and Near Eastern Studies at New York University, noted that the Hertz commentary had lasted 65 years. "That's incredible," he said. "If `Etz Hayim' isn't around for 50 years or more, I'd be surprised."
Its longevity, however, may depend on the pace of archaeological discovery.
I am a gentile raised in a Southern Baptist family. I was a skeptical child listening to the stories in Vacation Bible School and I have no recollection of ever truly being a believer. I cannot abandon that which was never mine.
Then if you still want to be agnostic, at least you can be somewhat more intellectually honest...
Agnosticism means, "I don't know". How can I be more intellectually honest than saying I have seen no convincing evidence of a Supreme Being? (but none to completely rule it out either)
....and say that you have a cursory knowledge of Judaism
It is cursory, but if Christianity left me unconvinced, I doubt that Judaism will bring me sudden enlightenment.
Thanks!
Luke's gospel refers to Joseph and Mary returning to Bethlehem, which was the city of Joseph's lineage to pay taxes. (Luke 2:1-3) Historians didn't believe that any such decree had actually been given, that is until an archaeological dig in Egypt uncovered a copy of a Roman edict dated 104 AD.
That edict given by C.Vibius Maximus, Roman prefect of Egypt stated;" The enrollment by household being at hand, it is necessary to notify all who for any cause soever are outside of their administrative districts that they return at once to their homes to carry out the customary enrollment."
This document confirms that such decrees requiring citizens to their places of origin did indeed take place, historians are now also in wide agreement that Lukes account of the timing of this particular census is accurate.
We also have non-Christian historical sources that verify the fact that Jesus performed miracles. The Talmud is a series of commentaries and religious codes compiled by the Pharisees after Jerusalem fell in 70 AD. The Talmud has few references to Christianity, and those it does have are hostile. But according to the commentaries of the earliest rabbis, there did exist a Jesus of Nazareth, who was described as a trangressor of Isreal who performed "magic".
The book of Acts tells us that Paul started a riot in Jerusalem, by taking a group of Gentiles into the Jewish temple, that Gentiles were forbidden to go beyond the outer court, under penalty of death.
In 1871 one of the notices which were put up to warn Gentiles from entering the Temple,(under penalty of death) was discovered in Jerusalem, confirming the Biblical account.
Archaeological finds have also confirm the Biblical account of Jericho's destruction.
During excavations in the early 1930s, it was determined from the remains of the walls, that they were not pushed inward as if knocked down by attackers using battering rams. Instead the walls seem to have fallen straight down as if the earth beneath them disappeared, or as in an earthquake.
The Biblical account says they were demolished supernaturally.
In addition, the Bible says Rahab the prostitute ( who helped Isreali spies) was told to bring her family inot her house and that they would be spared. Archaeologist not only found that part of the wall remained standing, but that there were houses built against that portion of the wall.
Daniel 5 tells us that Belshazzar was the king of Babylon during it's demise. However all evidence pointed toward Nabonidus as king of Babylon at that time and archaeologists could find no proof that Belshazzar even existed.
However, more recent archaeological discoveries have confirmed Daniels account. They unearthed a document known as the "Persian Verse Account of Nabonidus", which shows that Nabadonis was indeed King, but left on a long journey, leaving his first born son *Belshazzar* in charge.
Nabonidus was in northern Arabia at the time of Babylon's demise.
Before this discovery Belshazzer was unknown since Greek historians were mainly interested in official kings, and didn't record the name of Belshazzer who was a subordinate, thus historians eventually forgot about him.
Physical evidence has now been found to support the existance of Jonah. Not only has his tomb been found in Northern Isreal, but ancient coins have been found that bear the image of a man coming out of a fish's mouth. Of course Jesus Christ Himself refered to Jonah being in the belly of the whale as a fact.
Archaeology has also confirmed the existance of many other characters and places in the Bible. The remains of King Solomon's place and the stables at Megiddo have been unearthed. The pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem, described in the Bible has also been uncovered.
As to how one knows whether someone is "lying," the simple answer is that it is only after I have caught them at it, usually by what they have failed to tell me, but sometimes when they have told me one thing while I have seen another.
Perhaps Israel hating would have been more suitable. But I'll tell you what's more funny/sad...people including yourself apparently believe what the NYT prints.
Perhaps Israel hating would have been more suitable. But I'll tell you what's more funny/sad...people including yourself apparently believe what the NYT prints.
Perhaps Israel hating would have been more suitable. But I'll tell you what's more funny/sad...people including yourself apparently believe what the NYT prints.
The establishment press has indeed touched on similar criticisms of the Koran, but more Americans are interested in Judaism and Christianity than in Islam, and this affects the visibility of religious subjects in the media. This article is a little more critical than the Times article on the Koran I linked to, but that's also because the process of self-criticism has gone further in Judaism than in Islam. It's gone further still in Christianity as the annual articles on the "Jesus seminar" in establishment publications indicate. What we're seeing now are those critical methods that caused many Christians to doubt over a century and a half being reapplied to Judaism, and applied perhaps for the first time to Islam.
Anyway, it's nearsighted to think, as some did here, that archaeology or textual criticism will disprove other religions and leave one's own untouched or proven. Or that the reverse will happen. The methods and rules of evidence that science adopts weren't known in antiquity, so the conclusions that contemporary scientists and scholars come up with will be different from those that ancient writers and scholars drew. It might seem like the difficulties of another religion might prove the truth of our own, but the spread of unbelief from one culture to another is as likely a result.
These are very exciting times, but also frightening. All people desire some certainties, though the ones they find differ. Cut loose from its religious moorings or uprooted from its foundations in belief, what will happen to humanity? God is certainly not without a sense of humor. It seems to many humans that without religious differences to divide us we would all get along better. Yet one possiblity which we've seen in the past is that without God or gods we get along much worse.
Abraham, the Jewish patriarch, probably never existed.
So all of the history contained in the genetic lines kept diligently, first by oral tradition and then by the authors of the written document from generation to generation were just a concoction of some prankster's whim? Hebrew humor? I don't think so.
No Abraham, no Adonai? No Adonai, no nothing. We simply cease to exist?
Equally striking for many readers will be the essay "Biblical Archaeology," by Lee I. Levine, a professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. "There is no reference in Egyptian sources to Israel's sojourn in that country," he writes, "and the evidence that does exist is negligible and indirect." The few indirect pieces of evidence, like the use of Egyptian names, he adds, "are far from adequate to corroborate the historicity of the biblical account."
Nor did Moses. The entire Exodus story as recounted in the Bible probably never occurred.
For a fact, there WAS no Israel until the Exodus. The Exodus was the womb and birth of the Nation of Israel, the naming of the tribes, and the ingathering of all those who left Egypt during a time of famine and death in search of a better life into a cohesive PEOPLE.
Until Egypt, Jacob, whose tomb is still exactly where the Bible said it was, was a father with many sons and a large tribe of wanderers. When they settled in Egypt, it was thriving. When they left, it was already into another famine cycle, and many more people of the working class left with them.
It is well known that Moses had a severe speech impediment, that Aaron was his voice. Moses would not have been the choice of warriors nor *slaves* to lead them, yet he WAS their leader. A freak accident? Suddenly all the history that surrounds Moses becomes yet another ponzi scheme by those darned Jews to somehow gain...what exactly?
Here's what. LAW. Very exact, well ahead of its time. LAW concerning weights and measures, rape, abortion, theft, perjury, homosexuality, murder, manslaughter, and the different kinds of punishment for each, including accidental deaths. LAW for marriage, health, diseases, communication, cooking, the SABBATH DAY, HOLY DAYS, repentence, attonement, reparations and remunerations and fines. LAW to prepare an animal for eating properly, for killing an animal as painlessly as was humanely possible. LAW for inheritance and equality between men and women. LAW to learn the ways of the universe, to continue to educate one's self to the highest potential though there might be some who would stop you. LAW of worship and preparation to worship properly before formally presenting one's self to HaShem, ie., bathe, clean your hair. In the desert, you cover your head. Now it is traditional LAW to cover your head. MOSES wrote the LAW as it existed then, as it exists now.
There is nothing perverted in the LAW, but there are so many who pervert it or ignore it for their own illegitimate reasons. It gets in the way, therefore it must not be real and true.
It gets in the way, therefore, "Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the LAW."
THAT is not the LAW as I know it nor as I ever want it to be. Those who do are beyond redemption no matter what anyone says or does. One cannot educate himself beyond G-d and the final say is never your own.
And David, far from being the fearless king who built Jerusalem into a mighty capital, was more likely a provincial leader whose reputation was later magnified to provide a rallying point for a fledgling nation
David was NOT the first king of Israel, nor was Israel simply a *fledgling* nation when he became king. How easily they dispense with Saul and Jonathan to jump right to our heart and soul with such poison as I have never seen before. The next person who dares tell me that for one Jew to criticize another is tantamount to treason will get my swiftest kick and worse if I can. This is blasphemy beyond all blasphemy and any Jew who reads the NYeT from this point on and takes anything it has to say seriously is delusional.
Similarly ambiguous, Mr. Levine writes, is the evidence of the conquest and settlement of Canaan, the ancient name for the area including Israel. Excavations showing that Jericho was unwalled and uninhabited, he says, "clearly seem to contradict the violent and complete conquest portrayed in the Book of Joshua."
Jericho was most certainly walled, although some archaeologists suggest that instead of a great noise, which science has proven, at a certain pitch sustained for a period of time producing intense vibrations, can and DOES shatter seemingly solid material, (like mudbrick walls,) it COULD have been an earthquake which caused the walls of Jericho to fall.
I submit that this *story* written thousands of years ago, spoken about before hand, makes a mockery of archaeologist's *science*. How would the people/person who WROTE the story have any knowledge of vibratory concussions? Let alone the precise sound, pitch and tone, at how many decibles, over what period of time it would need to be sustained to cause the reaction which amounted to the shattering crystal effect we all learned about in early grade science experiments?
The net effect of something of this proportion would have precluded a battle because it would have frightened the residents out of their sandals. Either a peace was concluded or they ran for the hills.
Archaeologists have been out to disprove, not prove, the existence of anything beyond man's known realm. They have not succeeded, but they do so love trying.
What's more, he says, there is an "almost total absence of archaeological evidence" backing up the Bible's grand descriptions of the Jerusalem of David and Solomon.
Anyone ever hear of Old Testament Rome, Josephus, the Assyrians, Lebanon, Ethiopia? If you did, you are just dreaming. None of that stuff really happened. There is no place like Rachel's Tomb. No antiquities unearthed from the Temple Mount, no Dead Sea Scrolls, no Herod, no nothing. There is the Vatican. Without Jerusalem, it is worthless. Without David, it is even more worthless and should be dismantled brick by brick.
So these disasters disguised as *Rabbis* have gone ahead and written a *new* Torah. Well, they can't DO that and call it Torah. It is an entire culture these b*stards are trying to steal. It is MY culture and my inheritance and they can't have it. No one gave it to them to shape and mold as THEY see fit. It makes me wish there really was a pysical hell so they could be banished there forthwith.
Naaaah.
Sounds more like a coordinated sohisticated effort by the perverts and deviants to attack the foundations of the Judeo-Christian cultures rather than the frontal attack that has been ineffective the last 25 years or so.
That they are doing so by selective picking of subjects and discussions thereof is evident in this mini-argument.
I have neither the need nor the desire to defend the Bible, OT or NT.
But I certainly would be interested in reviewing all the new data synthesized from studies and recent archeological work. It is a fascinating subject, and I suspect quite different than what is presented here.
I think this is a funny attempt at what Mark Twain characterized as... "such large returns of conjecture from such small investment in fact".
The original, still the greatest.
No big surprise that the NY Times would be this sort of banner carrier. When the lefties crave so desperately to be God, one can guess they have a fairly strong need to discredit the True God whenever and however remotely possible regardless of the facts.
The facts, as Josh McDowell's site and Jefferies' sites can attest, have been that Bible fact after Bible fact has been redundantly verified as exceedingly true as stated.
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