Posted on 09/11/2002 10:03:59 PM PDT by Commie Basher
LAST FALL, the United Synagogues of Conservative Judaism, the largest branch of American Judaism, issued a new Torah and commentary titled "Etz Hayim" – "tree of life" – that includes several background essays discussing recent scholarship on the bible and Near Eastern archaeological findings.
According to the March 9 New York Times account, the new Torah, the first in 60 years for conservative Jews, is particularly notable because the new scholarship shows that the early books of the bible have no historical validity.
The Garden of Eden? An etiological myth. Noah and the flood? A legend that arose in Mesopotamia suggested by the regular flooding of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Sodom and Gomorrah? Another myth. Abraham? Like most legendary founders, he probably never existed.
The Israelite captivity in Egypt and the Exodus probably never occurred. There are no Egyptian sources mentioning an Israelite presence and no archaeological evidence anywhere for Israelites wandering in the Sinai – "not a pottery shard," as Rabbi David Wolpe put it.
There was no Israelite conquest of Palestine. Instead, there was a gradual and largely peaceful settlement. And Jericho? It didn't have any walls and it wasn't even inhabited when Joshua's "battle of Jericho" supposedly occurred.
King David? If he existed at all, and there is some dispute, was probably a local tribal leader whose importance was later inflated to promote religious pride. There is an "almost total absence of archaeological evidence" for a sizable Jerusalem at that time.
These and other modern findings have long been accepted by most bible scholars and seminary teachers. They are well known by most priests, ministers and rabbis. But they have not been widely shared with the laity in the pews, so they may even come as a surprise to readers here. Nonetheless, they are now the views of most scholars and supported by substantial evidence.
Why clergy are reluctant to share this information with laymen is a topic for another time. But perhaps intelligent laymen will not be so shocked. After I wrote a column on the Sodom legend, a conservative Jewish friend asked why I bothered. "Some people believe those bible stories," I said. He shook his head. "Fairy tales," he said. "They're just fairy tales."
This growing willingness to face historical evidence is significant for gay men because two key texts religious conservatives cite to attack gay men are in the Leviticus "Holiness Code" purportedly given by the biblical god Yahweh to Moses on Mt. Sinai.
Leviticus 18:22 reads: "Do not lie with a man as with a woman. It is an abhorrence" – as the new Torah translates it.
But if there was no Exodus, no wandering in the desert and probably no Moses, then there was no revelation on Sinai and the prohibition of homosexuality lacks divine authority. It is merely the human creation of ancient Jewish scribes.
In fact, so far as biblical scholars can tell, based on internal evidence, the Holiness Code (Leviticus chs. 17-26) was probably compiled no earlier than 750 B.C., and maybe as late as 550 B.C. – far later than the purported revelation on Sinai (traditionally between 1200 and 1450 B.C.) The code was then "backdated" by being inserted into the Moses legend to give it divine authority.
Examined carefully, noting various repetitions and inconsistencies, that section of Leviticus seems to combine at least two sets of laws by different writers who did not entirely agree on what was important and what the penalties should be.
For example, Lev. 18:22 says that anyone who does a number of things including homosexual sex "shall be cut off from his people" because the acts are "unclean." But the scribe who wrote Lev. 20:13, perhaps writing later, had much stronger feelings about homosexuals: "They shall be put to death," he inveighs; "Their blood shall be upon them."
Recognizing that there is no divine mandate to prohibit homosexuality, how do the compilers of the new Torah handle homosexuality? Well, some wanted to preserve the prohibition anyway.
"We couldn't come to a formulation that we could all be comfortable with," Rabbi Joseph Kushner said. "Some people felt that homosexuality was wrong." So the committee ended by saying that the prohibitions on homosexuality "have engendered considerable debate," but that conservative synagogues should "welcome gay and lesbian congregants in all congregational activities."
But while this step forward is welcome, a problem lingers. If homosexuality is wrong, we know from this Torah that it is cannot be wrong for theological reasons but for some secular reasons.
But if the reasons are secular, then people have an obligation to explain them, rather than just asserting their position, so we can examine them. But many people cannot give up age-old habits of thought, even when the rationale for them no longer has any validity.
But having readily dropped the Levitical mandate that gays should be killed, the new Torah would have been well-advised to abandon the idea that homosexuality is wrong and acknowledge that believing so is merely a cultural atavism.
Perhaps you are right... but the modernization of ancient Egyptian and ancient Hebrew pronunciation leaves scads of room for interpretation. DJ is close to Z in sound. Rohl's book is a popular treatment of his thesis... and for the general public it makes little difference. He does point out in his text that the 'ph' was probably 'f'. I did not include that part of his analysis of the metathesis in the interests of brevity.
Thank you for the link to the review. I read that review many years ago and had forgotten it.
However, it is not an authoritative statement denying Rohl's thesis. As the review's author states "A Test of Time is a piece of work and provocative, and its author s evidences and arguments are indeed persuasive. But was I persuaded, especially regarding the New Chronology? Much of what David Rohl presents in the elaborate tapestry of Time must be received in good faith, simply because my own knowledge in so many areas he deals with is slim to non-existent.
His primary arguments seem to be some minor errors Rohl made in talking about the history of the science of Archaeology... which is not Archaeology... which most likely were errors in the source quoted by Rohl. These minor errors are not at all related to his main theses.
The use of "Ankhu" for dogs was unknown to me... but perhaps logical... dogs are much more lively than cats.
Egyptologists look with an askew glance at revising the orthodox chronology because of academic inertia. They do not want to have to revise all their text books, museum placards, and their own edifaces of relational dating. However, a theory is only as good as its agreement with the existing evidence and as it can be used to predict other non-considered but related findings... and Rohl's thesis seems to do a better job of both.
Their entire argument consists of negatives... there is no report during Ramases II reign of any plague, natural disaster of unusual size, or loss of his army. This is a circular argument... but absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. If Ramases II is the WRONG PHAROAH, then of course there is no evidence of the Passover. They are looking in the wrong time frame by about 200 or so years.
The Egyptologists' approach is like future historians looking for evidence of Man Landing on the Moon during the American Revolution and discovering that Washington, Jefferson, Adams and Franklin did not mention the moon landing in their letters and documents. Not finding the evidence where they are looking, they "authoratatively' declare the moon landing never happened and congratulate each other on debunking another 'myth'.
My own impression of Roth's book is that it is really two books. One is about the revision of Egyptian chronology, which is indeed a controversial topic in its own right. The other is about evidence for the Biblical account of Joshua, Moses &c. The problem with the latter is that it creates a set of parallels with essentially no more archaeological support than there is for the traditional parallels.
There is zero substantive evidence for an exodus in the time of Sebekhotep IV, just as there is zero evidence from the time of Rameses II. Roth's only purported "hard evidence" is a bunch of graves from what he claims, very dubiously, to be a Hebrew settlement. Lo, the Tenth Plague! Excuse me? How can a bunch of adult graves from a Hebrew settlement be evidence for the deaths of Egyptian children?
Moreover, this redating creates its own problems. Pharaoh pursued the fleeing Hebrews with chariots, the Bible tells us. Unfortunately, the Egyptians didn't adopt the war chariot until Dynasty XVIII, post Hyksos; this is attested by inscriptions and wall carvings that are independent of chronology.
That said, I have no personal opinion on the historical accuracy of the Bible; that's way outsde my competence. I'll stick to Egypt, and I rather think Roth should have, too.
You are making a classic error here. The 10th plague was the death of the first born... of whatever age... not just infants or children. If I recall correctly it wasn't just the first born of humans but all domestic animals as well.
Khanaferre Sobekhotep IV is identified by Rohl (not Roth) with the Pharoah of Moses birth, not the Exodus. The Exodus, according to Rohl, occurred 7 Pharoah's later under Dudimose who may have also been referred to as Thutmose.
In regard to the mass graves found, Rohl's reasoning was that something occurred that required quick burial with little or no regard for religious niceties. The burials are numerous and indicative of some catastrophe where the sheer numbers of dead overwhelmed the religious burial system.
Unfortunately, the Egyptians didn't adopt the war chariot until Dynasty XVIII, post Hyksos; this is attested by inscriptions and wall carvings that are independent of chronology.
This is proving to be possibly erroneous.
German Scholar Wolfgang Helck reports a portion of a 13th Dynasty stele shows King's son and Commander of the Edfu Army, Prince Khounsuemwaset, and his wife seated in chairs. Under her chair are emblems indicating she is head of the household... and under his chair are a pair of Charioteer's gloves indicating he was a charioteer. The Charioteer's gloves were used in later carvings to indicate rank and were also distinctive on later carvings showing actual charioteers. The father of this charioteer prince was Dudimose. In addition, the remains of domesticated horses have been found in strata associated with the 13th dynasty.
Incidentally, distinctly Hyksos graves have been excavated with horses ritually sacrificed at the head of the buried person. This may indicate that Hyksos also had horses and hence, chariots.
The conventional explanation is a simple plague, which seems to fit the evidence - mass graes, hasty buriel, the settlement subsequently deserted. That's a classic scenario.
On the "charioteers gloves" claim, I just think that's too far-fetched. A picture of a charot would be convincing. But the symbolism of accoutrements changes over time, so for all we know those gloves may have indicated social rank or something. After all, modern air force officers wear many accoutrements that predate the invention of powered flight.
I think they have no lock on closed minds. There are few areas of history or theology which have not been encased in concrete (and unchangeable lecture notes), totally immune to new findings and new analysis. {ggg}.
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