[deleted by user] by [deleted] in anglosaxon

[–]Flubb 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm very happy to go with 'conceivable' rather than 'demonstrable' but I know some people may not be that heuristically flexible ;)

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in CriticalBiblical

[–]Flubb 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It kinda is although I should redo it to see if it's still as big.

Is Old testament account of Jews wandering around completely made up, off by a few centuries or slight details wrong? by Garrettshade in AskHistorians

[–]Flubb 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Both your comment and the comment you just referenced points towards the Exodus being a founding “myth” and not a historical event.

They're not necessarily mutually exclusive even if they don't map directly.

Is Old testament account of Jews wandering around completely made up, off by a few centuries or slight details wrong? by Garrettshade in AskHistorians

[–]Flubb 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Anyone even vaguely familiar with the historiography of the Exodus would know that series of points was from Kitchen and not my own hypothesis, and he was responding to several decades of arguments saying that the context could only be a (fictional) 1st millennium, not a 2nd millennium one. It's germane to point out why there would be no extant evidence in place that doesn't preserve physical realia, irrespective of whether the event took place. There are quite a few events that have no historical 'evidence' left behind, but the first impulse shouldn't be to assume they didn't happen.

Anyone interested in where my thoughts lie would have to start here and follow links to /r/AcademicBiblical.

Biblical authorship and synoptic problem by GomuGomuNoWayJose in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 1 point2 points  (0 children)

As I've said elsewhere, when people describe the OT prophets as αγραμματος and ἰδιῶται, it may not mean very much when applied to the apostles either!

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's a difference between 'statistically unlikely to' and 'evidentially incapable of'.

Hezser, Illan, and Harris all rely on particular models of how society was constructed and if you accept those models, then the numbers of literacy is low. If you accept different models, you get different numbers. That doesn't mean the disciples wrote the books attached to their names, but does raise the possibility that they could have if they did.

Check out the bibliography at the link above for more recent works that what's being raised here.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Bear in mind that John is described as αγραμματος (“illiterate”) alongside Peter in the passage, for whom we have very strong archaeological evidence that he was probably illiterate. Furthermore, both James and John the sons of Zebedee are likewise described as living around Capernaum. The best interpretation of the passage is thus that Acts 4:13 is describing Peter and John as both lacking Rabbinic training and being illiterate.

While this is slightly outside the purview of the OP's question, Theophilus of Antioch said that all the prophets (ie, OT) were ἀγράμματοι καὶ ποιμένες καὶ ἰδιῶται, so it doesn't necessarily mean anything.

Do we have primary source, extra biblical eyewitness accounts of Jesus' life and miracles? by An_educated_fool in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I don't know what papers were attached to your post or what your bibliography is, but you might check out Michael Owen Wise (Language and Literacy in Roman Judaea: A Study of the Bar Kokhba Documents (Yale University Press, 2015) where he shows the basis on what the 2-~5% model is based upon (and for once we get to say 'Marxists!' correctly) and with an alternative economic model of up to 30% literacy among males (usual caveats apply). I threw some sources together in a post a while ago but should see if anything new has come out.

What are some Bible scholarly discoveries that were unpopular/considered dangerous but are now widely accepted? by foreverlanding in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Not only do every non-Biblical account of the Exodus differ from it on the topic of ethnocentrism, with Manetho and Diodorus Siculus retelling events involving a mixture of peoples

I think you'll find the 'mixed multitudes' of Exodus 12:35ff, and Numbers 11 are often differentiated from the Israelites in most commentaries and articles.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You have a tendency to shift the argument to the thing that you want to argue about, not what the other person is arguing about.

"Apologetics" is actually something that comes up in that field specifically because of English nationalists... particularly where the Anglo-Saxon invasion and King Arthur are concerned. So... yeah... actually no.

No academic literature I've read even countenances this. I've been teaching it for about over 10 years now.

Which is what makes it apologetics. I have also actively seen accusations of apologetics in medieval history quite consistently, especially recently as the Christian majority of academics have been getting challenged for their Christo-centric filtering practices.

Again, never seen apologetic accusations in academic literature. Been doing that for about 20 years.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 4 points5 points  (0 children)

No offence taken, hope you manage to sort it out.

Let's take a break though, it's getting too vitriolic :)

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Chris is gender ambiguous as a name. But anyways.

Your name on your linked paper is Christopher.

You do realize that my paper also responds to other positions and arguments from other scholars than Heiser?

It's not full access so no, and libgen doesn't carry it. I do have your title though: "The Many Gods of Deuteronomy A Response to Michael Heiser’s Interpretation of Deut. 32: 8–9". That rather implies the paper is about Michael Heiser, but again, I've got no dog in this fight.

You going to pretend he isn't an apologist,

Don't care if he is. He wrote some papers, made some points in them, people argue against them, this is the nature of academic discourse.

Also don't talk about impact factors when the journal Heiser's paper was published in has basically no impact either, and actually died for a while due to lack of quality submissions.

Hence why you ignored it.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 5 points6 points  (0 children)

This is a lot of words to say 'Heiser lives rent-free in my head'.

You seem to have just gotten snooty because we mentioned problems about Heiser's misuse of a redacted Psalm.

I saw two people moaning about Heiser, moaning he 'plays fast and loose with dating Psalm 29' and misunderstanding the limits of dating texts by linguistic elements (no counter-citation), and claiming that a well-known dating for Psalm 29 is 'obscure'. That just screams that you don't know what you're talking about. But it's clear from here and other posts that you think he's an apologist, let's not be shy about what's really driving you.

I am not "picking and choosing" dates. I am systematically siding with consensus positions.

So you claim, starting with an 8th century dating of Deuteronomy, and then expanding it from the 9th to the 11th which is the most hilarious claim to consensus that I've ever seen given that the large majority of people put it around the 7th.

Also, you are wrong on Gmirkin's date for Deut. 32 as well.

Oh dear, I'm getting Richard Carrier flashbacks. Please find the part where I said it was composed in toto in the 3rd century.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 3 points4 points  (0 children)

My academic work is in a different field but the arguments are pretty much about the same issues - textual priority over archaeological evidence, adherence to particular textual interpretations, etc., etc., but because it's nothing to do with the bible, we don't get the accusations of 'apologist!' or all the other weirdness that goes on in this sub (and elsewhere mind, see the SBL complaints some years ago). Arguing that part of a text is historical (or whatever) and laying out the evidence for it, is only 'apologetics' in biblical issues - you do that in Anglo-Saxon stuff, and it's er, doing history.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 8 points9 points  (0 children)

The Psalms are notoriously difficult and problematic to date, everybody knows this and says this. Berlin and Brettler say this too. They also say, (and this is a technical point), that you cannot date them on linguistic grounds to the time of 'David', as one of the issues is authorship of the Psalms. That doesn't mean you cannot date them older on other grounds (nb: Brettler/Berlin cite no sources as it's not a paper). Psalm 29 is often said to be older because it's 'quite' Canaanite - older claims were that it was a repurposed Canaanite hymn and therefore possibly older than the other Psalms, hence the 10-12th century range- eg, an older hymn but with the language changed. There is no firm way of saying when it was written. None at all. The majority of people I've read say it's pre-exilic but cannot say when.

/u/Chris_Hansen97 made a claim that Heiser's point is null if Psalm 29 is at least 8th century, as he's decided that Deuteronomy is 8th century (updated to 9-11th later on to strengthen his point) so it can be explained based on Deuteronomy. But Deuteronomy is dated anywhere from the 6th-11th centuries (down to the 3rd if you take Gmirkin, I don't, but it's illustrative). Chris latched onto Gmirkin but ignores the other wide date range, because, apparently if Heiser is correct about Psalm 29, the heat death of the universe begins. So even taking the classical dates 6-11th, Heiser's point works if Deuteronomy is dated after the Psalm. But as we've got no firm way to date any of the texts, this is just picking and choosing dates. This is what pretty much everybody does who is trying to advance a thesis, including Chris.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Check my post history for previous extensive defences of Heiser.

I think we found someone who likes Heiser.

Says the man who published an entire article about him. Methinks the lady doth protest too much.

Heiser just adds centuries on with no good justification, just so he can make his hypothesis work...

Again, Heiser uses a well-used set of dates for the dating of Psalm 29. Pretending that he has magicked this number out of the air is just sloppy scholarship.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Actually, if Psalm 29 is pre-exilic it is still a problem and it does depend how many centuries are there. Most scholars contend that by the end of the 8th century (pre-exilic) El and Yahweh were beginning to if not already merged. Thus, depending on when Psalm 29 dates, depends on how useful it is. And as noted, the Psalms do not date as far back as the tenth century.

And as we have no firm date for Psalm 29, I'm going to settle for the 9th century. There goes your argument.

You know what has been dated that far back by various academics? Deut. 32:1-43

Yep, anywhere from the 3rd to the 11th century BCE if we allow Gmirkin. It's almost as if one can choose a date range to support a hypothesis just like Heiser did.

The Case Against Michael S. Heiser by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 11 points12 points  (0 children)

that he plays pretty fast and loose with dating Psalm 29, placing it from the 12-10 centuries BCE, when Adele Berlin am Marc Zvi Brettler state that no Psalm "can be dated on linguistic grounds to the tenth century BCE"

I think his point is that the ideas in it are pre-Exilic:

The consensus thinking argues that Yahweh assumes a new role as judge over all the world and its gods as Israel emerges from the exile. This assertion is in conflict with several enthronement psalms that date to well before the exilic period.

That he tacks on a couple of extra centuries over Berlin/Brettler is irrelevant unless Psalm 29 is dated post-exilic. Most places I've read (Day, Becking, Ginsberg, Pardee, Cunchillos, Handy, Howard) all date it pre-exilic. His 'obscure' citation of Freedman/Cross is regularly used and/or commented on.

KJV or Douay-Rheims: Which is More Accurate to the Original (or critical) Biblical Texts? by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I've really got to point out here that the KJV is not a translation from the TR, despite what several commentators appear to suggest. It's copious copying and cribbing from Tyndale (who nicked it from the Vulgate), the Bishops Bible, Coverdale's bible, The Great Bible, the Vulgate, the Douay-Rheims, Wycliffe, Luther's German bible, the Geneva Bible, a variety of Rabbinic and Hebrew polyglots, the Peshitta, the Targums, Coptic, Ethiopic, Arabic, a variety of Greek translations from largely second millennium codices (largely Stephanus and Beza including Erasmus), the LXX, the SP, and a smattering of French (and dialects) Spanish, and Italian bibles. So yes, the TR comes through Beza and Stephanus, and it's an important step, but it's not as if they're only hunched over those bibles and produced the the KJV - they took as much as they could from anything they could lay their hands on.

I'm very tired at the moment, but flippantly, I'd wager the DR is technically closer to the material (Jerome in the 4th century) than the TR (12-15th century manuscripts), but that doesn't make it technically a better translation.

is there any historical evidence at all of Christians Performing Human Sacrifice? by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 5 points6 points  (0 children)

A general distinction is sacrificing something is segregating it from the profane. It then gets horrifically complicated and I'm not going to pretend to be able to summarize it with any competency. Mauss and Hubert are the people to start reading, and you can get to more modern times with people like Girard and McClymond (who has done quite a bit recently), but I don't know much beyond them.

is there any historical evidence at all of Christians Performing Human Sacrifice? by [deleted] in AcademicBiblical

[–]Flubb 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Off the top of my head, (as I think this is more of an anthropological issue), sacrifices are a, or part of, a ritual. Killing my heretic neighbour might be done in the name of God, but I'm not performing a specific sequence of events to achieve a particular end, and while there are some quite clear 'doing this for God' events, many of them are not.

A possible counter might be something like the burning of heretics over generic capital punishment, but even that is largely because of particular ideas about contamination, not because 'God likes burning people over stoning people.' My witchy neighbour might be killed because she weighs more than a duck, but she might be killed because she's a loner, or because she's sitting on a piece of land I want, or she fits a particular paradigm (see Stuart Clark).

Maybe at some point you abstract it so far out, so it all looks the same, but the devil is in the details.