Explanation for "Nephi and His Asherah"

[Dan Vogel]

Will,

I

[William Schryver]

Vogel:

I

[Addictio]

DCP remarked above:

As I've pointed out before, Addictio's repeated derision of the supposed "Sunday school methodology" in my Asherah paper strikes me as either opaque -- perhaps I just don't get it -- or, as I myself am inclined to think, utterly devoid of serious substance.

In the post DCP is referencing, I did several things. One was to respond to this assertion by Hamblin in the first post on this thread:

Non-Mormon biblical scholar Margaret Barker has commented favorably on Dan

[William Schryver]

Addictio,

I confess that I cannot see the basis of your various arguments.

Bill Hamblin made this statement:

Non-Mormon biblical scholar Margaret Barker has commented favorably on Dan

[Dan Vogel]

Will,

The use of qualifiers is not an automatic indication of mind-reading.

I didn

[Daniel Peterson]

Addictio, maybe I haven't been clear enough:

I don't see anything in your objection except definitional maneuvering. Defining my article as "Sunday School" and "unscholarly" is your prerogative. But I don't have to find it interesting. If, as you suggest, the article doesn't use legitimate scholarly methodology, I can only say that, in that case, I'm incapable of recognizing the problem, and all those years of schooling and of reading academic articles appear to have been completely wasted on me.

It's possible.

From my perspective, though, your objections seem frivolous and, as I've pointed out, nonsubstantive.

[William Schryver]

Vogel:

It seems obvious to me that Jesus, not Mary, is the tree of life.

And it seems at least equally obvious to me that the tree of life represents the Mother of the Son of God, and that the fruit of that tree represents Christ, or the love of God. But more importantly, as Dan P. articulates so well, it seemed obvious to Nephi that the tree of life represented the Mother of the Son of God, and that her child (the fruit of that tree) represented the offspring of God the Father.

Without rejecting your interpretation as conclusively flawed, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree in terms of our conflicting views on this issue. It is a fascinating topic, in my estimation, especially in light of the relatively recent archaeological findings from the Near East. And I would invite you to continue the discussion, if you are so inclined, in the thread that has been commenced in the pundits' forum.

[Ron Beron]

Vogel:

It seems obvious to me that Jesus, not Mary, is the tree of life.

And it seems at least equally obvious to me that the tree of life represents the Mother of the Son of God, and that the fruit of that tree represents Christ, or the love of God. But more importantly, as Dan P. articulates so well, it seemed obvious to Nephi that the tree of life represented the Mother of the Son of God, and that her child (the fruit of that tree) represented the offspring of God the Father.

Without rejecting your interpretation as conclusively flawed, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree in terms of our conflicting views on this issue. It is a fascinating topic, in my estimation, especially in light of the relatively recent archaeological findings from the Near East. And I would invite you to continue the discussion, if you are so inclined, in the thread that has been commenced in the pundits' forum.

If I may jump in. I have been reading off and on the post here and I would have to agree with those who argue for a feminine reading of the tree in Nephi's dream. The tree, at least in ancient times have been associated with female dieties and by extension a masculine projection. In someways the tree could represent both male and female attributes, but still be uniquely female. From my post in Pundits.

In Egypt the goddess Hathor, whose hairstyle is copied with fertility cultic artifacts in Israel, is known as the Lady of the Sycamore. Eating the fruit (figs) of this tree offered immortality to the recipient. In Crete the fig tree was also figured predominately in a cultic sense where it was placed next to the altars (consider the high places of Israel where the Asherah was placed next to the altars). The fertility goddess is shown caressing the sycamores as if in sacred devotion. I also believe that the djed pillar was often associated with the spine of Osiris. Not particularly important until one determines that the djed were also connotated with the Egyptian belief of formation of semen in the spine.

In Egypt, Osiris was first buried in a mulberry coffin and later he was placed in a sycamore tree which his wife/mother Isis/Hathor traveled to Canaan to retrieve. Similarly, both Adonis and Attis met their demise on fig trees.

I think there are countless themes in myth to substantiate any belief in a tree as a feminine symbol.

[Dan Vogel]

Will,

Without rejecting your interpretation as conclusively flawed, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree in terms of our conflicting views on this issue. It is a fascinating topic, in my estimation, especially in light of the relatively recent archaeological findings from the Near East. And I would invite you to continue the discussion, if you are so inclined, in the thread that has been commenced in the pundits' forum.

Somehow I doubt your response will be any better over there than they are here.

[William Schryver]

Will,

Without rejecting your interpretation as conclusively flawed, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree in terms of our conflicting views on this issue. It is a fascinating topic, in my estimation, especially in light of the relatively recent archaeological findings from the Near East. And I would invite you to continue the discussion, if you are so inclined, in the thread that has been commenced in the pundits' forum.

Somehow I doubt your response will be any better over there than they are here.

As I said, "if you are so inclined." Or, if you'd rather post on "that other board" where everyone readily agrees with you and showers you with sycophantic praise, then you are certainly able to make that choice, too. But that doesn't sound like too much fun.

I think it is important and valuable for the participants on this board to get to see and consider what you, Brent, Addictio, and others with similar opinions, have to say.

It is a given that we will almost always be on opposite ends of the spectrum, but as Lehi said (or that "pious fraud" if you'd prefer), there must needs be an opposition in all things. I agree.

[Addictio]

DCP said most recently(bold emphasis added):

Addictio, maybe I haven't been clear enough:

I don't see anything in your objection except definitional maneuvering. Defining my article as "Sunday School" and "unscholarly" is your prerogative. But I don't have to find it interesting.

You've been sufficiently clear about this particular characterization of my arguments already, rest asssured; in fact, fwiw I kinda liked the earlier, "lexical legerdemain" version better. More colorful. Actually, though, for the record I think we both understand the pointlessness of mere verbal disputes, in which nothing is at stake but what the "disputants" each prefers to "call" or "label" something.

I also understand the usefulness of describing what you evidently (and strongly) believe is a gross mischaracterization of your analysis and method as if it were instead a matter of my unilaterally "defining" the undesirable, alleged characteristic/predicate (e.g., "unscholarly") into existence. We both know how to argue against someone's "garden variety," gross or even willful mischaracterization. Since you've elected to declare impasse, a helpless situation caused by my capricious, unilateral act of "defining" your analysis into something it's plainly not, that's OK too.

If, as you suggest, the article doesn't use legitimate scholarly methodology, I can only say that, in that case, I'm incapable of recognizing the problem, and all those years of schooling and of reading academic articles appear to have been completely wasted on me.

First, by way of officious reminder, in connection with the bolded word, here and in the first quote, I think it's still worth being precise about the focus of my critique, which has never been your entire article, but a specific component of it: the analysis and argument based upon the language excerpted from 1 Nephi 11.

Second, no need at present to jump or even saunter toward entertaining a purely hypothetical possibility that you are incapable of "recognizing the problem," is there? Remember thy good and excellent friend Hamblin, tireless defender of the article? I'll soon post a reply to his "standard academic practice" dismissal of that hypothetical possibility. Since the article's analysis of the BoM text is clearly-obviously "standard academic practice," according to Hamblin, remember, there's actually no problem for you or anyone else to "recognize."

Finally, and unseriously: Not completely wasted effort, was all that learning, though. Consider the brighter side. Without all that schooling and reading, for example, you never could have listed and endorsed all those attractive scholarly tools and methods you elected not to use, in your analysis of the BoM text. But more importantly, without all those well-spent years of study, how in the world could you provide the unexpected "shock and awe" of likening yourself so aptly unto Nephi the visionary, in two such sincere, perfectly-belated sentences about Nephi the author? And on such short notice?

From my perspective, though, your objections seem frivolous and, as I've pointed out, nonsubstantive.

Hmm, I think that f-word is brand-spanking new, isn't it? And what with its piquant binding of the worthless-and-pesky right together, like they deserve, doesn't "frivolous" more than trump that worn-out, dull "nonsubstantive" (and its ancestors, equally glum sound-alikes, as well)? Which definitely has to count as progress, seems to me. Significant progress in the ongoing struggle to express the true depth of your disinterest, I mean, not to mention its more-than-ample cause. Well, be patient, and just think negative(!) now and then. There's bound to be a suitable, perhaps an almost-perfect next word, lounging maybe one or two rungs down from "frivolous," on that descending ladder.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Addictio wrote:

Though this terminology may superficially "sound" similar, among other things, it reflects a fundamental difference in underlying assumptions about the historicity of the BoM text. Scholars who adopt a form of methodological naturalism (like Barker) obviously needn't, and many don't, deny the existence of (the Christian or Jewish) God, or of angels, or the occurrence of supernatural events. Like Barker, however, they do decline to take at face value, to accept uncritically or as a "given," a text's own religious, and/or "supernatural" account of its origin and authorship.

The only problem I have with this Addictio, is that these form of textual criticism can be applied to the Book of Mormon independant of its alleged source or production. I.E. we have a text which can be evaluated apart from issue of discovery and translation.

This isn't to say that your views on these aspects won't affect your default position, or your leanings in interpretation, and so on, merely that the text itself, can be examined using appropriate and widely used methods. Further, I think that BoM presents a rather unique problem in that the production of the text is separate and distinct in this way from its translation. That is, (and some blend these issues together inappropriately from my perspective) the origin and authorship of the Book of Mormon needn't be divine, although the translation may well be. I tend to be more of a minimalist (I think) with regards to the text, than many of my believing counterparts.

Ben

[Addictio]

I've been otherwise engaged for a while. I'm going to defer further discussions of methodology for the present, and return to the historicity argument set forth at the end of the DCP Asherah article.

As we know from the article's Asherah Argument (hereafter "AA") set forth at the beginning of the article, something important happens in 1 Nephi Chapter 11. Specifically, after Nephi states in verse 11 that he desires "to know the interpretation" of the tree that his father had seen, and he had just been shown, after the Spirit of the Lord abruptly departs, he is then shown a number of things, converses with his new interlocutor, the angel guide, who asks him if he knows the meaning of the tree, and Nephi replies that it is the love of God.

This portion of the AA reads as follows (in the online version):

Then "the Spirit" asks Nephi the question that Nephi himself had posed only a few verses before:

Knowest thou the meaning of the tree which thy father saw? (1 Nephi 11:21)

Strikingly, though the vision of Mary seems irrelevant to Nephi's original question about the significance of the tree

[Olavarria]

bumpoer