Tower Of Babel

[Ron Beron]

So you are saying that there was no serpent, garden of Eden, whale, flood or parting of the red sea? I am quite fond of the idea that Ezekiel saw something similar to a V-22 Osprey.

What do you mean "similar"? It was a an Osprey. Someone left the time machine on.

[Ron Beron]

Are you serious? Even the oldest strata of the Hebrew Bible- poetry, as it happens- has very sophisticated and evocative imagery. Semitic poets are masters of broad, bold, impressionist strokes of language.

We could go a bit further by looking at the oral traditions of the American Indians who described ancient events in the form of myth such as volcanic explosions, comets, etc.

[bcuzbcuz]

We could go a bit further by looking at the oral traditions of the American Indians who described ancient events in the form of myth such as volcanic explosions, comets, etc.

You're painting in rather broad strokes. Just which "oral traditions" are you referencing to when you talk of myths about volcanoes and comets, from which tribes?

[Bikeemikey]

I also take the OT literally most of the time. I doubt that the people of the day had the sophistication to write using metaphorical language or for a matter of fact any language that was not very direct.

CFR about this please... This seems an entirely unfounded assertion.

[Bikeemikey]

I also take the OT literally most of the time. I doubt that the people of the day had the sophistication to write using metaphorical language or for a matter of fact any language that was not very direct.

If we are going to talk in sweeping generalizations that are probably horribly inaccurate then you actually have it backwards.

Older civilizations were far more heavily reliant in metaphor and allegory as they were not sophisticated enough to be precise... Some today are concern that the highly precise nature of scientific language is eroding our metaphorical brains.

There was a really good interview on NPR the other day with an author who just wrote a book about how the human brain is a allegory machine...

[EllenMaksoud]

CFR about this please... This seems an entirely unfounded assertion.

CFR about this please... This seems an entirely unfounded assertion.

CFR? What is?

[EllenMaksoud]

What do you mean "similar"? It was a an Osprey. Someone left the time machine on.

I really do think that some of these OT stories went through the gobbledygook machine, and if we had got them first hand would have much easier to understand. I also wonder if the Babel incident was primitive man's negative interpretation of something Heavenly Father did that had nothing to do with them.

[volgadon]

CFR? What is?

A call for references, that is, you are being asked to support your claim.

[EllenMaksoud]

A call for references, that is, you are being asked to support your claim.

Thank you.

[EllenMaksoud]

CFR about this please... This seems an entirely unfounded assertion.

I stand corrected. In viewing other opinions, I found myself in error. "Off with her head".

[Nathair/|\]

"Myth" doesn't mean "untrue story," it means "story about

the things that really matter."

--John Michael Greer

[Bikeemikey]

I stand corrected. In viewing other opinions, I found myself in error. "Off with her head".

Let me know if you stumble across any sources suggesting limited metaphorical capacity in historic languages.... I would honestly be interested.

[rpn]

If the Tower was man's way of returning to God, then they had rejected the Lord's way (which is to live increasingly more righteously on earth, until He calls you home). I'm sure those who didn't get caught up with Enoch, did spend some time thinking about what they could do to join him.

[EllenMaksoud]

Let me know if you stumble across any sources suggesting limited metaphorical capacity in historic languages.... I would honestly be interested.

Don't be mistaken. I am no one. I worked at a trade as hard as I could to feed my babies. I attended college long enough to find out that calculus was for the person I wasn't. Anything I know about theology is through informal education. I've been retired for 10 years and spend my days reading and studying.

I'm not convinced that naked skinned bipeds are God's best effort. Having said that:

[volgadon]

Don't be mistaken. I am no one. I worked at a trade as hard as I could to feed my babies. I attended college long enough to find out that calculus was for the person I wasn't. Anything I know about theology is through informal education. I've been retired for 10 years and spend my days reading and studying.

I'm not convinced that naked skinned bipeds are God's best effort. Having said that:

I'm an autodidact who works in a call center, so?

[EllenMaksoud]

I'm an autodidact who works in a call center, so?

Well, it seems as though you have taught yourself well.

One day someone might say that about me, perhaps. Heavenly Father is the center of my life. I study everything I can find about him. When I'm not doing that I read and write Science Fiction.

[Bikeemikey]

Well, it seems as though you have taught yourself well.

One day someone might say that about me, perhaps. Heavenly Father is the center of my life. I study everything I can find about him. When I'm not doing that I read and write Science Fiction.

What's your favorite sci-fi book? Looking for something good to read.

[EllenMaksoud]

What's your favorite sci-fi book? Looking for something good to read.

I like the David Weber series, "Honor Harrington", John Ringo, "Sassinak" by Anne McCaffrey, Isaac Asimov's "Foundation Trillogy", Clarke's "Rama" books, though the ending tore my heart out. I don't know your age, but Piers Anthony, Robert A Heinlein, Gene Roddenberry. I would not bother with John Norman. Elizabeth Haydon wrote a series called, "The Symphony of Ages", then "The Rhapsody Trilogy". Work on that and get back to me OK?

[Ron Beron]

You're painting in rather broad strokes. Just which "oral traditions" are you referencing to when you talk of myths about volcanoes and comets, from which tribes?

That's because we are discussing this is broad terms. Specifically, in their book, "When They Severed Earth from Sky", Wayland and Barber writes about

Why were Prometheus and Loki envisioned as chained to rocks? What was the Golden Calf? Why are mirrors believed to carry bad luck? How could anyone think that mortals like Perseus, Beowulf, and St. George actually fought dragons, since dragons don't exist? Strange though they sound, however, these "myths" did not begin as fiction.

This absorbing book shows that myths originally transmitted real information about real events and observations, preserving the information sometimes for millennia within nonliterate societies. Geologists' interpretations of how a volcanic cataclysm long ago created Oregon's Crater Lake, for example, is echoed point for point in the local myth of its origin. The Klamath tribe saw it happen and passed down the story--for nearly 8,000 years.

We, however, have been literate so long that we've forgotten how myths encode reality. Recent studies of how our brains work, applied to a wide range of data from the Pacific Northwest to ancient Egypt to modern stories reported in newspapers, have helped the Barbers deduce the characteristic principles by which such tales both develop and degrade through time. Myth is in fact a quite reasonable way to convey important messages orally over many generations--although reasoning back to the original events is possible only under rather specific conditions. Book Description

This from the book... http://www.ohsu.edu/xd/education/schools/school-of-medicine/departments/clinical-departments/psychiatry/grand-rounds/upload/When-They-Severed-Earth-from-Sky-How-the-Human-Mind-Shapes-Myth.pdf

Further, many Greek myths have their origins a natural reading of paleolithic animal remains. For example, the Cyclops can easily be ascertained from the skull of a mammoth. The books by Adrienne Mayor discuss this quite thoroughly:

The First Fossil Hunters and Fossil Legends of the First Americans

[Ron Beron]

If we are going to talk in sweeping generalizations that are probably horribly inaccurate then you actually have it backwards.

Older civilizations were far more heavily reliant in metaphor and allegory as they were not sophisticated enough to be precise... Some today are concern that the highly precise nature of scientific language is eroding our metaphorical brains.

There was a really good interview on NPR the other day with an author who just wrote a book about how the human brain is a allegory machine...

Along this line I understand the ancient Greeks didn't have a specific name for blue, but simply "wine dark sea".

[Stone holm]

I really do think that some of these OT stories went through the gobbledygook machine, and if we had got them first hand would have much easier to understand. I also wonder if the Babel incident was primitive man's negative interpretation of something Heavenly Father did that had nothing to do with them.

I think that is an ongoing process where at times the Bible simply recites about "s[tuff] happens" and then the Biblical spin doctors immediately proceed to assign all types of symbolic and metaphorical meaning to it.

[Robert F. Smith]

That's because we are discussing this is broad terms. Specifically, in their book, "When They Severed Earth from Sky", Wayland and Barber writes about

This from the book... http://www.ohsu.edu/...Shapes-Myth.pdf

Further, many Greek myths have their origins a natural reading of paleolithic animal remains. For example, the Cyclops can easily be ascertained from the skull of a mammoth. The books by Adrienne Mayor discuss this quite thoroughly:

The First Fossil Hunters and Fossil Legends of the First Americans

On a far broader scale, see Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend, Hamlet's Mill: An Essay on Myth and the Frame of Time (Gambit, 1969/ reprint Godine, 1977), which is available as an ebook for $9.99 at http://books.google.com/books?id=ql7ATHGee50C , and is well worth it.

[Robert F. Smith]

I think that is an ongoing process where at times the Bible simply recites about "s[tuff] happens" and then the Biblical spin doctors immediately proceed to assign all types of symbolic and metaphorical meaning to it.

You probably need to examine the systematic case made by some of these fabled "spin doctors" to see whether your label is valid:

Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative

Robert Alter, The Art of Biblcial Poetry

Northrop Frye, The Great Code

Test your own assumptions for coherence.

[EllenMaksoud]

I think that is an ongoing process where at times the Bible simply recites about "s[tuff] happens" and then the Biblical spin doctors immediately proceed to assign all types of symbolic and metaphorical meaning to it.

OH, thank you. My knees were shaking in anticipation of reading your reply. Sigh ! We have the restored Gospel because the the apostates got their greasy hands on it before. I have mentioned this before, but I knew a man about 30 whose Father is a Jewish Rabbi and who had gone to college. He learned a half dozen of the ancient languages. I do not know enough to tell you which ones.

What he found was serious error getting from what ever the Jews used, to various other ancient languages.

It did not affect my faith because my faith does not come from proving the Bible. I didn't become religious because some MAN produced enough guilt to get me trapped in the fold. I came to God because I was freaking out trying to raise children and manage my life and I needed HELP!

So, getting back on subject, they keep running around all over the mountains trying to find the Ark. I think that when it suits Heavenly Father, the Ark, the plates, the Ark of the Covenant and all those things will be revealed.

[volgadon]

What he found was serious error getting from what ever the Jews used, to various other ancient languages.

I'm not sure I understand what you meant by that.