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Old Testament Chronological and Historical Problems

1. Time Line
2. Adam & Eve
3. Jabal, Jubal, & Tubal Cain
4. The Flood
5. The Curse of Ham
6. The Descendants of Shem, Ham, & Japheth
7. The Tower of Babel
   
8. The Patriarchs: Abraham & His Relatives
9. The Patriarchs: Isaac & Jacob
10. The Exodus
11. Moses
12. Late Authorship, Not Mosaic
13. The Mosaic Law:  Some Comments
    
14. Special Numbers
15. Archaeology
16. Commentary

Is it possible to demonstrate that the Bible is NOT the "infallible Word of God"?

This paper explores the matter of Old Testament (OT) chronology and compares the Bible to known history, attempting to explain discrepancies in an easy-to-understand manner accessible even to those with little knowledge of history.

I will first explain to you the time-line built into the Bible by its authors.  Then I will comment on history and the Biblical stories.

Time Line

The Bible has a definite internal time-line.  Even though its authors did not use the notation "BC" and "AD," or "BCE" and "CE," it is fairly simple to convert the Bible's dates into modern notation. 

One of the few undisputed dates for an OT event is the 586 BC destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. Given this date as a starting point, one can then use the numbers provided by the Bible itself to reconstruct a timeline of Biblical events.

1. 586 BC--Jerusalem destroyed by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar

2. 966 BC--the fourth year of Solomon's reign.

One may use numbers provided in I and II Kings and II Chronicles to find out when certain kings ruled. The OT provides the following numbers as years of the reigns of the kings of Judah:

 1.Solomon	40		12.Jothom	16
 2.Rehoboam	17		13.Ahaz		16
 3.Abijah	 3		14.Hezekiah	29
 4.Asa		41 (or 40)	15.Manasseh 	55	
 5.Jehoshaphat	25		16.Amon	 	 2
 6.Jehoram	 8		17.Josiah	31	
 7.Ahaziah	 1		18.Jehoahaz	 0.25 (3 months)
 8.Q. Athaliah	 6 (or 7)	19.Jehoikim	11		
 9.Joash	40		20.Jehoiachin	 0.25 (3 months, 10 days)
10.Amaziah	29		21.Zedekiah	11	
11.Uzziah	52
--------------------------------------------------------------
						433.50 yrs from Solomon to 586 BC

So adding the years of kingship (434) to 586 BC, we get 1020 BC as the year Solomon began to reign. But Bible scholars point out that some of the lengths of reigns included co-regencies. In other words, a person may have become king while his father was still reigning also; thus, he may have reigned 40 years total, but for the first 7 years his father was king too. In such a case, there would be 7 years of overlapping reigns. If we take into account approximately 50 years in overlapping reigns, we get 970 BC for the beginning of Solomon's reign. This date is acceptable even to the most conservative Bible scholars, and if you look in a Bible dictionary or at a traditional timeline, you will probably find a date close to this one (ex. Harper's Bible Dictionary says "second third of the 10th century," which is c.966-933 BC). For our purposes, it does not matter which date we take, so we shall take 970 BCE as the year Solomon started to rule. Solomon's fourth year, then, would be 966 BC.

3. 1446 BC--date of the Exodus from Egypt

I Kings 6:1 says that the fourth year of Solomon's reign was 480 years after the Exodus. If we believe I Kings 6:1 and add 480 years to 966 BC (Solomon’s 4th year), we get 1446 BC as the date of Israel’s Exodus from Egypt, and this is a date traditionally accepted by Christians (for an example, see the NIV Study Bible chronology).

4. 1876 BC--the beginning of Israel's sojourn in Egypt

In Genesis 15:13, Yahweh tells Abraham that his descendants would be enslaved for 400 years and return to Canaan in the fourth generation. If we believe Gen. 15:13 and add 400 years to 1446 BC, we get 1846 BC as the year Israel went down into Egypt. Exodus 12:40-41 gives a figure of 430 years; if we use it, we get 1876 BC as the beginning of Israel's sojourn. Either date is traditionally acceptable, and thirty years doesn't make a big difference. The NIV Study Bible uses 1876.

5. 2006 BC--Jacob (Israel) was born

Genesis 47:28 says Jacob lived in Egypt for 17 years, and he lived 147 years total. If Genesis 47:28 is true, he would have been 130 (147-17) when the family went to Egypt, so he would have been born 130 years before that. 1876 BC plus 130 years gives us 2006 BC as the year Jacob was born.

6. 2166 BC--Abraham was born

Genesis 25:26 says Isaac was 60 when Jacob was born, and Genesis 21:5 says Abraham was 100 when Isaac was born. If we believe these verses, Abraham was born 160 years before Jacob, and 160 years + 2006 BC gives us 2166 BC for the birth of Abraham.

7. 2456 BC--the Great Flood of Noah

Since the Bible gives for every person in Abraham's ancestry his age when his first son is born and when he dies, one may use the Bible's numbers to calculate when certain individuals were born--all the way back to Adam!! See Genesis 11 for Shem to Abraham and Genesis 5 for Adam to Noah and Shem.

2166 BC		Abraham is born	
+ 70--age of	Terah		when	Abraham		is born
+ 29--age of	Nahor		when	Terah		is born
+ 30--age of	Serug		when	Nahor		is born
+ 32--age of	Reu		when	Serug		is born
+ 30--age of	Peleg		when	Reu		is born
+ 34--age of	Eber		when	Peleg		is born
+ 30--age of	Shelah		when	Eber		is born
+ 35--age of	Arphaxad	when	Shelah		is born
+100--age of	Shem		when	Arphaxad	is born
+500--age of 	Noah 		when 	Shem		is born
3056 BC--Noah is born

And since we know the Flood occurred in Noah's 600th year (Gen 7:6), we can subtract 600 from 3056 BC (Noah's birth year) to get 2456 BC for the Worldwide Flood.

8. 4112 BC--Adam is born, or Yahweh creates Adam.

Using the same process as in the previous step, we can find when Adam was born.

3056 BC		Noah is born	
+182--age of 	Lamech 		when	Noah		is born
+187--age of	Methuselah	when	Lamech		is born
+ 65--age of	Enoch		when	Methuselah	is born
+162--age of	Jared		when	Enoch		is born
+ 65--age of	Mahalalel	when	Jared		is born	
+ 70--age of	Kenan		when	Mahalalel	is born
+ 90--age of	Enosh 		when	Kenan		is born	
+105--age of	Seth		when	Enosh		is born
+130--age of	Adam		when	Seth		is born
4112 BC--Yhwh created Adam

If we had taken Solomon's reign as starting in 1020 BC, we would have Adam being created 50 years earlier, which does not matter.

- - - - -  

The New Testament:  It is important to note that the authors of the New Testament also believed in humanity's recent creation by Yahweh.  The genealogy in Luke posits only 77 generations of humans from God to Jesus through Adam.  The author of Matthew also appears to have faith in Old Testament Jewish genealogies, although his genealogy differs from that found in Luke.

Now that we have used the information provided by the Bible to make a timeline of Biblical events, we can compare the Bible's dates, events, numbers, and concepts of time with what we know of history.

Adam and Eve

The Bible has Adam being created about 4112 BC, which is historically impossible. Archaeological evidence shows that Stone Age culture goes back much further than 50,000 BC, and people were around before the Stone Age. By 8,000 BC in Palestine, agriculture, animal domestication, and permanent town sites had already developed--and this is long before the Bible says Adam even existed! Even those radically conservative Christians who doubt scientists' dating methods should note that Adam supposedly lived 930 years; that means he would have died around 3181 BC, right around the time Egypt was developing into an advanced civilization and already had kings! Such a story simply does not fit with history.

While many have taken Genesis as a myth or symbolic story for a long time, there are plenty of fundamentalists who still insist on the accuracy of the Bible. Is the Garden of Eden story of Yahweh cursing the serpent the real reason that snakes crawl on their bellies? And why would Yahweh punish all snakes for what one snake did? Or, if the snake was really Satan, as later tradition (but not the author) claimed, why were snakes punished at all (since it was supposedly Satan's fault)? And if Yahweh did not want Adam and Eve to know the difference between good and evil, would he prefer that we forget about good and evil? And if they previously had no knowledge of good and evil, and they did not know the difference between right and wrong, were they not innocent in their disobedience? If they disobeyed before they had knowledge of good and evil, wasn't it unjust to punish them?

Back to chronology, some have actually suggested that the real numbers were written down wrong by scribal error, but how could anyone have made so many errors? Others have said that when it says someone was another's father, it could mean he was his ancestor (ex. The NIV Study Bible, textual note on Gen. 5:6). But the Bible says, "When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth," and "he had other sons and daughters;" and the rest of the lists follow the same pattern. If you try to replace the word "son" with the word "descendant," the passages make no sense at all: "When Adam was 130 he had a descendant(?), then he lived 800 more years and had other sons and daughters." Such an attempt to explain the discrepancy is useless. Obviously in context, the writer of the genealogies was trying to present a complete family record from David backward in time to Moses to Abraham and even to a mythical first man Adam, just as the New Testament tries to do with Jesus. If you read the Bible passages which I have quoted in this paper, you will see clearly that the author really meant "son" when he said "son" in these lists. Some may also suggest that "years" didn't really mean years, but the Bible uses the same word for year almost every time, and it uses "years" in other places where the dating is more obviously realistic. For example, the word for years in the genealogies is the same word used for telling how long a king ruled or any other length of time beyond 360-365 days. And anyway, if their year was shorter than 360-365 days, the problem would be even worse, because that would put Adam's creation even later in history; and if their year was longer, we would have even more outrageous life-spans for these people.

The only conclusion to make is that the writers did not know their true history, and that the creation story and the Garden of Eden story were merely Hebrew myths to explain how everything got here. Almost every culture created stories to explain how the world and people came to be.

Evolution:  I address evolution elsewhere:  "TheBigQuestions," Part 5.  Having been brought up in a conservative environment, I never really considered evolution until AFTER I realized that the Biblical creation stories were mythology rather than history.  According to the available evidence from fossils and DNA, humans evolved from earlier hominids over hundreds of thousands of years, and these, in turn, had evolved from prior forms.  The evidence found in nature is quite obvious when one looks at it enough, and it is certainly contrary to the stories of the Bible

Ancient Literature:  Not only does the Bible contradict evidence from archeology and the fossil record, but non-Jewish cultures did not think the earth was as young as the Jews thought.  For example, the Greek historian Herodotus claimed that Egyptian priests had lore going back 17,000 years (Histories 2.43).  The Egyptians belonged to a far older culture, and they believed humanity was much older than the Jews later imagined. 

Jabal, Jubal, Tubal-Cain

Many people are familiar with that old question of where Cain found his wife. Gen. 4:17 says Cain lay with his wife, but the author had only mentioned four people being in existence: Adam, Eve, Cain, and Abel. This has always been one of those small details that do not quite make sense without guessing at some additional information.

But there are other interesting tidbits to find in closely reading these stories. For example, after the Bible tells of Cain's exile for killing his brother Abel, it discusses Cain's descendants, one of whom is named Lamech. In the story, Lamech has three male children: Jabal, the father of all those who live in tents and raise livestock; Jubal, the father of all who play the harp and flute; and Tubal-Cain, who instructed all who work in bronze and iron (Gen. 4:17-22). What the author is probably doing here is repeating a story handed down over generations to explain how some people came to be herders, others musicians, and others craftsmen; that is, it is an etiological myth ¹ invented to explain how people learned to do these activities. There are some problems.

First, three chapters later (7:21) everyone but Noah and his small family is killed by a "world-wide" flood, and Cain's line was wiped out, so Lamech's children could not be the ancestors of all herdsmen, musicians, and metal-workers!

Second, humans learned to make bronze long before they learned how to manufacture iron implements. The Sumerians and Egyptians could make copper alloys and smelt gold and silver not long after 4,000 BC; bronze (a mixture of copper and tin) was discovered in the 3000s in western Asia. The use of iron came about in the 1000s BC (up to 2,000 years after bronze) and, since it was harder to work than bronze, only gradually replaced bronze in the making of weapons and tools. One man was not responsible for the knowledge of working with bronze and iron, nor was he father of everyone who did such work!

Third, the Bible puts metal-working before a global flood. There has definitely not been a global flood since people learned to make iron objects, and there probably has never been a global flood at all, especially since homo sapiens has existed.

The Flood

The Bible has the Flood occurring around 2456 BC, or about 1,500 years before Solomon. The Bible says the flood killed all people except Noah and his family (Gen. 6:13), wiping them from the face of the earth (6:7). Supposedly, all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered with water to a depth of more than 15 cubits, or 20 feet (7:19-20, Luckily for us, Noah or Yahweh must have measured the depth to all the mountain tops and handed the measurements down through the generations!? Someone seemed to think it was important information!?). Anyway, that the Biblical flood occurred at that time is historically impossible. In 2456 BC, Egypt and Sumer were both flourishing civilizations. And we know from history, archaeology, geology, etc. that no flood came along to destroy these civilizations or wipe out humanity. A world flood simply did not occur when the Bible says it did.

Furthermore, there is no reason to believe it ever occurred at all. The story looks and sounds like ancient fiction: there is the impossibility of fitting all the kinds of animals on board a boat, the use of numerology/mythical numbers (40 days and nights, 7-day spans, 7 of certain animals, the 3-fold sending of the dove at 7-day intervals), the assertion that Noah was 600 years old when it happened and lived to be 950 years old, the assertion that the flood covered the entire earth (or land), etc. It also serves as an etiological explanation for rainbows. But massive flooding of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers did take place in ancient times, and stories of a massive flood were likely handed down through the generations, since different, but similar versions show up in many cultures.

The Hebrew version of the story was either borrowed or adapted from earlier versions or it evolved from earlier versions. For example, one earlier Mesopotamian story of the flood said that the assembly of the Gods decided to send a flood to destroy mankind, but that one God, Ea, warned a certain man, Atrahasis (or Utnapishtim), to build a boat with 7 levels and gather onto it living beings and his kinfolk. It rained for 7 nights, then the boat floated for 12 leagues and landed on Mt. Nimush. Atrahasis waited 7 days, then sent out a dove which returned, a swallow which also returned, then finally a raven which did not return. Atrahasis then opened his ark, sent out all the animals, and made a sacrifice to the gods with 7 and 7 vessels. The Gods smelled the sacrifice (just as "Yahweh smelled the pleasing aroma" in the Bible² ), and Arahasis was blessed. The Mesopotamians had flood stories long before the Hebrews, and one can easily see how much the Hebrew version resembles this example taken from the Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet XI (which itself borrowed the flood story from an earlier copy). The Hebrews had merely adapted this common story to fit their national religion, replacing Ea and the other Gods with Yahweh, and replacing Atrahasis/Utnapishtim with Noah.

For more information, I suggest reviewing the history of Egypt and the Middle East, along with the rest of the world when there is time, so that you will see just how certain it is that there was no global flood that wiped out humanity within recorded history.  Here is a post (unfinished) I made concerning Egyptian history:  AncientHistoryAndTheBible.htm.  You may also wish to study flood myths, so that you can see how various cultures have adapted the myth to suit their tastes, just as the Jews did.  Again, humans have had continuous civilization in Egypt and Mesopotamia, among other places, without ANY disruption from a global flood, since well before 3000 BCE.  And even the written history, monuments, and inscriptions of Egypt and Mesopotamia confirm this.

The Curse of Ham

• This story was invented either during or (most probably) well after the Hebrew invasion of Canaan to justifiy the Israelites' treatment of the Canaanites, taking over their land and enslaving some of them. It claims that their actions were destined and had the support of their god, Yahweh.
  
  
• The Canaanites were not descended from a man named Canaan. The name Canaan means "land of purple," and was given to the region because the coastal cities made and exported purple dye. It was a common tool in myth-making to turn the name of a nation into the name of a man said to be it's ancestor.
  
  
• Verse 29 says Noah lived 950 years. This means he would have still been alive when Abraham was 50 years old (in 2106 BC)!!! This is not history; this is Hebrew mythology.

The Descendants of Shem, Ham, & Japheth

The listing of people descended from Shem, Ham, and Japheth (Gen. 10) is constructed in a manner that matches the geographical knowledge of Jews from the 500s BC (Redford 400-408), which means that it is not a factual, historical genealogy, but was invented at a late date to offer an explanation of where the neighbors of the Jews came from.

• In this "genealogy," the names of nations, tribes, and cities known to the Jews are given as the names of individual men, children and grandchildren of Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Gomer = Cimmerians, Madai = Medes, Javan (Yawan) = Ionians (a Greek people on the west coast of Asia Minor), Ashkenaz = Scythians, Mizraim = Egypt, Put = Libya (Pywd in Egyptian, Pataua in Persian, a tribe powerful in the 800s BC, later a name for Libya), Cush, Canaan, Ludites = Ludians (Lydians of Asia Minor), Asshur = Assyria, Eber = Hebrews (H-eber-u).
  
  
• The list of Japheth's sons reflects the geography of the empire of the Medes and Persians in the 500s BC.
  
  
• The fact the Cyprus (the Kittim) and Rhodes (Rodanim) are listed as sons of Javan (Ionian Greeks) displays the effects of Greek colonization of the eastern Mediterranean Sea from 710 to 610 BC and afterward.
  
  
• In 644 BC, the Cimmerians attcked Lydia in Asia Minor and took Sardis, the capital. But the Cimmerians lost power, and the Scythians took their place from around 630 BC forward. Since Gomer (Cimmerians) is made the father of Ashkenaz (Scythians) in the genealogy, the writer or his sources must have known that the Scythians followed the Cimmerians, and therefore had to live after 630 BC.
  
  
• The sons of Ham are really countries listed in the order of their political strength from 711 to 593 BC and afterward: Cush, Egypt (Mizraim), Libya (Put), and Canaan. The fact that Cush is placed before Egypt alludes to the time when Cush held sway over Egypt (711-593 BC). Libyans had ruled Egypt from 950 to 720 BC. And Canaan, always the weakest region, comes last in the list. The name Sabteca, listed as one of the sons of Cush, may even come from the Cushite king Shabtaka (697-690 BC).
  
  
• After 655 BC, Egypt had an alliance with Lydia and began to use Lydians as mercenaries. This is the only explanation for placing the Lydians (Ludites) as children of Mizraim (Egypt). The author had to have a reason for associating the Lydians with Egypt.
  
  
• The list names Sidon as the first-born of Canaan, and Tyre (the capital of Phoenicia, usually mentioned together with Sidon) is not even in the list. This may reflect a time when Tyre was impoverished after Nebuchadrezzar's siege of the city in the early 500s BC (shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem); Sidon was then the leading city of Phoenicia.
  
  
• Canaan did not get its name from an ancestor named "Canaan." Canaan means "land of purple" (so does "Phoenicia," the Greek name for the region), and it received this name because the people of the region produced and exported purple dye.
  
  

The Tower of Babel

The Patriarchs: Abraham and His Relatives

Date of Composition:  The stories as we have them were not composed until during or after the late 700's or 600's BC, LONG after the alleged events.  The writers unknowingly left clues that enable modern scholars to detect the time of writing and the fabricated nature of the material.

Philistines?:  The Bible says Abraham (2166 BC) existed in the time of the Philistines (Gen. 21:32,34; 26:1,8,14-15,18), but the Philistines were not even around Canaan until about 1200 BC or shortly afterward. They were apparently part of a group of "Sea Peoples" who invaded Egypt around 1175, were driven out, and then settled in Canaan.  Their pottery resembled Mycenaean pottery.  If there really was an Abraham and he really had dealings with the Philistines or lived in their land, his time period must have been after 1200 BC, only about 200 years before King David ruled or 160 years before Saul ruled.  And in that case there is not much time for any bondage in Egypt or Exodus or 40 years in the wilderness or a time of judges.  If Abraham was around at the time of the Philistines, how did his descendants become a whole nation and go through slavery and an exodus in less than 200 years, and how were there 14 generations from Abraham to David (like Matthew 1 says) in those 200 years?!? . . . unless of course Abraham did not really know the Philistines, in which case this aspect of the story was fabricated at a much later date by someone with inaccurate ideas of history.

Camels:  There are camels as beasts of burden and even camel caravans in the patriarch narratives.  Problem:  Camels were not domesticated as beasts of burden before sometime closer to 1000 BCE, and they were not widely used as such until well after 1000 BCE.  The caravan in the Joseph story brought  gum, balm, and myrrh.  This shows that the writer was familiar with Arabian trade under the Assyrian empire in the 700’s and 600’s BCE.  (see Finkelstein and Silberman, 37)

Gerar:  The Philistine city of Gerar is important in the patriarchal narratives.  Modern archaeologists identify Gerar with Tel Haror.  By the late 700's and 600's, under Assyrian influence, it had developed into a strong, fortified place worthy of note, but prior to this time, it was merely an insignificant village. (see Finkelstein and Silberman, 38)

Ammon and Moab:  In the 700's and 600's BC, Israel and Judah had significant political troubles with the Ammonites and Moabites.  The Jewish writer of Genesis 19:30-38 created an mythical ancestor of the Ammonites and Moabites.  He called them Ammon and Moab, and in order to insult them, he created the myth that they were both born from incest.  (see Finkelstein and Silberman, 39)

Arameans:  Arameans are mentioned in the stories of Jacob and Laban.  Ancient Near Eastern texts do not mention Arameans as a distinct ethnic group before around 1100 BC.  Aram-Damascus became important to Israelites in the early 800's BC, and the Jacob-Laban cycle in Genesis "metaphorically expresses the complex and often stormy relations between Aram and Israel over many centuries." (see Finkelstein and Silberman, 39)

Abram / Abraham: The name "Abram" (exalted father) or "Abraham" (father of many) actually looks like an invented name from a folk-myth. And the Abram figure may even be of Canaanite, as opposed to Hebrew, origin, in which case the Hebrews would have adopted this character from the legends of the people whom they supplanted (just as they adopted the Canaanite word "El" for the supreme God--El, Elohim, El Elyon, El Shaddai). The Israelites were saying, "Yes, my people are descended from a great and holy man named ExaltedFather. Long ago this land was promised to us by our God."

Some Israelite/Jewish individual(s) invented the story of their god's promise to Abraham (along with the story of the curse of Canaan) in order to claim divine right for the take-over and occupation of Canaan and the destruction of the original inhabitants. The story would be used as a claim to the land of Palestine for as long as there would be Jews who believed it. The Israelites and Jews were certainly not the only people to fabricate "prophecies" and put them in the mouths of real or invented people from the past.  And ancient nations hardly performed any actions without claiming to do the will of their god or gods through divine help.

[Many European Americans similarly claimed a divine right to take North America from the native population. Genocide is always best when a God favors it, right?]

In the story of Lot and his daughters, the two women decide to get their father drunk and sleep with him so that they can get pregnant and preserve their family line. The two children born from this incestuous union are said to be Moab, father of the Moabites, and Ben-Ammi, father of the Ammonites. This story was invented as an explanation of where these neighbors of the Israelites originated. Since the Israelites felt some kind of racial kinship with the people, their tale makes these tribes descendants of Lot, a nephew of Abraham; but since they were usually enemies, the myth-makers added a little incest as an insult to the Moabites and Ammonites.

For an explanation of the origin of the Aramean tribes, Genesis says Abraham's brother Nahor has 12 sons, one of whom fathered Aram, ancestor of the Arameans (Gen.22:20-24).

Abraham's son Ishmael is also said to have 12 sons who become 12 desert tribes, but the Israelites thought they were superior to these desert tribes (though racially similar), and made the story to the effect that although the two peoples are related, the Ishmaelites were descended through a slave woman (the concubine Hagar) and were not the special, chosen, "promised" offspring as were the descendants of Isaac.

N.B.  The use of the number 12 for such purposes is so typical of ancient mythology in general.  The 12 sons of Nahor and Ishmael will be echoed by the 12 sons of Jacob/Israel.

Through a third woman, Keturah (whom 1Chron.1:32 says was a concubine, i.e. slave), Genesis makes Abraham the father of other nations too, like the Midianites, Sheba, and Dedan.³ And the Israelites claim superiority to these peoples too by saying that although they are kin, these other tribes descended through a slave woman and were, thus, not as special.

This should be enough to show you how these myths were constructed
A) to instruct an audience of Israelites and/or Jews probably living in in the late 700's, the 600's, or later,
B) to offer an explanation for where everything and everyone came from,
C) to give ideological support to Jewish/Isaeli political goals, and
D) to exalt the Jews/Israelites over their neighbors.

If you want more information, see the list of suggested reading below.

The Patriarchs: Isaac and Jacob

The story of Isaac's twin boys Essau and Jacob also contains important Israelite claims. The Israelites had neighbors called the Edomites, who claimed descent from a legendary founder named Essau. These were racially similar people, and they lived in the region before the Israelites, but the Israelites became more powerful and enslaved the older nation of Edom. The Israelites afterward invented myths to explain what happened:

1. that long ago Jacob and Essau were two brothers, both sons of a mythical Isaac. Essau was older and in ancient custom should have been more blessed, but in the story he sold his birthright to his brother Jacob, relinquishing his rights as first-born.
   
   
2. that Jacob deceived his father Isaac in order to win the blessings that would have been bestowed upon his older brother. According to an ancient superstition, a blessing bestowed could not be revoked, and before Isaac died he blessed Jacob, thinking he was Essau, by saying, "Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you." (This myth, then, makes it right for Israel to enslave its neighbors, even though the Edomites were around first; "such was our destiny," they were claiming.)
   
   
3. that at birth, Essau came out first, but Jacob grabbed at his heel- hence Ya-acob, "he who grasps the heel." This is to symbolize Judah-Israel's supplanting of Edom.
   
   
4. that when their mother was pregnant, the babies were jostling each other in her womb, and when she asked Yahweh, he told her that her two children would become two nations and the elder would serve the younger.

Later in history, when the Edomites revolted from Judah, a section was added to the myth to explain the new development. After Isaac had given Jacob the best blessing, Essau came in with tears. So even though Isaac had already blessed Jacob with lordship over Essau, he added for Essau, "It shall come to pass . . . that you will break his yoke from off your neck." Thus, the Jews could claim that both the subjugation and the loss of Edom were a fulfillment of destiny.

This is a demonstration of how a legend often "follows the track of history and evolves according to the pattern of actual events" (Wallis 116; the explanation above was taken from Louis Wallis The Bible Is Human, a dated but well-written resource for understanding many stories of the Old Testament).

The Exodus

The date for the Exodus conflicts with other information provided in the Bible. The Jews who wrote I and II Kings said the Exodus was 480 years before Solomon (1446 BC), and Exodus says the Jewish slaves in Egypt built Pithom and Rameses (Exodus 1:11). This place called Rameses is mentioned also in Gen. 47:11, Ex. 12:37, and Num. 33:3,5, and is doubtless named after the great pharaoh Ramesses II. But Ramesses II hadn't even been born in 1446 BC, so no city at that time would have been named after him. That is one of the reasons why many modern Christians think the Exodus happened in the 1200s (the time of Ramesses II) instead of the 1400s, and the movie "The Ten Commandments" puts Moses in this later period. If it did happen in the 1200s, then the Bible is wrong when it says it happened 480 years before Solomon.

But neither a 1200s-BC nor a 1400s-BC date for the exodus solves the problem. After the Exodus, Israel supposedly numbered about 2.5 million (deduced from Num. 1:44-46, which gives the number of Hebrew fighting men), but the entire population of Egypt at that time was only 3-4.5 million; scholars know that the numbers are exaggerated, or even complete fabrications. Indeed, the loss of a servile population of 2.5 million, the pillaging of the gold and silver, the destruction of "the entire army of pharaoh" (Ex.14:28), and the great and horrible Ten Plagues (all mentioned in Exodus) would have had a totally devastating effect on Egypt,

"yet at no point in the history of the country during the New Kingdom is there the slightest hint of the traumatic impact such an event would have had on economics or society" (Redford 408, italics mine)!

In fact, Egypt had a mighty empire throughout that period, as is attested by both archaeology and the historical record (for a brief summary, see The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Egypt). Egypt was ruled by Thutmose III for most of the 1400s, and by Ramesses II for most of the 1200s. Both of these rulers were among the greatest pharaohs who ever existed, and both even fought great battles in Canaan and the surrounding area: Thutmose III was hero of the Battle of Megiddo (c. 1457), and Ramesses II fought the Hittites of Asia Minor (modern Turkey) to a stand-still at Kadesh (c. 1275). Around 1259, Egypt and the Hittites signed a treaty dividing control of Syrian trade-routes. The entire period from around 1518 to 1087 BCE was called the New Kingdom, a time in which Egypt was very strong and was a respected international power .

This undercuts both the 1400s and the 1200s as likely time-frames for the Exodus, at least the kind of exodus described in the Bible, with its devastating plagues, parting of the Red Sea, and destruction of the entire army of the pharaoh.


In other words, the biblical Exodus account is at the very least extremely exaggerated and most likely misplaced in historical chronology.

Was there ever an Exodus at all?  There may have been something remotely similar.  Some historians believe that the events which grew into the legend of the Exodus could have happened during the time of the Hyksos, who held power in the eastern Nile delta from around 1636 until 1518, when Pharaoh Ahmose drove them out and established the New Kingdom in Egypt (Redford 412-422 argues that the Exodus story is a memory of the Hyksos age kept alive and modified among the Canaanites and adopted by the Hebrews). Others think the exodus may have happened in the New Kingdom, but was nothing like the Biblical account.

Was there ever an Exodus exactly as described in the Bible?  No way! 

• In the 1400's BCE? 
  
• with 2.5 million Hebrew slaves? (huge exaggeration.)
  
• after Yahweh performs magic tricks with Aaron's staff, turning it into a devouring snake? 
  
• after the Nile turns to blood? 
  
• after plagues of frogs, gnats, and flies that cover “the whole country”? 
  
• after “ALL” (9:6) the Egyptians’ horses, donkeys, camels, herds, and flocks in the fields die from a pestilence? 
  
• after boils come upon humans and animals “throughout the entire land of Egypt”? 
  
• after thunder, fire, and hail strike down “everything in the open field throughout all the land of Egypt, both human and animal,” including “all the plants of the field,” and shatter “every tree”? 
  
• after locusts cover the entire land so that the land is black and no one can even see the soil, and the locusts eat all the plants and fruit so that not a single green thing is left in the entire country, not a plant, not a tree? 
  
• after darkness covers the entire land for 3 days? 
  
• after Yahweh kills every single first-born male of humans and livestock “throughout the whole land of Egypt”? 
  
• with a pillar of cloud leading the Israelites by day and a pillar of fire by night?   
  
• after the sea is miraculous parted for the Israelites but then miraculously returns to its proportions and destroys the ENTIRE army of "pharaoh"? 
  
• after a sadistic Yahweh repeatedly hardens the heart of “pharaoh” just so he can torture the Egyptians more and more and show how much more he loves the Israelites? 
  

Moses

The story of Moses, too, is of doubtful historicity, at least in many details. Like Moses, Hammurabi of Babylon (c.1765 BC, before the Bible says Moses existed) and Zoroaster (Iranian, c.628-551 BC) also went up on a mountain and received laws from their gods. Also like the Moses legend is the story of Sargon I, king of Akkad (c. 2325 BC). His mother bore him in times of difficulty, placed him in an ark of rushes, and put him into the river, which carried him until he was picked up by Akki, and he grew up to become king.  Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome, were likewise thrown into the river Tiber as children during the rule of a wicked king. The boys were washed ashore, suckled by a she-wolf, then found and reared by a shepherd. When they grew up, they returned to their birthplace to defeat the wicked king. They went on to found Rome, and Romulus was the great law-giver, just like Moses. Cyrus the Great of Persia (c. 585-529 BC) also had a miraculous birth. Because of a dream which foretold the child's future kingship, the wicked king Astyages of the Medes ordered him killed. But he ended up in the hands of a shepherd and his wife (a slave of the king), who raised the child as their own. When Cyrus was grown he led the Persians to take over Astyages' kingdom. From these few examples alone, one can see that the stories of Moses' birth, exile and return, and receiving the divine laws on the mountain follow common folk-tale/legend motifs. Stories of great leaders were almost always embellished and exaggerated in the ancient world.

I should also mention that the Bible makes Moses 7th in line from Abraham (Ex.6 Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Levi, Kohath, Amram, Moses). Given the numerological importance of the number 7, this is probably another example of myth-making. Similar in their numerological nature are the 400 years of captivity, Moses' 40 days and nights on the mountain, the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, being hidden for 3 months at birth, 3 days of darkness in Egypt, Moses' wife is one of 7 daughters. In Ex.24:16, Yahweh covers the mountain with dark clouds for 6 days, and then on the 7th day calls to Moses. The author's use of special numbers is characteristic of ancient mythology, not history. I will give more examples of numerology later.

Late Authorship, Not Mosaic

The writer(s) of the Exodus story could not even name who was pharaoh when they were supposedly in captivity (i.e. the writer was not Moses or an eye witness), and whoever supplied the geographical information for the Exodus account had no information earlier than the 500s and 600s BC, over 800 years after the supposed event (Redford 409-410). So the Jews did not write this particular account until around the time of the Babylonian exile or soon afterward, and they filled in missing details with whatever knowledge they had of the world at that time. The same is true of the post-flood Table of Nations in Gen. 10, as I explained above.  No wonder their writings contain so many anachronisms.  (Also note my explanation above concerning the date of composition for the patriarchal narratives.)

More evidence for the late authorship/editing of the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the Bible):

• Gen. 36:31 contains the phrase "before any Israelite king reigned." This phrase shows that the author/editor was writing well after the kingdom had been established, definitely after the 900s BC; the writer was thinking about his nation's past and saying, "long ago, before we even had kings in Israel . . ."
  
  
• The Bible says that Abraham came from Ur of the Chaldeans (Gen. 11 & 15, Acts 7:4), but the Chaldeans did not settle in the area of Ur before the 800s or 700s BC, so the writer must have lived after that time.
  
  
• Again, Gen. 14:14 refers to Abraham's pursuit of an enemy "as far as Dan," but the city of Dan wasn't founded until time of the Judges, well after the time of Moses; so Moses could not have referred to that city.
  
  
• Consider Numbers 12:3, "Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth."  Do you think Moses wrote that?  First, humble people usually do not advertise their humility in such a way; second, the reference is in the third person; third, this is merely an opinion -- this writer did not know every person on the face of the earth, and he had no basis for such a judgement. 
  
  
• The Pentateuch records the death of Moses without a break in the narrative.
  
  
• The whole Pentateuch is written from a third-person perspective of someone who lived long after the events described.

After a little study then, it becomes obvious that Moses did NOT write the Pentateuch, despite what tradition said.

It is fashionable now for conservative Bible scholars to admit that the first five books were edited at a later date, but to claim that Moses still wrote most of it. My point is this: even if a man named Moses did write a set of laws or some part of the Pentateuch, how could anyone tell which part he wrote? We know without a doubt that he did not write the version we have, and those conservative theologians have no basis for their opinion other than a tradition that has already been proven unreliable. If Moses existed and he wrote anything at all, it was without a doubt changed, embellished, and augmented, and it is impossible to pick out anything that can reliably be said to have been written in the 1400s to 1200s BC, the alleged time of Moses. In the case of Moses and the Exodus, it is often impossible to separate any history from myth and legend, just as in the case of Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome, and many other ancient legends.  Furthermore, given that Moses was supposedly reared at the Egyptian royal court, what language and script would he have written anyway?  Egyptian hieroglyphics, hieratic cursive? Any belief in Mosaic authorship merely expresses a wish to preserve an outdated tradition.  The Old Testament was written well after the time Moses would have lived, assuming he existed.

***Here are some more points.

If Moses wrote the stories of the creation, Adam & Eve, Noah & the flood, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, how did he know about all these things that happened so long before he was around?
How did he know what words Yahweh spoke to Abraham, or all of the other conversations and events recorded in Genesis?
Did Yahweh tell these stories to Moses so he could write them down?

---If so, why did Yahweh give Moses the wrong numbers and false information?

---If not, then either (A) Moses made the stories up or heard them from others, or (B) someone else invented them or heard them from others. In either case, they are not reliable!

1. Polygamy:  In the Bible Moses/Yahweh never says anything against polygamy, and some of his most famous followers in mythology were polygamous (especially in the early mythology):  Abraham, Jacob, David, Solomon.  While the New Testament does not forbid polygamy, 1 Tim 3:2 (a pseudo-Pauline epistle) demands that overseers/bishops be “the husband of but one wife,” and most modern Christians consider polygamy immoral despite the fact that in the literature Yahweh and Jesus never said so.  Mormons have heavily debated this too.
2. Slavery:  The ancient Jews and their biblical Moses/Yahweh acknowledged the morality of slavery (e.g. Exodus 20:17; 21:1-7).  The Mosaic law supports it, even in the ten commandments, and the law of Moses was supposed to be eternal.  It was even acceptable to sell one’s own daughter into slavery (Exodus 21).
3. Beating slaves:  Exodus 21:20-21 – If a man beats a slave, it is acceptable as long as the slave gets up within 2 days and can continue his/her work.  Why?  Yahweh and Moses say that the slave is money/property.
4. Sabbath:  Moses/Yahweh killed a man for collecting firewood on Saturday and was called "just" by worshippers (Num. 15:32-36).  Today, according to many Christians Yahweh no longer does such things and does not consider it immoral to collect wood on any day of the week.  Did Yahweh give his approval for Roman Christians to change observance from the Sabbath to Sunday, from the 7th day to the 1st day.  In 321 CE, the Pagan sun-worshiping Emperor Constantine declared that Sunday was to be a day of rest throughout the Roman Empire.  About 364 CE, the Church Council of Laodicea ordered that religious observances were to be conducted on Sunday, not Saturday.  Sunday became the new “Sabbath.”  By 2000 CE, a majority of modern Christians no longer worried about what they could or could not do on the “Sabbath.”  Plenty of Christians consider Sabbath observance obsolete.
5. Death for some children:  Yahweh sometimes ordered the killing of children (e.g. 1 Sam 15).  Most modern Christians consider that immoral.
6. Yahweh punished the descendants of Ham following Noah's curse, which was due to a minor incident involving being seen naked and perhaps mocked while drunk.  What did the descendants do wrong?  Many modern Christians would criticize such an action if performed by anyone but the Yahweh of their old literature.
7. Yahweh/Moses ordered the death penalty for the following:
1. disobedient children (Deut. 21:18-21),
2. people with other religions (Deut 13:6-10; 17:2-5),
3. anyone who curses his father or mother (Lev 20:9),
4. homosexuals (Lev 20:13),
5. blasphemers (Lev 24:16),
6. adulterers (Lev 20:10),
7. and others.
   

8. Yahweh/Moses thought it was immoral for a man to have sex with a woman during her period; if it happened, both were to be exiled (Lev 20:18).  Many modern Christians do not consider such sex immoral, even if they do not all have such sex.  It certainly is not right to exile someone for it.
9. Yahweh/Moses considered it immoral to wear clothing woven of two different kinds of material, or to sow a field with two different kinds of crops (Lev 19:19).
10. Yahweh/Moses considered it immoral to eat rabbits or pigs (11:6-7).  In the New Testament, he decided it was okay after all (Acts 10).  This is another case where Gentile Christianity won out over Jewish Christianity.  Did Yahweh change his mind about the desirability of such actions?
    
11. Yahweh and ancient Jews (like many other cultures and their gods) considered women to be a men’s property and generally inferior. 
1. If you study the Mosaic law, you will see that it primarily addresses men.  Ex 20:17 lists a wife among a man’s possessions: “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor`s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor`s wife, nor his man-servant, nor his maid-servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor`s.”
2. Also, if men were dissatisfied, they could divorce women (Deut. 24), but there was no provision for women divorcing men. 
3. If a woman gave birth to a female child, she was ritually impure for twice as long than she would have been for a male child (Lev 12:2-5). 
4. Many modern Christians do not believe that women actually belong to their husbands, or that female children are more impure. 
12. Yahweh says he punishes the children and grandchildren of sinners for crimes they did not even commit. “I Yahweh your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation” (Exodus 20:5; 34:7; etc.).  In the minds of many modern Christians, God only punishes people for their own sins.  Yahweh was immoral by most modern standards.
13. “But if any harm follow, then you must give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (Exodus 21: 23-25).  The Jesus in the gospel of Matthew seemed to think his “father,” Yahweh, was a bit harsh in this, and that there was a better morality (Mt 5:38-41).

Special Numbers

Gen. 1:1 contains 7 words in Hebrew, 7 days of creation, Cain avenged 7 times, 7 of every clean animal onto the arch, God gives Noah 7 days until the flood, Yahweh's 7-fold promise to Abraham (Gen.12), 7 fat and 7 skinny cows in Joseph's dream, 7-time march around Jericho, Gideon has 70 sons, Samson's hair has 7 braids, King David lives 70 years, King Solomon has 700 wives, etc..

Lamech, whom I mentioned above, was the 7th from Adam through Cain, and served as an example of evil; Enoch was the 7th from Adam through Seth, and served as an example of good. Both lists name 10 males. The "Table of Nations" in Gen. 10 lists 70 (10 x 7) descendants of Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The list from Shem to Abraham has 10 names (Gen. 11). The number of Jacob's family to go into Egypt was said to be 70 (Gen. 46:27). Moses was said to be the 7th from Abraham (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Levi, Kohath, Amram, Moses; Ex. 6). 10 plagues upon Egypt, 10 Commandments on stone. Ruth 4:18-22 lists 10 generations from Perez to David. Have you noticed a pattern yet? All important genealogies in the Bible use the special numbers 7 and 10 or their multiples. Does this not seem a bit fishy to you? Especially since the genealogies do not match history?.

Although it is a bit outside the scope of this paper, please note that the New Testament genealogies also use multiples of 7. Matthew 1 names 14 generations from Abraham to David, 14 from David to Exile, 14 from Exile to the Messiah. And even though Luke gives a different genealogy for Jesus(!?!), he still uses a special number, 77; Jesus is 77th from God through Adam (Luke 3).  Other NT books also use these special numbers.

The flood of 40 days & nights, Israel enslaved 400 years, Israelites 40 years in the wilderness, Moses on the mountain 40 days & nights, 12 spies explore the land 40 days & nights, 40 lashes is the highest punishment (Dt. 25:3), Goliath taunts Israel 40 days, Elijah in the wilderness 40 days & nights, Jesus in the wilderness 40 days & nights, 40 day & nights from resurrection to ascension. Do you see a pattern here?

12 sons of Jacob, 12 sons of Nahor (Gen. 22), 12 sons/tribes of Ishmael, 12 sons/tribes of Israel, 12 spies to Canaan, 12 famous judges/leaders before monarchy, 12 mighty deeds of Samson, Elisha's 12 yoke of oxen, Israel united for 120 years (40 x 3 - Saul - 40, David - 40, Solomon - 40), 12 minor prophets.

The 480 years between the Exodus and Solomon's 4th year was probably derived by multiplying 12 legendary generations of mighty judges by 40 years each (two "special" numbers), giving 480.

There is scholarly research and writing on the use of "special" numbers in the Bible.  These numbers -- 3s, 7s, 10s, 12s, 40s, and their multiples -- are jammed all through the Bible (both Old and New Testaments) and suggest that much/most of it should not be taken literally. The examples I have given you are just a few. It is very important to note that these same numbers are found in myths all over the world and were derived largely from ancient astrology and astronomy.  For example, the ancients believed there were 7 planets (sometimes including the sun & moon), and thus 7 heavens; they had 12 signs of the heavenly Zodiac; the important constellation of the Pleiades (7 sisters) was absent 40 days of the year, and human pregnancy is 40 x 7 days, and in ancient Babylon the number 40 became connected with expectation and patience (exactly as it is used by the Bible). If one studies why these numbers are special and discovers just how much the Bible and other myths use these numbers, the connection between the Bible and other ancient lore becomes more clear. For a more comprehensive analysis, see my paper "The Use of Special Numbers in the Bible."

David and Solomon

David:  (unfinished)

Solomon:

According to the Bible, in the 900's BC Solomon supposedly has a vast Israelite Empire from the Euphrates to the Egyptian border, 700 wives and 300 concubines, stables with 40,000 stalls of horses, 1,400 chariots, 12,000 cavalrymen, so much wealth that silver is "as common in Jerusalem as stone" (1 Kgs 10:27); he supposedly "excelled all the kings of the earth in riches and in wisdom" so that "the whole world" sought his presence (1 Kgs 10:23-4).  The Bible's description of his reign are elaborate and make many boasts.

It is interesting to note, then, that Solomon is not even mentioned in a single known Egyptian or Mesopotamian text.  How could this be, if indeed "the whole world" sought his presence? 

The idea that Solomon "excelled all the kings of the earth in riches and in wisdom" is equally ridiculous.  1. Archeology does not support the claim regarding wealth.  Other kingdoms in history appear to have been far wealthier than Israel at ANY period.  2. This author had no clue as to how rich or wise "all the kings of the earth" were or had been.  His knowledge was far too limited.  3. As I imply below, if Solomon was the wisest man who ever lived, that implies that worship foreign gods having 700 wives and 300 slave women counts as wisdom, too.  Of course, it is doubtful that he had so many wives, assuming he did exist, and it should be noted that these are nice round numbers and multiples of 7, 3, and 10.

Those who look to archaeology to find evidence of Solomon's greatness will be quite disappointed, since the archeological remains do not support a picture of wealth on the scale described in the Bible.  In other words, the writers of the Bible exaggerated, to say the least.  Nobody other than a fundamentalist predisposed to believe the Bible would consider it anything but an obvious exaggeration to write that silver is "as common in Jerusalem as stone" for ANY period in Jewish history.

Finkelstein and Silberman deal with David and Solomon at length in their book, cited below.  I highly recommend it.

One other aspect of the story I will mention.  The Biblical authors ascribe a reign of exactly 40 years each to Saul, David, and Solomon, adding up to a total of 120 years of Israel and Judah being united under one king.   These numbers are highly suspicious, as 40's and 12's are numbers typical of ancient mythology.

Archaeology

The remains of a great many places mentioned in the Bible have been dug up or located.  Some have claimed this as a verification of the truth of the Bible's stories, but that is misguided. I am not calling into question the existence of any geographical locations.  To me, the relationship between the Bible and archaeology is similar to the relationship between the Greek Iliad and Odyssey and archaeology.  We know that the city of Troy (Ilium) existed and that it was attacked by invaders, but that does not verify the stories Homer tells about the characters in the war or the interventions of the Gods.  Just because Troy really existed does not mean the Goddess Athena really helped Odysseus, or that Diomedes battled Ares, or that Aphrodite protected Aeneas.  Likewise, archaeologists agree that many Canaanite towns were destroyed around the 1200s and afterward, and I have no problem believing that the Hebrews/Israelites did it, or at least some of it.  But that does not mean that I believe their ancient legends and myths about how they conquered the land with Yahweh's help and mandate any more than I believe Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, and Athena really guided the Greeks and Trojans.  So what if Jericho's walls crumbled?  There is no reason to believe that they crumbled because the Israelites marched around the city 7 times and blew their trumpets and Yahweh knocked the walls down himself, or that God really ordered the Israelites to kill every man, woman, child, and beast -- quite an unjust command.

Modern archaeology backs the claims made in this essay.  See, for example, the following books: 

Finkelstein, Israel and Silberman, Neil Asher.  The Bible Unearthed:  Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts.  (2002, Touchstone).

Smith, Mark S.  The Early History of God:  Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel.  (1990) Second Edition 2002. 

Commentary

The Jews had their legends and myths just like all other ancient peoples had, so why do some even in this "modern" age think the Judeo-Christian stories were real history while other peoples' stories were make-believe? Evidently, a little priestly authority can go a long way. 1500 to 2000 years of tradition pounded into European minds (and hearts!) do not easily lose their influence.

• Do we still think Yahweh turned the Nile to blood and parted the Red Sea and drowned the entire army of Pharaoh?
• If he rained food for Israel in the desert, why doesn't he rain food for the starving people of today; are they less valuable?
• Did the earth really open up and swallow Moses' enemies so that they went down alive into Sheol (Num.16:31-35)?
  
• Did Yahweh put a man to death just for collecting wood in the desert on the Sabbath (Num.15:32-36)?
• Do we still think he made the sun and moon stand STILL in the sky for about a day while Joshua and the Israelites slaughtered their enemies (Jsh. 10)?
• Do we know that Shamgar struck down 600 men with an oxgoad (Jdg. 3)?
• Would God really allow a man's descendants (not even the man himself) to be cursed just because he saw his father (Noah) naked? Anyway, what is wrong with seeing someone naked? Except that it was a moral hang-up for some ancient Jewish people? Would you let your great-grandchildren be cursed into slavery just because one of your children sees you naked?
• Is the "Tower of Babel" story honestly the best explanation for the world's different languages? Do we not have concrete examples of how languages have evolved over time?
• Concerning the tower of Babel, why would God punish people for trying to make a building to reach the sky? And if he punished them for that, why doesn't he knock down every skyscraper we build?
• Is it true that Yahweh turned Lot's wife into a pillar of salt for looking back as the family fled Sodom and Gomorrah, or is that story more likely a local myth associated with the large deposits of salt around the Dead Sea?  Does the "looking back" motif not sound like the action of Eurydice in the Orpheus myth, or other characters in other myths?
• Did Baalam's donkey really talk to him?
• Was Solomon the wisest man who ever lived? If so, why did he worship foreign gods? And if the wisest man who ever lived had 700 wives and 300 slave women, does this mean we can too? Or did he really even have that many wives?
• Did the God of the universe really talk to a man named Abraham 4,000 years ago and promise him that his descendants could forever have the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean? Or did the Hebrews invent that story to feel justified in taking the land away from the people who already lived there, and to lay permanent claim to the region?
• Was the law written by Moses, or was most of it written by Jewish priests hundreds of years after the supposed time of Moses? Did Hammurabi (1700s BC) get his laws from God too? Why did so many ancient societies claim that their laws were from God(s)? Are any of their claims true? How do you know?

Unfortunately some people in history, for whatever reason, convinced masses of others that the Bible was perfect and came from a personal, anthropomorphic (human-like) god who watches over the world from a throne up in the sky. ⁴ And those people who believed such assertions have passed down their misinformed beliefs throughout history. Once a tradition is established, it is very hard to break because people grow up with it, feel good about it, grow attached to it, and then feel robbed, threatened, or afraid when anyone casts doubt on their most cherished traditions. But truth is more important than tradition.

Even this quick analysis of Biblical dates and stories shows us that those who wrote the material either (a) never intended it to be taken literally, (b) merely retold the myth and folklore they heard or grew up with, inventing numbers or using "special" ones, (c) purposely invented stories to achieve some specific effect, or (d) any combination of the above.

It is known that the Bible was not compiled in its present form until well after the Babylonian Exile. Some parts, like Daniel, did not enter the collection until even later. Why then should it be hard to understand that the entire collection is colored by the limited knowledge, bias, personal agendas, and desires of the Jewish compilers after the Exile?

The information presented here and a wealth of other information that will back up the conclusions drawn in this paper can be found in numerous books and other sources.  A bibliography follows.

Finkelstein, Israel and Silberman, Neil Asher.  The Bible Unearthed:  Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts.  (2002, Touchstone).

Friedman, Richard Elliott .  Who Wrote the Old Testament. (1987).

Manly, Bill.  The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Egypt.  (1996), 

Redford, Donald.  Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times. (1992).

Smith, Mark S.  The Early History of God:  Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel.  (1990) (Second Edition 2002). 

Wallis, Louis.  The Bible Is Human. (1942). 

Anchor Bible Dictionary.

Harper's Bible Dictionary. 

Encyclopedia Judaica.

Encyclopedia of Religion.  Edited by Mircea Eliade.

Plenty of other information can be found on the web at places like www.wikipedia.com or www.pbs.org. 

The Writing of the Pentateuch - http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bible/coogan.html.

Matthew J. Kruebbe
University of Texas at Tyler
12-07-1999

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Endnotes