RE: Archaeological problems with the Origins Solution

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
> Behalf Of Dick Fischer
> Sent: Monday, February 16, 2004 12:36 AM

> Glenn wrote:
>
>
> While we are all after my friend, Dick, I might as well make mention of a
> post I put on TheologyWeb in response to an enquiry about Dick's views.
> Part of that note is reproduced here. (I think this is a dull saw, Dick)
>
> "Et tu, Brute!"
>

Hey, the original Brutus made Caesar a very popular fellow. Even today, if
you go to Caesar's grave in Rome, you can find young maidens leaving flowers
on his grave. One might say that Brutus did him a favor! Thus I am here to
do you a favor.

> Gosh, are those typos in my book? Just kidding. When I spent my
> two years
> in the Library of Congress digging all this stuff up, I would call up
> volumes of books I got off the LOC computer which were dutifully delivered
> to my little desk. One book was untranslated Sumerian in
> phonetic English.
> Might have had something good in it, but it was sure lost on me.
>
> This I think is interesting, and I haven't told you this before as I
> remember. Some thieves made an unauthorized excavation and stole clay
> tablets which they were able to sell. I read through the book which was a
> translation of those tablets. What was funny was that the thieves had
> raided the ancient cattle market at Drehem. Almost the entirety of the
> tablets was nothing more than cattle receipts.
>
> I did see a receipt for "burnt bricks" I thought was interesting
> and another
> one that was for "unblemished cattle for sacrifice." That one struck a
> chord. Apparently the Sumerians had picked up the sacrificial system from
> the Accadians who would be Adamites in my scheme of things as they spoke a
> pre-Semitic language. In fact, that may be the earliest written record of
> animal sacrifice and in a non-Semitic tongue.

Yeah, but that is probably the earliest written cattle receipts also. Should
we put religious significance on them as well? Writing started around the
time you are referring to so the mere fact that they write of animal
sacrifice doesn't mean it is the first animal sacrifice.
>

> Again, theology places demands history can't fulfill. In Genesis
> Chapter 1,
> a man and woman were created in the "image of God," in His
> "likeness." Some
> Bible scholars have extended this verse to encompass all of mankind. The
> traditional interpretation, and probably the correct one, is that
> this verse
> refers specifically to Adam and Eve, although Adam is not named until the
> next chapter.
>
> Instead of venturing as to what we think "likeness" and image implies, I
> think just reading the biblical text is helpful.
>
> "This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created
> man, in the likeness of God made he him; male and female created he them;
> and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were
> created. And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a
> son in his
> own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth (Gen.5:1-3)."
>
> Who was created "in the likeness of God"? The man, Adam, who "lived an
> hundred and thirty years and begat a son," "and called his name
> Seth." Who
> were not created "in the likeness of God"? Those who did not live "an
> hundred and thirty years," and did not "begat a son" called "Seth" - the
> indigenous populations.
>
> Dominick M'Causland said:
>
> Adam then Appears in the majesty of God's likeness,
> ushered into the world in the fullness of time, to draw
> his fellow-creatures to the development of the hidden
> treasures of wisdom and knowledge in their widest and
> deepest sense. With other races of human beings surrounding
> him, he is a more perfect type of the second Adam, than if
> he had been a solitary individual occupying the wide domain
> of the habitable earth, without a fellow-creature to behold him
> a being made in the likeness of the Creator.
>
> The "image" only implies to Adam's status as an ambassador for God. The
> "image" was carried by the Israelites as God's chosen and the
> Jews. Christ
> was appointed by God as His representative. The second Adam,
> Christ, was in
> the "image of God" (II Cor. 4:4) just as the first Adam, and the
> mantle was
> passed to the followers of Christ.

So did Ishmael not carry the image of God? You don't mention the larger
Semite family.

>
>
> Ancient men hunted and scavenged animals, and sometimes hauled their
> carcasses into caves where they were eaten by the family and the rest of
> their tribe. Bones make tools, fish hooks and sewing needles, and skulls
> look nice mounted on the bedstead and artfully arranged like a stone age
> statue of David. So what? I never said pre-Adamites weren't clever or
> creative.
>
> But biblical animal sacrifice has certain elements not proven or even
> suggested by your examples. First of all, domesticated animals were used
> for sacrifice.

Isn't that a bit of stretch? What is the spiritual significance of
domesticated animals?
The Siberian bear cults raise a bear cub with them in their homes. Indeed,
when missionaries went to the Ainu, there are stories about the missionary
preaching to a room full of Ainu women who were passing the bear cub around
each nursing it in turn as they listened to the sermon. If that isn't
domesticated, I don't know what is. Or do you attach significance to the
willingness of the animal to stay in a fence?

 When were animals domesticated? 31,000 years ago? Not
> hardly. Next, only certain animals were chosen solely on the basis that
> they were the best. No cripples or lame animals were deemed worthy for an
> offering. Did you cite a single example that suggests that only certain
> animals that could pass muster were used? No. Then, the meat
> was burned as
> an offering to the deity. Nothing in any of the examples you
> provided even
> suggest that the meat was burned on an altar to provide a pleasing incense
> to a god (or God) unseen.

Dick, DICK!! LOOK AT BRUNIQUEL!!!! Not ony did they burn meat, the burned
the dead bear!!! The Neandertals got a bear to go underground (or killed
him at the surface and dragged him there). But they burned the meat and
all!

What you are doing is saying that unless the sacrifice meets exactly your
view of what the ancient Sumerian sacrifice was like, then it doesn't count.
Isn't that a wee bit ad hoc?

>
> That said, I don't think it would make any difference if pre-Adamites did
> engage in animal sacrifice, though I don't think they did. Moses laws
> harken back to the law code of Hammurabi.

Dick, this is crazy. Unless the sacrifice meets exactly your view of what
the ancient Sumerian sacrifice was, and it is in the same culture and comes
after the Hammurabi code, then it doesn't count? Can't see that Dick.

Jesus wasn't the first
> or last to
> die on a cross. So if animal sacrifice as described in the Bible
> commenced
> with Adam, fine. Even if it didn't, I don't see any impact on my
> case. But
> I don't see God picking up on a pagan rite and using it as a covering for
> sin.

But the sacrifice you mention wasn't the first animal sacrifice as you
require, at least in your book. If you add domestication to the list, then
what about the bear cubs raised in the homes of the bear cult people. We
know the bear cult goes back many thousands of years.

>
> As for any racial implications, Adam had no parents, no black parents, no
> white parents, no hispanic parents. He didn't belong to any
> race. But the
> Adamite populations did mix with the Sumerians who were
> Aryan as far as we know. So the resultant Jews do have some
> Aryan features.

It still sets up two populations. BTW, my wife really does like the idea of
being superior to me as she has suspected all these years.

>> I reject Dicks views as not being consistent with the observational
data.
>> Of course, my friend will have a different viewpoint.
>
> Ah, but we will still be friends.

I noted in another note that you claimed Neanderthal ancestry. From one
descendant to another, here is to animal sacrifice and its ancient origins!
>
Received on Mon Feb 16 07:31:11 2004