I had written:
>>>> Glenn wrote: So, when people start throwing out those inconvenient parts, why stop with one or two facts? Go whole hog and get rid of all the nonsense and fix that early genesis account.
Now, to me, throwing things out is really just an ad hoc solution. It works, no doubt, but it is a wee bit inelegant. <<<<
Phil Replied:
>>>PTM: Hi Glenn. I have to respectfully disagree. If it is motivated by the fact that Urarutu didn't exist when Moses wrote the text then this suggestion certainly cannot be called ad hoc.
Also, if the explanation is an apparent edit of just one single word, and that word was not in the original text, and the text in question (a place name) is the type of thing that an editor would reasonably not understand at a later date, and if this one edit provides vast explanatory power for a number of otherwise unexplainable phenomena, then I'd say the explanation is quite elegant.<<<<<
GRM:I would first off challenge your 'fact' that uruartu didn't exist. While my sources here are not as good as the ones I could access in Houston, here is what I have found. Moses is believed to have lived around 1500 BC. Thus, if you date Urartu from the date of the first ruler, you would be correct:
GRM:But we also know that the earliest inscriptions about Urartu were on Assyrian documents which indicated that
""As early as the reign of the Assyrian king Shalmanaser I (1280-1266 BC), mention of Urartu is made, under the name "Uruatri". Shalmanaser’s texts describe a campaign against 8 countries collectively called the Uruatri." http://www.tacentral.com/erebuni/urartu.asp
GRM:Now, Urartu existed 400 years before it had its first ruler and only 200 years after Moses. Thus, I would say that your case that Uraratu didn't exist is questionable. It was a place name, not necessarily a country name in the earliest occurrences. Thus, I would re-iterate that picking that word to throw out of the Bible , for the reasons you say, is not entirely a good procedure.
>>>> Glenn wrote: I would say if a document purportedly by GW mentions Disney World, you could reasonably say it is a fake. It isn't true. One wouldn't wax eloquent about how it teaches the true theology and how the errors are an accommodation to the knowledge of Washington's day. <<<<
>>>>PTM: This is a recurring theme in your posts. You say that without scientifically explaining Genesis 1-11 we should give up our faith and become atheists. But there are many reasons to trust in Jesus (and the Scriptures that He quoted) beyond scientific explanation of the early chapters. Consider the poor unscientific peoples raised in the jungles. It seems that God considers their basis for faith to be just as valid as ours. If so, then we can share in that valid faith the same way that they do without having to understand science in Genesis 1-11. Then, explaining Genesis 1-11 would merely be a bonus and not mandatory to our faith. I don't accept the epistemology of unbelievers.<<<<
GRM: YEs it is a recurring theme. When I was a YEC, I ignored dataset after dataset because I didn't want YEC to be false. You should do a search on 'Morton's Demon' if you want to see what it is that I fear most. It is falling into another trap where evidence and data doesn't matter. And that is what I see here everybit as much as I see on YEC bulletin boards.
GRM: I know that one could claim that the technologically primitive peoples have just as much claim to faith as we do. But both can't be true at the same time unless one is willing to have the meaning of words so plastic as to be utterly useless. Let us take a technologically primitive people here in China (relatively so). Their first man said this:
“Chong-ren-li-en, the legendary father of the Naxi people. proudly announced:
"’I am the descendant of nine gods who created the sky’”
“'I am the descendant of seven goddesses who created the earth’”
“’I am the descendant of a people who climbed over 99 giant mountains and waded across 77 deep ravines without feeling tired..'”
Liu Jun, "Feast of Naxi Culture to Mark Ethnic Festival," China Daily, March 4, 2006, p. 9
GRM: Can you please explain how their claim that they are the descendants of 9 god can be true at the very same time that we claim that there is only one God???? Yes, they have a claim to have the true faith, but logically one or the other faiths is false. Either theirs, ours, or both.
GRM: Add in the Shinto's and you now have a group claiming that there were two gods, Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto originally. So, now we have 3 choices. Can they all be true at the same time? There is one god, there are two gods there are nine gods? 1=2=9. Interesting mathematical arrangement. I think the statement that 1=2=9 is utterly false and always will be false. Please tell me how all can be true at the same time.
GRM:And this is what I find uttlerly incredibly wrong with the approach you take. YOu wouldn't publish a physics paper saying that Pons and Fleischman have every bit as much claim to the truth as those in your business who do not believe in cold fusion, would you? You would not say, "If so, then we can share in that valid truthh of cold fusion and in non-cold fusion." (where is Aristotle when you need him?) I would contend that if you wouldn't apply a line of logic in your scientific discipline, it is utterly invalid to use such a logical structure when it comes to theology.
GRM: Jesus said, "I am the way, the Truth and the LIfe, no man comes to the father except through me." Unless of course we count those who come through belief in their descent from the 9 gods, or the 2 gods of Shinto
GRM: Don't forget the Norse traditions and their VALID faith (as you call it). "
Where the sparks and warm winds of Muspell reached the south side of frigid Ginnungagap, the ice thawed and dripped, and from the drips thickened and formed the shape of a man. His name was Ymir, the first of and ancestor of the frost-giants.
As the ice dripped more, it formed a cow, and from her teats flowed four rivers of milk that fed Ymir. The cow fed on the salt of the rime ice, and as she licked a man's head began to emerge. By the end of the third day of her licking, the whole man had emerged, and his name was Buri. He had a son named Bor, who married Bestla, a daughter of one of the giants. Bor and Bestla had three sons, one of whom was Odin, the most powerful of the gods. "http://www.gly.uga.edu/railsback/CS/CSOdin&Ymir.html
GRM:Obviously we can both be made by water dripping to form a cow or a man coming out of the ice as a giant cow licked it.
GRM:How can all this be true at the same time? I simply don't understand such logical plasticity.
>>>PTM: I suspect this is all a misunderstanding of scales. If the flood was smaller scale than you or others in your profession believe, then when you saw the localized deposits you would believe it was no big deal and of no consequence to Noah. Hence, it would not be discussed as a big deal. Also, the flood wasn't recent enough for its deposits to escape being covered by eaolian sand. <<<
GRM:ARe you aware that near surface geologists regularly bore into the near surface to see what is there? I keep trying to tell you, but you refuse to listen, that if there was evidence of a widespread holocene flood, it would be abundantly evident. Maybe you should do some geology courses sometime.
****
Bill Hamilton wrote:>>>>
OK. I guess I haven't been paying enough attention to that aspect of the discussion. I remember reading about archaeologists finding evidence of flooding in Mesopotamia, and that must have made a big impression on me.<<<<
GRM:Unfortunately, in spite of Woolley's 'discovery' having been rejected for about 50 years, it continues to get great play in theology commentaries and other places. It is the story that will never die. Dick Fischer gives a good account of the blunder at http://www.asa3.org/archive/asa/199604/0281.html. I don't know if he has changed his mind, but, as I have said, the only place one can find widespread deposits is on the Tigris/Euphrates delta and that can't really be taken as good evidence of a flood because deltas always spread sediment all over the place.
GRM:And as usual with apologetical discussions, people WANT to believe their theological position and so are always unduely skeptical of anything that would contradict their pet theology.(I am not speaking of you) Thus, evidence never suffices, logic doesn't work. And after about 10 years of watching this on both sides of the creation/evolution issue, I have again begun to wonder if any of it all is real. How can it be real when the people who are the initial reporters of facts may be no better with observational evidence than even those on the ASA list who have scientific qualifications?
GRM:Another site for the flood, look at http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/specex/ur/ur-flood.htm
***
David Opderbeck wrote:
>>>And if there were a significant flood in the southern part, we wouldn't be able to distinguish it from the existing fluviatile sediments, as it would be mixed up / covered over / washed away with those? Ok, I know it wouldn't fit your view of the location required by scripture, but just as to the geology? And the maps you have go back about 12K years? <<<
GRM:No doubt there have been 'significant floods' in the southern part of Mesopotamia just like there have been significant floods on every delta in the world. But one can't use that flooding, south of Bagdad, to magically get a boat to the Mountains of Ararat. So, if you want to believe in a flood, why beleive in a flood that you have to discount so much of the story? If the story is wrong, say so, don't try to make it true when it is wrong.
GRM:No one will ever risk the Bible being wrong in order to actually find some different solution other than the same old mush that didn't work 200 years ago and won't work today.
GRM:As to the maps, they cover all ages of sediments back to the Permian (225 million years ago, which is the oldest exposed sediment in Iraq. I will capitalize this becaue it is important. FROM RAMIDI NORTH THE EUPHRATES RIVER SEDIMENTS LIE ON TOP OF MUCH OLDER ROCKS (Miocene and Pliocene). IF THERE WERE WIDESPREAD FLOOD DEPOSITS UP THERE, THERE WOULD BE NO PLACE FOR THEM TO HIDE. THEY WOULD NOT BE COVERED BY ANY YOUNGER SEDIMENTS BECAUSE THERE IS NOTHING BUT RIVER DEPOSITS LOCATED NARROWLY ALONG THE CHANNEL.
GRM:FROM MOSUL TO THE NORTH THE TIGRIS RIVER IS ALSO LYING ATOP MUCH OLDER ROCKS(Miocene and Pliocene). THERE ARE NO OTHER QUATERNARY OR HOLOCENE ROCKS WITH WHICH TO COVER THE RIVERINE SEDIMENTS. ONCE AGAIN THE RIVER SEDIMENT LIES LOCATED NARROWLY ALONG THE CHANNEL.
GRM:THUS THERE IS NO ESCAPING THE FACT THAT NORTHERN IRAQ HAD NO WIDESPREAD FLOOD. AND NO WIDESPREAD FLOOD, NO ARK GOING TOWARDS A TURKISH VACATION.
GRM:I will say what I said to Bill. Nothing I say will change anything. The reason is that the Mesopotamian flood is viewed as THE intellectual's flood. They think they don't have the problems that the dumb YECs have who believe in that silly old global flood. But little do they know that there simply is no evidence for a flood of the magnitude required to get a boat to Turkey. And when it is pointed out, like yecs, this side still shows itself to be true believers in their theological position.
Received on Wed Mar 8 08:05:30 2006