Re: [asa] Half Full re wrap-up

In a message dated 6/26/2006 7:39:38 PM Eastern Standard Time,
PHSeely@msn.com writes:
PHS: Reading Finkelstein to me would be like reading Henry Morris to get
balance. I do own his book and have read part of it, but he is extreme. You don't
seem to realize just how far out Finkelstein is. To quote William Dever from
his review of the book in Biblical Archaeology Review, "The Bible Unearthed is
an ideological manifesto, not judicious well-balanced scholarship." He calls
Finkelstein, an "idiosyncratic, doctrinaire archaeologist." If you want to see
more specifically why he (and I) thinks this way about Finkelstein, read his
book, What did the Biblical Writers Know and When did they Know it?

Dever is a well respected Syro-Palestinian archaeologist with thirty-five
years of fieldwork. He agrees with Finkelstein on more issues than Kitchen would
agree to, but he is not a doctrinaire conservative.

I can only comment on Liverani that as a minimalist, his views need to be
subjected to the balance that Kitchen (who is also doctrinaire but sets forth
hard data) and Dever bring to the discussion.

Then you haven't read either Finkelstein or Liverani and couldn't know that
they both agree on how Judaism developed and couldn't know that it agrees
perfectly with MacDonalds' "mirror strategy" of the anti-semitic cycle in
evolutionary psychology.
Finkelstein is not far out. He's only extreme relative to the traditional
view, which is based on revelation, not archeology.
I did not see an argument in your response. If you present one based on your
view of Finkelstein or Liverani, I'll respond to it.

rich faussette

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Received on Tue Jun 27 07:52:42 2006