View Full Version : Jewish history
Since atheists claim they deal in facts, not fantasy, then please tell us the real history of the Jews so you can speak from knowledge, not ignorance for once. ;)
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters. ;) The bible gives us a lineage from Adam to Christ. So which people in that lineage were fictional characters and which ones were real people? Then explain where the real people came from? Since atheists live in a fantasy world where they make up their own history this should be really entertaining. So let's see if you can discern fact from fiction. ;)
So let's see if you can discern fact from fiction.
Why, purely because you can't?
Betrayer0fHope
10-25-08, 06:02 PM
Let's say I care enough to do the entire lineage. Then what the hell are you supposed to do?
Medicine*Woman
10-25-08, 08:04 PM
Since atheists claim they deal in facts, not fantasy, then please tell us the real history of the Jews so you can speak from knowledge, not ignorance for once. ;)
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters. ;) The bible gives us a lineage from Adam to Christ. So which people in that lineage were fictional characters and which ones were real people? Then explain where the real people came from? Since atheists live in a fantasy world where they make up their own history this should be really entertaining. So let's see if you can discern fact from fiction. ;)
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M*W: Please do tell us what history atheists make up.
Your question about who was the first Jew goes back to ancient Egypt, specifically the Eighteenth Dynasty, and maybe even earlier. The ancient Hebrews were known as the habiru and/or the apiru who were the ancestors of the Hebrews. They were nomadic shepherds, not slaves, as your bible would indicate. They were common laborers in the fields. Read anything by Ahmed Osman, a well-known Egyptologist.
Since you don't know the true history of christianity, you probably don't know the history of the Jews either. If I were you, I would start from there. IOW, you believe in a fantasy, and you make up your own history. It's a waste of time to read any of your posts, because you do not deal in reality.
But until they adopted the god of the Canaans "El" and named him YHWH, were they "real" Jews?
Its fascinating though, how the apiru/Habiru through the modern Jews have consistently been survivors among larger groups that have exploited them as labourers or slaves [insurgents, as those forced into guerilla warfare to survive are usually called].
Is there any other group that has been so small and yet so stubbornly and uniquely persistent against all odds?
CheskiChips
10-25-08, 08:56 PM
*************
M*W: Please do tell us what history atheists make up.
Your question about who was the first Jew goes back to ancient Egypt, specifically the Eighteenth Dynasty, and maybe even earlier. The ancient Hebrews were known as the habiru and/or the apiru who were the ancestors of the Hebrews. They were nomadic shepherds, not slaves, as your bible would indicate. They were common laborers in the fields. Read anything by Ahmed Osman, a well-known Egyptologist.
Since you don't know the true history of christianity, you probably don't know the history of the Jews either. If I were you, I would start from there. IOW, you believe in a fantasy, and you make up your own history. It's a waste of time to read any of your posts, because you do not deal in reality.
Often history confuses ancient bedouins and Hebrews as being synonymous. They were related...but not identical.
The apiru were not bedouins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apiru
CheskiChips
10-25-08, 08:59 PM
bedouin is translated as "Migrant sheep herder"
The apiru were not sheep herders, they were a rebel social class
CheskiChips
10-25-08, 09:03 PM
I'm afraid we'll never really know who they were before, or after.
Then you haven't been reading too well. Genetic studies have placed Jews in the North Fertile crescent and appear to substantially validate their history as migrants from the Assyrian lands, I'm sure Israeli linguists and archaoelogists will uncover more evidence, as will the Arabs now that they are becoming interested in exploring the past. There is a wealth of untapped archaeological information just waiting to be unearthed.
CheskiChips
10-25-08, 09:08 PM
Then you haven't been reading too well. Genetic studies have placed Jews in the North Fertile crescent and appear to substantially validate their history as migrants from the Assyrian lands, I'm sure Israeli linguists and archaoelogists will uncover more evidence, as will the Arabs now that they are becoming interested in exploring the past. There is a wealth of untapped archaeological information just waiting to be unearthed.
Mostly in Iran and Iraq, if they ever become stabilized. Hold the anti-American comments, please.
Carico,
If you're going to take the evangelist Christian viewpoint to the history of Jewry, then please, do not bother. The Jews today do not have a common history. Besides, why should it matter if you're an atheist, Christian, etc.? History will not change itself to make way for your beliefs.
Its fascinating though, how the apiru/Habiru through the modern Jews have consistently been survivors among larger groups that have exploited them as labourers or slaves [insurgents, as those forced into guerilla warfare to survive are usually called].
Gentiles are hardly to blame for the Jewish-Gentile conflict, and indeed, separation is the only solution.
Kadark
Mostly in Iran and Iraq, if they ever become stabilized. Hold the anti-American comments, please.
If you're interested in reading what is known, here is a good link to begin with
http://www.bibleorigins.net/Hebrewhabiruslaves.html
CheskiChips
10-25-08, 09:25 PM
Many of the interpretations here seem to be confused with later Christian additions. But I'll read it more thoroughly when I can get it to a printer.
ylooshi
10-26-08, 01:26 AM
Since atheists claim they deal in facts, not fantasy, then please tell us the real history of the Jews so you can speak from knowledge, not ignorance for once.
Since you seem to care so much, why don\'t you tell us what you perceive as a history of the Levant, Mesopotamia, and the Near East, citing appropriate ethnographic and archaeologic sources?
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters.
Why would anyone one bother with such a stupid-ass demand? First, why should there be any evidence of the first person to consider himself a \"Jew\" and why should it matter? Second, you\'re the one making a positive claim about \"Adam and Eve,\" so why don\'t you cite legitimate sources (outside of biblical mythology) that support that such persons existed?
The Near East is full of mythical tales that speak of \"first peoples.\" They were obsessed with telling each other their lineages and who they were and where they came from, even if it wasn\'t accurate. There\'s no reason to believe that biblical mythology that religious nuts cling to today as \"truth\" isn\'t also a compendum of half-truths, tall-tales, and outright fabrications used to propagandize followers and maintain the status quo of ruling elites.
The bible gives us a lineage from Adam to Christ. So which people in that lineage were fictional characters and which ones were real people?
What good reason is there to believe that any of them were real? Maybe some were. Maybe none were. Maybe all were.
One thing we know for certain is that Mesopotamian, and Levantian peoples had strong traditions in oral history, oral story telling, and borrowing each others\' \"histories\" and \"stories\" to create new ones. This is an indisputable and understood phenomenon that emerges in cultural studies from Anatolia to Sumer to Canaan to Egypt. There\'s no reason to believe that the Canaanites who later became the Isrealites didn\'t also have the same literary habits as the rest of the region. In fact, there\'s good reason to believe they did since many of the stories in the Old Testament can be traced to older texts, such as that of the Noachian flood myth -which is an over-embellishment of the Sumerian myth.
spidergoat
10-26-08, 02:51 AM
Since atheists claim they deal in facts, not fantasy, then please tell us the real history of the Jews so you can speak from knowledge, not ignorance for once. ;)
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters. ;) The bible gives us a lineage from Adam to Christ. So which people in that lineage were fictional characters and which ones were real people? Then explain where the real people came from? Since atheists live in a fantasy world where they make up their own history this should be really entertaining. So let's see if you can discern fact from fiction. ;)
I don't think you are capable of judging fact from fiction. Who did Adam and Eve's children marry?
Why would I care about the Jew's history? Its not really that interesting.
Leo Volont
10-26-08, 05:02 AM
Much is said in Allegory. Individual Names are probably substituted for complete Clans or Tribes.
Abraham was not the first Jew, technically. Abraham is the "Father" of all Semites -- Arabs and Jews. Differentiation between Arab and Jew begins with the Sons of Issacc. This is where it gets funny. Jacob, the Jew, was the younger son, but he was a little cheat and liar and was able to steal the Birthright by deception. God Himself was offended and sent an Angel to kick Jacob's ass. Jacob's mother supported him in this because she saw herself more in Jacob than in her first son, who was mannly and honorable. She herself was probably a prostitute. When Abraham's family sent a Servent to find a Wife for Issacc, this one particular woman was the first to meet him as he came into town. What kind of woman is the first to toss herself in the path of a travelling stranger? Who participates in lies and deceptions?
The Jews take some great pride in being descended from this Cheat and Liar. This should give us some keen insight into their Psychology... why they enjoy being lawyers, bankers, business people... where screwing over people is okay because it is Just Business. Far from seeing Jacob as flawed, even evil, they see his clever deceptions and cheats as traits to be lived up to.
Hey, its their Bible. I'm not making this stuff up.
But is any of it true? Scholars have had trouble finding anything supposively from the Books of Moses, the early chapters of the Bible, that date prior to the Babylonnian Captivity. Indeed, some of the later Books of the Bible... taking up from after the Stay in Egypt... have a kind of discontinuity from the Books of Moses... suddenly the Jews are not careful about Priestly Rules and such that only a chapter before had been so all important. many Scholars therefore suppose that the Jews only became acquainted with the Legends and Stories of Abraham and Moses when they came to Babylon. It was a huge Cosmopolitan City, the Center of a broad Empire, in commerce with another Huge Empire, Persia. They were probably amazed and delighted with the Literature they found. So they stole some of it. They created a Legend for themselves.
Why they wrote themselves into being a Race of Scheming Liars and Cheats... Well, maybe they had some Bad Boy Thing going. Being Noble and Religious would have been too sissyfied for them, and so they thought being clever...
Oh, there are other Scholarly interpretations for the Jacob vs Esau dichotomy. You see, before the Babylonnian Capitivity there had been a Civil War between the Jews, between Israel and Judah. The War had gone undecided until Ninava, a Civilization from the North, came down and helped out by conquering Israel the way that Babylon had subsequently conquered Judah... the difference being that History tells us nothing of what might have happened to the captives of Israel. The Ten Lost Tribes.
There is some modern proof that the Jews were not really the Jews ... the legendary people from the Bible... that the Babylon Jews stole the book and applied it to themselves. If one goes to the Kashmir region of India, and looks at the Ancient Census Data, one finds that every 3rd boy was named Moses. One finds local place names from out of the Bible... places that are not named in the Near East where we would expect to find them.
so it is very likely that the Jews stole their Biblical Identity.
Since atheists claim they deal in facts, not fantasy, then please tell us the real history of the Jews so you can speak from knowledge, not ignorance for once. ;)
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters. ;) The bible gives us a lineage from Adam to Christ. So which people in that lineage were fictional characters and which ones were real people? Then explain where the real people came from? Since atheists live in a fantasy world where they make up their own history this should be really entertaining. So let's see if you can discern fact from fiction. ;)
Michael
10-26-08, 07:10 AM
Judaism is a religion. anyone can be a Jew. You should be asking where did this belief come from?
What he said is essentially correct, though he did not couch it in politically correct language
The close relationship between the Hebrews and the people of the desert and steppes is recognized in the story of Ishmael, the nomadic first son of Abraham; but it is through Isaac, the second son about whom so very little is recorded, that the Hebrews trace their own family line. Both Isaac and his son Jacob maintain a separateness from the people among whom they dwell, taking wives from among their own kin in Haran (Gen. 24; 28). The story of Jacob, who becomes Israel, and his twin brother Esau, who becomes Edom, is colored with rivalry, trickery and bitter misundertanding but also contains echoes of Hurrian custom. In Hurrian law, birthright could be purchased, and some of the terminology associated with Isaac's blessing of his sons reflects Hurrian patterns.6
The stories about Jacob also accord with Nuzi (Hurrian) law for it is recorded that a man may labor for his wife.7 In dealing with his uncle Laban, Jacob's trickery was matched by his uncle's deceptive acts. There is no condemnation of chicanery but, rather, the attitude that to best a man in a business contract revealed cleverness. When Jacob's hopes to inherit his uncle's estate were dashed by the birth of male heirs, he broke contract and fled, and it was only when a new contract was made that relationships were healed. The account of Jacob's night wrestling with an angelic visitor has probably come down to us through various recensions, for it now contains two aetiological explanations: one concerning the name "Jacob-Israel" and the other giving the reason why the ischiatic sinew is not eaten by Hebrews. Other traditions associate Jacob with Bethel and Shechem.
A somewhat different tradition of Hebrew beginnings is reflected in Ezek. (16:3 ff.), where mixed ancestry — Amorite, Hittite and Canaanite — is attributed to the Jerusalemites. But here we have a unique situation, for Jerusalem was a Jebusite stronghold which did not become a Hebrew city until the time of David (II Sam. 5). The firstfruits liturgy (Deut. 26:5) traces Hebrew ancestry to the Aramaeans, but the designation appears to be used in a broad rather than a specific sense.
Etymological analyses of the term "Hebrew" ( 'ibri) have given little help to the study of origins. The term has been related to a root, meaning "to go over" or "to go across"; hence, a "Hebrew" would be one who crossed over or one who went from place to place, a nomad, a wanderer, a designation that would fit some aspects of patriarchal behavior. A similar term, habiru, is found in cuneiform documents from the twentieth to the eleventh centuries, often used interchangeably with another word, SA.GAZ. At times the Habiru appear to be settled in specific locations; at times they serve in the army as mercenaries, or are bound to masters as servants. The El Amarna tablets refer to invaders of Palestine as 'apiru, a word bearing close relationship to the terms habiru and "Hebrew."14 Extensive research has led many scholars to the conclusion that the term "Hebrew" was first used as an appellative to describe foreigners who crossed into settled areas and referred not to a specific group but to a social caste. If the word "Hebrew" parallels habiru or 'apiru, we know that these people on occasion were employed, at times created settlements of their own, and at other times attacked established communities. The suggestion that the terms 'apiru, habiru and "Hebrew" relate to those who have renounced a relationship to an existing society, who have by a deliberate action withdrawn from some organization or rejected some authority, and who have become through this action freebooters, slaves, employees or mercenaries presents real possibilities.15 In the Bible the word Hebrew becomes an ethnic term used interchangeably with "Israelite."16
Perhaps the best that can be said is that the Hebrews of the Bible appear to be one branch of the Northwest Semitic group, related linguistically to Canaanites, Edomites and Moabites, who moved from a semi-nomadic existence to settled life in the Bronze Age.
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/gerald_larue/otll/chap8.html
[quote]
Theories on the creation of a biblical identity:
http://prophetess.lstc.edu/~rklein/Documents/grounds.htm
According to Finkelstein's theory, the legends about earlier periods were invented for the same purpose. "The people of Judah started to market the story of Joshua's conquest of the land, which was also written in that period, in order to give moral justification to their territorial longings, to the conquest of the territories of Israel. The story also contains a `laundering' of foreigners, which was exactly the problem Josiah faced when he conquered Israel. So they relate the story of the Gibeonites, who were terrified by the might of Joshua and his army and begged for their lives, and told Joshua that they were not indigenous Canaanites but foreigners who came from afar. Joshua made an alliance of peace with them, but when he found out they had cheated him, he did not expel them but made them hewers of wood and drawers of water - in other words, he laundered them.
"That is the situation Josiah and his people faced with foreign deportees the Assyrians brought to the Land of Israel, and the biblical text comes and says, `Have no worry, this already happened before: there were strangers in the land then, too, and Joshua laundered them during the conquest. Our conquest is not really what it looks like, it is only the restoration of past glories.'
So they must have had a good information ministry?
"I don't believe that there was a department for the invention of stories in Jerusalem. There were folktales that were handed down from generation to generation, local traditions and legends, and they were the basis for the creation of the biblical narrative. Maybe there really was no conquest, and maybe there were vague memories of local events. In any case, the scribes in the period of Josiah collected these materials and forged them into a coherent story containing a message it was important for them to get across. They didn't actually care whether there ever was such a person as Joshua. Jericho and the area of Bethel, and the Shefelah and the Galilee were on the agenda of Judah. They never actually conquered many of these regions. `This was once ours,' they said, `as in the time of Joshua, and all we are doing is putting history back in its track, correcting the course of history and on this occasion renewing the glorious monarchy of David, which was the first to rule these territories.'"
Are you saying that the story of the conquest of the land is a complete fiction?
"It is a story which, as it is presented in the Bible, definitely never happened. Archaeology shows that it has no historical grounds. Many of the sites that are cited in the story of the conquest were not even inhabited in the relevant period, so there was nothing to conquer, there were only hills and rocks. Jericho was not fortified and had no walls, and it's doubtful that there was a settlement there at the time. Therefore, in the case of the story of the conquest of Arad, for instance, some scholars said that the war was fought against the forces of one Bedouin sheikh.
I don't think Finkelstein is entirely correct, though, as the genetic studies do not support his theory [that the Hebrews are indigenous to Canaan, as they are closer to Assyrians]
Carico
So you can start by telling us who was the first real Jew and where did he come from since you claim that Adam, Eve and their descendants were fictional characters.
Wow. Don't you even read your own myths?
Abraham is the first "real jew."
Pinocchio's Hoof
10-27-08, 06:58 AM
But is any of it true? Scholars have had trouble finding anything supposively from the Books of Moses, the early chapters of the Bible, that date prior to the Babylonnian Captivity. Indeed, some of the later Books of the Bible... taking up from after the Stay in Egypt... have a kind of discontinuity from the Books of Moses... suddenly the Jews are not careful about Priestly Rules and such that only a chapter before had been so all important. many Scholars therefore suppose that the Jews only became acquainted with the Legends and Stories of Abraham and Moses when they came to Babylon. It was a huge Cosmopolitan City, the Center of a broad Empire, in commerce with another Huge Empire, Persia. They were probably amazed and delighted with the Literature they found. So they stole some of it. They created a Legend for themselves.
In 1854 Hurmuuzd Rassam found the remains of a library in Nineveh, the library was collected by King Ashurbanipal in about 650 b.c. In 1873 George Smith found tablets with a tale of a flood (think it was about Gilgamesh) nearly identical to Noah so you would have to presume that as the jews were enslaved about 100 years later under the reign of Nebuchadnezzar that they took their stories directly from babylon and encorporated them as their own..
Why.
Because they were enslaved..an attempt to rewrite their history to a more fantastical one?
I'm wondering when the first hebrew text's were found (i dont know too much about early text that would be for fraggle rocker to awnser) the rosetta stone was greek and egyptian, there was another stone found in Behistun in western iran dated 520 B.c. which contained Persian,Sumerian and Babylonian....does anyone know?
ccording to Finkelstein's theory, the legends about earlier periods were invented for the same purpose. "The people of Judah started to market the story of Joshua's conquest of the land, which was also written in that period, in order to give moral justification to their territorial longings, to the conquest of the territories of Israel. The story also contains a `laundering' of foreigners, which was exactly the problem Josiah faced when he conquered Israel. So they relate the story of the Gibeonites, who were terrified by the might of Joshua and his army and begged for their lives, and told Joshua that they were not indigenous Canaanites but foreigners who came from afar. Joshua made an alliance of peace with them, but when he found out they had cheated him, he did not expel them but made them hewers of wood and drawers of water - in other words, he laundered them.
So then YOUR history of the Jews is that they sat around on the ground and wrote fables about their history. :D Is that correct? :bugeye:
If so, then they have the best history of all of us because they weren't violent and had no wars unlike the rest of mankind. ;)
So then YOUR history of the Jews is that they sat around on the ground and wrote fables about their history. :D Is that correct? :bugeye:
If so, then they have the best history of all of us because they weren't violent and had no wars unlike the rest of mankind. ;)
Umm the reason they possibly invented their own history is not because they were less violent. Its because as brigands, slaves and labourers, they were social outcasts and had aspirations for land ownership. Its like immigrants who move to the US and then their children consider US history as their own history, the language, social, cultural and political values of Americans as their values. Except, these immigrants [the Hebrews] wanted to take over the land for themselves.
The notion that Israel enters into a Covenant of WAR and of PEACE, with her God, who promises to give the Hebrews ALL THE LAND OF CANAAN, mirrors the reports from mayors loyal to Pharaoh that the `Apiru grand plan is to make ALL THE LANDS OF CANAAN APIRU LANDS, to the very border of Egypt. The `Apiru leagues or covenants follow the same procedures outlined for Israel by Moses. First, offer PEACE, if accepted the city must be servants to Israel, if they resist, destroy them in war. I really see no differences between God's Covenant with Israel, promising her victory over her enemies and the `Apiru tactics, both had the same ultimate goal, winning ALL THE LAND OF CANAAN for themselves.
http://www.bibleorigins.net/Hebrewhabiruslaves.html
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