Is Old Testament historicaly correct?

[Channel72]

If we accept he is the same Pharaoh mentioned in the bible, an identification that, while being the majority view, is not really unanimous. As for synchronizing him with events in Mesopotamia or in the Levant, I would argue that since we have several inscriptions in the levant from him as well as the depictions and reliefs at his temples, they might not be that important. However, I'd be the first to admit that I have not done extensive study there, so if you know more than I do, feel free to correct me.

I think the Shishak/Sheshonk identification is pretty unanimous. The only people who really question this are idiots like David Rohl or crackpots like Velikovsky, who have an obvious religious agenda to alter Near Eastern chronology in order to reinterpret certain archeological findings to line up with the Biblical accounts. If there are any serious, mainstream scholars who question this identification, I'm not aware of them.

But many specific events in the Old Testament actually happened, because we can verify them through other sources. Therefore, my point stands that the Old Testament is far more historically "correct" than the Iliad, and so it's wrong to compare the two on that basis.

I would say that the value of those events are largely conjecture and the verifications usually seem to rely on assumptions. In any case, verifications by other sources usually leads to the bible stories having to be substantially modified, as in the case of moses I quoted above.

Look at it this way: suppose as an analogy we say the Iliad and the Old Testament are both paintings. The Iliad would appear as an amorphous, shadowy picture defined with very broad strokes. It might convey to us an overall mood or atmosphere, but very little in the way of any fine details. The Old Testament, on the other hand, would have many fine strokes, conveying a lot of specific imagery, even if most of it is contorted or exaggerated.

The fact is, many of the events in Kings, Ezra and Nehemiah are confirmed by other sources, and probably happened pretty much exactly as they were described in the Old Testament. Consider, for example, King Ahaz's appeal to Tiglath-Pileser III to help him fight against Northern Israel and Damascus, followed by the humiliating requirement that he pay tribute to Assyria and erect an altar to the Assyrian gods in Jerusalem. There seems to be little or no exaggeration in the Old Testament account, because the Assyrian records tell the same story.

One of the advantages of the Hebrew theological framework was that it easily allowed for the nation of Israel to suffer humiliating defeats. The Hebrew theologians simply interpreted this as a manifestation of Yahweh's anger. Consequently, the Hebrews rarely tried to modify or cover-up unfavorable events which happened to Israel. Compare this with, say, the Egyptians, who simply lied when they lost a battle (c.f. the battle of Kadesh).

So, a lot of the political events described in Kings, Ezra and Nehemiah probably happened exactly as recounted. Again, I'm not saying that every political event in Kings happened exactly as recounted; obviously the supernatural defeat of Sennacherib's army is an exaggeration or an outright lie, and all the Elijah/Elisha stories are probably 99% fabrications. But the majority of political events described in Kings, from the Omri dynasty onwards, seem to be more or less historically accurate. So in that regard, the Old Testament is far more useful as an historical record than the Iliad.

Well, the Mycenaean period is a period encompassing at its end an overlap of bronze and iron age tactics. However, as far as I know, the practice of champion combat was still used. Nevermind kings having hetairoi, the practice and importance of ships, the descriptions of meals taken together, practices regarding captured cities and the division of booty....

As for the chariots, AFAIK Mycenaean chariots were not really used predominantly in combat but did indeed serve as glorified taxis (though take note that there is at least one passage in the Illias where chariot combat is mentioned, iirc). Feel free to cite a study saying otherwise, though, as I noted, Mycenaean Greece is something I do not focus on.

Bronze-Age chariots were initially an Indo-European weapon imported to the Mediterranean via the Hittites and other Indo-European peoples. They were clearly not used as war-taxis, but rather were used in actual combat. This is made obvious through countless reliefs and descriptions of chariot combat by New Kingdom Egyptian records as well as evidence from excavations at the Hittite capital of Hattusa.

However, I have to admit that their usage in Mycenaean Greece is not clear. According to The Cambridge Companion to Homer, which cites a study (Crouwel, J. Chariots and Other Means of Land Transport in Bronze Age Greece), Mycenaean reliefs provide evidence that chariots were used for transportation, but there is no evidence they were used in war. Suffice it to say, there is no evidence for the Homeric "war-taxis", but there is also no evidence for traditional, Hittite-style chariot combat either. I would argue that it's highly likely that even if the Bronze Age Greeks didn't use chariots for war, the Trojans would use traditional Hittite-style chariot combat, given their proximity to the Hittite empire, and so Homer is probably wrong about that.

[Thanas]

Look at it this way: suppose as an analogy we say the Iliad and the Old Testament are both paintings. The Iliad would appear as an amorphous, shadowy picture defined with very broad strokes. It might convey to us an overall mood or atmosphere, but very little in the way of any fine details. The Old Testament, on the other hand, would have many fine strokes, conveying a lot of specific imagery, even if most of it is contorted or exaggerated.

The fact is, many of the events in Kings, Ezra and Nehemiah are confirmed by other sources, and probably happened pretty much exactly as they were described in the Old Testament. Consider, for example, King Ahaz's appeal to Tiglath-Pileser III to help him fight against Northern Israel and Damascus, followed by the humiliating requirement that he pay tribute to Assyria and erect an altar to the Assyrian gods in Jerusalem. There seems to be little or no exaggeration in the Old Testament account, because the Assyrian records tell the same story.

One of the advantages of the Hebrew theological framework was that it easily allowed for the nation of Israel to suffer humiliating defeats. The Hebrew theologians simply interpreted this as a manifestation of Yahweh's anger. Consequently, the Hebrews rarely tried to modify or cover-up unfavorable events which happened to Israel. Compare this with, say, the Egyptians, who simply lied when they lost a battle (c.f. the battle of Kadesh).

So, a lot of the political events described in Kings, Ezra and Nehemiah probably happened exactly as recounted. Again, I'm not saying that every political event in Kings happened exactly as recounted; obviously the supernatural defeat of Sennacherib's army is an exaggeration or an outright lie, and all the Elijah/Elisha stories are probably 99% fabrications. But the majority of political events described in Kings, from the Omri dynasty onwards, seem to be more or less historically accurate. So in that regard, the Old Testament is far more useful as an historical record than the Iliad.´

I see your point, but I differ when it comes to the actual opinion. For me, this "more or less" historically accurate is where I draw the line. See the moses story for an example. The problem is one of authorship - the Bible is more or less religious propaganda, up to the point that its only value is because we simply do not have anything else to support it. This does not make it a source I'd rather not use except when I have to, and even then I would have a truckload of caveats.

The sheer amount of useless stufff...it is worse than christian hagiography. So I would probably say that with the exception of those very few things, the whole thing is worthless. Meanwhile, the illias is actually being of way more importance in the field today, simply due to being important when it comes to understanding greek art.

Bronze-Age chariots were initially an Indo-European weapon imported to the Mediterranean via the Hittites and other Indo-European peoples. They were clearly not used as war-taxis, but rather were used in actual combat. This is made obvious through countless reliefs and descriptions of chariot combat by New Kingdom Egyptian records as well as evidence from excavations at the Hittite capital of Hattusa.

However, I have to admit that their usage in Mycenaean Greece is not clear. According to The Cambridge Companion to Homer, which cites a study (Crouwel, J. Chariots and Other Means of Land Transport in Bronze Age Greece), Mycenaean reliefs provide evidence that chariots were used for transportation, but there is no evidence they were used in war. Suffice it to say, there is no evidence for the Homeric "war-taxis", but there is also no evidence for traditional, Hittite-style chariot combat either. I would argue that it's highly likely that even if the Bronze Age Greeks didn't use chariots for war, the Trojans would use traditional Hittite-style chariot combat, given their proximity to the Hittite empire, and so Homer is probably wrong about that.

I disagree, mainly because I have seen the reliefs and pottery. I especially remember one from Abai, which showed a warrior riding in a chariot, the next relief showed him fighting on foot (with the weapons he previously carried with him in the chariot). In any case, if the Trojans used traditional Hittite-style combat (something I am not entirely convinced about, due to lack of evidence and they might very well just have used styles comparable to others, e.g. their enemies/trading partners the greeks).

[Liberty]

Similarly, we know Jericho existed and we know that it was destroyed, at some point, but we also know it wasn't brought down by marching around it for seven days and it wasn't sacked by the Israelites. More likely, as I recall, it's ruins were discovered by the Israelites and they took credit for it.

Wasn't that the ruse for the sneak attack? I hear a pretty convincing theory that the 'red rope' Rahab tied to her window was an important fact. So whenever the Israelites marched around the city, a handful of men climbed up and into town. After seven days, they had enough men in there, and on the signal of the horns, they stormed the gates and opened them, while everybody was distracted by the Israelites blowing the war horns, thinking they would start the storm on the walls now... I just can't remember where I have it from, but it sounds better than a coincidental earthquake, and it explains the rope, which would do nothing to protect Rahab's house in the heat of battle - no one would notice it.

You are assuming from the start that the Biblical account must be in essence true. This is a mistake.

In The Bible Unearthed, archeologists Finkelstein and Silberman say that Jericho was not even settled during the time the Israelites supposedly entered Canaan, having been destroyed over a century earlier. Who do you have trumpeting the whole "it's real, the walls and everything!" theory? A man named Bryant. From Wikipedia: "Bryant G. Wood is a biblical archaeologist and Research Director of the inerrantist Associates for Biblical Research." Do you really want to trust him? Wikipedia goes on to say that Bryant "is known for his 1990 proposed redating of the destruction of Jericho to accord with the biblical chronology of c. 1400 BC. The proposal was later (1995) contradicted by new radiocarbon evidence, and Kathleen Kenyon's dating of c. 1550 BC remains the date accepted in scholarly publications." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryant_G._Wood)

The Israelites did not conquer Jericho in the first place, so there is no use trying to figure out the red rope - it's a myth.

[Darth Wong]

I would say that the value of those events are largely conjecture and the verifications usually seem to rely on assumptions. In any case, verifications by other sources usually leads to the bible stories having to be substantially modified, as in the case of moses I quoted above.

Look at it this way: suppose as an analogy we say the Iliad and the Old Testament are both paintings. The Iliad would appear as an amorphous, shadowy picture defined with very broad strokes. It might convey to us an overall mood or atmosphere, but very little in the way of any fine details. The Old Testament, on the other hand, would have many fine strokes, conveying a lot of specific imagery, even if most of it is contorted or exaggerated.

So the Old Testament is more "historically correct" because it contains more specific detail, even though much of that detail is wrong? This seems to be your argument, and I don't see how it makes any sense.

[The Spartan]

Wasn't that the ruse for the sneak attack? I hear a pretty convincing theory that the 'red rope' Rahab tied to her window was an important fact. So whenever the Israelites marched around the city, a handful of men climbed up and into town. After seven days, they had enough men in there, and on the signal of the horns, they stormed the gates and opened them, while everybody was distracted by the Israelites blowing the war horns, thinking they would start the storm on the walls now... I just can't remember where I have it from, but it sounds better than a coincidental earthquake, and it explains the rope, which would do nothing to protect Rahab's house in the heat of battle - no one would notice it.

Sorry LaCroix, I had missed your reply. Didn't mean to ignore you.

Anyhow, as Liberty pointed out the red rope was just a myth because the dates just don't line up between the Israelites and Jericho being occupied. You see that in a few Biblical stories; an act to demonstrate one's faith that is. Rahab was saved because she had faith. Like with Moses and striking the rock. He was told to strike the rock to get water. Which he did. Then, later, he was told to talk to the rock to get water, but lost faith and struck it again. His punishment was to not see the Promised Land.

There are others, but those are the two that I actually remember.

[Liberty]

Wasn't that the ruse for the sneak attack? I hear a pretty convincing theory that the 'red rope' Rahab tied to her window was an important fact. So whenever the Israelites marched around the city, a handful of men climbed up and into town. After seven days, they had enough men in there, and on the signal of the horns, they stormed the gates and opened them, while everybody was distracted by the Israelites blowing the war horns, thinking they would start the storm on the walls now... I just can't remember where I have it from, but it sounds better than a coincidental earthquake, and it explains the rope, which would do nothing to protect Rahab's house in the heat of battle - no one would notice it.

Sorry LaCroix, I had missed your reply. Didn't mean to ignore you.

Anyhow, as Liberty pointed out the red rope was just a myth because the dates just don't line up between the Israelites and Jericho being occupied. You see that in a few Biblical stories; an act to demonstrate one's faith that is. Rahab was saved because she had faith. Like with Moses and striking the rock. He was told to strike the rock to get water. Which he did. Then, later, he was told to talk to the rock to get water, but lost faith and struck it again. His punishment was to not see the Promised Land.

There are others, but those are the two that I actually remember.

And honestly, a red rope might have signified something to the Ancient Israelites; it's just that it would be a mythical symbolic kind of meaning, not a literal "this actually happened" kind of meaning.

[Channel72]

So the Old Testament is more "historically correct" because it contains more specific detail, even though much of that detail is wrong? This seems to be your argument, and I don't see how it makes any sense.

If we're defining "historical correctness" as "statements describing specific events that are verifiably true", then it's valid to say the Old Testament is more "historically correct" than the Iliad. The Iliad is essentially 100% mythology; it's only broadly connected with reality via the inclusion of actual places and a possible association with some actual conflict that happened at Troy. But it doesn't make any statements about specific events or people that are verifiably true, beyond broad obvious things like the existence of places. It is therefore useless to historians who are interested in forming chronologies or determining biographical information about specific people.

The Old Testament, however, makes many specific statements about events which are verifiably true; I've cited a few examples of such statements earlier. So, while the Old Testament contains a lot of mythology, hagiography, religious propaganda, etc., it also contains sections which are more or less historical annals which contain many statements about political events and figures which are verified by other sources. So, it is more "historically correct" than something that is 100% mythological, and it is often just as useful to historians as other Ancient Near Eastern annals such as the Assyrian king lists, which are used all the time by historians to form chronologies.

[Liberty]

So the Old Testament is more "historically correct" because it contains more specific detail, even though much of that detail is wrong? This seems to be your argument, and I don't see how it makes any sense.

If we're defining "historical correctness" as "statements describing specific events that are verifiably true", then it's valid to say the Old Testament is more "historically correct" than the Iliad. The Iliad is essentially 100% mythology; it's only broadly connected with reality via the inclusion of actual places and a possible association with some actual conflict that happened at Troy. But it doesn't make any statements about specific events or people that are verifiably true, beyond broad obvious things like the existence of places. It is therefore useless to historians who are interested in forming chronologies or determining biographical information about specific people.

The Old Testament, however, makes many specific statements about events which are verifiably true; I've cited a few examples of such statements earlier. So, while the Old Testament contains a lot of mythology, hagiography, religious propaganda, etc., it also contains sections which are more or less historical annals which contain many statements about political events and figures which are verified by other sources. So, it is more "historically correct" than something that is 100% mythological, and it is often just as useful to historians as other Ancient Near Eastern annals such as the Assyrian king lists, which are used all the time by historians to form chronologies.

Not to get into you guys' little debate here, but in my understanding most archeologists, etc, today believe that the first five books of the Bible are complete myth, and that the stories of the kings and their battles after that are heavily mythologized and biased. But again, the first give books, the Pentateuch, are complete myth.

[LaCroix]

Similarly, we know Jericho existed and we know that it was destroyed, at some point, but we also know it wasn't brought down by marching around it for seven days and it wasn't sacked by the Israelites. More likely, as I recall, it's ruins were discovered by the Israelites and they took credit for it.

Wasn't that the ruse for the sneak attack? I hear a pretty convincing theory that the 'red rope' Rahab tied to her window was an important fact. So whenever the Israelites marched around the city, a handful of men climbed up and into town. After seven days, they had enough men in there, and on the signal of the horns, they stormed the gates and opened them, while everybody was distracted by the Israelites blowing the war horns, thinking they would start the storm on the walls now... I just can't remember where I have it from, but it sounds better than a coincidental earthquake, and it explains the rope, which would do nothing to protect Rahab's house in the heat of battle - no one would notice it.

You are assuming from the start that the Biblical account must be in essence true. This is a mistake.

In The Bible Unearthed, archeologists Finkelstein and Silberman say that Jericho was not even settled during the time the Israelites supposedly entered Canaan, having been destroyed over a century earlier. Who do you have trumpeting the whole "it's real, the walls and everything!" theory? A man named Bryant. From Wikipedia: "Bryant G. Wood is a biblical archaeologist and Research Director of the inerrantist Associates for Biblical Research." Do you really want to trust him? Wikipedia goes on to say that Bryant "is known for his 1990 proposed redating of the destruction of Jericho to accord with the biblical chronology of c. 1400 BC. The proposal was later (1995) contradicted by new radiocarbon evidence, and Kathleen Kenyon's dating of c. 1550 BC remains the date accepted in scholarly publications." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryant_G._Wood)

The Israelites did not conquer Jericho in the first place, so there is no use trying to figure out the red rope - it's a myth.

OK, thanks, didn't know that.

Sounds funny that the Israelites would brag about conquering a city that was death for over 150 years before they came along. Maybe they did encounter a small village with a wooden fence, captured it and claimed it was Jericho, or they read the map wrong and took a diffenrent small town and insisted that it WAS Jericho...

That is like shoving a British kid off an air mattress and claiming to have beaten the Royal Navy. They couldn't even use it as a tale to ensure terror, since after 150 years, everybody around would have known that there was no city or walls to storm anymore.

I was of the opinion that these tales were written during or shortly after the conquest of Canaan but it's quite believable that they were written long after and made an attempt to make the history even more fantastic, and since no one remembered anymore, creative license made its appearance...

[Darth Wong]

So the Old Testament is more "historically correct" because it contains more specific detail, even though much of that detail is wrong? This seems to be your argument, and I don't see how it makes any sense.

If we're defining "historical correctness" as "statements describing specific events that are verifiably true", then it's valid to say the Old Testament is more "historically correct" than the Iliad.

So there is no penalty for its myriad events, no matter how spectacular or broad-ranging in scope, which are blatantly untrue?

The Iliad is essentially 100% mythology; it's only broadly connected with reality via the inclusion of actual places and a possible association with some actual conflict that happened at Troy. But it doesn't make any statements about specific events or people that are verifiably true, beyond broad obvious things like the existence of places. It is therefore useless to historians who are interested in forming chronologies or determining biographical information about specific people.

As long as you're citing percentages, what percentage of the Bible's stories are verifiably true? And by that, I mean "true without having to massively modify them"?

The Old Testament, however, makes many specific statements about events which are verifiably true; I've cited a few examples of such statements earlier. So, while the Old Testament contains a lot of mythology, hagiography, religious propaganda, etc., it also contains sections which are more or less historical annals which contain many statements about political events and figures which are verified by other sources. So, it is more "historically correct" than something that is 100% mythological, and it is often just as useful to historians as other Ancient Near Eastern annals such as the Assyrian king lists, which are used all the time by historians to form chronologies.

I don't see how the fact that you can cherry-pick certain verifiable facts from the Bible makes it "historically correct". You're ignoring all of the hopelessly incorrect stuff.

[Channel72]

So there is no penalty for its myriad events, no matter how spectacular or broad-ranging in scope, which are blatantly untrue?

Of course there's a penalty. The penalty is we apply extreme skepticism when assessing anything from the Old Testament, and we assign different levels of trust to different portions of the Old Testament, depending on how much of it we can verify. This is basically how we should treat any ancient historical document that includes obviously mythological/religious elements.

As long as you're citing percentages, what percentage of the Bible's stories are verifiably true? And by that, I mean "true without having to massively modify them"?

A small percentage, I would guess. Basically certain portions of Kings, Ezra, Nehemiah, and some passages from the major/minor prophets. But this doesn't change the fact that the Old Testament is useful to historians. Historians actually incorporate information from the Book of Kings, Ezra and Nehemiah to form chronologies.

I don't see how the fact that you can cherry-pick certain verifiable facts from the Bible makes it "historically correct". You're ignoring all of the hopelessly incorrect stuff.

What are you talking about? I'm explicitly not ignoring the hopelessly incorrect stuff; in my breakdown above I went over each major section of the Bible and pointed out how a lot of it is worthless historically. All I'm saying is that as far as ancient documents go, the Old Testament has a lot more verifiably correct information in it than the Iliad.

[Shroom Man 777]

That's hardly fair since the Old Testament encompasses so many books and stories, whereas the Illiad is just a story about the Trojan War, right? I'm sure Illiad would be more accurate than Genesis . And maybe probably somewhere on the same level as Joshua or something.

[Darth Wong]

What are you talking about? I'm explicitly not ignoring the hopelessly incorrect stuff; in my breakdown above I went over each major section of the Bible and pointed out how a lot of it is worthless historically. All I'm saying is that as far as ancient documents go, the Old Testament has a lot more verifiably correct information in it than the Iliad.

Yes, but it also has a lot more verifiably false stuff in it than the Iliad. That's the point.

[Simon_Jester]

Not to get into you guys' little debate here, but in my understanding most archeologists, etc, today believe that the first five books of the Bible are complete myth, and that the stories of the kings and their battles after that are heavily mythologized and biased. But again, the first give books, the Pentateuch, are complete myth.

Hmm.

When you say "complete myth," how do you mean it?

For example, the Norse creation myth is complete myth and has no historically accurate features, nor even the remains of historical accuracy twisted out of proportion. It's pure fiction.

Whereas, say, the Iliad is assuredly not historically accurate, but it at least contains some remnants of warped historical fact. Most of the places Homer is talking about (Troy, Sparta, Sicily) actually existed, the fighting styles bear at least a vague resemblance to how real people might have fought at the time, and it's even conceivable that there actually was a Mycenean siege and sack of Troy. Thus, the Iliad might be considered 'historical fiction' by the standards of its era: it isn't true, but it can at least provide some insight into what was.

Genesis is most likely complete myth in the same sense that anyone else's creation myth is. The later books? I could at least imagine those being extremely fictionalized history, with all the numbers and tales of heroism getting pumped up to beyond-absurd levels.

What are you talking about? I'm explicitly not ignoring the hopelessly incorrect stuff; in my breakdown above I went over each major section of the Bible and pointed out how a lot of it is worthless historically. All I'm saying is that as far as ancient documents go, the Old Testament has a lot more verifiably correct information in it than the Iliad.

Yes, but it also has a lot more verifiably false stuff in it than the Iliad. That's the point.

Yeah, and that's not much of a surprise. The Old Testament covers an entire historical period instead of a single incident where we can't possibly verify or falsify most of the stuff that supposedly happened. Because of the relatively small scale of events covered in the Iliad in time and space, it's less falsifiable than the Old Testament.

We can check whether two million people departed from Egypt around 1200 BC (they didn't). We can't check whether there was a tough guy named Achilles who helped sack Troy around 1200 BC, though it's safe to assume that even if he did exist, reports of his toughness are greatly exaggerated.

Since Channel72 made a very obvious effort to separate out the completely mythical, and therefore useless, parts of the Bible from the incompletely mythical ones that have some residual historical value, I think what he's doing is reasonable.

[Darth Wong]

Since Channel72 made a very obvious effort to separate out the completely mythical, and therefore useless, parts of the Bible from the incompletely mythical ones that have some residual historical value, I think what he's doing is reasonable.

Even the pseudo-mythical events with "residual historical value" are often grossly wrong, so how does this factor into an assessment of being "correct"? Precisely what does the word "correct" mean in your dictionary?

[Simon_Jester]

Since Channel72 made a very obvious effort to separate out the completely mythical, and therefore useless, parts of the Bible from the incompletely mythical ones that have some residual historical value, I think what he's doing is reasonable.

Even the pseudo-mythical events with "residual historical value" are often grossly wrong, so how does this factor into an assessment of being "correct"? Precisely what does the word "correct" mean in your dictionary?

To me, "Correct" means "lines up with the facts." The question is whether we say "This thing is either correct (and useful) or incorrect (and useless)," or whether we say "this thing is X% correct and should be handled accordingly," where X is a number anywhere from 0 to 100.

When you're looking at a creation myth, the whole thing is 0% correct from a historical point of view. It's all wrong, and you ignore all of it. When you're looking at an account of something that supposedly happened? Harder to say.

Some accounts are going to be 0% correct, like Exodus. Exodus can't be used as historical evidence for anything because it's dead wrong in almost every significant particular. It might just be a mythicized version of something that really happened, or it might be absolute bullshit. There's no way to tell.

Much of the Bible falls in this range.

Other accounts might be, say, 10% correct: reading them you find interesting bits that agree with other, well known and better supported sources. Things like that can't be used to prove anything. At best, they might be used as a source of hypotheses to be tested by other means, if you don't mind wasting a lot of time on possibilities that don't pan out.

The least inaccurate parts of the Bible fall in this range. They're primary sources that claim what happened, and in at least some places their claims can be proven correct. Which means they aren't completely useless, because they can be used as a baseline for an educated guess.

Whether you call stuff that's 10% or 20% correct "historically correct" is a matter of opinion. I don't, and I think it would be foolish to do so. You probably feel the same way, I expect. "Historically useful" is not the same as "historically correct:" incorrect sources can still be useful if we can deduce useful information from them, the way Thanas can deduce useful information about Greek and Roman culture from the Iliad.

[Marcus Aurelius]

That's hardly fair since the Old Testament encompasses so many books and stories, whereas the Illiad is just a story about the Trojan War, right? I'm sure Illiad would be more accurate than Genesis . And maybe probably somewhere on the same level as Joshua or something.

This is a very good point. I see that Mike's insistance on calling the Old Testament "mostly bullshit" probably comes from his hobby of debating creationist and fundamentalists, who also like to think the Bible as a single book or at most two books (Old and New Testament). However, such a view is entirely based on religious dogma and has no basis in real history. Fundies of course do not want to accept that since it would challenge their beliefs, but from a historian's point of view the Bible is a collection of writings or "books", which have very diverse origins. There has been some harmonizing but evidence of different origins are still everywhere to see.

A secular historian will look at each writing separately and even look for clues that some books may have several different sources, as is quite evident with the two different creation stories in the beginning of Genesis. So there is no discrepancy in saying that the Old Testament is both accurate and mythological, since some books are almost pure mythology but others have a high content of real history. This of course does not change the fact that most of the religiously important events like Genesis and Exodus have very little or no basis in real history. Fundies may want to take or leave the Bible as a whole, but secular historians have no need for that, because they do not acknowledge that the Bible is God's word. So in that sense it is perfectly okay to "cherry pick" the most historically accurate writings and use them in historical research. This is what I believe Channel72 and Simon_Jester are trying to convey.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, it's certainly what I'm trying to say.

I would no more use Genesis as a source for a historical argument than I'd use old Superman comics, but I don't see a problem with drawing a distinction between Genesis and Kings. If Kings generally doesn't contradict other historical evidence, then treating it as a (not perfectly trustworthy) source for events seems reasonable to me.

[Darth Wong]

Other accounts might be, say, 10% correct: reading them you find interesting bits that agree with other, well known and better supported sources. Things like that can't be used to prove anything. At best, they might be used as a source of hypotheses to be tested by other means, if you don't mind wasting a lot of time on possibilities that don't pan out.

The least inaccurate parts of the Bible fall in this range. They're primary sources that claim what happened, and in at least some places their claims can be proven correct. Which means they aren't completely useless, because they can be used as a baseline for an educated guess.

And why can't the Iliad be used for this purpose? Why can't one make an educated guess that there might have actually been a warlord named Achilles during that period, although his magical abilities were probably bullshit? That's no more or less reasonable than taking scraps of reality out of the Biblical Jericho story even though it's obviously full of shit as a whole.

Whether you call stuff that's 10% or 20% correct "historically correct" is a matter of opinion. I don't, and I think it would be foolish to do so. You probably feel the same way, I expect. "Historically useful" is not the same as "historically correct:" incorrect sources can still be useful if we can deduce useful information from them, the way Thanas can deduce useful information about Greek and Roman culture from the Iliad.

First, you are changing the subject from "correct" to "useful". Second, I still don't see why the Old Testament scores higher on this metric than the Iliad does. Yes, it does have certain very specific kinds of information that the Iliad doesn't, like dates and family trees and troop numbers, but those more precise pieces of information are also often completely wrong, so I don't see how they make it better.

[Simon_Jester]

And why can't the Iliad be used for this purpose? Why can't one make an educated guess that there might have actually been a warlord named Achilles during that period, although his magical abilities were probably bullshit? That's no more or less reasonable than taking scraps of reality out of the Biblical Jericho story even though it's obviously full of shit as a whole.

Of course, as I recall the Biblical Jericho story is one of the ones we don't use... but I take your meaning. And there might have been a warlord named Achilles, just as there might have been a proto-Israelite religious leader named Joshua. But that's about as far as we can go, because in both cases the story of their lives has been warped beyond all plausibility.

The only parts of the Bible that even approach "historical correctness," even by the low standards of ancient primary sources, are the ones that are least mythologized. Even they probably aren't very good.

First, you are changing the subject from "correct" to "useful". Second, I still don't see why the Old Testament scores higher on this metric than the Iliad does. Yes, it does have certain very specific kinds of information that the Iliad doesn't, like dates and family trees and troop numbers, but those more precise pieces of information are also often completely wrong, so I don't see how they make it better.

I'm trying rather hard to avoid using "useful" to describe things that are factually incorrect, because I'm talking only about usefulness as a guide to events. A complete fiction may be a useful cultural artifact if it tells us about the culture, but it's useless as a way to find out what actually happened.

The Iliad is immensely useful as a cultural artifact, but useless as a historical reference because none of it can be independently corroborated, and some of it is obviously wrong.

Most of the Bible is useful as a cultural artifact, but useless as a historical reference, like the Iliad and for the same reasons. Some specific bits of the Bible are also useful as historical references if there's independent corroboration of the events it describes.

Those parts, and only those parts, are at least somewhat "correct," in that they give partly accurate descriptions of events we know happened.

Talking about how useful the Bible is overall kind of misses the point, because some parts of it are more useless than others (just as some parts are more incorrect than others).

[Setzer]

Also don't forget that whatever grains of truth might be in the books, they're biased.
I recall looking up one of the so-called victories claimed by Hezekiah against the Assyrian king Sennacherib. The bible claims it as a great victory, with 185k Assyrians killed by God himself. On the other hand the Assyrians consider it a victory and mention that they plundered all his lands, locked him up in Jerusalem and that in fear of the Assyrian might, the Hebrew king offered them a ton of gold in tribute if they could please lift the siege and go away.
So while there are two sources here confirming the event did actually happen, it's impossible that both are right.

My money is on the Assyrian account being closer to the truth btw.

Did the Assyrians ever assemble a force of 185,000 in one place? I mean, outside of official propaganda? I could see the Persians or the Romans managing it, but I don't think the Assyrians had that kind of population or logistics.

[Channel72]

What are you talking about? I'm explicitly not ignoring the hopelessly incorrect stuff; in my breakdown above I went over each major section of the Bible and pointed out how a lot of it is worthless historically. All I'm saying is that as far as ancient documents go, the Old Testament has a lot more verifiably correct information in it than the Iliad.

Yes, but it also has a lot more verifiably false stuff in it than the Iliad. That's the point.

Fine, but how is that point relevant? It's a collection of ancient religious documents for crying out loud; of course it contains reams of bullshit. But it doesn't matter how much false garbage we can point to in the Old Testament; the fact is, it also contains verifiably correct information, especially in Kings, Ezra, and Nehemiah. The scholarly consensus on Nehemiah even concludes that it's partially an eyewitness account. The Iliad has nothing even close to that. So you can't say the Iliad is just as historically correct as the Old Testament.

[Darth Wong]

In other words, the vast majority of the Old Testament is nonsense, but small scraps of it are useful ... but the only way to know which parts are useful is to confirm them against other sources. It certainly can't be relied upon itself. And the Iliad is less useful ... because there are no other sources to confirm it against, so it represents the only source on the era it describes. Sorry but I don't see how this makes it less useful.

[Havok]

Man, I am sorry, and I know this is way too spamy for this forum and Thanas, but I literally started laughing out loud when I saw the title of this thread.
How can anyone ask about the historical accuracy of the OT, especially after reading it? It is clearly nonsense at worst and vaguely a set of rules hidden in nonsense at best.

I mean, yeah it uses actual people and places, but so does Spider-Man, y'know.

Sorry again Thanas.

[LaCroix]

And why can't the Iliad be used for this purpose? Why can't one make an educated guess that there might have actually been a warlord named Achilles during that period, although his magical abilities were probably bullshit?

If you have seen the Dendra Panoply that (rich) warriors wore at the time of the Trojan war, you wouldn't disagree with tales his invulnerability. If you wore that armor, with the arm and leg protection, and had the money (as a warlord probably had) to get highest quality, the probably only way to harm you is stabbing you in the heel.

I can very much agree that he ran around in that armor, got his battle-taxi (the greek did that - switching warriors during battle if they got tired, so probably only haf the men were fighting at any time) to get him back to rest every few minutes.

And then he stepped onto a broken spear or something when he stomped over the battlefield or got hit there from a prone enemy not fully dead. He then died from sepsis. Maybe his tale started out as a joke among his peers - "Have you heard about the Achilles bloke? That stupid jerk was armored like a fortress, and then he got himself stabbed in the heel, for Zeus' sake, and died from that!"
Must have been a hoot at the campfires for weeks!