Is Exodus is an accuate account of Historical events

Twin-go

Duscussion on if Exodus is an accuate account of Historical events
moved from this Thread:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056039794

Quote:
Originally Posted by PDN
Yes, I do believe the Exodus account to be accurate.


But the Exodus also specifically says:

Who appeared to Moses in the Burning Bush?
God:
Exodus 3:4 And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses.

An Angel:
Exodus 3:2 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

Who Hardened the Pharaohs Heart?

God:
Exodus 10:20 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go.

The Pharaoh:
Exodus 8:32 And Pharaoh hardened his heart at this time also, neither would he let the people go.

Did the Lord kill all the cattle in the 6th Plague?
Yes:Exodus 9:3-6 Behold, the hand of the LORD is upon thy cattle which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep: there shall be a very grievous murrain. ... And the LORD did that thing on the morrow, and all the cattle of Egypt died. No:
Exodus 12:29 At midnight the LORD smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle.

Is God is Warlike?
Exodus 15:3 The Lord is a man of war.

Is it ok to make images?
No:
Exodus 20:4, "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below Yes:Exodus 25:18, 20 Thou shalt make two cherubims of gold ... And the cherubims shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and their faces shall look to one another.


So how accurate can Exodus be? How trustworthy is it with the contradictions listed above?

mathepac

I suppose it depends - do you know / believe the above translation to English is accurate and reflective of the histories and concepts the original writer(s) wished to convey?

Given the various steps and stages, the variety of translators, writers, editors and (perhaps inadvertent) censors these stories have had over the centuries, I think it's almost inevitable that contradictions appear.

I know (more correctly I have been told) that the books of the Old Testament are a history of the ancient Jews and are thus important to them as well as to Christians / Paulines. I wonder what is the Jewish position on the accuracy / validity of Exodus in any of its multiple English translations?

Twin-go

mathepac wrote: »

I suppose it depends - do you know / believe the above translation to English is accurate and reflective of the histories and concepts the original writer(s) wished to convey?

Given the various steps and stages, the variety of translators, writers, editors and (perhaps inadvertent) censors these stories have had over the centuries, I think it's almost inevitable that contradictions appear.

I know (more correctly I have been told) that the books of the Old Testament are a history of the ancient Jews and are thus important to them as well as to Christians / Paulines. I wonder what is the Jewish position on the accuracy / validity of Exodus in any of its multiple English translations?

Thats my point we don't know and we can't know thus it invalidates the account.

If a news paper contradicted itself in articals people wouldn't be long in stopping to read it. They simply wouldn't, couldn't trust what was been reported.

Yet we have different standards when it comes to books of religion. We make excuses to why it contradicts itself. We pick and choose what we believe. The inacuracies are tollerated. We should have higher standards if in fact these are indeed "the word of the Lord".

PDN

Twin-go wrote: »

But the Exodus also specifically says:

Who appeared to Moses in the Burning Bush?
God:
Exodus 3:4 And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses.

An Angel:
Exodus 3:2 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

Oh dear, I do wish that our atheist friends would understand that the Skeptics Annotated Bible is written by theologically illiterate noobs - and that trying to use it as a basis for 'challenges' is only going to make them look silly too.

The phrase 'angel (lit. messenger) of the Lord' is a Hebrew construction often used to designate an appearence of God. Since God is in fact Spirit, any physical manifestation of Himself necessitated taking on a temporary form (almost like an avatar, if you will). You can read more about it on wiki. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_the_Lord

wikipedia wrote:

In the earlier Biblical writings the term "Malakh YHWH" (messenger of the Lord) occurs chiefly in the singular, and signifies a special self-manifestation of God (see Gen. 31:11-13, where the angel of God says, "I am the God of Beth-el"; Ex. 3:2-6, where the angel of the Lord who appeared to Moses in the flame of fire says, "I am the God of thy father"; compare Gen. 22:11; Judges 6:11-22)

Who Hardened the Pharaohs Heart?

God:
Exodus 10:20 But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go.

The Pharaoh:
Exodus 8:32 And Pharaoh hardened his heart at this time also, neither would he let the people go.

This illustrates an important principle, that if we continually reject God then our heart becomes so hard that God gives us over to our sinful desires.

Pharaoh kept hardening his heart, rather than listening to God, so eventually God said, "Ok, you want a hard heart? Then I'll give you one."

Perhaps, Twin-Go, you should take this as a warning to yourself regarding your own spiritual condition?

Did the Lord kill all the cattle in the 6th Plague?
Yes:Exodus 9:3-6 Behold, the hand of the LORD is upon thy cattle which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep: there shall be a very grievous murrain. ... And the LORD did that thing on the morrow, and all the cattle of Egypt died. No:
Exodus 12:29 At midnight the LORD smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle.

Oh dear, the perils of selective quotes. Sorry to break this to you, but not only are the noobs at the Skeptics Annotated Bible theologically illiterate - they are also dishonest.

If you had read the quote from Exodux Chapter 9 for yourself you would have seen the bits that they deliberately omitted:

the hand of the LORD will bring a terrible plague on your livestock in the field—on your horses and donkeys and camels and on your cattle and sheep and goats. 4 But the LORD will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and that of Egypt, so that no animal belonging to the Israelites will die.' "

5 The LORD set a time and said, "Tomorrow the LORD will do this in the land." 6 And the next day the LORD did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one animal belonging to the Israelites died. 7 Pharaoh sent men to investigate and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died.

So, we are expressly told THREE TIMES that the cattle belonging to the Israelites were not killed. Now, you don't have to be a genius to see the likely outcome to this scenario. The Egyptians have lost all their cattle, the Israelite slaves still have cattle - so what do you think the guys with the political power will do? ................... That's right! They take the slaves' cattle.

Is God is Warlike?
Exodus 15:3 The Lord is a man of war.

Sorry, is this supposed to be a contradiction?

God will indeed wage war on those who defy him. Again, a warning to be heeded!

Is it ok to make images?
No:
Exodus 20:4, "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below Yes:Exodus 25:18, 20 Thou shalt make two cherubims of gold ... And the cherubims shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and their faces shall look to one another.

I think you're really stretching rather desperately here.

There's a clear difference between God telling people not to make idols for themselves, and then instructing them to build a Temple for Him.

Perhaps a simple analogy will help you here. The government has laws that forbid you and I from printing banknotes. But if we get a job in the European Central Bank then we might find our job includes printing banknotes! But only an overly pedantic smartass would say, "Ah, but I thought there were laws against us doing this kind of thing!"

So how accurate can Exodus be? How trustworthy is it with the contradictions listed above?

If you show me an actual contradiction then I'll consider that question.

georgieporgy

the bible is to be interpreted as one seamless book. no one part or statement contradicts another.you need to read it with that in mind. plus,,, a spirit of filial trust is necessary.

( and an accurate translation will mean you are reading the right book)

wolfsbane

PDN wrote: »

overly pedantic smartass

I do like your literary flare!
___________________________________________________________________
Hebrews 11:29 By faith they passed through the Red Sea as by dry land, whereas the Egyptians, attempting to do so, were drowned.

ISAW

PDN wrote: »

Oh dear, I do wish that our atheist friends would understand that the Skeptics Annotated Bible is written by theologically illiterate noobs - and that trying to use it as a basis for 'challenges' is only going to make them look silly too.

...


If you show me an actual contradiction then I'll consider that question.

Mind you I do enjoy reading it. What annoys me though is people who start with the bigoted premise that the Bible must be wrong and then seek to convince ignorant people that they are right. Ironically because they believe they are right.

The title of this thread though has similar misconceptions. The thing is the PAST is the territory and history is only a map. there is NO accurate history just the historians view. Relativists (moral and philosophical ones) when faced with this have problems because they have to accept that if nothing is absolute then historians views are just that! yet they set the argument up as if history was fact - particularly THEIR history! One can,t assert relativism is always correct as that is a logical contradiction.

In short - with WHAT "accurate account of historical events" do they propose we compare exodus?

Twin-go

ISAW wrote: »

Mind you I do enjoy reading it. What annoys me though is people who start with the bigoted premise that the Bible must be wrong and then seek to convince ignorant people that they are right. Ironically because they believe they are right.

I don't think it must be wrong but I do think it is probably wrong. If a modern history book reported on events like the bible did people wouldn't be long in stopping reading it and dissmissing it.

There is a higher standard of evidence in truth and accuracy in modern reporting than is required of the Bible.

ISAW wrote: »

The title of this thread though has similar misconceptions. The thing is the PAST is the territory and history is only a map. there is NO accurate history just the historians view. Relativists (moral and philosophical ones) when faced with this have problems because they have to accept that if nothing is absolute then historians views are just that! yet they set the argument up as if history was fact - particularly THEIR history! One can,t assert relativism is always correct as that is a logical contradiction.

I agree that as there is "no accurate history just the historians view" (Up to a certain point in time anyway). Thus a story that is many thousands of years old, has been translated many times from different languages has a strong possability of been factually incorrect. It could be way off, it might not of happened at all. Yet believers put alot of faith in a book, which on balance could be totally wrong. I find this kind of scary.

ISAW wrote: »

In short - with WHAT "accurate account of historical events" do they propose we compare exodus?

I don't think there is 100% accurate account of accient history.

But if we take other ancient civalizations like the Greeks or Egyptians.
We have their writings
We have physical evidence
We know about their Gods

Why are we all athiestic to the Gods of the Greeks and the Egyptions?

Soul Winner

Twin-go wrote: »

There is a higher standard of evidence in truth and accuracy in modern reporting than is required of the Bible.

Ah yes, the modern media, a prime example of prudent and honest reporting of all the facts, all the time. Uncensored by bias viewpoints, unprejudiced by preconceived notions of right and wrong, and completely uninfluenced by religious or political affiliations. Always reporting the truth no matter what. Yes, the modern media, where would we be without it?

Nodin

Twin-go wrote: »

(..........)


So how accurate can Exodus be? How trustworthy is it with the contradictions listed above?

They're rather irrelevant as theres just no evidence for a large Jewish presence in Egypt at that time, or a mass journey through the Sinai.

Twin-go

Soul Winner wrote: »

Ah yes, the modern media, a prime example of prudent and honest reporting of all the facts, all the time. Uncensored by bias viewpoints, unprejudiced by preconceived notions of right and wrong, and completely uninfluenced by religious or political affiliations. Always reporting the truth no matter what. Yes, the modern media, where would we be without it?

But we have several sources. Some less bias than others.
Most people are aware of the angle of a particular media outlet in terms of politics, religion etc.

The bible is but one source. Who knows, it could be the Fox news of its time
:rolleyes:

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

Ah yes, the modern media, a prime example of prudent and honest reporting of all the facts, all the time. Uncensored by bias viewpoints, unprejudiced by preconceived notions of right and wrong, and completely uninfluenced by religious or political affiliations. Always reporting the truth no matter what. Yes, the modern media, where would we be without it?

Doesn't your trustworthiness of the Bible require to you to be more trusting of people to report events accurately?

I mean if you think FOX News are lying to you for an agenda why not the men who wrote the Bible?

Soul Winner

Twin-go wrote: »

But we have several sources. Some less bias than others.
Most people are aware of the angle of a particular media outlet in terms of politics, religion etc.

The bible is but one source. Who knows, it could be the Fox news of its time
:rolleyes:

Look, it doesn't matter what other ancient corroborating texts might say or what archeology unearths which supports the claims the Bible, there will always be skeptics as to its claims. The best way to proceed with how to grapple with the Bible is to start with the resurrection of Jesus and work back based on that. If you can conclude as best you can that the resurrection actually happened as a fact of history by simply studying the evidence for it then all you need do is to study the books that that resurrected person stamps His approval on. Then work from there. That's how I do it.

I've no problem believing Exodus because Jesus refers to it in the New Testament, or to Moses at least. So if He really was the Son of God then I'm on better grounds with His appraisal of ancient texts than I am with anyone else's. If it was a fraud then He would know, right? Now if you want to come to the same conclusion that I came to in relation to His resurrection then I suggest that you grapple with that one first then move on from there, because if that claim is false then it doesn't really matter about everything else in the Bible anyway, without the resurrection of Jesus being an actually fact of history then the rest of the Bible is irrelevant even if it the other events it describes actually happened.

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

Look, it doesn't matter what other ancient corroborating texts might say or what archeology unearths which supports the claims the Bible, there will always be skeptics as to its claims. The best way to proceed with how to grapple with the Bible is to start with the resurrection of Jesus and work back based on that. If you can conclude as best you can that the resurrection actually happened as a fact of history by simply studying the evidence for it then all you need do is to study the books that that resurrected person stamps His approval on. Then work from there. That's how I do it.

I've no problem believing Exodus because Jesus refers to it in the New Testament, or to Moses at least. So if He really was the Son of God then I'm on better grounds with His appraisal of ancient texts than I am with anyone else's. If it was a fraud then He would know, right? Now if you want to come to the same conclusion that I came to in relation to His resurrection then I suggest that you grapple with that one first then move on from there, because if that claim is false then it doesn't really matter about everything else in the Bible anyway, without the resurrection of Jesus being an actually fact of history then the rest of the Bible is irrelevant even if it the other events it describes actually happened.

Couldn't things like Exodus though end up weighing against accepting the New Testament?

Jesus refers to Moses and Exodus, those events probably never happened, Jesus isn't the son of God he is just a Jew recounting Jewish stories to impress his followers, that sort of thing?

To ignore everything around Jesus and on the weight of the claims of a few of his followers conclude he was the Son of God and then retroactively assert that everything he said should therefore be true seems rather the wrong way around.

That doesn't reconcile things like the absence of Egyptian records for Exodus, it just dismisses them because Jesus is the Son of God (based on what his followers claimed who we believe) and thus isn't lying about this stuff.

It isn't even a question of believing the Son of God, it is a question of believing his followers who made the claims about him, and there isn't even a pretext that these people are infallible.

Soul Winner

Wicknight wrote: »

Couldn't things like Exodus though end up weighing against accepting the New Testament?

Jesus refers to Moses and Exodus, those events probably never happened, Jesus isn't the son of God he is just a Jew recounting Jewish stories to impress his followers, that sort of thing?

To ignore everything around Jesus and on the weight of the claims of a few of his followers conclude he was the Son of God and then retroactively assert that everything he said should therefore be true seems rather the wrong way around.

That doesn't reconcile things like the absence of Egyptian records for Exodus, it just dismisses them because Jesus is the Son of God (based on what his followers claimed who we believe) and thus isn't lying about this stuff.

You go from the testimony of Jesus' followers to

Its really simple. His followers either lied about Him or they were telling the truth. But there are many more and better reasons to think that they were telling the truth than that they were lying. If you can show evidence that they were in fact lying then we have something to talk about. But suggesting that its possible that they could be lying is not good enough. One needs only read the text to straight away be confronted with stories which on face value alone suggests truth telling as apposed to lie telling.

Like the fact that they paint themselves in a very bad light when it comes to their understanding of Jesus and what He came to do. If they were lying in order to save face because they followed Him for so long before hand, then they wouldn't have painted themselves in such a bad way. I've gone through all the other reasons with you before and you are entitled to reject them a insufficient for you if you like but you can't say that Christians who study these men intently and then turn to believe them are irrational simply because you don't believe them. That's just stupid and closed minded.

I'm convinced that there is no better explanation for these men genuinely coming to believe in Jesus as the Son of God because they were eye witnesses to the events they describe in their writings. Granted on face value they might not harmonies too well on some of the secondary details but all agree on the primary details, and they are that; Jesus was crucified to death, was buried, rose again and was seen alive and vital by many people including; believers, skeptics, unbelievers, and even enemies, and that He ascended into the sky with the promise to return. All these are agreed upon by all the testimonies. I've yet to find any evidence which suggests coercion, manipulating of the facts, or collaboration. The texts appear to independent of each other, written for different audiences at different times, including embarrassing facts, simple references and no threat of any sort if the recipients didn't regard the texts as authentic. There are many other reasons to believe that they at least believe what they were reporting.

And then to undergo horrific torture and death because they refused to renege on their testimony is the clincher. Because if they were lying, then they knew they were lying, which means that they didn't care about the truth which means that they wouldn't be ready t die for the truth much less a lie that they knew was a lie. So how do explain away the smiling faces on some of those who endured such torture and death given the fact they professed a God who abhored lying and hence would not allow them entry to heaven after their deaths anyway?

It is psychologically inconceivable that at least one of these men would have reneged at some point given the severity of the punishment they received if their story was a lie. You find the one. Not one of them ever did. Now given the fact that we cannot prove anything in history anyway I think that the martyrdom of these particular individuals speaks volumes as to their trustworthiness. If that is not good enough for you then nothing ever will be good enough for you. Its good enough for me though, which means I lean more trustingly on what Jesus said than on anythng else inlcuding the modern media. Does that mean that I don't believe the RTE Six O'Clock news? Don't be absurd.