size, interesting that you point gobekli tepe. I am going to get a tattoo of the fox relief from there.in the image below, it's the top right image
Early Civilizations and Bible Chronology
by xelder 109 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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jwfacts
Lars - there is no sicence that I've seen that would effectively support or contradict the Bible.
You cannot have read much science then. There are numerous ways of dating that prove the Bible timeline incorrect. For instance, detailed documents outlining the rule of Egyptian kings shows that the pyramid of Giza was built prior to when the global flood is said to have occurred. Carbon dating is very accurate back to at least 10000 years, with one verification being tree rings. There really is no doubt that civilisation dates back 10,000 years, disproving a literal interpretation of a 6000 year old Adamic creation story.
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EntirelyPossible
That 12000 year old just might predate the Hebrew scriptures by just a little. Maybe.
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Aaron Eldridge
Wow, it's amazing the discussion that was started from two blank post. Only on Jehovah's-Witnesses.net :)
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ShadesofGrey
Why did I not claim to have God's Spirit when I was a JW? It seems it would be easy enough to do so then as it is now.
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sizemik
The implications of the find at Gobekli Tepe is a "must consider" for any treatment of early Mesopotamian civilisation, culture, mythology and religion . . . including the Hebrew writings.
The 12,000 year age places it at the late melt stage of the last ice-age. The climatic conditions at the time draw interesting paralells with a paradise lost, cataclysmic flood legends, etc.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/gobekli-tepe.html
This extract by Tom Knox (The Genesis Secret) is an interesting and very plausable hypothesis . . .
EP . . . I like the tatoo idea . . . wearing one of the oldest man made images ever discovered is kinda cool.
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OnTheWayOut
The men who wrote what later became called the Bible knew nothing of the earliest civilizations of people, so Bible chronology has nothing to do with them. By the time of the alledged "Adam and Eve," there were many people on the face of the earth. And they were indeed already PEOPLE, not Neanderthals or apemen or apes.
From: http://worldhistory1a.homestead.com/sumeria.html
The first true civilization on planet earth (of which we are aware) developed in Mesopotamia, and the people who built this first civilization are known as the Sumerians. Ironically, little more than a century ago, nothing was known of the Sumerians. The first civilization in history had been lost to history. Slowly, over the past hundred years, and largely due to the efforts of the Universities of Chicago and Pennsylvania, the puzzle has been slowly pieced together.
There are, however, more questions than answers. For instance, modern scholars have no idea where the Sumerians originated. We do know that the Sumerians were not the first inhabitants of the 'Land Between the Rivers.' The primary evidence that there were earlier inhabitants comes from the study of language, in much the same way that the names Chattahoochee, Tallapoosa, Etowah, Coosa, Kennesaw, Apalacheecola, and Alatoona indicate that those who now inhabit our own state were preceded by others. At present, the best scholarly guess is that the Sumerians came from the same area that would eventually give rise to the Indo-Europeans, though the Sumerian language does not appear to be related in any way to the Indo-European languages, or, for that matter, any other language that has ever been spoken on earth. The Sumerians occupied the lower half of the Tigris-Euphrates valley, roughly the area presently known as Iraq. It was an area about the size of Massachusetts and had a hot, dry, wind-swept climate. There were no trees, and therefore no timber. It would seem that the only natural resources were the silt-laden waters of the rivers and the huge reeds that grew in abundance along the river banks. For the resourceful Sumerians, however, this would prove to be sufficient. During the first half of this century an extremely important historian named Arnold Toynbee authored a twelve-volume work that revolved around his theory that civilizations develop or die as a result of the manner in which they respond to various challenges. In most instances, these challenges are environmental in nature. The environment of Sumeria and the Sumerian response provide an excellent example of Toynbee's theories in action. To begin, contrast the Tigris-Euphrates valley with the Nile, the cradle of Egyptian civilization. The Nile was predictable. Though it flooded, it flooded with regularity, at the same time and with basically the same intensity every year. As we will see next class, this predictability is the key to understanding the longevity as well as the static nature of Egyptian civilization. The flooding of the Tigris and the Euphrates, on the other hand, was violent and irregular, hence the mental life of the Mesopotamian civilizations became dominated by a sense of anxiety. The world was unpredictable and capricious, bringing life-giving rain and fertility one day and devastating destruction the next. Since the forces of nature were expressions of the whims of the gods, the gods were also unpredictable and capricious. Rather than the high estate which the Hebrews assigned to man as the representative of God on earth, for the inhabitants of Mesopotamia man was nothing more than the slave of the gods, designed to relieve them of their toils and subject to their whims.
From: http://archaeologyexcavations.blogspot.com/2010/12/what-is-oldest-civilization-on-earth.html The Mesopotamian civilization of Sumer is officially is believed to have begun around 4000-3500 BC. It ended at 2334 BC with the rise of Akkad, and is the world's first civilization. -
sizemik
Why did I not claim to have God's Spirit when I was a JW?
Anyone who is a believing JW claims this. A believing JW considers himself part of God's spirit-directed organisation. To refute the claim in hindsight, and then claim it now, is not likely to add weight to the claim, except in the mind of the claimant.
Unlike the holy spirit . . . real truth doesn't come that easy. Try finding evidence to refute your claim . . . it's a fascinating exercise to actually apply critical thinking and the scientific method . . . and you can still believe whatever you like. There's nothing to fear.
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sizemik
The men who wrote what later became called the Bible knew nothing of the earliest civilizations of people, so Bible chronology has nothing to do with them. . . . OTWO
This statement is seriously flawed OTWO . . . and probably just plain wrong. The paralells between Sumerian mythology and the Hebrew writings are well documented.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumerian_religion
Some stories in Sumerian religion appear similar to stories in other Middle-Eastern religions. For example, the biblical account of the Noah's flood myth resembles some aspects of the Sumerian deluge myth. The Judaic underworld Sheol is very similar in description with the Sumerian and Babylonian Kigal. Sumerian scholar Samuel Noah Kramer noted similarities between many Sumerian and Akkadian "proverbs" and the later Hebrew proverbs, many of which are featured in the Book of Proverbs.
The flooding of the Tigris and the Euphrates, on the other hand, was violent and irregular, hence the mental life of the Mesopotamian civilizations became dominated by a sense of anxiety. The world was unpredictable and capricious, bringing life-giving rain and fertility one day and devastating destruction the next.
This acknowledgment describes the climatic conditions likely at the melt stage (9,000 - 12,000 BC) . . . as does the Genesis account.
As you look into Gobekli Tepe . . . it refutes the Sumerian civilisation as the oldest by 1,000's of years.
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designs
Ossuary containing bones of a Biblical character- good science
Human remains and tools dating to 12,000 BC- bad science