Has the Bible been redacted so that YAHWEH can be promoted to EL's position as Almighty God?

by I_love_Jeff 47 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  David_Jay

  Fairlane,

  Who decides how Americans understand and use their legends like the one about George Washington and the cherry tree, Johnny Appleseed, Betsy Ross or "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere"?

  Just because these and other American tales are old, have been added and subtracted to, argued over and questioned (especially the ones about Paul Revere and Betsy Ross), does this mean that Americans shouldn't have claim to their own cultural legends? Should others decide who gets to state what their purpose and meaning are or should Americans?

  Jews had a purpose in composing the Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible), and the Midrash, and the Talmud. Why do the claims of non-Jewish people over the purpose of our writings negate the original reason we composed them in the first place? Not saying others can't have their own interpretation of them, but they are our cultural legends, our stories, developed by our religion. Doesn't the culture and people of the Book have a say in what the Book is for?

  Why does everyone want to claim our writings as their own? Many who do then turn around and use them to reject and persecute us! Non-Jewish people can't even read the Hebrew Scriptures unless someone translates them into your language. If the language of your culture isn't Hebrew, that should indicate something about who it's intended for.

  Believe what you want on "who decides" regarding the purpose of Jewish cultural and religious works. But I've said it before and I'll say it again: If you're going to use our books and ignore our reasons behind them, lay off! You've got your own culture. Use your people's stuff.

  How would you like it if I took the history of your family, interpreted the way I wanted to, and then used this interpretation to tell the world your were damned? You want a religious book that you can interpret the way you want, then make up your own.
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  Anony Mous

  @David_Jay it's funny to see Jews claiming the books as their own when they are themselves based on other religious books and beliefs. Christians merely added on to the Jewish traditions as Jews did onto the contemporary Canaanite and Egyptian traditions and later on Muslims added theirs to both Jewish and Christian contemporary belief systems as did Mormons and eventually JWs.
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  David_Jay

  Anony Mous,

  Did you know that George Lucas developed Star Wars based on themes from the novel Dune and the comic strip Flash Gordon?

  Lucas originally wanted to film a remake of the old Flash Gordon movies, but he couldn't obtain the rights. So he took elements from Dune (like the hero coming from a desert planet during a time of galactic war) and Flash Gordon (turning the sword fights between Ming the Merciless and Flash into the lightsaber duels between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi)--and there you have it, an original story created by George Lucas!

  Lucas was inspired by the elements of other stories and authors, but no one challenges that he didn't create something from this that was totally new and unique. Star Wars is not simply Dune or Flash Gordon re-conceptualized. It has become an original mythology in its own right.

  The elements in Jewish writings do indeed come from the Mesopotamian culture from which the Hebrews sprung. After all, it is all they knew. But the Jews aren't taking credit for these elements of saying the original elements mean only what they decide, and I never wrote that.

  The Tanakh is a unique work in its own right. What I wrote was that since the Tanakh (the Hebrew Scriptures) was written by the Jews, then they like any other author of a writing, the Jews have a clear claim to its meaning.

  The Jews didn't actually set out to merely change the religious views of others and make new stories to redfine them. If you've been following everything I've written so far, the Tanakh is really a story about how we left those things behind to become what we are today. It describes the meaning Jewish cultural practices came to have for Jews, regardless of their origin (kind of like how an atheist can celebrate Christmas with their own meanings attached to it). We made something new out of our origins and have even left much of what you read in the Bible behind thousands of years ago.

  We make no claims to the elements that made up the Semitic world from which we sprung. I am only talking about the books we wrote, saying what Jews wrote for their own people has a specific intended meaning.

  But if you believe that Jews don't have a right to interpret their own writings, then that means I can interpret what you write in your posts to mean something you didn't intend.

  I can say your posts have hidden racist comments and secret messages to encourage pedophilia and attacks on atheism. I can say your interpretation of your own writing doesn't matter. After all, the words you are using were not developed by you. You didn't create the English language. How can you then make claim to the meanings of English words you wrote?

  You see, that's just foolishness. Authors have a right to claim the intended meanings of their own compositions.
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  Brokeback Watchtower

  I say ancient books written 1 ,2,3,4,or 5 thousand years ago all the way back to when mankind as a species started writing down things down in stone, clay and what have you, should have a meaning that was possible for that time period. So I say leave it to those having degrees in anthropology to tell what a text might mean, excluding any religious biases that tend to limit ones power of observation as JWs readily show blunts understanding reality.
  
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  Brokeback Watchtower

  As far the religious ideas of ancient Jews they did not originate in a vacuum with no influence by the other groups of humans that came before them and so we see similarities in other written records written around that time and that came before. Just like language takes words from other older language and make a blend that keeps changing with time so to religious writing should manifest this borrowing of meaning . So I think this EL being before Yaweh in power and higher up the scale of gods. We need to forget about any kind of world we presently know and think back to the limitations of the imaginations of people back then.
  
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  Crazyguy

  The thing is we can read in the Bible descriptions of the god Yahweh that mirror that of El and then Baal Hadad. There are also writings in the Bible that mirror writtings about Marduk.

  Lets also not forget that the temple of Solomon is a copy of some of those found in Egypt. Some of the writtings in the book of proverbs are from the writtings of Amenope. The Noah's flood story comes from an older story from Sumeria same with the book of Job.

  The Bible is clearly a collection of other writer stories and ideas. The same can be said with the gods in the Bible. Writtings in the Bible are talking about and describing different gods all through out. Genesis describing gods like that of Anu, Enlil, Enki etc. other books are describing EL , Baal . The Bible writers are even making a clear connection with Baal to Yahweh when talking about his mountain and then mount Zion.

  Judaism is a collection of beliefs from all the countries that surrounded them and conquered them. Then Christianity does the same. The similarities between their beliefs and that found in ancient Egypt are astounding.
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  Brokeback Watchtower

  I'm sure that scholars of these text can find tons of redactions from many rulers that were around during it's formation. To it is ridiculous to think for these text to survive usefulness without redactions. The will of the king in colaboration with the priest or what have you (guardians of the doctrine). To me that explains all the miracles as storytelling changing as it is passed on to the next generation, 10 could become a 1000000 and beyond.
  
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  David_Jay

  Judaism is a collection of beliefs from all the countries that surrounded them and conquered them. Then Christianity does the same. The similarities between their beliefs and that found in ancient Egypt are astounding.

  Judaism is not a religion of beliefs. It is one of practice.

  Jews don't have to believe in God, for instance, yet will still pray to God and observe Torah: http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/must-a-jew-believe-in-god/

  Judaism is quite different from the religions it competed with. It rejected the concept of deities and images. It demanded a morality that went beyond action, such as laws against coveting. And it rejected the ideas that animals were or could be divine: http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/jewish-ethics-some-basic-concepts-and-ideas/

  I have to admit, however, that for some people the idea that God even as understood by the Jews still has to be fraudulent. Others without any experience in Judaism or without even having contacts who are Jews will claim that their interpretation of Judaism is correct while what the Jews understand about themselves is wrong.

  All I can say is that one's views on Judaism, it's history and Scriptures will always be questionable if the person promoting them cannot at least read and speak Hebrew. That's the least and perhaps simplest thing to do, step one in really being knowledgeable about the Jews.

  But alas, the world is still filled with so many unmarried marriage counselors. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't get it to stop thinking it's right about everything.
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  Crazyguy

  The laws they do relish also can be found in Hammurabi's rules and that of another ruler before him. The Egyptians had laws and rules very similar as well. Sorry to say David_jay but your religion isn't very original.
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  David_Jay

  But that's just it, Crazyguy. I never said it was original.

  It's unique, it's different. Original? Jews don't teach that. That comes from Christianity.

  I think that causes a problem sometimes between what I actually write and what some people conceive when they read it. The Jehovah's Witnesses and other Christians have so programmed it into most people that the Jewish religion is original, that when you read things I or other Jews say about ourselves you read it through the Christian-colored glasses you were provided with years ago.

  It isn't your fault, Crazyguy or anyone else's. It is hard to process a view that isn't what you are sure of. It's like when I tell people that I done believe in God, but that at the same time I'm a theist and know God is real. I've had people tell me that can't be true not because they've studied and experienced how Judaism works, but because Christianity has colored people's minds to thinking that all religions are belief systems.

  The same is true with a lot of those who shake their heads at what I've written here. They're not necessarily disagreeing with me. They're disagreeing with what they're projecting from Christianity when they read my words, even if they are atheist now. The only definitions of religion and spirituality that many Westerners know, both theist and atheist, are Christian definitions. So when you read my words you hear Christianity still, not me.

  Thus you mistakenly read that I am saying that Judaism is original. You "hear" that when I say "different" and "unique." I am not the one saying this. You've got Christianity on the brain. You have to read my words at their own value and stop reading what isn't there.