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On March 24 2011 01:40 Alejandrisha wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2011 01:24 Igakusei wrote:On March 24 2011 01:22 Alejandrisha wrote:
who GIVES a shit. not me. what is the point of trying to "discover" whether or not an influential story book character had a wife To quote Bart Ehrman: "This kind of information is relevant not only to scholars like me, who devote their lives to serious research, but also to everyone who is interested in the Bible -- whether they personally consider themselves believers or not. In my opinion this really matters. Whether you are a believer -- fundamentalist, evangelical, moderate, liberal -- or a nonbeliever, the Bible is the most significant book in the history of our civilization. Coming to understand what it actually is, and is not, is one of the most important intellectual endeavors that anyone in our society can embark upon." I understand that religion is a huge facet of American culture but honestly I don't think a small tweak of the lore of Christianity would really have an affect on religion. I don't think it changes anything either way
I think this depends on your brand of Christianity. It's not very threatening to something like the Catholic Church or any of the more liberal branches of protestantism, but to someone like a fundamentalist evangelical or a seventh-day adventist where the Bible is taken to be a literal historical account these small details can have many significant repercussions.
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I usually hate these topics because it just sensationalizes something that isn't very interesting in terms of the wow factor... like really? "OMG the isrealite people also worshiped God's wife?" really? that's it? (and of course many people just go OT with the OT (Off topic with the Opening thread)
This is to me is not surprising, any reading through the old testament would reveal that the Israelites also believed in a whole slew of other deities such as Baal, the golden calf, Molech etc, so if you just add another god or goddess to the mix doesn't change anything about how the people of Israel were like every other people at the time worshiping many Gods. The key thing here is that Yahweh or the God of Israel him/her/itself explicitly stated not to worship another Gods or idols or then face the consequences, to which there are many instances in the old testament (see the book of Judges, Kings, or Prophets) where Israel was punished for those acts.
So yes, there may in fact be a 'goddess' that Israel worshiped way back in the old testament, and yes it may not have been mentioned in the old testament, but with the reading of the old testament you would never thing that God approved of it.
What I find most interesting about the old testament is that somehow so many books can survive at a time where a lot of the people didn't necessarily even believe of the God that the book describes. (looking at the book of Kings you can find kings for several centuries who hate God)
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An interesting post, I am an atheist and I found that religion would be extinct in a matter of time anyways, probably not in my lifetime though. I have to agree that while this is an interesting discovery, it probably wont affect religion much, no one is going to abandon their religion simply because science finds that some fact in the bible is false, after all, there are already plenty of those.
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On March 23 2011 12:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:
We JUST opened, and JUST closed a religious thread.
I guess this means that God can't be given any female pronouns? I know some religious speakers wanted to make it sound fair (gender-wise) by not only using He, but by also using She, when referring to God.
lol! that's the one thing you take away from this!? haha too funny.
hmmm seems the OP is almost trying to disprove religion through a small loophole so i think im gonna keep my thoughts out of it.
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so he cheated on her with mary then?
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On March 24 2011 02:03 jacknory wrote:
So yes, there may in fact be a 'goddess' that Israel worshiped way back in the old testament, and yes it may not have been mentioned in the old testament, but with the reading of the old testament you would never thing that God approved of it.
Except for the part where God tell's Moses to make a Asherah pole to save the Israelites from poisonous snakes. Numbers 21
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Very interesting thread. It's good that we talk about it because it makes people think about these things, which is better than pretending the issue of God or no God exists.
The God of the Bible has no gender or no need of gender because he is all in all. He spoke and the world came into being. He describes himself as a "he" and a "father" because we can best relate to him as just that, an authority figure from whom we get our lineage, who watches for us, directs us, and cares for us.
However, the same God also describes himself as having what we would consider as "feminine qualities" such as in the name El shaddai, translated to mean "mighty (or many) breasted one" referring to the provision of God for the people.
Jesus said that the children of heaven are not given in marriage, referring tot he fact that marriage, sex, and procreation are not needed in the eternal destination he was preparing.
The God of the bible has no need or desire to have a wife, if any sect or historical group has worshipped a wife of God, it does not describe the God of the bible, but something totally different.
People do this all the time, taking the original meaning of what the bible says and inject their own beliefs. The bible itself describes the Jews doing this quite often, either going after other "gods" (perhaps because those gods allowed you to sin) and/or through religiosity and tradition (read: legalism and the threat of control by men).
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On March 24 2011 01:27 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +On March 23 2011 22:55 Igakusei wrote:
It's pretty clear to me that many of the ancient Israelites were polytheists, up to and including their leaders. It's apparent from much of the language of this part of the OT that YHWH was simply Israel's god of choice. There's some controversy over whether El (the Caananite god that Abraham made his pact with) and YHWH (the god that delivered the Israelites from Egypt) were the same entity, and it appears that this connection was made by later authors.
The early Israelites were aware of and believed in a pantheon of gods, and the idea that YHWH was the only god appears to have not been present before the Babylonian captivity. There is a lot of linguistic evidence in the Bible for this. Got any citations on this matter? I mean you are implying that there were some heavy edits done to Exodus and other books if this was the case and I'd like to see some nice evidence on this matter :O
The documentary hypothesis as popularly understood in books like "Who wrote the Bible" no longer appears to be accepted by the majority of scholars (scholars never could agree exactly on where J and E began and ended), but that doesn't mean they have thrown the whole idea out. It still seems to be widely accepted that no part of the Bible was written before ~600 BCE, and that P was added significantly later. Part of the documentary hypothesis was that these sources were all written independently and compiled later, but now the consensus seems to be that P was probably directly added to the earlier work.
I plan on spending a significant amount of time this summer reading OT journals and researching all of these viewpoints, as right now most of my knowledge comes from a handful of books written by scholars and a handful of journal articles.
What is certainly not contested is that the Pentateuch has been heavily edited from whatever its original form was.
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why is everyone pulling evidence from the bible without directly sourcing it?
2 Kings 21 shows the king of Judah making an Asherah pole as one of the reasons that "he did evil in the eyes of the LORD" (v.2)
Jeremiah 17 and Isaiah 17 are other clear passages where Asherah worship is frowned upon.
Seriously it doesn't make sense to have a lazy argument regarding what the bible says when there is such easy access to look through scripture. find your sources.
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On March 24 2011 00:35 Jameser wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2011 00:30 JamesJohansen wrote:
I think people have to be careful about articles like this. Religeon is such a hotbutton issue that articles like this are quickly jumped on and supported or decried despite being somewhat sensationalist and lacking in firm evidence.
Personally, I think the female character unearthed is not a deity but is instead some sort of "lesser spiritual being" which most scholars know are very present in early abrahamic texts (there are many strange beliefs pertaining to demonology and the study of spirits).
Saying that "God had a wife" is this scientist being an attention whore And as we all know, attention whores are the worst kind of whores. also, clearly, your on-the-spot, completely fabricated from conjecture, scenario that explains the existance of an unaccounted for female character in the bible is worth AT LEAST as much as the investigation and publication of an actual scientist
Calm the fuck down son. This "idea" just doesn't seem to have much backing. True, I'm no biblical scholar or anthropologist by any means but my parents forced me through 13 years of private religious schooling so Ive accumulated at least some biblical knowledge. All I'm saying is that I think this is sensationalist reporting at its finest. Its not a fucking crime to call that out.
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On March 24 2011 02:24 cerebralz wrote:
Very interesting thread. It's good that we talk about it because it makes people think about these things, which is better than pretending the issue of God or no God exists.
The God of the Bible has no gender or no need of gender because he is all in all. He spoke and the world came into being. He describes himself as a "he" and a "father" because we can best relate to him as just that, an authority figure from whom we get our lineage, who watches for us, directs us, and cares for us.
However, the same God also describes himself as having what we would consider as "feminine qualities" such as in the name El shaddai, translated to mean "mighty (or many) breasted one" referring to the provision of God for the people.
Jesus said that the children of heaven are not given in marriage, referring tot he fact that marriage, sex, and procreation are not needed in the eternal destination he was preparing.
The God of the bible has no need or desire to have a wife, if any sect or historical group has worshipped a wife of God, it does not describe the God of the bible, but something totally different.
People do this all the time, taking the original meaning of what the bible says and inject their own beliefs. The bible itself describes the Jews doing this quite often, either going after other "gods" (perhaps because those gods allowed you to sin) and/or through religiosity and tradition (read: legalism and the threat of control by men).
You almost sound like my friend who's preparing for priesthood now. Thanks for the sound reply.
One thing im really curious is, why does God (or the authors) insist on the nonsexuality of God. As you say God being a father is only a function of convenience, but essentially, from a spiritual perspective, God has/needs no gender. Why is this? Is this to avoid the confusion with the carnal requirements of gender? Gender seems to be too primordial that I don't see the reason why God necessarily has to be genderless.
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The judeo-christian God has a wife should be a more accurate topicname I'd say.
Theism is a pretty interesting subject to read about and the reasoning why people believe what they believe. Though I think the world in general is headed towards an non-theistic society and it's only logical to happen.
'God' is the belief for the unknown and unexplainable, and as we get more knowledge about the visible world, the idea is getting outdated.
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God doesnt exist, deal with it.
User was warned for this post
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On March 24 2011 02:31 JamesJohansen wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2011 00:35 Jameser wrote:On March 24 2011 00:30 JamesJohansen wrote:
I think people have to be careful about articles like this. Religeon is such a hotbutton issue that articles like this are quickly jumped on and supported or decried despite being somewhat sensationalist and lacking in firm evidence.
Personally, I think the female character unearthed is not a deity but is instead some sort of "lesser spiritual being" which most scholars know are very present in early abrahamic texts (there are many strange beliefs pertaining to demonology and the study of spirits).
Saying that "God had a wife" is this scientist being an attention whore And as we all know, attention whores are the worst kind of whores. also, clearly, your on-the-spot, completely fabricated from conjecture, scenario that explains the existance of an unaccounted for female character in the bible is worth AT LEAST as much as the investigation and publication of an actual scientist Calm the fuck down son. This "idea" just doesn't seem to have much backing. True, I'm no biblical scholar or anthropologist by any means but my parents forced me through 13 years of private religious schooling so Ive accumulated at least some biblical knowledge. All I'm saying is that I think this is sensationalist reporting at its finest. Its not a fucking crime to call that out.
Um Did you read the article? The article is saying, with evidence provided, that the female character is not just a "lesser" spiritual divine being.
"Crucially, the inscription asks for a blessing from 'Yahweh and his Asherah.' Here was evidence that presented Yahweh and Asherah as a divine pair.
They are trying to say that Yahweh and Asherah were together. What need would a "God" have for a "lesser spiritual being?" Also Asherah is directly refered to as a "goddess" in some biblical texts. No?
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On March 24 2011 02:33 gongryong wrote:
You almost sound like my friend who's preparing for priesthood now. Thanks for the sound reply.
One thing im really curious is, why does God (or the authors) insist on the nonsexuality of God. As you say God being a father is only a function of convenience, but essentially, from a spiritual perspective, God has/needs no gender. Why is this? Is this to avoid the confusion with the carnal requirements of gender? Gender seems to be too primordial that I don't see the reason why God necessarily has to be genderless.
a better question to ask is "why would God need a gender (or sex)?" humans need the distinction for procreation, but for a God Who was, and is, and is to come, aka everlasting/immortal, God has always been and will always be. God does not create other Gods.
so, a question you might want to ask is "why should God even have a gender?"
but anyways, most biblical scholars agree that God shows traits (and calls himself by these traits) like both a father and a mother.
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On March 24 2011 02:37 Facedriller wrote:
God doesnt exist, deal with it.
Prove it!
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On March 24 2011 02:38 JiYan wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2011 02:33 gongryong wrote:
You almost sound like my friend who's preparing for priesthood now. Thanks for the sound reply.
One thing im really curious is, why does God (or the authors) insist on the nonsexuality of God. As you say God being a father is only a function of convenience, but essentially, from a spiritual perspective, God has/needs no gender. Why is this? Is this to avoid the confusion with the carnal requirements of gender? Gender seems to be too primordial that I don't see the reason why God necessarily has to be genderless. a better question to ask is "why would God need a gender (or sex)?" humans need the distinction for procreation, but for a God Who was, and is, and is to come, aka everlasting/immortal, God has always been and will always be. God does not create other Gods. so, a question you might want to ask is "why should God even have a gender?" but anyways, most biblical scholars agree that God shows traits (and calls himself by these traits) like both a father and a mother.
Except your wrong he does create other Gods. El created all the other Gods they just got demoted to angels and demons when Josiah and Isaiah reworked the cannon.
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Doubt it.
There's no way God could have accomplished what he did in seven days with some skirt nagging him at every step.
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On March 24 2011 02:43 Flaccid wrote:
Doubt it.
There's no way God could have accomplished what he did in seven days with some skirt nagging him at every step.
6 days 
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On March 24 2011 02:15 Jswizzy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 24 2011 02:03 jacknory wrote:
So yes, there may in fact be a 'goddess' that Israel worshiped way back in the old testament, and yes it may not have been mentioned in the old testament, but with the reading of the old testament you would never thing that God approved of it.
Except for the part where God tell's Moses to make a Asherah pole to save the Israelites from poisonous snakes. Numbers 21
Good point, I haven't considered that - The only thing that I would question I would have is whether or not the pole that they made was truly an Asherah pole, did Asherah poles at the time have bronze snakes on them? (I also realize that later on as another poster mentions that worshiping Asherah poles are forbidden)
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EPT
