[_ Old Earth _] History Channel...Looking for Garden of Eden.

[Orion]

This post is less about "the search for the Garden of Eden" and more about what else the brought up lastnight. They were saying that the story of creation, the flood, tower of babel, etc. were all stories found in ancient Sumerian stories written 1,000 years before biblical texts were, and in such the Biblical text were taken from them. They had two people in a garden, a tree, a snake, ...

They also talked about how, when the ice from the ice age started melting, many of the areas where there were lush valleys surrounded by mountains were overtaken by the rising oceans, which accounts for many cultures having flood myths, since this type of thing would have happened all over the globe, . . . rising waters as the ice receeded (melted).

So, the Persian gulf, where the Tigris and Euphrates river run into wasn't there, and two other rivers mentioned in the Bible were found (their dryed up remains, that is) met up with the Tigris and Euphrates at a point that is now under the waters of the Perian gulf.

Anyone else see this lastnight?

 

[wavy]

I saw it last night and I saw it before, when it first aired.

While I am not a geologist to either confirm or disconfirm the views put forward about this ice-age flood, I am inclined to agree that the Hebrews derived their story of Genesis from earlier myths.

 

[Orion]

Wouldn't that be a very damaging thing for several religions (borrowing from earlier myths)?

 

[wavy]

Of course, if you mean Christians in general, that is to say, those who hold the bible as the literal and inerrant word of God.

 

[Orion]

Yes, that is what I mean. If you believe that the entire Bible that we have now was entirely given directly from God, and many Christian (probably most) are in that group, then the idea that the few stories in Genesis were lifted from earlier religions can't sit very well.

 

[Arj]

We who have felt the Holy Spirit know that is real.Where in the bible is gods spirit first mentioned?

 

[Orion]

I'm just curious. How do we know that the Sumerian texts were written 1,000 years before The Old Testiment?

I suppose that it could be possible that these stories were told throughout the generations, and those who eventually resided in Sumeria just happened to write down things before other cultures, but by then, they had things mixed up with new customs and myths and ended up with their similar yet skewed version of the event. Or would that be trying to rationalize away that the early parts of The Old Testiment WERE completely taken off of an earlier mythos?

I don't believe that it all was, of course. Song of Solomon, Psalms, Proverbs, many others are obviously talking about the God of the Bible (well Song of Solomon was about Solomon's love for his eventual wife). In other words, original thoughts.

 

[Orion]

We who have felt the Holy Spirit know that is real.Where in the bible is gods spirit first mentioned?

The issue is that it may be the case that ancient Sumerian texts, written supposedly 1,000 years before Hebrew scripture, has stories that are very similar to what is eventually written down in those Hebrew texts. The beginning, the flood, the tower of babel, maybe others.

I'm not saying that the Holy Spirit isn't real. It may be the case that these early Hebrews copied myths of other religions thinking that there was some truth to it. It may not be the way it happened at all, so when I hear about how Sumerian texts have similar stories and supposedly written 1,000 years earlier then Hebrew texts, it seems a pretty serious situation. But that doesn't mean that God isn't real, or that God DID choose Hebrew people to send Jesus into the world to walk with humans. Man is still depraved and lost, bound to sin, and needed a way to be redeemed. For me, HOW man got that way is MUCH less important than how he can be redeemed.

 

[Arj]

I havnt read the whole bible,but im interested about when gods spirit first appeared?

 

[Orion]

I'm not sure if this is what you're asking, but in the Bible, the very first verse of Genesis mentions God.

 

[Arj]

Like when the prophets said the spirit of the lord came to them.

 

[Orion]

Like when the prophets said the spirit of the lord came to them.

Well, . . . .that I can't answer. I'm sure someone of much more "bible scholarisity" could shed more light on that than I could.