41–50 of 121 posts
"missing for a millennium" - according to both the article and the journal piece, the most recent of these fragments is nearly two millennia old. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/iraq/article/literar...
Source article in the journal Iraq: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S002108892...
I was wondering about the headline date "missing for a millennium", as this Babylon is much older than 1000 years. From the article it seems like "two millenia" is more accurate: "The text survives in 20 manuscripts, from the 7th to the 2nd/1st centuries BCE"
We could presumably infer it still wasn’t “missing” as recently as a thousand years ago from later sources referring to it, even if the specific text (or oral tradition) those authors knew of hasn’t survived.
Like how we know about some of now lost Greek plays, originally written in the 5th century BC, because they were still being performed in Imperial Rome and writers of that time described them, even the details of how they were staged.
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Monotheism elevates godhood in many regards. In Polytheistic culture, gods fight and gods die. Zeus eats his (and thus kills) his father Chronos. Thor dies in Ragnarok. In Monotheistic culture, the one true God is above all else. As it turns out, different Monotheistic cultures can then cooperate as it's an argument over what this one true God believes (Catholics vs Muslims). Then we get into weird blends like Hindu…
Polytheistic religions have more room for multiple worldviews than monotheistic religions. Polytheists have internalized the fact that there can be different paths that are right for different people. That’s why you get so much division in monotheistic religions. In polytheistic religions, you still get infighting, but it isn’t considered virtuous. Put another way, monotheism is polytheism except with a single title,…
FYI, before the monotheists fully suppressed the polytheists in the Roman Empire, it was the polytheists who were suppressing the monotheists.
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> El, YHWH, and Baal were all different deities merged into one as the people groups unified. How does this theory account for the overt hostility to Baal et al. in the Bible?
"Baal" was less a name than a title. In modern Hebrew, it just means "lord" or "husband". It was also apparently a title that could, at some stages of Israel's history, even be applied to YHWH, much like "Adonay" ("My lord"). For instance, the individuals named "Mephibosheth" and "Ish-bosheth" (two of the sons of Saul, a clear if imperfect Yahwist) were originally named "Meribaal" and "Ish-baal". Whoever put together…
My understanding is more that Yahvists had more nomadic origins and populated (/conquered, possibly the Levites[1]) a Canaanite cultural context and then there was religious syncreticism and interest in merging them. Depending on the specific passage's history there's either a ret-coning of "all one god" or at least the interpretation that way (including how your links translate those passages).
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Exodus-Richard-Elliott-Friedman/dp/00...
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I found that the languages are hard to break into as an amateur, owning to the available literature. In contrast Egyptology has many popular treatments, you just have to watch out for the junk.
Speaking of junk, I was in Syria, many years ago, when it had about 250k tourists yearly, under Hafez al-Assad . I was in the company of an Assyriologist and in a shop of a vendor I knew (who sold artifacts under the table). The vendor proudly showed us a new acquisition, an ancient cylinder seal. The archeologist examined it and told him it was a fake, because he explained, "I can read this language, and it is gibbe…
All this to say I have infinite respect for someone who'd learn a dead language, let alone two. I'm glad someone is doing this work, and fortunately it's not me.
The Fall of Civilizations podcast has an interesting episode about Assyria. The cities in Mesopotamia were polytheistic and each city has its own deity. Apparently the way they viewed their deities was similar to how we view sports teams. There was an expectation that if you traveled to another city, you should sacrifice to its god. They viewed inter city warfare as the gods competing in heaven.
Some of this is visible in the Bible. For example, Moses needing to keep his hands up to win a battle (Ex 17). Or his battles with the Egyptian gods. From what I've read, it's believed that the Hebrews emerged from multiple people's groups combining and unifying their beliefs. El, YHWH, and Baal were all different deities merged into one as the people groups unified. That's why some of the biblical stories like the c…
That said, I agree there was some idea of a god "living" someplace specific -- e g. YHWH living in the Arc so they could carry Him into battle.
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Some of this is visible in the Bible. For example, Moses needing to keep his hands up to win a battle (Ex 17). Or his battles with the Egyptian gods. From what I've read, it's believed that the Hebrews emerged from multiple people's groups combining and unifying their beliefs. El, YHWH, and Baal were all different deities merged into one as the people groups unified. That's why some of the biblical stories like the c…
> El, YHWH, and Baal were all different deities merged into one as the people groups unified. How does this theory account for the overt hostility to Baal et al. in the Bible?
Otoh, just like "Easter" is an echo of an earlier holiday, it just so happens Canaanites, as I understand it, celebrated the end of the storm god's season in spring ... Very similarly to how Passover is observed. With a sacrificed lamb shank bone and some other aspects.
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Catholicism maintains it somehow by having "patron saints" and every city picking one up. Most cities in highly Catholic countries will have their own specific saint that they will have a special relationship with.
One difference is that saints are not deities, even if there may be a similar psychological need (for protection, help, etc) in play. Saints do not possess power of their own accord. They function as intercessors. They are still human beings, albeit in an elevated spiritual state or plane, so to speak (a saint is anyone who is saved from hell and in heaven; canonized saints are simply those who are known to be saints…
There were all kinds of gods. The Christian conception of God is taken from "pagan" philosophers. There's also a difference between theologian's/philosopher's conception of the Divine and religion and how lay people actually understood their faith. Even early Christians were divided on how they understood God.
If I'm interpreting this correctly, ancient Babylon had institutionalized childhood education for complex literary works. Medieval Europe treated literacy as a specialized craft. So much for exponential growth.
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Polytheistic religions have more room for multiple worldviews than monotheistic religions. Polytheists have internalized the fact that there can be different paths that are right for different people. That’s why you get so much division in monotheistic religions. In polytheistic religions, you still get infighting, but it isn’t considered virtuous. Put another way, monotheism is polytheism except with a single title,…
> that need to justify one’s beliefs, provides a drive that monotheists have and polytheists lack FYI, before the monotheists fully suppressed the polytheists in the Roman Empire, it was the polytheists who were suppressing the monotheists.