heahd@tellab1.UUCP (Dan Wood) (08/15/84)
Ah, but the Jews did worship female deities at various times in their history. Most of these were local deities in Palestine at the time of the Jew's migration, and therefore not strictly speaking jewish deities. But they were worshiped by Jews. The proof of this is in the Old Testament, if the Jews had stuck to the straight and narrow worship of Yahweh, the prophets would not have spent so much time wailing about the people not worshiping what they considered to be the one true god. For example, Sarah and Deborah are both known to have been names of palestinian Goddesses. Quite a coincidence that both were also names of prominent figures in Jewish mythology. All peoples of the world have stories of how they came to be a group (or tribe) and how they came to be in a particular geographical area. I see no reason to assume that the Jewish legends of this type are the only ones that are actually historical in content. My theory is that none of the Patriarchs existed historically (at least not as single individuals), but that the stories told of there lives in the Old Testament are compilations of the lives of several generations of leaders. I say this because I don't believe that anybody ever lived as long as the Patriarchs are said to. As is the case with all mythology, a considerable amount of material has accrued around the original myths, some of this borrowed from peoples that the Jews came in contact with during their extensive wanderings. (A good example of this is the incident of the golden calf at the foot of Mt. Sinai. I believe that the golden calf was a representation of the cow-headed Goddess Hathor of Egypt) Thus, we have two palestinian Goddesses transformed into wives and daughters of Jewish Patriarchs. I have seen God and she is black. DW @ ...!ihnp4!tellab1!heahd
rjb@akgua.UUCP (R.J. Brown [Bob]) (08/20/84)
>>My theory is that none of the Patriarchs existed historically (at least not >>as single individuals), but that the stories told of there lives in the Old >>Testament are compilations of the lives of several generations of leaders. >>I say this because I don't believe that anybody ever lived as long as the >>Patriarchs are said to. As is the case with all mythology, a considerable >>amount of material has accrued around the original myths, some of this borrowed >>from peoples that the Jews came in contact with during their extensive >>wanderings. Mr Wood, Do you have any independent (of the Bible) sources that show the Jews wandered extensively as a cohesive unit ? If not, then how can you be found consistent when you disbelieve one part of the text (the ages of the Patriarchs) but accept another part (the wanderings of the Jews) ? I realize that it is possible to discriminate between truth and error in many contexts but what is the basis of dicrimination here ? Bob Brown {...ihnp4!akgua!rjb} AT&T Technologies, Inc.............. Norcross, Ga (404) 447-3784 ... Cornet 583-3784