I say that everything in the Old Testament before and including their migration into Israel is a farce and did not even happen. The Old Testament is much like the BOM, made up.

The stories in the Old Testament were made up to bind the locals into a nation and make it easier to rule them because god said so.

Do you believe a god had the OT written?

The whole bible is fake just like BOM.

You're presenting somewhat of a false dichotomy.
Rejecting the idea that any divine inspiration went into its writing, this doesn't indicate that the non-supernatural elements were also falsified.
Were there literally 12 tribes born from the 12 sons of one guy? Probably not. Maybe something close to that did happen, maybe it's completely fabricated. I sure don't know.

If the bible is not a valid source of information, which I maintain, then it does not indicate the existence or non-existence of anything significant.

I read a scholarly article about the spread of burial items which had hebraic writing on them. They spread throughout Europe from the south and moved north throughout the rest of Europe. The writings on the burial items evolved over time as they spread outward.

I'm not an archealogist or anthropologist so cannot talk as to the quality of the scholarly work.

The authors of the paper said it might have been indicative of Israelite tribes moving through the region and spreading their culture.

Eventually they've blended in and disappeared. It was interesting and I read it ages ago in a non-religous publication.

I tried googling to find it and only got a bunch of religious sites talking about it. Don't feel like wading through all the searches to see if there's anything there.

You may be interested in the recent work on the DNA of European Jews, the Ashkenazim. Check my past posts for links to the work.

According to geneticists, the folks ID'd as Jews who migrated into Europe were of primarily Turkish and trans-Caucasian Khazarian peoples who converted to Judaism in the 8th century, then migrated into Europe over time and by degrees some hundreds of years later. If these peoples were actually and originally the fabled "ten lost tribes" from the Northern Kingdom, they passed on surprisingly little DNA evidence of being such.

The DNA studies are quite explicit, very revealing stuff.

It is clear enough that the old testament is a tribal mythology set in the real world, with some more or less historical stuff in it. It contains various anachronisms that highlight the time difference between the settings of the foundational legends, the long period of time the legends were orally transmitted, and the relatively late date when the legends were written down. It is an interesting document with ancient origins and roots deep down into near eastern religions. The new testament is also set in the real world. It may be pure mythology, but most people believe that there is a historic core that was mythologized, and worked and reworked over a period of decades or even a century or two by a lot of thinking people. It is an interesting glimpse of a real cultural melding of ideas in late antiquity. Interesting ideas from other religions and ways of thinking were adapted to solve some of the problems of old testament judaism. None of the supernatural stuff in either testament ever happened. By contrast, the Book of Mormon is a fictional book in a fictional setting. It never happened in a setting that never existed. By fictional rather than mythological, I mean one guy or a small number of guys made it up on their own in a very short period and then went out and sold people on it. Nothing is true about it. In that limited sense it is less true than the bible. It is certainly not worth studying for any purpose, but perhaps to get a look at the state of Protestantism and historic knowledge among back country folk in the first third of the 19th century. One other thing,I want to add here. Ashkenazi Jews do not descend in any significant way from Turkic people such as Khazars. That story is based on a medieval tale that had some level of truth probably. However, archaeology has not found much evidence of it. There have been limited finds of Hebrew characters on grave goods. But they are not used in a literate way. They are more like shamanic uses as symbols or amulets of supernatural power. They also occur with other disparate symbology. Modern Ashkenazi males are largely similar y chromosome wise to middle eastern populations. Mitochondrial DNA is more diverse, reflecting the idea that Jewish men did much of the migrating and married local women in various parts of Europe and Asia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_on_Jews has some interesting stuff. The only people I ever hear really pushing the Khazar thing, are various breeds of lunatic racists who wish to delegitimatize Jews, sometimes as part of a mythology that portrays the lunatics as the true biblical people. If you just read one or two sources on a subject, you can get perspectives that are not shared by any mainstream of sane people.

bentleye Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
The only people I
> ever hear really pushing the Khazar thing, are
> various breeds of lunatic racists who wish to
> delegitimatize Jews, sometimes as part of a
> mythology that portrays the lunatics as the true
> biblical people. If you just read one or two
> sources on a subject, you can get perspectives
> that are not shared by any mainstream of sane
> people.

Maybe you are looking in the wrong places, bentleye? Is Dr. Eran Israeli-Elhaik of Johns Hopkins University a lunatic racist? I checked him out, he seems pretty mainstream. He and his team recently published this important work, which you may wish to peruse.

http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1208/1208.1092.pdf

Here's a portion of the abstract:

Abstract
The question of Jewish ancestry has been the subject of controversy for over two centuries and
has yet to be resolved. The “Rhineland Hypothesis” proposes that Eastern European Jews emerged from a small group of German Jews who migrated eastward and expanded rapidly.
Alternatively, the “Khazarian Hypothesis” suggests that Eastern European descended from
Judean tribes who joined the Khazars, an amalgam
of Turkic clans that settled the Caucasus in
the early centuries CE and converted to Judaism in the 8th century. The Judaized Empire was
continuously reinforced with Mesopotamian and Greco-Roman Jews until the 13th century.
Following the collapse of their empire, the Judeo-Khazars fled to Eastern Europe. The rise of
European Jewry is therefore explained by the contribution of the Judeo-Khazars. Thus far, however, their contribution has been estimated only empirically; the absence of genome-wide
data from Caucasus populations precluded testing the Khazarian Hypothesis. Recent sequencing
of modern Caucasus populations prompted us to revisit the Khazarian Hypothesis and compare it
with the Rhineland Hypothesis. We applied a
wide range of population genetic analyses — including principal component, biogeographical origin, admixture,
identity by descent, allele sharing distance, and uniparental analyses —to compare these two hypotheses. Our findings
support the Khazarian Hypothesis and portray the
European Jewish genome as a mosaic of
Caucasus, European, and Semitic ancestries, thereby consolidating previous contradictory reports
of Jewish ancestry."

This is in fact the paper I referenced in my post above, which post you replied to. Now that I have provided a fresh link to it, perhaps you may wish to actually read the paper, bentleye?

If not, I will assume you are just a drive-by sniper, doing some quick name-calling and dust-throwing to confuse the discussion.

The tribes may have existed but surely merged with other populations in their migrations. The fact is that there are maps of the allotment of territory to the tribes including changes which occurred after the original division. Moreover, the splitting between two kingdoms even had evidences at the time of Christ as one notes the disagreements between the Samaritans and the Jewish people. The amount of historical evidence is substantial, especially as compared to the evidence against the Book of Mormon.

rhgc Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
The fact is that there are maps of the allotment of territory
> to the tribes including changes which occurred
> after the original division.

What "maps" are you referring to here, rhgc?

> Moreover, the splitting between two kingdoms even had evidences
> at the time of Christ as one notes the
> disagreements between the Samaritans and the
> Jewish people. The amount of historical evidence
> is substantial, especially as compared to the
> evidence against the Book of Mormon.

Are you saying that there is a substantial amount of evidence that there were in fact a Northern Hebrew Kingdom and a Southern Hebrew Kingdom, which split apart after the "King Solomon" character's death? I don't think the few New Testament mentions of Samaritans, or a Jewish dislike of same, constitutes real evidence of an ancient Northern Hebrew Kingdom.

What are these "substantial evidences"?

The Northern Kingdom of Israel was dispersed throughout Assyria (as the Assyrians tended to do to conquered people), is there any reason to doubt that?

Now, to say that they stayed in a cohesive group, traveled to the North Pole, and took a flying chunk of rock out into space (or disappeared beneath the Earth's surface, or are otherwise still together in some form that will be discovered) is a completely different story.

Or that they became the British nation. That's one I used to hear sometimes.

Yeah, everybody on earth came from one of the Israelite tribes. Not exactly. This line of BS that Mormons and others believe is simplistic in the extreme. Early 19th century thinking there. If I had semetic ancestors, that would be fine, but I don't think I do. My ancestors were probably in Europe 35,000 years ago.

Futhark Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The Northern Kingdom of Israel was dispersed
> throughout Assyria (as the Assyrians tended to do
> to conquered people), is there any reason to doubt
> that?

If you are referring to a conquest by Assyria of northern Palestine, then you are likely close to the truth. But calling this a "Northern Hebrew Kingdom" may be a stretch. Are there Assyrian court records that show that they conquered the "Hebrew Kingdom"?

Google LEMBA TRIBE. Lots of DNA work done that proves their hebraic lineage...with you know, some real science n sh*t. ;)

It's not all made up, like the Book of Mormon. Just most of it.

According to Professor Ze'ev Herzog in the archeology department of Tel Aviv University, "This is what archaeologists have learned from their excavations in the Land of Israel: the Israelites were never in Egypt, did not wander in the desert, did not conquer the land in a military campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes of Israel. Perhaps even harder to swallow is the fact that the united monarchy of David and Solomon, which is described by the Bible as a regional power, was at most a small tribal kingdom..."

amiwhiteyet Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> According to Professor Ze'ev Herzog in the
> archeology department of Tel Aviv University,
> "This is what archaeologists have learned from
> their excavations in the Land of Israel: the
> Israelites were never in Egypt, did not wander in
> the desert, did not conquer the land in a military
> campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes
> of Israel. Perhaps even harder to swallow is the
> fact that the united monarchy of David and
> Solomon, which is described by the Bible as a
> regional power, was at most a small tribal
> kingdom..."

important to note, thank you amiwhiteyet...

Just like the new testament was a fabrication of the Calpurnius Piso family in Italy.
(re:The Abelard Reuchlin Foundation)

Right , that is not
accepted history. In fact it is nonsense.

Not accepted by whom?

Anyone with expertise who has studied the issue.

I think there's 1000x more evidence for the Bible, although that's a long way from certainty on many events. I think many Christians are at least somewhat willing to debate the evidence. Mormons are more prone to attacking the messenger, and their leaders are almost never willing to discuss anything or be interviewed for very long by someone who is not a Mormon. As a Mormon, I even thought that the apostles were nothing like Peter who was willing to stand and fight for his beliefs in chains in front of a king. When do apostles get up in front of the world and debate with anyone who is not a Mormon? They are nothing like as brave as the average missionary on the street.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/2013 06:43PM by raiku.

There have probably been hundreds of thousands of tribes in human history. Or more.

Why would any handful of tribes be more special to God? Is he some racist jerk who loves Hebrews and ignored all the Asian and African tribes?

It makes no sense.

pewsitter Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I say that everything in the Old Testament before
> and including their migration into Israel is a
> farce and did not even happen. The Old Testament
> is much like the BOM, made up.
>
> The stories in the Old Testament were made up to
> bind the locals into a nation and make it easier
> to rule them because god said so.

WHAT ? you mean the 10 tribes are just like (the) Jesus (myth) ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihN2iOlyqp4

my TBM uncle was trying to prepare my nephew's wife to go to the temple. he blabbered off MORmON doctrines like they really meant something important. he gave special emphasis to the fact that MORmONS believe in the literal gathering of the lost ten tribes. It sounded so stupid.

some blabbering about Neptune regaining control over the seas would have sounded so much more logical.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/2013 08:05PM by lucky.

I was about 13 years old when I realized what crap the whole "tribes" thing was. One of my Beehive advisors (not the one who thought Satan broke her washing machine, this is the other one) was a convert of a number of years. Her patriarchal blessing said that she was of the tribe of Benjamin.

I did a "WTF?"

Why?

We were of the same ethnic background, yet both of my parents were told that they were of Ephraim, & she was told that she was of Benjamin. I knew right then that I would never get one.

Even though I was already a disbeliever, but this was one of those incidents that made things more clear for me.

Actually, the Bible says that Paul was of the tribe of Benjamin. However, the mumbo-jumbo of patriarchal blessings is non-scriptural other than that a father may give blessings to his offspring. The patriarchal blessings of moism began with JS Sr. who made money off them. Sort of like selling..... But they are not any more meaningful than reading tea leaves or looking in a crystal ball by a fortune-teller.

I do realize all of that. But I also think that the Bible is a made up book.

and then there is the Book Of MORmON -so ridiculous and idiocy laiden that it almosts makes the bible look legit, a very funny way of being "a second witness" to the bible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1mFdO1wB08

I believe that the bible is not inspired because I don't believe in God. How much of it is historical is of interest, though. I'd say 10-20%. The wandering in the desert has no evidence and it's mostly a collection of stories, many derived from older pagan myths. Much of the NT is adaptions and rewrites of the OT stories. And then there are the interpolations added by the church very long after the aledged life of Christ. For intstance, the book of John was completely written by the church. Anything in John was put there for the benefit of the church and government of the time.

Many Afghans and Pakistanis think that they did exist, and we're absorbed through the generations. Then they point to the many regional tribal names, such as the tribal name of that girl who was shot in the head (who is now in the UK): Yussufzai--Tribe of Joseph. Then there is Daudzai, or Tribe of David, and many more. There were, in fact, many Jews there at one time, but have all since been absorbed over the centuries.

pewsitter Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I say that everything in the Old Testament before
> and including their migration into Israel is a
> farce and did not even happen. The Old Testament
> is much like the BOM, made up.
>
> The stories in the Old Testament were made up to
> bind the locals into a nation and make it easier
> to rule them because god said so.
>
> Do you believe a god had the OT written?

The Assyrians carried off some elite Israelite families
and they disappeared from history -- probably just died.

Does that mean that an ancient patriarch named Jacob had
twelve sons, and the descendants of ten of those sons
ended up living in some strange place, far from Jerusalem?

No... The twelve tribes were a social fabrication.

There really were Israelite tribes at one point in ancient
history, but we probably never be able to work backwards
from what existed in known history, to what Israelite/Jewish
origins really were.

UD