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The Sumerian Flood Story
- Thread starter Rainbow Mage
- Start date
The word used was not earth though. That is the translation. I have been saying this as have others. Just as outhouse seems to not want to look at the real meanings of the words used it seems you don't feel like it either. Well all I can do is repeat myself here so I will bow out.
Post 72
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
Which assumptions are those? I'm not arguing over the meaning of a single word, although I do not for a second trust your insight into Hebrew or Aramaic. You are not an expert in Semitic languages, and one cannot translate a language accurately merely by looking up words in a bilingual dictionary. Nevertheless, my position was not that you mistranslated a word, but that your interpretation made no sense in the context of the rest of the story. If God sent the flood to kill off all life, then how can the flood have been regional? Are you going to conclude that there were no living beings outside the area of the flood? You have already pointed out that God's flood missed the future spouses of Noah's children. :areyoucra
Are you saying that God does not perform miracles? You do not seem to be a mainstream thinker on this subject. I'll say that for you.
I do not assume that you use cherry-picking techniques to rationalize your claim. I conclude it from reading your posts. You have not even tried to reconcile the fact that the flood was supposed to have wiped out all life except that on the ark, yet it was just a regional flood. I would say that the Bible is just as credible as any religious scripture, including the vast amount of scripture from other religions that you reject. For example, you probably do not believe that humans descend from crows, as did some Native American tribes in the Pacific Northwest of the US. Would you say that their sacred literature is just as credible a source as the Bible? I would.
gnostic
The Lost One
So you think that Genesis was referring to "all people on earth" to "all people on this land" or "this country".
I supposed this is a possible meaning.
Except that we don't know what land or kingdom Noah lived in prior to the Flood. There are no geographical location given in the narrative, until the flood ended, with the ark resting on Mount Ararat.
Also, how on earth did the ark land on top of Mount Ararat?
3rdly, if the flood is regional, then why spent a whole damn year building an ark, when he could have simply walked out of corrupted kingdom?
Noah had a year warning. A whole year, you could have travelled thousands of miles. If you cover 30-40 miles each day, in a year you would have travelled at the very least 10,000 (more if you were doing 40 miles per day). 30 or 40 may be ambitious, but it is possible for fit soldiers. Even 20 miles per day would allow you move over 7000 miles. 10 would mean 3650 miles in a year.
It is simply illogical to build an ark when you walk the distance.
I supposed this is a possible meaning.
Except that we don't know what land or kingdom Noah lived in prior to the Flood. There are no geographical location given in the narrative, until the flood ended, with the ark resting on Mount Ararat.
Also, how on earth did the ark land on top of Mount Ararat?
3rdly, if the flood is regional, then why spent a whole damn year building an ark, when he could have simply walked out of corrupted kingdom?
Noah had a year warning. A whole year, you could have travelled thousands of miles. If you cover 30-40 miles each day, in a year you would have travelled at the very least 10,000 (more if you were doing 40 miles per day). 30 or 40 may be ambitious, but it is possible for fit soldiers. Even 20 miles per day would allow you move over 7000 miles. 10 would mean 3650 miles in a year.
It is simply illogical to build an ark when you walk the distance.
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Which assumptions are those? I'm not arguing over the meaning of a single word, although I do not for a second trust your insight into Hebrew or Aramaic. You are not an expert in Semitic languages, and one cannot translate a language accurately merely by looking up words in a bilingual dictionary. Nevertheless, my position was not that you mistranslated a word, but that your interpretation made no sense in the context of the rest of the story. If God sent the flood to kill off all life, then how can the flood have been regional? Are you going to conclude that there were no living beings outside the area of the flood? You have already pointed out that God's flood missed the future spouses of Noah's children. :areyoucra
Are you saying that God does not perform miracles? You do not seem to be a mainstream thinker on this subject. I'll say that for you.
I do not assume that you use cherry-picking techniques to rationalize your claim. I conclude it from reading your posts. You have not even tried to reconcile the fact that the flood was supposed to have wiped out all life except that on the ark, yet it was just a regional flood. I would say that the Bible is just as credible as any religious scripture, including the vast amount of scripture from other religions that you reject. For example, you probably do not believe that humans descend from crows, as did some Native American tribes in the Pacific Northwest of the US. Would you say that their sacred literature is just as credible a source as the Bible? I would.
I have spent a lot of time studying the flood account as well as many OT stories. Am I a linguist? Not so much but I am using a lot more than a three language dictionary and the College courses I took on the subject
BTW what did I reject? I try to avoid doing that and look for commonality. I have read many religious texts and find many truths in them. Just because I can not recommend them as a book of faith does not mean that I condemn them. What do Christians really think about the Qur'anmy posts here should prove my point.
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Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
That may be, but I still doubt that you can distinguish between cases where a prophet has literally painted all the buildings in a town red or just had a good time. I say that, because it is also true of even the most enlightened modern scholars. There are no native speakers of dead languages whom we can ask questions of, and we do not always know whether expressions like "red earth" are to be taken literally or idiomatically. The thing about Ugaritic is that it was close enough to ancient Hebrew that specialists were able to interpret the idioms in the Bible more clearly. But this was a few centuries after the official translation that folks rely on had become the most popular book on the planet. You may think that textbook authors know what they are talking about, but it was not so long that French textbooks in the US were recommending that people use the word "baiser" to be equivalent to "kiss" in English. Imagine the embarrassment of all those Americans who discovered that "baiser" is a colloquial expression for the f-word, and "embrasser" is what the French normally use in order to avoid sounding like stupid foreigners.I have spent a lot of time studying the flood account as well as many OT stories. Am I a linguist? Not so much but I am using a lot more than a three language dictionary and the College courses I took on the subject
OK, henceforth I will take it as true that you do not reject idolatry. We're making progress here, eh?
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Pegg
Jehovah our God is One
its really not surprising that older accounts exist...the real surprising thing is that accounts exist at all.
Noah had 3 sons, the children of which took the story of the flood with them into the respective nations they formed....so yes the Sumerians had a flood story and for the flood to have happened its exactly what you'd expect.
the differences in their accounts are to be expected too because, like any great story told from one person to the next, details get changed. I guess the question about which account is accurate depends on who you believe has the story most closest to the original.
That may be, but I still doubt that you can distinguish between cases where a prophet has literally painted all the buildings in a town red or just had a good time. I say that, because it is also true of even the most enlightened modern scholars. There are no native speakers of dead languages whom we can ask questions of, and we do not always know whether expressions like "red earth" are to be taken literally or idiomatically. The thing about Ugaritic is that it was close enough to ancient Hebrew that specialists were able to interpret the idioms in the Bible more clearly. But this was a few centuries after the official translation that folks rely on had become the most popular book on the planet. You may think that textbook authors know what they are talking about, but it was not so long that French textbooks in the US were recommending that people use the word "baiser" to be equivalent to "kiss" in English. Imagine the embarrassment of all those Americans who discovered that "baiser" is a colloquial expression for the f-word, and "embrasser" is what the French normally use in order to avoid sounding like stupid foreigners.
OK, henceforth I will take it as true that you do not reject idolatry. We're making progress here, eh?
The first part I wont comment on because even the experts argue about things.
As for the last part; I don't believe in many things but if worshiping JuJu beans makes someone happy then more power to them. What I have a problem with is someone ignoring Biblical scripture and forming a social club around it and calling it a church. Sure I don't agree with many of the denominations but it is usually a matter of semantics and though I may not agree with them and they with me neither of us is moving counter to scripture.
What I am talking about is one simply removing what they want and keeping the rest.
Here we go: Well Paul commented on Homosexuality so we don't believe Paul. Considering how much of the new testament he wrote just take it all out because we also don't agree with Peter or all that death and destruction spoken of in revelations. So we keep the Gospels
Wait Jesus was a Jew and followed Moses for the most part so if we throw out everything Moses supposedly did then Jesus did not have a problem with homosexuals. Crap Judges has a lot of killing and some of the writings attributed to David are not in our world view so hell let us throw everything away but the Gospels and follow a nutty Jew. Wait there is no foundation for following the Jewish nut so throw the whole book away and burn incense and pray to a tree.Above are the people I don't like. They worship a God they didn't ever know and threw Him out of their Church to boot.
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Dirty Penguin
Master Of Ceremony
outhouse
Atheistically
Absolutely not
what time period do you place your mythical flood???
gnostic
The Lost One
I've realised that I have not addressed Senedjem's original points and questions in the OP. So I thought I will do so now.
I know and believe that the Sumerian legend about the flood to be the oldest in the ancient Middle East, and older than the Genesis. I also believe that Bible flood legend originated from the Sumerian, at first from oral tradition, before it was written down in the 2nd half of 3rd millennium BCE. And that the Israelites got it from the Babylonians, instead of being uniquely their own legend; the Hebrews modified the existing legend to suit their own.
But this is not the only legend that Hebrews borrowed from the earlier Mesopotamian culture (eg 6 day creation, and creating man from the earth), but this is not the point of this thread.
Having said all that, I would not go as far as Senedjem to say that even if the Sumerian/Babylonian versions were older than the biblical version, then it doesn't mean that I would believe it to be true, historically.
It is not so simple as that.
Regardless that the Hebrews may have borrowed legends, they have modified it so it was uniquely their own.
For me, the Sumerian/Babylonian version is just as mythological as the Bible's version of the Flood.
Senedjem said:
I know and believe that the Sumerian legend about the flood to be the oldest in the ancient Middle East, and older than the Genesis. I also believe that Bible flood legend originated from the Sumerian, at first from oral tradition, before it was written down in the 2nd half of 3rd millennium BCE. And that the Israelites got it from the Babylonians, instead of being uniquely their own legend; the Hebrews modified the existing legend to suit their own.
But this is not the only legend that Hebrews borrowed from the earlier Mesopotamian culture (eg 6 day creation, and creating man from the earth), but this is not the point of this thread.
Having said all that, I would not go as far as Senedjem to say that even if the Sumerian/Babylonian versions were older than the biblical version, then it doesn't mean that I would believe it to be true, historically.
It is not so simple as that.
Regardless that the Hebrews may have borrowed legends, they have modified it so it was uniquely their own.
For me, the Sumerian/Babylonian version is just as mythological as the Bible's version of the Flood.
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
I recently read a comparison of the various versions of the Gilgamesh epic that discussed the ways in which it evolved over time. The Akkadian versions were much more detailed and elaborate than the Sumerian ones. Clearly, this was one of the most influential stories for centuries in that area of the world, and it probably inspired most of the literature that came after it, e.g. the Homeric epics. It ought to be obligatory reading for anyone interested in history and/or the Bible. I am not at all surprised that the Hebrew-speaking Bedouins wove this ancient Semitic folklore into their own religious perspective. The Bible was a compendium of different source materials that helped to establish the unique identity of the Jewish nation in Israel and Judea. Lots of local nations and empires developed their own historical narratives. For example, the Romans concocted their own story of Romulus and Remus to glorify the founding of Rome. Augustus Caesar himself was elevated to divine status born of virgin birth--even before Jesus came on the scene. People have never been shy about making stuff up. They still do it. Just turn on Fox News.
Pegg
Jehovah our God is One
a sumerian legend?
i think you'll find that most cultures have a legend very similar to whats in the bible
David M
Well-Known Member
Everything after this point is irrelevant because the biblical dating is wrong. Its derived from a list of names that cannot be shown to be complete and contain ridiculous ages. Its mythology not geneology.
David M
Well-Known Member
The size of the ark,its not possible.
No wooden boat that large could hold together, the size of the ark has to be an exaggeration.