Subject: Re: Liberals vs conservatives
Date: 2 Dec 1999 04:12:45 GMT
From: Chris Ho-Stuart <>
Newsgroups: aus.religion.christian

First of several responses in progress to ur32212451's post...

  wrote:
> In article <80>,
>   Chris Ho-Stuart <> wrote:
[snip]
> The book of Genesis does not contain any mention of Moses. Yet it does
> give a record of events, people, places, conversations, and exact
> circumstances which all occurred before Moses was born. Nor is there any
> mention of Moses receiving a revelation from G-d about what the book
> contains.
>
> But there is plenty of evidence that Genesis is an edited compilation of
> approximately 11 books. Each `book' was most likely written on clay
> tablets, and though long periods of time may have intervened between the
> writing of one book to the next, the history `toledot' is a continuous
> one as the books are connected to each other by colophons, a colophon
> being an a connecting link between clay tablets. The books and possible
> authors are as follows:
>
>    Book 1. Genesis  1:1 to 2:4.     Adam? (Perhaps as revealed to him by
>                                        G-d, before the fall, or perhaps
>                                        by direct revelation to Moses)
>    Book 2. Genesis  2:5  to  5:1    Adam
>    Book 3. Genesis  5:1  to  6:9    Noah
>    Book 4. Genesis  6:9  to 10:1    Sons of Noah
>    Book 5. Genesis 10:1  to 11:10   Shem
>    Book 6. Genesis 11:10 to 11:27   Terah
>    Book 7 and Book 8. Genesis 11:27 to 25:19  Abraham, Isaac, & Ishmael
>    Books 9, 10, & 11. Genesis 25:19 to 37:2   Isaac, Esau, Jacob.

In Genesis 36:31, (KJV) we read

And these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom,

before there reigned any king over the children of Israel.

The reference to a king over the children of Israel shows that this
verse, at least, was written after the start of the monarchy; since it
uses that as a kind of historical baseline for putting its information
into context.

In Genesis 14:14, we read

And when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive,

he armed his trained servants, born in his own house,

three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them unto Dan.

The reference to Dan is another (comparatively) modern reference
showing that the book was written for readers substantially after
the time of Moses. In Judges 18:29 we see that the city of Dan was
named so after the time of Moses.

You speak of evidence that Genesis is a compilation of a number of
books. I agree that such evidence exists. However, verses such as
the above are part of that evidence, and suggest that the books
were written after the time of Moses, and after the institution of
the monarchy in Israel.

> The remainder of Genesis deals with Joseph and was probably written in
> Egypt on Papyrus instead of clay tablets. The minute details in these
> later chapters indicate the author was either Joseph or someone who
> received this history directly from Joseph, such as one of his sons.
>
> The history recorded in the book of Genesis was most likely written over
> a few thousand years. Names of places change over time. This is one
> indication that Moses did indeed edit the above `books'. He gives the
> (then) modern names to ancient sites; e.g. Gen, 14:2,3,7,8,15,17
> Gen. 16:14, Gen. 23:2,19, 35:19. Plus, Moses writes of cities that had
> cease to exist long before his time (e.g. Sodom and Gomorrah) giving
> their exact locations, and this he knew because he had possession of
> these ancient books which had been passed on to him.

One of the modern names you mention there is the use of "Dan" rather
than "Laish". This name change took place after the time of Moses.
The list of Edomite kings in Genesis also dates after the time of
Moses. In fact, the use of modern names is generally used as an
arguement for compilation after the time of Moses.

Cheers -- Chris Ho-Stuart