(March 28, 2021 at 10:51 pm)Ferrocyanide Wrote: I will read the link he provided and extract the statistics later on.

This is the main thing.

Please note the bibliography, and all the sources cited in the text. It is solid history.

The idea that extreme age and/or other preternatural characteristics were literally meant as characteristics of people they thought they were writing about requires no list of references. What Christians today think about the ancient Hebrew texts is a total red herring. The question is, what did the editors of the texts in question think they were writing about, and where did they get those understandings. What many Christians think about Bible texts today is nothing but the ad populum fallacy.  
If you want to know what the Hebrews thought about something, just look it up in the Talmud.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talmud#:~:...n%20Talmud.

Bibliography and Further Reading

Armstrong, K (2007) The Bible: The Bibliography. London: Atlantic Books.

Armstrong, K (2019) The Lost Art of Scripture: Rescuing the Sacred Texts. London: The Bodley Head.

Augustine/Bettenson, H (1972) Concerning the City of God against the Pagans. London: Penguin Books, p.643

Barton, J (2019) A History of The Bible: The Book and its faiths. London: Penguin Books. pp. 325-326

B Shabbat 31a (1975). In A Cohen, ed. Everyman’s Talmud, 1st ed. New York: Schocken Books, p.65

Caputo, J D. (2018) Hermeneutics: Facts and Interpretation in the Age of Information. London: Penguin Random House, p.4

Cameron, M (2012). “Augustine and Scripture”. In M Vessey and S Reid, ed. A Companion to Augustine, 2nd ed. West Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Copeland, R and Struck, P (2010). “Introduction”. In R Copeland and P Struck, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Allegory, 1st ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 2

Dawkins, R (2006/2016) The God Delusion. London: Transworld Publishers. P.269

Evans, G.R (1984) The Language and Logic of the Bible: The Earlier Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Goodman, Martin (2017) A History of Judaism, UK: Penguin Books.

Hadot, P/Davidson, A.I (ed) (1995) Philosophy as a Way of Life. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Pp. 126-144

Harris, S (2007) A Letter to a Christian Nation: A Challenge to Faith. London: Transworld Publishers P. 11

Hart, Bentley, D (2009) Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and its Fashionable Enemies. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. P. 63

Hitchens, C (2007) God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. London: Atlantic Books p. 103

Holland, T (2019) Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind. London: Little, Brown.

Lohr, W (2010) “Christianity as Philosophy: Problems and Perspectives of an Ancient Intellectual Project”. Vigiliae Christianae. [Online] Vol 64 (2) pp. 160-188. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/2070036...bc1e904833 [Accessed 22nd March 2021]

MacCulloch, D (2009) A History of Christianity. London: Penguin Random House UK

McGrath, Alister E. (2013) Historical Theology: An Introduction to the History of Christian Thought. West Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Pp. 22-53

Mark, Joshua J (2012) St. Augustine: from The Literal Meaning of Genesis [Online] World History Encyclopaedia. Available at: https://www.ancient.eu/article/91/st-aug...f-genesis/ [Accessed 22nd March 2021]

Noone, Timothy B (2003) Scholasticism. In J, J.E Gracia and T, B. Noone, ed. A Companion to Philosophy in the Middle Ages, 1st ed. Masachussets, USA/ Oxford, UK/Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing.

Origen of Alexandria/Crombie, F (trans) (2015) Against Celsus/Contra Celsum. United States: Ex Fontibus Co. , p. 41

Origen of Alexandria/Crombie, F (trans) De Princpiis, Book IV. [Online] Available at: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/04124.htm [Accessed 19th March 2021]

Parry, K (2015). The Nature and Scope of the Patristics. In K Parry, ed. The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Patristics, 1st ed. Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons Ltd, pp. 7-8

Pew Research Center, (2014) Interpreting Scripture. [Online] Available at: https://www.pewforum.org/religious-lands...-practices [Accessed 19th March 2021]

Philo/Yonge, C.D (trans) (1993) The Works of Philo: Complete and Unabridged. United States: Hendrickson Publishers Marketing, LLC.

Prügl, T (2005) Thomas Aquinas as Interpreter of Scripture. In R, Van Nieuwenhove and J, Wawrykow, ed. The Theology of Thomas Aquinas, 1st ed. Indiana, USA: University of Notre Dame Press p. 396

Rosemann, P.W (2003) Peter Lombard. In J, J.E Gracia and T, B. Noone, ed. A Companion to Philosophy in the Middle Ages, 1st ed. Masachussets, USA/ Oxford, UK/Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing. P.90

Rupke, J. Richardson, D, M.B (trans) (2018) Pantheon: A New History of Roman Religion. Princeton: Princeton University Press. P. 171

Saint Augustine/ Green, R.P.H (trans) (1997) On Christian Teaching. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press

Saad, L (2017) Record Few Americans Believe Bible Is Literal Word of God. [Online] Gallup. Available at: https://news.gallup.com/poll/210704/reco...d-god.aspx [Accessed 19th March 2021]

Sefaria (2021) Menachot 29b: The William Davidson Talmud [Online] Available at:https://www.sefaria.org/Menachot.29b?lang=bi [Accessed 21st March 2021]

Sefaria (2021) Mishna Sanhedrin 6: The William Davidson Talmud [Online] Available at: https://www.sefaria.org/Mishnah_Sanhedrin.7?lang=bi [Accessed 21st March 2021]

Sefaria (2021) Bava Metzia 59b : The William Davidson Talmud [Online] Available at:https://www.sefaria.org/Bava_Metzia.59b.5?lang=bi&with=all&lang2=en [Accessed 21st March 2021]

Smalley, B (1964) The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages. Indiana, USA: University of Notre Dame Press

Stump, E (1993) Biblical commentary and philosophy. In N Kretzmann and E Stump ed. The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas, 1st ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Tannous, J (2018) The Making of the Medieval Middle East: Religion, Society and Simple Believers. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, Page 244-245

Turner, D (2010) “Allegory in Christian Late Antiquity”. In R Copeland and P Struck, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Allegory, 1st ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pp. 72-73

Vessey, D (2016) “Medieval Hermeneutics”. In: N, Keane , and C, Law ed. The Blackwell Companion to Hermeneutics, 1st ed. Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. pp. 67–80 Ziegler, Robert A (2015) Augustine of Hippo’s Doctrine of Scripture: Christian Exegesis in Late Antiquity. Primary Source. [Online] Vol 5 (2) pp. 33-39. Available at: https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/ind.../view/1239 [Accessed 22nd March 2021]

What Medieval writers or 19th Century writers thought is totally irrelevant.
The important archaeology refuting historicity of the OT was done in the 20th Century.

If you actually attend a mainline university and take a Biblical Studies course, you will be required to read:
"Who Wrote the Bible", Dr. Richard Elliott Friedman : https://www.amazon.com/Wrote-Bible-Richa...0060630353
"How the Bible Became a Book, the Textualization of Ancient Israel", Dr. William Schneidewind, https://www.amazon.com/How-Bible-Became-...0521536227

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Re that bibliography :

"The Gish gallop is a term for an eristic technique in which a debater attempts to overwhelm an opponent by excessive number of arguments, without regard for the accuracy or strength of those arguments. The term was coined by Eugenie Scott; it is named after the creationist Duane Gish, who used the technique frequently against proponents of evolution. It is similar to a method used in formal debate called spreading."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gish_gallop

The works may actually be interesting, by themselves, but are of no help in dertermining TODAY, what can be determined about the literal intent or meaning of ancient Hebrew texts.
Most are irrelevant to the question at hand, and what was being criticized.

There's a lovely passage in the Phaedrus which addresses how people used myth in the old days.

Socrates and Phaedrus are walking along outside the walls of Athens. Phaedrus thinks they're at the spot where, according to legend, the wind god abducted a girl. He asked Socrates of he believes in the literal truth of such myths.

Quote:Phaedrus: Tell me, Socrates, isn’t this or hereabouts the place from where Boreas is said to have abducted Oreithuia from the Ilissus?

Socrates: Yes, that’s how the story goes, anyway.

Phaedrus: Well, wasn’t it from here? At any rate, the water has a pleasant, clean, clear appearance –– just right for girls to play beside.

Socrates: No, this isn’t the place. It’s about two or three stades* downstream, where one crosses to go towards Agra.* There’s an altar of Boreas somewhere there.

Phaedrus: I’ve not really noticed it. But tell me, Socrates, by Zeus:* do you think this story is true?

Socrates: It wouldn’t be odd for me to doubt it as the experts do. I might give a clever explanation of it, and say that a gust of wind from the north pushed her from the nearby rocks while she was playing with Pharmaceia, and although this caused her death she was said to have been abducted by Boreas––either from here or from the Areopad gus,* since there’s another version of the story, that she was abducted from there, not here. Basically, Phaedrus, although I find these kinds of interpretations fascinating, they are the work of someone who is too clever for his own good. He has to work hard and is rather unfortunate, if only because he next has to correct the way Centaurs look, and then the Chimaera, and then there pours down on him a horde of similar creatures, like the Gorgon and Pegasus and countless other extraordinary beasts with all kinds of monstrous natures.*† If anyone has doubts about these creatures and wants to use a rough-and-ready kind of ingenuity to force each of them to conform with probability, he’ll need a lot of spare time. As for me, I never have time to spend on these things, and there’s a good reason for this, my friend: I am still incapable of obeying the Delphic inscription and know- ing myself.* It strikes me as absurd to look into matters that have nothing to do with me as long as I’m still ignorant in this respect, so I ignore all these matters and go along with the traditional views about them. As I said just now, I investigate myself rather than these things, to see whether I am in fact a creature of more complexity and savagery than Typhon, or something tamer and more simple, with a naturally divine and non-Typhonic nature. But anyway, my friend, if I may interrupt our conversation, isn’t this the tree you were taking us to?

Socrates considers a euhemerist interpretation, but in the end says it doesn't matter. The importance of these stories is what we can learn from them about ourselves.

This is a basic hermeneutic among traditional Christians, as well. The importance is a spiritual, rather than a historical, meaning.

Quote:This is a basic hermeneutic among traditional Christians, as well. The importance is a spiritual, rather than a historical, meaning.

Not as much as you'd like us to think. 'Traditional Christians' by and large accept Jesus' walking on water, healing by touch, cursing the fig tree, casting out demons, etc, as matters of historical fact. They seem to spend a great deal of time trying to find factual explanations for the star announcing Jesus birth, his virgin mother, the feeding of the multitude and so on.

While I don't doubt their attempt to glean moral or spiritual teaching from these stories, the fact is that a majority of Christians accept these fantasies and fairy tales as fact. They have to - Christianity without miracles would vanish in a puff of nonsense.

Boru

I'll remind the christians in my life that it's not important whether or not christ existed. The Message™ is spiritual.

OFC people have believed in their own religious content as facts. It's amazing to me that anyone is attempting to debate this. Even in the narrative above, which is..itself.... a myth or legend, our hero only has occasion to mention his own take because someone else has asked a question that simply assumes the truth of some other myth or legend.

Care to provide references for the unsupported assertion concerning "a basic hermeneutic among traditional Christians ?
I seem to recall St. Paul saying (and hearing this preached from High (church) Anglican and liberal Roman pulpits :
1 Corinthians 15:17-19 : "And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is in vain; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.
If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied."

I very much doubt that the very close (end-point practical) similarity between the Medieval "Cloud of Unknowing" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cloud_of_Unknowing
the "Dark Night of the Soul" (John of the Cross / Teresa of Avila) and for example Chinese Tao Mysticism, and agnostic atheism are even on the horizon of more than 5 Christians in the entire world. If Christians bought into "allegory" that would not be so. There is no widespread concensus in Christianity, AT ALL, or even "many" who've heard about the resurrection as allegory, (as in Progressive Christianity), where, as Dr. B.B. Scott says, (in "The Trouble With Ressurection") Jesus was metaphorically "exalted" (as Hebrew Apocalyptic heroes were "exalted") (the Greek word used in Paul for "raised up", and not "risen from the dead").

And actually it matters a very great deal. In many places in 2021 a literal interpretation is what Fundamentalist Christians in huge numbers demand and espouse. 
Did Jesus rise from the dead or not ? While my exposure was entirely non-Fundamental(ist) the unsupported assertion "among traditional Christians" is entirely false. 
And the importance of YOUR question, seems to have been forgotten from a couple days before. It was important for you to challenge. 

Quote:I would say that most likely that the majority of the people were Bible literalists, up until the 19 th century.

Quote:You keep repeating this. I'm looking for some kind of scholarly, historical source. 

So am I. It was important enough for you to make an issue of it. 
The links you provided in the copy-pasta bibliography do not suffice, unless you'd care to summarize each one. 

"Thomas (Aquinas) believed that the historical sense of Scripture was of primary importance: "all the senses are founded on one - the literal - from which alone can any argument be drawn, and not from those intended in allegory, as Augustine says".

"That signification whereby things signified by words have themselves also a signification is called the spiritual sense, which is based on the literal, and presupposes it". http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm#article10 Summa Theologica I, q. 1, art. 10, reply to objection 1
Reply to Objection 1. The multiplicity of these senses does not produce equivocation ... because the things signified by the words can be themselves types of other things. Thus in Holy Writ no confusion results, for all the senses are founded on one - the literal - from which alone can any argument be drawn, and not from those intended in allegory, as Augustine says (Epis. 48). http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm#article10 Summa Theologica I, q. 1, art. 10, reply to objection 1

Also in the Summa Theologica I, q. 102, art. 1, Aquinas discusses the question of whether Paradise was a literal place or a figurative, spiritual place, and concludes that it was both:
I answer that, as Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xiii, 21): "Nothing prevents us from holding, within proper limits, a spiritual paradise; so long as we believe in the truth of the events narrated as having there occurred." For whatever Scripture tells us about paradise is set down as a matter of history; and wherever Scripture makes use of this method, we must hold to the historical truth of the narrative as a foundation of whatever spiritual explanation we may offer."

https://www.angelfire.com/linux/vjtorley...ys%20(Epis.

You do realize the Holy Bible is the oldest living document we have of early civilizations and how things were back then, there's lots of historicity in the bible, also lots of silliness, but you can't just write off the whole book just b/c u dont believe. It's the only book we have of the old ages.

(March 30, 2021 at 6:24 pm)jasonelijah Wrote: You do realize the Holy Bible is the oldest living document we have of early civilizations and how things were back then, there's lots of historicity in the bible, also lots of silliness, but you can't just write off the whole book just b/c u dont believe. It's the only book we have of the old ages.

I think you're right if you're taking about specific regions or ethnic groups. The Bible is the oldest set of texts we have from them.

Other groups have records that are pretty damn old, though. Egypt, for example, and Mesopotamia. 

And it depends on what parts of the Bible you're talking about, and which scholars' dates you accept. Is the Moses story older than Homer? Was it written much later to portray events that were already long past? 

I think "oldest" is kind of stretching it.

I agree with you, though, that it's an important document and should definitely not be written off.