Who Really Wrote the Bible?

[blugiant]

7 Facts That Shatter the Theories About Who Really Wrote the Bible



Moses Did Not Write the Torah/Pentateuch

Jews and Christians widely believe that Moses wrote the first five books in the Bible. However, beginning with some medieval rabbis, doubts have been raised. Among the details that challenged the notion that Moses was the author are as follows:

The Edomite kings listed in Genesis 36 did not live until after Moses was dead.
Moses is referred to in the third person in several passages.
There are places named that Moses could not have known (he never entered the Promised Land).
The Hebrew of the text includes terms that were developed long after Moses’ death.
Moses’ death is included in Deuteronomy.
Camels are listed in Abraham’s retinue, but camels were domesticated around 1000, long after Abraham (1550 B.C.) and even Moses (1250 B.C.).
The text mentions Philistines in the time between Abraham and Moses, but the Philistines did not enter the coastal areas of Canaan until around 1200 B.C. (after Moses).
The text says, “At that time the Canaanites were in the land” (Gen 12:6), which implies the author writes in a time when they were no longer there — but they were clearly there when Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan after Moses’ death.
Statements such as “before any king ruled over the Israelites” (Gen 36:31) imply a time in the writer’s mind when kings had ruled over the Israelites — but none ever did in Moses’ lifetime.
In Deuteronomy 34, the writer says, “There never arose another prophet in Israel like Moses.” It didn’t seem to make sense that Moses — or even God, in Moses’ time — would write such words.

[blugiant]

The Gospels Are Not Eyewitness Accounts?

The four canonical Gospels in the New Testament were originally anonymous. The names of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were not attached to them until the second century.

As is the case with all the Gospels, it is unknown exactly when the Gospel of Mark was written. Most scholars believe that it was written by a second-generation Christian, around or shortly after the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Second Temple in year 70.

Numerous early sources say that Mark’s material was dictated to him by St. Peter, who later compiled it into his Gospel. The Gospel, however, appears to rely on several underlying sources, which vary in form and in theology, and which go against the story that the Gospel was based on Peter’s preaching.

Biblical scholars generally hold that Matthew was composed between the years c. 70 and 100 and the author was probably a Jewish Christian writing for other Jewish Christians.

As is the case of the Gospel of Luke, scholars have proposed a range of dates from as early as 60 A.D. to as late as 90 A.D. and it was penned by the same author who wrote Acts of the Apostles.

A majority of scholars find it unlikely that John the Apostle wrote the Gospel of John because the Gospel is a deeply meditated representation of Jesus’ character and teachings rather than a plain account of Jesus’ ministry.

[blugiant]

Matthew and Luke are a Plagiarized Version of Mark?

Although it is unknown exactly how the four canonical Gospels were composed, a popular theory among scholars is the two-source hypothesis. The hypothesis puts the Gospel of Mark being written first and then the authors of the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke using Mark and a hypothetical Q document, in addition to some other sources, to write their individual Gospels. The three Gospels are called the Synoptic Gospels since they are so very similar.

The Q document, also called the Q source, Q Gospel or Q (from German: Quelle, meaning “source”) is a hypothetical written collection of sayings from Jesus (the Beatitudes and the Lord’s Prayer) that is believed, by some scholars, to be the source of the material found in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke but not in the Gospel of Mark.

According to this hypothesis, verbal agreements between Matthew and Luke suggest the non-Markan material must have been taken from a written, not oral, source. Since Q does not contain any Passion story, this has led some researchers to conclude that whoever first wrote the document must have regarded Jesus as a teacher of wisdom and nothing more.

[blugiant]

Apostle Paul Only Wrote Half of Those Letters?

According to renowned biblical scholar Bart D. Ehrman, Paul only wrote seven of 13 books attributed to him in the New Testament

The remaining books are forgeries, Ehrman says. His proof: inconsistencies in the language, choice of words and blatant contradiction in doctrine.

For example, Ehrman says the book of Ephesians doesn’t conform to Paul’s distinctive Greek writing style. He says Paul wrote in short, pointed sentences while Ephesians is full of long Greek sentences (the opening sentence of thanksgiving in Ephesians unfurls a sentence that winds through 12 verses, he says).

The scholar also points to a famous passage in 1 Corinthians in which Paul is recorded as saying that women should be “silent” in churches and that “if they wish to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home.”

Only three chapters earlier, in the same book, Paul is urging women who pray and prophesy in church to cover their heads with veils, Ehrman says: “If they were allowed to speak in chapter 11, how could they be told not to speak in chapter 14?”

[blugiant]

Daniel Is ‘Prophecy-After-The-Fact’ ?

The Book of Daniel is often paired with the Book of Revelation as providing the road map of future end-time events. Many alleged prophecies in Daniel were fulfilled, but most scholars of the Book of Daniel conclude that so-called “prophecies” were only produced “after the fact” or ex eventu. This is a position reached by first examining the historical, theological and literary nature of the Book of Daniel.

Some scholars say Daniel might actually be a Jew from the Hellenistic period, not a person from the Babylonian court and the book itself betrays more than one author. Chapters 1–6 were written in Aramaic, while chapters 7–12 are in Hebrew. Daniel makes many historical errors when talking about the Babylonian period, the time in which he supposedly lived. For example, he claims that Belshazzar was the son of Nebuchadnezzar, but the Nabonidus Cylinder found in Ur names Nabonidus as Belshazzar’s actual father. Also, Belshazzar was a crown prince but never a king, contrary to Daniel’s claim.

In Daniel 5:30, Daniel writes that a certain Darius the Mede conquered Babylon. It was actually Cyrus the Great, a Persian and not a Mede, who overthrew Babylon.

On the other hand, Daniel writes about events of the Hellenistic era with extreme accuracy.

[blugiant]

John Did Not Write Revelation?

The traditional view that Jesus’ disciple John wrote the Book of Revelation was questioned as early as the third century. Christian writer Dionysius of Alexandria, using the critical methods still employed by modern scholars, spotted the difference between the elegant Greek of John’s Gospel and the crudely ungrammatical prose of Revelation. The works could not have been written by the same person.

Ehrman, who charges in his book Forged that half the New Testament is forged, says that Jesus’ original disciples, John and Peter, could not have written the books attributed to them in the New Testament because they were illiterate.

“According to Acts 4:13, both Peter and his companion John, also a fisherman, were agrammatoi, a Greek word that literally means ‘unlettered,’ that is, ‘illiterate,’ ’’ he writes.

It’s likely that Revelation might have been originally written even before Christianity existed. References to Jesus Christ would then have been inserted only later to Christianize the document. Surprisingly, the verses containing references to Jesus can be removed without disturbing the structure and flow of the surrounding verses, keeping the meaning and sense of the text intact. This suggests that the original Book of Revelation had nothing at all to do with Jesus.

[blugiant]

Bible Stories Borrowed From Ancient Mythology?

There are almost 3,000 years of high culture and folklore predating the book of Genesis. Two-thirds of recorded history had already taken place before the Old Testament writers had ever stepped on the scene.

Judaic similarities with Egyptian other ancient religious mythology can be found as early as the book of Genesis, Where the Ten Commandments resemble the Laws of Ma’at written in the Egyptian Book of the Dead:

Commandments: Egyptian Book of the Dead (circa 1800 B.C.) vs. Ten Commandments (1491 B.C.):
Book of the Dead: “I have done away sin for thee and not acted fraudulently or deceitfully. I have not belittled God. I have not inflicted pain or caused another to weep. I have not murdered or given such an order. I have not used false balances or scales. I have not purloined (held back) the offerings to the gods. I have not stolen. I have not uttered lies or curses.”

Exodus 20:7-16: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. … Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery … Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor…”

There is also ample evidence of similarities between Jesus and the Egyptian gods Horus and Osiris, and the Flood narrative in the Bible and the Mesopotamia story of Gilgamesh

http://atlantablackstar.com/2014/09/23/7-facts-that-shatter-the-theories-about-who-really-wrote-the-bible/7/

[blugiant]

Biblical Concepts and Stories That Originated Outside of The Bible

The Creation Story

In the Persian scriptures of the Zoroastrians, the Avesta tells the story of how Ormuzd created the world and the first two humans in six days and then rested on the seventh. The names of these two human beings were Adama and Evah. These texts date back as far as the 10th century B.C.

There is also a lot of evidence that the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest recorded texts in human history (estimated to go as far back as 2200 B.C.), had an influence on the Biblical creation story. The Epic of Gilgamesh tells the story of a man, Enkidu, who was created from the earth by a god. He lives among the animals in a natural paradise until he is tempted by a woman.

[blugiant]

The Fall of Man

In his book “Pagan Origins of the Christian Myth,” George G. Jackson writes, “there is nothing unique about these Hebraic Eden myths. They were known among the so-called heathens thousands of years before the Bible was invented.”

He cites several examples, but one was a quote from Sir Godfrey Higgins, the English orientalist, as follows:

“Another striding instance is recorded by the very intelligent traveler (Wilson) regarding a representation of the fall of our first parents, sculptured in the magnificent temple of Ipsambul in Nubia. He says that a very exact representation of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is to be seen in that cave, and that the serpent climbing round the tree is especially delineated, and the whole subject of the tempting of our first parents most accurately exhibited.”

In the Epic of Gilgamesh, EnKidu was tempted by a woman named Shamhat. He accepts food from this woman and is forced to leave his paradise in the forest after becoming aware of his own nakedness. Later in the epic, he encounters a snake which steals a plant of immortality from him. He dies regretting the day when he turned into a human.

[blugiant]

The Flood

Another story that the Bible shares with The Epic of Gilgamesh is the flood narrative in Genesis. Many historians claim that the Biblical version is a rewritten version of an original Sumerian myth of the flood and the ark was probably passed along to the Jews during their Babylonian exile in the 6th century B.C. and served as the basis for the Genesis story.

Here’s a chart that shows the similarities and some of the differences between the Bible and Gilgamesh versions.


COMPARISON OF GENESIS AND GILGAMESH


GENESIS


GILGAMESH
Extent of flood Global Global
Cause Man’s wickedness Man’s sins
Intended for whom? All mankind One city & all mankind
Sender Yahweh Assembly of “gods”
Name of hero Noah Utnapishtim
Hero’s character Righteous Righteous
Means of announcement Direct from God In a dream
Ordered to build boat? Yes Yes
Did hero complain? Yes Yes
Height of boat Several stories (3) Several stories (6)
Compartments inside? Many Many
Doors One One
Windows At least one At least one
Outside coating Pitch Pitch
Shape of boat Rectangular Square
Human passengers Family members only Family & few others
Other passengers All species of animals All species of animals
Means of flood Ground water & heavy rain Heavy rain
Duration of flood Long (40 days & nights plus) Short (6 days & nights)
Test to find land Release of birds Release of birds
Types of birds Raven & three doves Dove, swallow, raven
Ark landing spot Mountain — Mt. Ararat Mountain — Mt. Nisir
Sacrificed after flood? Yes, by Noah Yes, by Utnapishtim
Blessed after flood? Yes Yes

http://atlantablackstar.com/2014/02/03/8-biblical-concepts-stories-originated-outside-bible/3/

[blugiant]

Proverbs

There are many striking similarities between the book of Proverbs in the Bible and the Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope. Though all surviving texts of the Instruction of Amenemope are of a later date, the works are thought to have been composed during the 12th dynasty. There has been much debate on this topic, but modern scholars agree that there is enough compelling evidence to support that the Instruction of Amenemope predates the Bible. Here are just a few examples of the parallel verses:

Proverbs 22:17-18: “Incline thy ear, and hear the words of the wise: and apply thy heart to my doctrine. Which shall be beautiful for thee, if thou keep it in thy bowels, and it shall flow in thy lips.”
Amenemope ch. 1: “Give thine ear, and hear what I say, And apply thine heart to apprehend; It is good for thee to place them in thine heart, let them rest in the casket of thy belly; That they may act as a peg upon thy tongue.”

Proverbs 22:22: “Do no violence to the poor, because he is poor: and do not oppress the needy in the gate.”
Amenemope ch. 1: “Beware of robbing the poor, and oppressing the afflicted.”

Proverbs 22:20: “Have I not written for you 30 sayings of counsel and knowledge?”
Amenemope, ch. 30: “Look to these 30 chapters; they inform, they educate.”

Proverbs 23:4-5: “Toil not to become rich, And cease from dishonest gain; For wealth maketh to itself wings, Like an eagle that flieth heavenwards”
Amenemope, ch. 7: “Toil not after riches; If stolen goods are brought to thee, they remain not over night with thee. They have made themselves wings like geese. And have flown into the heavens.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instruction_of_Amenemope

[blugiant]

The 10 Commandments

In the Bible, the 10 Commandments were given to Moses on Mount Sinai, and were written on stone tablets, supposedly by the hand of God himself. This is estimated to have taken place around 1490 B.C. However, chapter 125 of the Egyptian Book of the Dead (around 2600 B.C.), which would have been available to Moses during his time in Egypt, seems to have provided some inspiration. The Egyptian Book of the Dead reads like the 10 Commandments written in the Negative Confession. Some examples are:

Book of the Dead: “I have not blasphemed.”
Exodus 20:7: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that shall take the name of the Lord his God in vain.”

Book of the Dead: “I have not defiled the wife of a man.”/ “I have not committed adultery, I have not lain with men.”
Exodus 20:14: “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”

Book of the Dead: “I have not stolen.”
Exodus 20:15: “Thou shalt not steal.”

Book of the Dead: ”I have slandered [no man]”
Exodus 20:16: ”Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.”

There is also some similarity between the story of the 10 Commandments and the Code of Hammurapi, dated around 1772 B.C.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maat

http://edward.de.leau.net/the-10-commandments-are-a-copy-from-chapter-125-in-the-egyptian-book-of-the-dead-20070513.html

[blugiant]

Heaven and Hell

Along with the idea of good and evil, the concept of Heaven and Hell seems to predate Judaism as well. In fact the concept of both Heaven and Hell didn’t even exist in the first two thirds of the Bible. Zoroastrianism is known by religious historians as the first religion to have a concept of Heaven and Hell, so once again, Persian influence can be credited for a Judao-Christian concept.

The prophet Daniel, who lived at that time the Hebrews were living in captivity of the Persians, was the first Biblical figure to refer to ideas of resurrection and judgement (Daniel 12:2).

The word “paradise” comes directly from the Persian religion of Mithraism. The word “Hell” seems to derive from the Norse word Hel, most certainly a pre-Christian concept.

There are a number of examples of Hell-like afterlives portrayed in ancient religions, such as the cult of Osiris during the Middle Kingdom in Egypt, where moral fitness became the dominant factor in determined a person’s fate in the afterlife.

At death a person faced judgment by a tribunal of 42 divine judges. If they had led a life in conformance with the 42 principles of Maat, the person was welcomed into the Two Fields. If found guilty the person was thrown to a “devourer” and would be condemned to the lake of fire.

The person taken by the devourer is subject first to terrifying punishment and then annihilated. These depictions of punishment may have influenced medieval perceptions of the inferno in Hell via early Christian and Coptic texts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell

[blugiant]

Trinity

While the New Testament definitely mentions the concepts of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19), it makes no actual mention of the word “trinity,” and there is still some contention as to whether the trinity god-head is a Biblical theme.

Judaism teaches pure monotheism, while Catholicism favors the trinity concept.Yet it is clearly a concept that was influenced by other pagan religions existing at the time that Christianity came about.

Examples of pagan trinities are: Amun, Re, and Ptah of Egyptian Mythology; Anu, Enlil, and Ea of Sumerian Mythology; and Ishtar, Baal, and Tammuz of Babylonian Mythology.

[blugiant]

Christ

The aspects of the Messiah that the Bible assigns to Jesus Christ can be traced back to humanity’s primitive cultures. In ”Pagan Origins of the Christian Myth,” Jackson makes note of the vegetation theory developed by Sir James George Frazer, in his “Golden Bough” and by Grant Allen in “The Evolution of the Idea of God.” Jackson quotes psychologist Dr. David Forsyth, who summarized the theory:

“Many gods besides Christ have been supposed to die, be resurrected and ascend to heaven. This idea has now been traced back to its origin among primitive people in the annual death and resurrection of crops and plant life generally. According to the advocates of the solar myth theory, the ancient crucified saviors were personifications of the sun, and their life-stories were allegories of the sun’s passage through the 12 constellations of the Zodiac.”

Jackson continues:

“Vegetation cults, it seems are older than stellar or solar cults, but were later blended with them. In the primitive vegetation-god sacrifice, the victim was, it is believed, originally the king, or head-man, of the tribe or clan. It was believed by ancient man that the prosperity of the tribe depended on the well-being of the ruler. If the king became old and feeble, it was considered a foregone conclusion that the nation or tribe would suffer a similar decline. So the king, who was usually regarded as a god in human form, was sacrificed, and replaced with a younger and more vigorous man. He was generally slain while bound to a sacred tree, with arms outstretched in the form of a cross. After being entombed, he was believed to rise from the dead within three days; the three-day period representing the return of vegetation.”

Other saviors with stories similar to life of Jesus, which contain a virgin birth, death, and resurrection, include Buddha, Krishna, Odysseus, Romulus, Dionysus, Heracles, Glycon, Zoroaster, Attis of Phrygia, and Horus.

http://atlantablackstar.com/2014/02/03/8-biblical-concepts-stories-originated-outside-bible/8/