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Member (Idle past 2791 days) Posts: 1174 From: Eugene, Oregon, USA Joined: |
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Author | Topic: Not The Planet | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: There,s the quite obvious example of your argument that since the Biblical authors were unaware of the true nature of the planet they must intend the Flood account to be taken as purely local, rather than covering all the land. The absurdity seems self evident.
quote: No, I am tallying about interpretation of written words.
quote: Not knowing of a place does not equate to a specific intention to exclude it.
quote: But this, surely, is a matter of fact. Either the statements are there or they are not. If you are going to alter the text to suit your arguments there seems little point in debating matters of interpretation.
quote: Since the story as we have it is a myth, why should it not refer to a universal flood?
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: It's a massive non-sequitur as should be obvious to anyone. Does it make sense to you? Do you really think that they lacked the basic concept of "the world"?
quote: The absurdity is your addition of "AND NOWHERE ELSE!!!!" to the story.
quote: Your argument requires the intention to exclude because without that you have no general rule which lets you infer that other places should not be included.
quote: Is not hyperbole an obvious exaggeration? If we cannot say that it definitely is exaggeration, then it cannot be hyperbole. And if it is not hyperbole, why should we not take it as intended to be literal? (in the context of the myth)
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Because it is the concept of "the world" that is important, not the concept of the world being a globe. There is no problem with them finding out that the world was larger than they knew and understanding the story to include those areas too. Why do you keep claiming otherwise?
quote: So you concede that there is no problem with understanding the story as referring to a universal flood.
quote: But you have conceded that they do not exclude unknown lands. And a REAL flood would not even have covered all the known lands. If there was a historical flood, that served as a basis of the myth it likely covered no more than a large part of Mesopotamia - or maybe somewhere even further from Israel.
quote: What the audience could envision is not important.
quote: The point you are attempting to address is that "everything" statements may be literally true in a myth. Please address that point instead of dragging an entirely different argument into it.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: But that would be conceding that the story says that the flood was universal, which Purpledawn's denies. And even a large, localised flood would not have covered the known world at the time of writing. Canaan itself, for instance, is unlikely to have been affected at all.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Let us say, that portion of the cosmos inhabited or habitable by humans, of which the listener's land is a part.
quote: Of course I never claimed that the storyteller was saying anything about the size of the world. So this is just another misdirection on your part. And I will repeat, if their land is in Canaan, it probably wasn't covered by any real flood at all.
quote: Which simply raises the question of where the universal statements you object to could be.
quote: I'm not. You are. You're the one that insists that the universal interpretation is invalid. So you are the one who needs to rule it out. If the text doesn't rule it out, then too bad for you.
quote: But they could trigger the view of a universal flood.
quote: Well if you wish to argue that the supernatural beings that appear in myths - including your God - are incapable of affecting the entire planet than please go ahead. So far as I am aware, most people would decisively reject such a view.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Is it really relevant ? Let,s say material reality, then.
quote: You really have to learn to read in context. The point is that if the story was based on a historical event it is very unlikely that it covered all the land that the Israelites knew of - and that the "Promised Land" of Canaan was almost certainly spared. If the story is meant to convey the message that their land was covered, then it is still almost certainly false.
quote: You neglected to explain exactly which. So if you don't know what you were talking about I can't be expected to tell you.
quote: I note your weasel wording. You have argued against a "global" flood on the grounds that the author was not aware that the world was a globe. But you have not disproven a universal interpretation -which is the one you need to address.
quote: Sure I have, by pointing out that myths often involve the actions of beings accepted as being capable of acting on that level. It is no different from the example of Superman presented earlier in the thread, which you accepted.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: But it's pretty clear that you want the Bible to be true, and from that point of view a flood which covered pretty much all the Middle East - or even just Judah - isn't any better than a universal flood.
quote: But I am not arguing for that it means a global flood in your peculiar sense. I just want to know if you have a valid reason for ruling out a universal flood. So why do you keep trying to change the subject?
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Actually right now, we are supposedly discussing whether the flood should be taken as universal or local. In the Bible, clearly those words do not refer to our concept of the planet in the sense that the authors knew and understood it. But equally clearly it is not impossible that some usages can be correctly understood as referring to the planet, if the story is taken as a true story about our world, as oppose to a fiction set in a world where the concepts of the ancient authors were factually correct.
quote: And there you do it again. I'm not asking for arguments against you concept of a "global" flood. I am asking about arguments against a universal flood. And every time you try to change the subject.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: She doesn't here or in the related thread on hyperbole. She tries to argue that the flood story does not claim that the flood was universal, making it more plausible. It's common for concordists to try to interpret the Bible to match modern knowledge, to argue for the reliability of the Bible. The fact that she was willing to contradict herself to support her preferred reading also speaks of a motive beyond merely understanding the text. She refuses to consider the fact that the Flood story as we have it is a myth and dismissed the idea of referring to the older stories it is based on to try to understand it better. She also directly attributes Jewish monotheism to the legendary Abraham, which relies again on assuming Biblical reliability. Seems pretty clear to me.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Leaving the universal flood in the title field as an excluded middle.
quote: We've already seen verses that could be read as referring to a universal flood, and it seems reasonable that a believer in the story could extend that to a planetary flood based on our better understanding of the world. Of course, if it's taken just as a story, then the whole "global" issue is unimportant.
quote: Oh please. You're the one playing word games. You keep referring back to your argument that since the author would not have known that the world was a globe that the story did not include that concept. But that is not an argument against the flood being seen as universal. And that is why YOU keep referring back to a "global" flood instead of a "universal" flood, which does not require the idea that the Earth is a globe.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: The whole business of "everything" statements in the flood story, of course. Don't you forget your attempt to say that your statement that they even existed should be disregarded because you made it in a different thread ?
quote: Of course it isn't that simple. I asked about Genesis 1, so the history of monotheism is implicitly there (i.e. Genesis 1, the text under discussion was written when monotheism was the Jewish view). Your answer in Message 222 was:
Judaism started with Abraham recognizing one real God. That isn't really the purpose of the Genesis 1 creation story.
So the point about Abraham is NOT given as "something the Bible presents" - it is presented as a fact. And with nothing to link it to the point. (And, interestingly my understanding is that monotheism IS believed to be an important part of the point of the Genesis 1 creation story !). But even if monotheism were not "the point" of Genesis 1, however, all that is required is that Genesis 1 IS monotheistic, thus implicitly denying the possibility of other deities creating any portion of the universe.
quote: Yet a local flood IS far more plausible than a universal flood. And if it is just a story, why the aversion to considering it as a myth ? Why not consider the historical origins of the story to understand it ? Why the insistence on a local flood, if a universal flood serves the story just as well ? You're being somewhat disingenuous in your explanations.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Well, let's start off with those "everything" statements that you wish to class as hyperbole. You say they're there, so you should know which ones you meant.
quote: So, WHY are you set on classing it as a purely local flood ?
quote: Which, as everyone can see is primarily focussed on the irrelevant issue of the author's understanding of the world.
quote: That difference doesn't bother me. What bothers me is your behaviour. For reasons I have already given. But let us look at the facts. I ask for an argument against a universal flood. You say that you have an argument against a global flood and lo and behold, the fact that the Earth is a globe and the author of the current version of the story did not know that is a key part of that argument. And equally clearly it does not apply against a universal flood. And you keep on doing it, even after I've made this objection - and in fact knowing that I had already rejected this argument as actually telling us anything about the supposed extent of the flood already. It looks very much to me as if you are TRYING to give the false impression that you have an argument against a universal flood and deliberately using the word "global" so you can claim that you were being honest. Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: The question of whether such statements are present in the story is a matter of objective fact, not an argument. It cannot be true in one thread and false in the other. Thus you have no valid reason to object - not if you are being honest.
quote: But I have provided an argument which does establish a reasonable possibility that such statements may be true at the end of Message 239. And if it is reasonable that such statements can be true, then how can they be hyperbole ?
quote: Your sarcasm aside, you did present the statement as a bald statement of fact, with no explanation of how it related to my argument.
quote: I don't see why you would need more information. It expresses the concept that the entire world was flooded, without restricting it to the area that the author knew about (your "local flood").
quote:I stand corrected on the point of whether you are prepared to call the story a myth (although noting that you were reluctant elsewhere to consider it). However your claim that I did not give the reason is false, as shown above. Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Relying on YOUR claim that they were there. If you don't know which statements you were referring to, why expect me to ?
quote: There are plenty of other subjects you could choose to debate. No, it is clearly important to you that the flood is local, important enough to justify all the odd behaviour. And no, your argument that the author didn't know about the size of the world is NOT enough to establish that it isn't meant to be a universal flood.
quote: Whether the author felt that the flood was universal or strictly limited is relevant. Whether he understood that our world is a globe or a planet is not.
quote: Well the "global" flood terminology is yours. By inference from your posts to write about it requires understanding that the earth is a planet, a globe. A universal flood does not. That's one key difference. A universal flood is simply one that is not restricted to a purely local area of our world. Writing about one requires nothing more than the ability to imagine that - not knowledge of the actual structure of the planet. So really the point of the difference is to stop talking about matters irrelevant to the extent of the flood in the story.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Since the issue is one of fact, not reasoning, this cannot be a valid reason.
quote: I give a reason for my conclusion. You do not dispute that reason. Again you give me reason to question your honesty.
quote: It was given early in the hyperbole thread. Message 38 quote: It disposes of the false dichotomy that the author must either be describing a strictly local flood or a flood covering the planet as we understand it, as I have explained above.
quote: That's also false, since I gave relevant verses in the first post introducing the issue in the hyperbole thread: Message 3
The creation of the rainbow (Genesis 9:13-14), for instance, is an obvious mythic element.
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