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Author Topic:   Did a "minimalist" indirectly admit Judges 1 doesnt contradict Joshua
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 16 of 35 (586281)
10-12-2010 10:45 AM


Definition of "raid"
Raid Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
quote:
Definition of RAID
1a : a hostile or predatory incursion b : a surprise attack by a small force
2a : a brief foray outside one's usual sphere b : a sudden invasion by officers of the law

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 17 of 35 (586285)
10-12-2010 10:55 AM
Reply to: Message 15 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 10:39 AM


Re: A "raid" means what?
quote:
Kitchen talks about Canaanites regrouping after attacks.Blenkinsopp talks about Jews regrouping after much more severe attacks.
Kitchen has to deal with the Canaanites as a significant military force, after their "conquest". He does this by saying that the successful "conquests" were hyperbolic descriptions of successful raids.
Blenkinsopp simply says that many Jews managed to remain in Judah, under Babylonian rule. Which they did NOT fight against. He also argues that the destruction was less complete than Stern claims, leaving some smaller cities at least relatively untouched. This hardly seems to be the close parallel that you want to claim.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 15 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 10:39 AM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 18 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 11:30 AM PaulK has replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 18 of 35 (586290)
10-12-2010 11:30 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by PaulK
10-12-2010 10:55 AM


Re: post 17
I suppose we should compare the archaeological situation of the c.580 attacks to the biblical text of Joshua 10-Judges 3.
But Kitchen is also looking at a specific archaeological period for the Conquest(the terminal Late Bronze Age/Iron Age transition around c.1200 BCE).It colors his opinion.
Anyway,by any measure, the destructions of the Babylonian attacks were far more severe than the Conquest attacks.
Blenkinsopp argues that populations remained but did not build cities right away.I agree.Stern has made a super good case(elsewhere) that Edomites began to control parts of the Negev in 700BCE plus took over nearly all of it decades later then the Babylonians attacks and deported Edomits from the Negev c.600 BCE (580 BCE I think).The mainstream view is that Edomites attacked and destroyed (with Babylonians) the sites around 600-580BCE.Regardless,Edomite presence is clearly attested in the archaeological record by around 350BCE even though the towns were completely destroyed.Stern has written(elsewhere) that he feels small groups of semi-nomadic Edomites continued some degree of control over the Negev even during the period absent archaeological evidence from around c580-380BCE or so.He also believes that the centers of population in Edom proper(like Bozra which was outside Palestine) were destroyed by the Babylonians in 552 BCE and infact Babylonians texts support that argument.
I guess the issue is that populations can remain despite complete destruction.
There were continued Babylonian attacks on population centers but the Edomites survived and held their land(they were driven out of their main homeland by Nabataeans around the same time though).
With regards to the the Jewish/Edomite situation of c.580-540,I see consistency and good comparison with the situation of Canaanites surviving the Joshua raids, and then fighting back.Though the 580-540 Babylonians seemed to be superior to the Israelites of the (Joshua) Conquest.The Canaanites did a good job of fighting back(unlike the Jews of c.580-540BCE), but again, they were in a situation where they had major population centers left(unlike the c.580 BCE Jews and to some extent the Edomites).The Edomites still had their main population center left however nothing was left in the Negev frontier.
(EDIT: When I said "I agree" with Blenkinsopp, I still feel that the c.600 BCE population of 100,000 fell to around 5000 settled in some Benjaminite cities after c.580 BCE.The semi-nomadic population might make the population as high as 10,000-30,000 I suppose.I agree with him in part but I feel that the land was essentially "empty", while he sees population numbers as not so severely reduced.Finkelstein says that the population of Palestine was around 30,000 even by 400 BCE.)
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 17 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 10:55 AM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 20 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 12:06 PM Nimrod has replied

  
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 19 of 35 (586292)
10-12-2010 11:53 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 4:53 AM


Who is this Blenkinsopp guy and why is he worth a thread?
Well done. Out of the zillions of people who disagree with you, you've found one that you can interpret as possibly contradicting other "minimalists" who are not him and do not share or endorse his views.
Huzzah!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 4:53 AM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 23 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 12:26 PM Dr Adequate has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 20 of 35 (586297)
10-12-2010 12:06 PM
Reply to: Message 18 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 11:30 AM


Re: post 17
quote:
Anyway,by any measure, the destructions of the Babylonian attacks were far more severe than the Conquest attacks.
Only if Kitchen is right. In which case you don't need Blenkinsopp.
Don't forget that Joshua was supposedly engaged in a campaign of outright genocide (which could not be expected to spare rural populations, another problem for you).
quote:
I guess the issue is that populations can remain despite complete destruction.
No, that's not the issue. Kitchen argues that many of Joshua's attacks were far less severe than a literal interpretation of the Bible says. Blenkinsopp argues that the Babylonian destruction was far less severe than Stern says. Arguing that the destruction was less says nothing about the ability of a genuinely destroyed population to survive.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 18 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 11:30 AM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 24 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 1:05 PM PaulK has replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 21 of 35 (586298)
10-12-2010 12:12 PM


Problems with vanishing populations and urban centers.
There is a similar issue over what happned to the population of 65,000 estimated dwellers in the central hill country,shephelah, and Negev region of Palestine during the Middle Bronze Age/Late Bronze Age transition (typically dated at 1550 BCE but Albright,Bietak, Redford, and Stiebing have written that the period ended as late as 1450-1475 BCE).
There was widespread-complete destruction in those areas (typically attributed to the Egyptians but Kathleen Kenyon and some others attributed it to the Hyksos), but Finkelstein(who rejects Egyptian campaigns as the reason for the destruction) argues that most of the population remained.
quote:
Biblical Archaeology Review
VOL XIV NO.V
Sept/Oct 1988
Searching for Israelite Origins
Israel Finkelstein
pp34-45
..the patterns of settlement in the central hill country during the Middle bronze II to Iron I will make a crucial contribution to clarifying the course of Israelite settlement and will also shed light on the origins of the Israelite population.
In Middle Bronze II B (c. 1750-1650 B.C.) , the entire country flourished ...an unprecedented number of settlers inundated the central hill-country as well.Hundreds of sites of every size-fortified villages ... were founded throughout teh hill country...
....
At the end of the Mb II (c 1550 B.C.), the fortiied centers of the hill country , as well as many of the major cities of the lowlands, were destroyed.
....
The crisis was gravest in the hill country, where the reduction in the number of settlements was drastic.
....
Morever, many of the occupied sites shrank in size. For example, the fortified Middle bronze settlement at Shiloh was abandoned and replaced by only small-scale cultic activity in the Late Bronze Age.... Only in the southern coastal plain, the Shephelah and the northern valleys was human activity lively during the period.
....
The three patterns of settlement representing the MbII, late Bronze Age, and Iron I settlements illuminate the problem of the origin of the early Israelites.They raise two critical questions: Where did over half of the country's people (and almost all the hill-country population) "vanish" to at the end of the Middle Bronze Age? And from where did the people who settled the hundreds of sites in Iron I "materialize"?
....
..at the end of the MB II...
....
What then happened to the sizeable population if it was not decimated by war or pestilence?
....
...apparantly large parts of the sedentary population became nomadized
It seems probable that this is what happened in the "frontier zones", including the hill country , toward the end of the Middle Bronze Age.The network of permanent settlements fell apart, and many of the inhabitants adopted a nomadic existence.This would explain their archaeological disappearance", for we have yet to find a way to detect and identify the activities of nonsedentary, pastoral groups, especially in nondesert regions.
...back to population estimates.during the transition from the Middle Bronze to the Late Bronze periods ..... there was a change in the proportion of sedentary dwellers to pastoralist groups ,but only the reduced ranks of the fromer category are reflected in archaeological field work ... the new pastoralists of the late Bronze Age were simply not counted.
....
But can we produce any archaeological evidence whatsoever ... for the existence of a large population of pastoralists in the land of Israel in the Late Bronze Age?
Archaeologically, there are, perhaps , two intriguing clues. The first is the phenomenon of isolated sanctuaries , either unreleated to any settlementor else located close to permanent sites ... the Late Bronze cult place at Shiloh, where no permanent settlement settlement was found...
His main argument for continued occupation wasnt pottery (which was absent) but texts showing peoples in the area (such as the Habiru), and the Fosse Temple, Shiloh, and other isolated shrine/sacrificial sites.He used the evidence of lack of pig bones at those Late Bronze Age sites (Shiloh only survived from 1550-1400 before being abandoned for 200+ years, the Fosse seemed to remain but underwent changes such as unhewn stones from 1550-1500 to hewn stones later)(there was also a temple with unhewn stones on Mount Gerezim toward Shechem but only briefly during the Middle Bronze Age-Late Bronze age transition then abandoned)
Population issues are difficult with semi-nomadic groups outside deserts but fire-pits make desert semi-nomads easier to locate. But even the desert hs its difficulties as the 2 central Negev Middle-Bronze Age sites,before they were destroyed at the end of the period,(Mazar placed the destruction of Tel Masos at the very end of the MBA while some place its destruction 100 years earlier,Tell Malhalta was destroyed at the very end in 2 quick destructions, and all agree there) lacked evidence of travel between them (pottery),between them and Egypt, between them and Arabia, and between them and northern sites in Palestine though these large centers clearly had travel between them.
These are the sites near Kadesh-Barnea(where this entire central-Negev area outside Tell Masos and Tel Malhalta was absent pottery from 2300 to 1200).Hormah and Arad were in the region.Most agree that Hormah was either Tell Masos or Tell Malhalta as there arent any other good candidates near Tel Arad (Aharoni and others consider Tel Arad "Arad the greater"). Aharoni and others feel Tel Malhalta was "Arad the Lesser" and he feels it is the only choice since there wasnt any other settled candidate during the time of Shoshenq's 925 text.That means Tell Masos must be Hormah.
Anyway, the lack of pottery between these two sites (before they were destroyed at the end of the Middle Bronze Age) shows the difficulty of pinning down nomads.
The book "Le-David Maskil: A Birthday Tribute for David Noel Freedman (Biblical and Judaic Studies, V. 9 Eisenbrauns)" has a debate between Finkelstein and other achaeologists over the issue of nomads leaving remains in the desert.Finkelstein argues that nomads often leave no remains even in deserts while others argue against his points (they seem to fall on mostly fire-pits as their evidence for likely remains that must be left).
Anyway, there is a problem with places lacking urban centers and/or small towns and in-addition mainly containing semi-nomads.The problem is how to identify the population minus pottery and other gauges of activity.

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 22 of 35 (586299)
10-12-2010 12:12 PM


dupe
delete
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 23 of 35 (586300)
10-12-2010 12:26 PM
Reply to: Message 19 by Dr Adequate
10-12-2010 11:53 AM


Interesting post.
quote:
Who is this Blenkinsopp guy and why is he worth a thread?
Well done. Out of the zillions of people who disagree with you, you've found one that you can interpret as possibly contradicting other "minimalists" who are not him and do not share or endorse his views.
Huzzah
Only one of the top Bible scholars in the world.Interesting that you dont know who he is.Both he and Stern have written major volumes for the Anchor Bible Commentary series(Stern covered the archaeological volumes from around 722-331BCE, A.Mazar covered the volume from around 3000-700BCE.Blenkinsopp as a scholar wrote the volume introducing the state of Old Testament scholarship & the Bible plus 3 large volumes on the Isaiah.They have written much for other important publishers.)The Anchor publications (on scholarshipand to some extent archaeology too) have been accused of being anti-Israel and somewhat liberal.Anson Rainey and Hershel Shanks have had major falling out with Blenkinsopp and the Anchor editors.Rainey demanded that his contributions be canceled and they were.
Also, I like the minimalists.
Niels Peter Lemche agrees with me (in a Scandinavian Journal Of The Old Testament 1994 issue) that the terminal Middle Bronze Age/Late Bronze Age transition was a period of material culture change in the Israelite region of Palestine(the ONLY period for a possible in-migration).He even said that there was a possible migration of semi-nomadic tribes into the area of Benjamin and looked at the destruction of Jericho as possibly being them.He said the Israelites could have been called such as early as the terminal Middle Bronze Age (1550) but the Egyptians would have simply called them generic names such as "Habiru" or "Shashu".He considers the Habiru as ancestors of the Hebrews both in bloodline and linguistically.
I also agree with them that ethnicity is extremely complex and dont disagree with much on that issue at all.I find myself agreeing with them more than Dever frankly.
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 19 by Dr Adequate, posted 10-12-2010 11:53 AM Dr Adequate has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 26 by Dr Adequate, posted 10-12-2010 2:59 PM Nimrod has replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 24 of 35 (586304)
10-12-2010 1:05 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by PaulK
10-12-2010 12:06 PM


Re: PaulK
quote:
Nimrod
Anyway,by any measure, the destructions of the Babylonian attacks were far more severe than the Conquest attacks.The Babylonian destructions completely destroyed every last city aside from a few small ones in the highlands of Benjamin.
PaulK
Only if Kitchen is right. In which case you don't need Blenkinsopp.
Biblical scholarship has long considered the Conquest as only taking the central-highlands (and other minor regions).Kitchen has nothing to do with it.Im refering to the Bible text.
quote:
PaulK
Don't forget that Joshua was supposedly engaged in a campaign of outright genocide (which could not be expected to spare rural populations, another problem for you).
He tryed,he cryed.
Merneptah seemed interested in "genocide".Mesha too.
The Bible doesnt seem to indicate success beyond killing and destroying the cities and major population centers in a limited area.The text is full of Canaanite survival in certain centers especially the coast(where only Gaza,Ashkelon, and Ekron were taken-briefly).Especially the Jezreel Valley(only Hazor destroyed).Especially "Phoenicia".Plus Jerusalem,Gibeon, and Shechem in the highlands.
Take archaeological examples.
For example, at the very end of the Middle Bronze Age Ekron(lower city) and Ashkelon were completely destroyed but both picked up fairly quickly right after the Late Bronze Age started.Ashdod and Gath werent destroyed at the end of the period (Gaza only saw excavation in 1924 and briefly in a small section).
Even though two of the 4 explored sites were destroyed and two werent, all 4 were running strong just short years after the destructions.
quote:
Nimrod
I guess the issue is that populations can remain despite complete destruction.
PaulK
No, that's not the issue. Kitchen argues that many of Joshua's attacks were far less severe than a literal interpretation of the Bible says. Blenkinsopp argues that the Babylonian destruction was far less severe than Stern says. Arguing that the destruction was less says nothing about the ability of a genuinely destroyed population to survive.
Kitchen feels that towns were depopulated(briefly) by not burnt down.
Blenkinsopp argues for less destruction (though he only could prove that a few towns in Benjamin werent destroyed-something Stern always said anyway,I read his books),admits to destructions but feels it was Assyrians,Edomites,etc. in addition to Babylonians(and earlier than 580BCE too), plus argues that the destructions didnt equal a severe population reduction.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 20 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 12:06 PM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 25 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 1:31 PM Nimrod has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 25 of 35 (586307)
10-12-2010 1:31 PM
Reply to: Message 24 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 1:05 PM


Re: PaulK
quote:
Biblical scholarship has long considered the Conquest as only taking the central-highlands (and other minor regions).Kitchen has nothing to do with it.Im refering to the Bible text.
So you're saying that Blenkinsopp's comments are even less relevant than they might have been.
quote:
Merneptah seemed interested in "genocide".Mesha too.
Again this is not equivalent, since the Book of Joshua claims a divine command to commit genocide. That is more than just boasting about having slaughtered the enemy.
quote:
The Bible doesnt seem to indicate success beyond killing and destroying the cities and major population centers in a limited area
Your quote from Kitchen seems to indicate even less than that. Disabling raids don't require the destruction of cities.
Again, what does Blenkinsopp's quote contribute if you already have an adequate explanation for the apparent inconsistency ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 24 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 1:05 PM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 27 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 3:06 PM PaulK has replied

  
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 26 of 35 (586329)
10-12-2010 2:59 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 12:26 PM


Re: Interesting post.
Only one of the top Bible scholars in the world.Interesting that you dont know who he is.
Well, I don't really care that much.
Perhaps you could name me the world's top ten scholars of the Koran. No cheating and looking it up, mind.
Some guy has written some thing which seems to you to contradict the opinions of other people who have written other things that you disagree with.
What of it? If this Blenkinsopp guy could prove that his opinion was true, then that would be marginally interesting. Instead you're getting all excited about him having some opinion which it seems that you do not believe is proven and which you don't ascribe to.
What's the point?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 12:26 PM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 29 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 3:52 PM Dr Adequate has not replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 27 of 35 (586330)
10-12-2010 3:06 PM
Reply to: Message 25 by PaulK
10-12-2010 1:31 PM


Re: PaulK
quote:
Nimrod
Biblical scholarship has long considered the Conquest as only taking the central-highlands (and other minor regions).Kitchen has nothing to do with it.Im refering to the Bible text.
PaulK
So you're saying that Blenkinsopp's comments are even less relevant than they might have been.
Blenkinsopp is relevant because he suggested that you can have total destruction (though he might quibble with whether every or not every last site was destroyed) of a peoples towns in Palestine,yet the victims can bounce back in years.He doesnt see the "empty land" as empty with regard to Jews despite the conflagrations.
quote:
Nimrod
Merneptah seemed interested in "genocide".Mesha too.
PaulK
Again this is not equivalent, since the Book of Joshua claims a divine command to commit genocide. That is more than just boasting about having slaughtered the enemy.
The book Joshua was written in a dialect (the D source) that dates around 650-600 BCE plus some later redactions from around 580 BCE and 400 BCE(a separate strand of D date to around 580 BCE.Richard Elliot Friedman (and the linguists who study Palestinian inscriptions plus the Bibles Hebrew texts,in addition to knowledge of linguistic evolution) state that J/E date sometime before 700 BCE (with redactions to 400BCE) and are earlier than P which has linguistic features of around 700 BCE (with redactions down to 400 BCE).D pre-dates Ezekiel which is a text dated to sometime between 600 BCE and slightly later.
Im sure there are theological inconsisties and well as consistencies when a text shows altering between a 250 year period.
If the Conquest was historical then it would pre-date the c600 BCE date of the current book of Joshua by nearly 1000 years or perhaps sligtly-somewhat less.Plenty of time for allo kinds of theological elements to be added and so much so that the writers of our current book of Joshua wouldnt even know what was or wasnt historical(they might have their views though).
BUT BUT my point on Mesha and Merneptah is that they recorded historical victories despite the hyperboil.Gods fought on the European kings side (Jesus war a European-war God for the last 1700 years) and supported their cause(wars, wars, wars, etc.).Constantine even said Jesus told him to take over Rome under his sign of the cross.There is plenty of theological lace involved.
Egyptians and Moabites claimed to have destroyed Israel.Im sure they won some good battles if not the entire war(for the year) itself.
Doesnt prove that they completely destroyed the Israelites in either case.At least the book of Joshua doesnt claim total destruction of Canaanites if you read it in its entirety.Nor does Judges.
quote:
Nimrod
The Bible doesnt seem to indicate success beyond killing and destroying the cities and major population centers in a limited area
PaulK
Your quote from Kitchen seems to indicate even less than that. Disabling raids don't require the destruction of cities.
Again, what does Blenkinsopp's quote contribute if you already have an adequate explanation for the apparent inconsistency ?
Kitchen and Blenkinsopp agree that there was population destruction of a large amount of cities, but recovery due to viccvtims taking refuge in some safe zones.Kitchen jokingly distinguished those who died in the cities (the "less mobile") and those who took off and regrouped to fight back another day as by refering to them as the quick and the dead".
If the minimalists think it worked for the widespread destructions of c580 BCE then they must admit it worked for the more limited destructions in the Joshua text describing the Conquest.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 25 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 1:31 PM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 28 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 3:46 PM Nimrod has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 28 of 35 (586336)
10-12-2010 3:46 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by Nimrod
10-12-2010 3:06 PM


Re: PaulK
quote:
Blenkinsopp is relevant because he suggested that you can have total destruction (though he might quibble with whether every or not every last site was destroyed) of a peoples towns in Palestine,yet the victims can bounce back in years.He doesnt see the "empty land" as empty with regard to Jews despite the conflagrations.
By quibbles you mean "outright denies":
The bottom line is that destruction of urban centers, although considerable, was not nearly as complete as the Albright-Stern thesis postulates.
All you've got is:
Moreover, most people did not live in cities, and we should not underestimate the resilience of a population to restore some semblance of normality in a relatively short time, despite a destruction.
[bolding mine]
So your point seems to be that if the destruction were more severe than you believe it is (or more severe than Kitchen - who you claim to agree with - says), the Canaanite farmers could have got going again in a few years. How is that relevant ?
quote:
f the Conquest was historical then it would pre-date the c600 BCE date of the current book of Joshua by nearly 1000 years or perhaps sligtly-somewhat less.Plenty of time for allo kinds of theological elements to be added and so much so that the writers of our current book of Joshua wouldnt even know what was or wasnt historical(they might have their views though).
OK, so you're saying that the Bible is wrong on the point of Joshua's genocidal intent, too. This doesn't sound like you're defending the Bible against criticism, you know...
quote:
Doesnt prove that they completely destroyed the Israelites in either case.At least the book of Joshua doesnt claim total destruction of Canaanites if you read it in its entirety.
Which misses the point. My point is that Joshua's army was allegedly bent on real genocide,and if the Bible is accurate on that point then the army would be destroying the rural Canaanites, too.
quote:
Kitchen and Blenkinsopp agree that there was population destruction of a large amount of cities, but recovery due to viccvtims taking refuge in some safe zones
That's not in the quote of Kitchen you provided. In that quote Kitchen argues that the objectives of the attacks were lesser ("disabling raids") and the results exaggerated. Did you quote the wrong passage ? Did you not notice ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 3:06 PM Nimrod has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 30 by Nimrod, posted 10-12-2010 4:32 PM PaulK has replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 29 of 35 (586337)
10-12-2010 3:52 PM
Reply to: Message 26 by Dr Adequate
10-12-2010 2:59 PM


Interesting post.
quote:
Nimrod
Only one of the top Bible scholars in the world.Interesting that you dont know who he is.
Dr Adequate
Well, I don't really care that much.
Perhaps you could name me the world's top ten scholars of the Koran. No cheating and looking it up, mind.
Um,o.k.
quote:
Dr Adequate
Some guy has written some thing which seems to you to contradict the opinions of other people who have written other things that you disagree with.
What of it? If this Blenkinsopp guy could prove that his opinion was true, then that would be marginally interesting. Instead you're getting all excited about him having some opinion which it seems that you do not believe is proven and which you don't ascribe to.
What's the point?
My point is that minimalists (plural) seem to view the "empty land" as some sort of Zionist plot (they sound 100% reasonable till you read some of what they say about the "empty land" of 580-540/520 BCE), and some fundamentalist scheme.They are obsessed on this point. (they compare it to the propaganda of modern supporters of Israel who falsely claime Palestine was a desolate waste before the 20th century.Blenkinsopp wrote a real nutty letter to Hershel Shanks.At the same time the Anchor editors got into some spat over the "Jerusalem 3000" celebrations plus pissed Anson Rainey on other issues)
Its really sad because they(minimalists) tend to be far less political than the maximalists (Dever, Rainey, Biran-RIP, Frank Moore Cross,etc. are political animals frankly ) otherwise.But on this "empty land" issue, they(minimalists) just run off the cliff.The facts actually support a 90% population reduction in a few decades from 600 to 580 BCE, so thy run their archaeological credibility off the cliff too.
MinimalistS (plural *s*).It isnt just Blenkinsopp.Trust me.
My larger point though is that minimalists dont seem to want to consider the "resilience of a population to restore some semblance of normality in a relatively short time, despite a destruction" when reading the Joshua text.No comments like the Cannanites "no doubt took refuge in one or the other of the inaccessible places that southern Judah and the Jordan Valley liberally provided, only to re-emerge once the dust had settled" like the Judges text indicates(as well as Joshua to some extent too!).
All we hear about are the "contradictions" between Joshua and Judges.
(Minimalists to be fair arent as big on contradictions as mainstream scholars.They often reject the Documentary Hypothesis" and argue more for the unity of biblical texts than do mainstream scholars-no doubt due to the fact that they date the texts so late that they are forced to ignore the linguistic evidence that has made the JEPD "Documentary Hypothesis" as rock solid as the hardest diamond.It is only in the last 3 decades that the sources have been proven due to the linguistic evidence being worked out.It shocked people to see P date so early, but at least the source was proven to be waht was worked out by scholars on other grounds for the last 200 years.)
Also,I dont disagree with Blenkinsopp that there was a much higher population than just the people in the small settlements around Benjamin and Shechem would indicate.I still dont think it changes the fact that the land was mostly "empty" after 580 BCE.Stern admitted there were sherds in areas with no builoding remains.
Its nice to see a minimalist admit that "we should not understimate" such a scant and newly destroyed population in Palestine.
Perhaps we "should not understimate" the Canaanites.
Or the Edomites from 1600-700 BCE. Do you know that there is not a single sherd of pottery in the land of Edom between 2000 and 700 BCE? Yet the Assyrians mention Edomite kings as early as 750 BCE and they appear in Egyptian texts as far back as 1206BCE. (they are called "Bedouin/Shashu tribes of Edom" and they are metioned in the same sentence as Succoth and Pithom but neither of those sites were settled nor did they have a single sherd just like Edom itself! All from 1206 BCE!)
Perhaps the vague and shadowy "king of Edom" really was able to cause the Israelites to take a detour at some point between 1700 and 1200 BCE? (my source for the lack of any Edomite pottery is in Stern's own New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations In The Holy Land" volume 5 from just the last 3 years and is based on all the latest archaeological work.The archaeologist writing about the problem mentions that only the Wadi Feinan site consistently produces carbon dates around 1000 BCE but no pottery is found anywhere near that period there or anywhere else in Edom)
Edited by Nimrod, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by Dr Adequate, posted 10-12-2010 2:59 PM Dr Adequate has not replied

  
Nimrod
Member (Idle past 4916 days)
Posts: 277
Joined: 06-22-2006


Message 30 of 35 (586341)
10-12-2010 4:32 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by PaulK
10-12-2010 3:46 PM


Re: PaulK
(FIRST,sorry to mess up your format below Paul,I know you had the code correct and orderly.Im trying my best but dont know the code very well)
Now.
quote:
Nimrod
Blenkinsopp is relevant because he suggested that you can have total destruction (though he might quibble with whether every or not every last site was destroyed) of a peoples towns in Palestine,yet the victims can bounce back in years.He doesnt see the "empty land" as empty with regard to Jews despite the conflagrations.
PaulK
By quibbles you mean "outright denies":
Blenkinsopp
The bottom line is that destruction of urban centers, although considerable, was not nearly as complete as the Albright-Stern thesis postulates.
PaulK
All you've got is:
Blenkinsopp
Moreover, most people did not live in cities, and we should not underestimate the resilience of a population to restore some semblance of normality in a relatively short time, despite a destruction.
PaulK
So your point seems to be that if the destruction were more severe than you believe it is (or more severe than Kitchen - who you claim to agree with - says), the Canaanite farmers could have got going again in a few years. How is that relevant ?
Kitchen is talking about his reading of the Biblical text of Joshua.
But let me get to Blenkinsopp and his comments on the archaeological situation of c580-540 BCE.He disagrees with a 40 year period of an empty land where there was a dramatic population reduction.He doesnt disagree as much with the conflagrations.
He is arguing for a very rapid rebounding of the population (archaeology is tough to isolate between 20-30 years so if he cant stand the idea of a severe 40 year population reduction-the "Babylonian Gap"- then he might not accept a reduction for much at all or at most a few years), though he admits cities were destroyed is a severe and fairly widespread (albeit not 100%) manner.
quote:
Nimrod
f the Conquest was historical then it would pre-date the c600 BCE date of the current book of Joshua by nearly 1000 years or perhaps sligtly-somewhat less.Plenty of time for allo kinds of theological elements to be added and so much so that the writers of our current book of Joshua wouldnt even know what was or wasnt historical(they might have their views though).
....
Doesnt prove that they completely destroyed the Israelites in either case.At least the book of Joshua doesnt claim total destruction of Canaanites if you read it in its entirety.
PaulK
Which misses the point. My point is that Joshua's army was allegedly bent on real genocide,and if the Bible is accurate on that point then the army would be destroying the rural Canaanites, too.
(meant to say that it doesnt prove that they completely destroyed the *Canaanites* not "Israelites")
I said "He tryed .... He Cryed" earlier. I suppose the intent doesnt always come to pass.Perhaps he really attempted to do so but just couldnt? I suppose that would be the toughest historical element to confirm even the the whole darn thing (ie. Conquest) was proven to be mostly historical.
quote:
Nimrod
Kitchen and Blenkinsopp agree that there was population destruction of a large amount of cities, but recovery due to viccvtims taking refuge in some safe zones
PaulK
That's not in the quote of Kitchen you provided. In that quote Kitchen argues that the objectives of the attacks were lesser ("disabling raids") and the results exaggerated. Did you quote the wrong passage ? Did you not notice ?
Kitchen thinks wars like Joshua's were fairly commonplace.I try not to discuss Kitchen too much because it will cause me to look at c1200BCE archaeology and that might be off topic.He does feel Israelites won raids against small towns and that it was fairly easy to knock off many small towns in the central highlands which were just simple villages and families and a tiny army to boot.
Note I said *population* destruction not conflagration of large cities.
But both propose defeated populations recovering after loosing battles and perhaps the larger war in the case of Joshua(the Joshua text is more debatable- when read carefully- if one asks if the Israelites won the "war" over the Canaanites.With Judges is becomes a much larger question).The Babylonian defeat of Judah (and everybody else in Palestine) was 100% clear and lasting.But Blenkinsopp seems to want to apply a standard to that situation that minimalists wont apply to the Conquest of Joshua over the Canaanites.
It would make much more sense to apply the Blenkinsopp standard to the Joshua/Canaanite situation that to the Babylonian/Jewish c580 BCE situation. (KEEP IN MIND THAT one situation,Joshua, is purely textual and not archaeological in the sense that an Israelite conquest can be pinned down conclusively to any archaeological period)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 28 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 3:46 PM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 31 by PaulK, posted 10-12-2010 4:59 PM Nimrod has replied

  
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