You guys should have a part of the show called "Tel Dan" (Tell Dan) where you address audience questions and comments. Perfect use of the Dual-Dan Dynamic
Well, that's a Lot to take in.. Sorry. Great episode! The issue of provenance doesn't apply just to the forgery cases but also to the illegal and amateur archaeology.
I’ve always struggled with this story in the same manner I struggled with Eve’s eternal punishment for momentary lapses / weaknesses. This makes so much sense now… Thank you! I’m loving this channel!
The first play on Biblical Hebrew and English words that I have ever heard on RUclips: "to Ish his own." So one Dan does the color commentary, and the other Dan does the scholarship. I like it!
The first 3 episodes have been great. The two of you have a great rapport, and it makes the information flow so easily. I'm so grateful that you guys decided to start this channel. Such great information. Keep up the excellent work.
Thanks for getting me addicted to a new podcast... I listened to Dan Beecher on Thank God I'm Atheist for awhile (I'm also a UT dwelling exMo), but had never seen him until now, and he looks EXACTLY like what I pictured... ANYWAY, I'm so excited for more. This is my new favorite podcast!!!
Loved this episode (yes, I watch at hyperspeed). I think those of us who have studied the pentateuchal scholarship for _years_ have likely forgotten just how incredibly confusing so much of this is for folks diving in for the first time. This stuff is wild.
7:54 to be fair, the Greek word angelos (άγγελος) , which comes to us as angel means messenger as well, and still has that sort of meaning in the modern word evangelist (one with a good message).
It says Zoar is a "Mitzar" which comes from a root "Tza'ar" or "sorrow", so the town is "pitiful". I think it's meant to be abandoned, a derelict ghost town.
Hey Dr. McClellan, hope you know that your discussions are a blessing to me even though I'm still a Christian. It's great to be able to hear your perspectives and learn from you (for free!). Appreciate your calm and non-antagonistic approach. I just picked up Dever's book "Beyond the Text." What's a good book/resource on the dating process and scholarship about the formation, editing, and redactions of the OT?
That’s a pretty complex discussion, but I’d start with a good introduction, like John Collins’ An Introduction to the Hebrew Bible. I think it’s in a third edition.
@@maklelan Thanks so much sir! Just put in an order. On topic, have you seen the videos of the supposed Sodom and Gomorrah site littered with"sulfur balls" located at Bab Edh-Dhra? I've seen people pick them up and burn them. It's been used as a way to prove the historicity of the story.
Do we know how many people were actually in Sodom, 100, 200, 1,000? Listening to the story is fascinating but i brings up tons of questions as its being told.
I'm reading David Frye's Walls: A History of Civilization in Blood and Brick currently. The divide between city-dwellers and nomadic shepherds that develops is really fascinating and it's interesting to see where that social and cultural divide also crosses over in religion - because everything was intertwined in society at that point. And it's interesting to look at how that shifts and develops perceptions of outsiders and insiders, us and them, etc., over the centuries. Not sure if I'm articulating that thought super well, but the lens of the book is one I'd like to see more about, particularly in ancient southwest Asia.
How far did Abraham pitch his tent? ⛺ Was it folded up, or not? Did he have insurance, in case he harmed someone!? These are very important and profound questions. 🤔
Dogma is personally owned by Harvey Weinstein, which means Kevin Smith isn't involved in the negotiations to get it on streaming services. Kevin has suggested it might be being held hostage, he has tried to buy the rights back but nothing came of it. Anyways, best you can do is to get a downloaded version or an actual physical DVD. Maybe even a VHS.
14:45 „Before they had gone to bed, all the men of the city of Sodom, both young and old, surrounded the house.“ Genesis 19:4 It does not say „men“ came but „enosh“ which is a collective term for mortals. Why do you think it was only men ?
Could the “Pillar of Salt” have some reference to the temple Temple pillars Salt covenant Could it be a representation of the “Asherah leaving the temple” theme? Those towns were sooooo wicked, the ONE good man and his “Asherah” left I understand the geographical location with pillars of salt reference But could it be a two-fold reference?
I always saw the purpose of the story of Lot’s wife, turning into a pillar of salt, to emphasize obedience as the running theme of the Bible. The Bible has commandments and various rules but figures in the Bible who are major players seem to skate by violating these commandments and don’t seem very “righteous” but whenever there are instances of disobedience or questioning god, there is immediate consequence that is inappropriate to the offense.
It only goes down to 10, and then Abraham stops there This is one of the places that Judaism draws from for the idea of a minyan, a congregation According to Judaism, there were 5 cities, such is the reason Abraham started at 50, 10 per city......and widdled down to 10, for, 1 congregation for 5 cities
The idea that it stopped is a typical Dan logical fallacy to get away with claiming that perhaps the biblical authors could have been okay with a perverse sexual orientation
@@tsemayekekema2918Dan isn't the only one that agrees that the text, understood in its original context, doesn't condemn homosexuality as we understand it. This is surprising, because the Bible rarely shys away from declaring that its god desires immoral behavior. This means that when Christians are homophobic, they are homophobic because they want to be and not because their holy book is garbage.
@@Kyeudo many scholars don't argue with him. More importantly, many of the scholars who agree with him lack the intuitive understanding of the way pre-20th century minds worked, as they only grew up in late-20th century Western society. Scholarship doesn't remove all blindspots. His theory depends on verifiably wrong assumptions such as: (1) sexual penetration not connoting dominance in modern times (social media language used by real modern people prove that wrong). (2) The laughably wrong assumption that ancient homoerotic relationships were not mostly loving & mostly consensual - this is based on the fallacy of projecting modern values of consent onto an ancient discussion; specifically, he assumes the laughable modern idea that dominance & extreme hierarchy in sexual relationships was ever viewed as mutually exclusive with mutual love & desire on the part of the receptive partner (receptive partners even in the so-called "abusive" situations usually longed for it even in ancient times). (4) He has a gross misunderstanding of what ancient people meant by the word "abuse" that was regularly used by ancient writers to describe homoerotic activity-ancient people defined "abuse" literally as "deviance from heteronormativity", NOT lack of consent; that's a modern western definition that he & some biblical scholars incompetently project onto ancient texts that use the word abuse in homosexual contexts (even masturbation used to be called "self-abuse" by 19th century speakers who regarded it as wrong). (5) Due to the fact that he is not a specialist in Greco-Roman CLASSICS & latin (he's really an ancient near eastern anyiquity)-he's ignorant of the fact that Greco roman physicians recognized homoerotic orientation in the modern sense & classified it as mental illness. This is why Gnostic Informant rightly says he should stick to the HEBREW bible-which is his only real supreme expertise
@@Kyeudo to be clear about debunking a myth peddled by some scholars-almost no receptive partners in ancient homoerotic relationships would have agreed with the idea that they are "victims". Modern classification of power imbalance in sexual activity as implying that the lesser partner is a "victim" is what is projected onto the mind of the biblical writers by Dr Mclellan. The biblical writers-who commanded & assumed subordination of wives-would not have agreed that inequality is what made a one-sided status of same-sex penetrator & receptor as wrong. In fact, modern ideas of equality & so-called "non-abusive" partnership would have been regarded as DOUBLY abomination - a fortiori
@@tsemayekekema2918 All you are telling me is that you don't listen to what Dan or other scholars say. The problem wasn't the one sided relationship. The problem was a one sided relationship where the participants are supposed to be social equals. Victimhood doesn't enter into the equation.
Informative and entertaining. As always. You two do a great Bob and Ray. BUT I am missing something. "Hospitality to strangers" is an ideal in "this time period". In the story of Lot this ideal of the duties and responsibilities to the stranger/"guest" trumps all other considerations. I don't get it. The "explanation" in Ezekiel does not cut it. To say that the story of Lot is about the lack of a safety net in Sodom is way too much of a stretch for me. As rationalizations go, it is pathetic. We live in the age of "stranger/danger". I can't get my head around the idea that there was a time when hospitality to strangers was not just "nice" but a absolute requirement. Really? Please splain this to me.
It makes sense in a world that wasn't as individualistic as ours! However, this historical fact gets abused by those who want to pretend as if the author of the story didn't regard homosexuality as evil in & of itself. The greatest form of inhospitality is to allow your guest fall victim of people with a sexual orientation that all Israeliltes of the biblical period regarded as perverse. The fact that they didn't have the modern lingo of sexual orientation is irrelevant to the fact that the very concept of homoeroticism in all its forms was considered evil by Jews!!
@@tsemayekekema2918 Good point. Lot's choice as the lesser of evils. I can buy that. But would offering up his daughters for gang rape have been considered evil? At this time and in this place? Or were his daugters his property to do with as he pleased?
@@delhattoncertainly at a later point in 2nd Temple Judaism, it was considered evil for a man to ever touch or shake hands with a female that wasn't his sister or wife-as any slightest mental thought of sexual excitation asides officially married spouses was considered evil. Jesus' saying about lustful thoughts being sinful represented the Jewish consensus from the Hasmonean period henceforth (and probably long before). Despite the uniquely modern prejudice against "child brides", BOTH raping and even having a mental "crush" on a female you weren't married to were considered equally evil by Hellenistic Jews. While modern liberals classify sexual morality based on CONSENT, Late-Second Temple Jews unanimously classified sexual morality based on MARRIAGE-they would therefore classify talking to a prostitute to be as evil as rape, as they both fell under the same equal category of extra-marital sin. The only difference would be that the rape victim could have the benefit of doubt of that she wasn't a willing partner in the evil sin of non-marital sex. That summarizes how Jews of say 250 BC would have viewed the story of Lot & his daughters
I was going to wait to comment until i completed the video. I think the Abrahamic story is a story from the old babylonian/Kassite system. - The god of Abram was not Yahweh, but El the head of the Canaanite pantheon. I can basically argue that Abraham was against Sodom because it was a city, but notice very carefully one city Abram is not against, Shalim, because the official of that city is reverent to the El, the most high, this is obviously a reference to the old system of patronage established by the Sumerians along the Euphates and maintained by the Akkadians. Shalim is the bastard son between El and some canaanite woman. So Shalim is not a substrate god, but a babylonian god. I should point out that while we dont kniw how old trading directly into the s. levant from sumer/akkad is the egyptians note the name of a small town, likely the seat of Judah, Beth Lahmu, the guardian of Enki. And so this is deep into mesopotamian culture. So we can look at Jerusalem, a town devoted to El's son and an official devoted to El and Abram is in good accord. Lets also look at the Abrams sons, do not marry from these locals, but go back to Ur/Haran to get wives, once again there is this slur against the substrate culture in favor of mesopotamian culture. I propose the following explanation for these stories and they may have nothing to do with AAbram, or they might, depends on when (if) the Avbram figure lived. One city we know was destroyed in the Akkadian/Sumerian period, Ai, but others like Jericho (on the Jordan jus north of the dead sea). And so we need a reason why these were destroyed, often centuries after the fact. Here is what I think the core argument comes from and how it was executed. In the 4th millenium Sumer was having trouble with Middle Euphratean peoples as it wanted to trade up the Euphrates and with Cyprus. They built protoMari, but it was destroyed. One local people we know, the followers of Anah (Anat) and the other the Mar.Tu. After the flood they reestablished Mari and ~4.5 millenium ago attacked up the Euphrates and devolped an alliance with substrate Eblite culture and cooperative Canaanite cities. In the scheme of trade with Egypt the coastal areas were swampy and trade east of Bakaa afforded a watchful eye on trade going to the head waters of the Jordan river. The priests (Angels) of El could watch over Euphratean trade and north south trade from the Shaddu. Lets think about this, what do they need to trade with Egypt. There are two cities, Jericho, this immensely old city with their exotic gods, Hazor and "Ai". They, Akkad/Sumer have noone there. But wait isn't Avram a pioneer? Judah, loyal to the god Yah according to the Yahwist before Exidus 6:3 called on the name of Yahweh. To the eblaites Ea and Yahu are the same, and the guardian of Enki is the patron god of bethlehem. So, ahah, we have a scraggly group of people loyal to Euphratean gods. What about shamgar, hes of Anath, another Euphratean god. Ok, here is a Sodom and Gomorrah in a nut shell. IMO. Mesopotamians: " Hey guys you want to be trading posts on our trade routes to Egypt" Some canaanite citites "Lets say yes, but steal their trade goods and kill them, they have a big army but they will be gone soon, well show them" Later Mesopotamians "That didn't work, lets send out some pioneers and set up some trading posts, get those priest and acolytes of El to spy on the cities" Some canaanite cities "Hey these guys are spies lets kill them" Mesopotamians "Priests of El send your messengers to our trading partners and outposts lets raise an army. " So the story has these cryptic layers. First Babel is not the oldest city, this flips between eridu and "Erech" So that story implies that israelite knowledge only goes as far back as babylon, and old babylon was not a tower of babel. But between Akkad and Israel we have Gutians, Sumer again, Babylon, Hittites, Kassites, post-Hyxsos Egypt/Assyria, Early LBAC. The second problem is that no evidence ever that Israel could read or write akkadian cuneiform. And so i think that Abrahamic period stories were a set of lessons concerning mores of loyalist to El. Trade is good, those who obstruct trade or harass traders are bad. Does El of the most high places hate cities? Why does El not have a temple? Is the tabernacle a temple or satellite thereof, one could argue that Els temple is in Uruk, but his functionaries exist in high remote places overlooking trade. The functionary sites are mobile, there are at least three sites we know where functionaries of El pitched their tents. Why, The El priesthoods function is to observe trade and watch over sojourners and wanderers, not at the detriment of cities but for their benefit. When the Mari kings invaded Sumer they did not destroy the city gods, they placed the gods under an overarching pantheon, those that cooperated were protected, but those that defied were destroyed. We have to look specifically at the details of the story and its functionaries - Messengers, probably a priest of El and two acolytes, checking the state of the system - Abram, a trader/shepherd familiar with both Egypt and mesopotamia, understands the system. Shepherds as part of the system - Melchizedek, in a city of the system loyal to the local god, but also the overarching god El - Amelikites (Some canaanites) and Egyptians, peoples exterior to the system, cannot be trusted. Sodom, Gommorah, Lot and his family are just story props, the issue if you look at events before story of lot is how to integrate the belief system into the cultural system of trade such that trading cities are not at odds with each other. Think about Abram, we see the bublical loyalist, but what is he. From Ur/Haran. He has a small militia of shepherds (common defense), they produce a product, wool, milk and meat. That product is traded for grain, metal objects, clothing. He is trading with cities. Was he a sustinace farmer in Ur? No. Did he go out of his way to avoid Egypt? No. Was period Israel (S. Canaan) unpopulated? No, A modified law of Hammurabi was found in Hazor, the cities had people writing akkadian cuneiform at the time Abram lived. What we have in the Abramic stories are "Us" versus "Them" discriminators. What needs to be done is place them correctly on the people group. "Them" - Canaanites, Egyptians, Arabians "Us" - From Haran (deity Suen/Nanna) and Ur (same gods) from Sumer (High gods Anu/Enki/Enlil) - syncresis El, Yahu. "Them" - who abuse travelers "Us" - travelers and traders. "Them" - hamites, other sons of Noah "Us" - Semites (Akkad, NW semitic languages, language of cooperators) , essentially the sanctioned sons of Akkad. I think this is a more refined method of defining what aspect of badness the story of "Sodom and Gomorrah" the original story is attacking.
So a couple more issues Agree with the "pillar of salt", but my sort of Elohimic apologetic here is the following, when the bible repeats something, it generally means there's an emphesis. Don't look back. Once Jericho is destroyed dont rebuild it, once Ai is destroyed don't rebuild this. Don't look back, don't be nostalgic for the cultures that the priest of El formulated to destroy. Thats what I think the story is. Lot is now afraid, what other cities god has in store for destruction. Of course this is a tale. but think about this, when the Assyrians destroyed the northern kingdom, those that fled and lived in caves, surrounded by potential enemies everywhere (including the Judeans) how might they not felt their world had come to end. Marry the girl off to a sodomite and they will be destroyed, try to find a righteous man and risk being killed by him. Again, from near Eastern Culture, from the perspective of the culture Israel was immersed in from the Akkadian to the Late Assyrian. Ishtar was a revered goddess. The grandchildren of Noah were coupling. Cousins marry cousins all the time in the near east. As my colleage told me if it came between marrying your sister and someone outside your village, of course you would marry your sister. In the ANE, Ishtar was the Granddaughter of Enlil (equivilent to the all powerful in Yahweh). She begins one story by polishing her genetalia. She is going to her great uncles house, for she does not have enough power and she wants some of his wisdom. Enki sees her coming and has some of his most potent beer made up, hes going to drink her under the table, because no man or god can resist Ishtar (later Gilgamesh figures out his fate and does resist, she kills his friend), but Ishtar drinks him under the table and steals the Mes, and runs off to Uruk. Later Ishtar wonders why she does not have a thrown as grand as her greatgrandfathers, El (il ilu, An). So once again, Ishtar takes her seductive form into her grandfathers house, we dont kniw what happens but she walks away with the thrown. In the story of Tamar and Judah, Judah promised Tamar a functional husband, which in the end, he could not deliver, instead she recieved a boy. Tamar then goes to a place near a local temple (maybe to Anat or Astarte/Ishtar) and dresses up like a temple prostitute. Judah then pays to have sex with the women, Tamar then leverages her pregnancy and the items he gave her to basically take the position as his first concubine. What these stories all have in common. Istar - the male gods are depriving her of power. Tamar - the sons of Judah are denying her the birthright of her sons. lot's Daughter - Lot is denying them opportunity to find husbands, hes getting old and may die. Ishtar - use the power of seduction to lift powers for herself (She does well, by Akkad she is the most powerful god) Tamar - use the reverence for temple prostitutes and Judah's lustful nature to get a birthright for her sons. Lot's daughters - Use alcohol and a scheme to get themselves pregnant by their insular father. We see form these that the feminine is betrayed by men, she finds a weakness in their target male, then exploits that weakness to get what she deserves. In the Ishtar and the Mes story, Enki is wise, but his trickery and his weakness to alcohol are his downfall. In the Judah story judah conspiracy to deny Tamar a birthright and his weakness to women is part of his later shame. In the lot story, the belief that by running to a cave and getting drunk gets rid of the woes in the world results in the unthinkable. There is a substrate story in the tale of Lot as how women respond when men deny them something they deserve by right, either by birth or by the the ability to give birth. This may reflect back to the time when there was great reverence for the womans body to create as a metaphor for the mother earth.
Wait doesn't the host send out his daughter as well with the guys concubine? Only to have the daughter die and the concubine die the next morning? Then the guy chops her up and sends her to the 12 tribes of Israel
I hope I remember Dan, right, and I understood the question. There are 2 stories in the bible where men try to SA angels. One is the more popular Sodom and Gomorrah, which involves two daughters. Despite being offered, the men leave them alone. The concubine is the second story. She was offered and taken, and then her master cut her up and mailed her around.
@parkerplumer6266 Yeah I know but I'm pretty sure the guy also sends out his daughter and she dies during the night. The concubine dies the next morning on the steps.
Pretty sure Occam’s razor would say that the story was just an ancient myth that never actually happened. Whatever the truth is, meteor hitting earth is definitely not the simplest possibility.
@@danielbeecher8053 Check out the science papers of Tall al-Hammam, melted ground and people by very high temperatures, superbolide airburst could be the only causation. Maybe, it was an idiom, 'turned into salt', really meant 'she was toast', dead and salted for preservation.
@@danielbeecher8053 There was actually a Christian archeologist group that "found" Sodom destroyed by meteors. They later admitted they made it all up lol
The story of Lot's wife is yet another of the stories in Genesis that portrays women as disobedient or deceitful (in general, "Bad news"). The fact that she isn't even named just adds to the disrespect.
She turned to salt because she looked back at her sins but when one repents you shouldn’t look back but move forward. It’s the shin that holds you back. Salt is used because she doesn’t need to be tossed out unless she looses her savor. It’s probably metaphorical but hey that’s what the I was told in a vision. Ok kidding about the vision but …
You guys should have a part of the show called "Tel Dan" (Tell Dan) where you address audience questions and comments.
Perfect use of the Dual-Dan Dynamic
His followers could be called Danites.
The BEST Sunday school lessons ever, any day of the week - and I no longer attend traditional religious meetings. Thanks, keep it up guys!
Good for you. You now follow the communistic thought on assembling for religious purposes.
Active latter-day-saint here. Love these discussions. Keep it up!
Well, that's a Lot to take in.. Sorry. Great episode!
The issue of provenance doesn't apply just to the forgery cases but also to the illegal and amateur archaeology.
I’ve always struggled with this story in the same manner I struggled with Eve’s eternal punishment for momentary lapses / weaknesses. This makes so much sense now… Thank you! I’m loving this channel!
This is the best event of the week!! I hope Dr McClellan accepts to come to our podcast soon!!
The first play on Biblical Hebrew and English words that I have ever heard on RUclips: "to Ish his own." So one Dan does the color commentary, and the other Dan does the scholarship. I like it!
I'm really really enjoying this podcast, a niche subject I've always found fascinating. With Love from London! 🖤
Im also from London and also love this podcast! Mammoth love from GB! 🎉
Dogma (the movie Dan(s) talked about) is free on RUclips courtesy of Kevin Smith. One of my all time favorite movies.
The first 3 episodes have been great. The two of you have a great rapport, and it makes the information flow so easily. I'm so grateful that you guys decided to start this channel. Such great information. Keep up the excellent work.
Thanks for getting me addicted to a new podcast... I listened to Dan Beecher on Thank God I'm Atheist for awhile (I'm also a UT dwelling exMo), but had never seen him until now, and he looks EXACTLY like what I pictured... ANYWAY, I'm so excited for more. This is my new favorite podcast!!!
I love Dan’s incredulity. I expect him to shout, “You can’t make this stuff up!”
I love this duo. good mix of personality and respect to each other.
This show is amazing! So interesting so scholarly and also funny. I have always liked religious studies but not in a ‘dogmatic’ way
The humor in this show is perfect.
Loved this episode (yes, I watch at hyperspeed). I think those of us who have studied the pentateuchal scholarship for _years_ have likely forgotten just how incredibly confusing so much of this is for folks diving in for the first time. This stuff is wild.
7:54 to be fair, the Greek word angelos (άγγελος) , which comes to us as angel means messenger as well, and still has that sort of meaning in the modern word evangelist (one with a good message).
Loving these videos! Thank you. Eye opening as a former believer.
It says Zoar is a "Mitzar" which comes from a root "Tza'ar" or "sorrow", so the town is "pitiful". I think it's meant to be abandoned, a derelict ghost town.
Hey Dr. McClellan, hope you know that your discussions are a blessing to me even though I'm still a Christian. It's great to be able to hear your perspectives and learn from you (for free!). Appreciate your calm and non-antagonistic approach.
I just picked up Dever's book "Beyond the Text." What's a good book/resource on the dating process and scholarship about the formation, editing, and redactions of the OT?
That’s a pretty complex discussion, but I’d start with a good introduction, like John Collins’ An Introduction to the Hebrew Bible. I think it’s in a third edition.
@@maklelan Thanks so much sir! Just put in an order.
On topic, have you seen the videos of the supposed Sodom and Gomorrah site littered with"sulfur balls" located at Bab Edh-Dhra? I've seen people pick them up and burn them. It's been used as a way to prove the historicity of the story.
Do we know how many people were actually in Sodom, 100, 200, 1,000? Listening to the story is fascinating but i brings up tons of questions as its being told.
You two are “knocking it out of the ballpark!” Keep it up my brothers.
What are your thoughts on the JST (Joseph Smith Translation) of Genesis 19:9-15 changing Lot's offer of his daughters to be him not offering them?
Informative and entertaining. Great show!
My guess is the hardest forgeries to detect would be ones made closer to the date of the actual artifact.
I'm glad its been many years ago that I was a fundamentalist Christian😂😂😂
I'm reading David Frye's Walls: A History of Civilization in Blood and Brick currently. The divide between city-dwellers and nomadic shepherds that develops is really fascinating and it's interesting to see where that social and cultural divide also crosses over in religion - because everything was intertwined in society at that point. And it's interesting to look at how that shifts and develops perceptions of outsiders and insiders, us and them, etc., over the centuries. Not sure if I'm articulating that thought super well, but the lens of the book is one I'd like to see more about, particularly in ancient southwest Asia.
Someone has to make that Pawnstars meme. Best I can do is 10
How far did Abraham pitch his tent? ⛺ Was it folded up, or not? Did he have insurance, in case he harmed someone!? These are very important and profound questions. 🤔
ACHCHCHGHGH YES 4 MORE HOURS OF DAN'S CONTENT
I always love your insight.
Dogma is personally owned by Harvey Weinstein, which means Kevin Smith isn't involved in the negotiations to get it on streaming services. Kevin has suggested it might be being held hostage, he has tried to buy the rights back but nothing came of it. Anyways, best you can do is to get a downloaded version or an actual physical DVD. Maybe even a VHS.
So, apparently, Lot was too drunk to recognize his daughters, but could perform sexually?😂
It’s dark in tents. No flashlights. Can’t bring flames into a tent.
I’m just glad to learn how much of the Bible is just fables, and not actual history or fact.
14:45
„Before they had gone to bed, all the men of the city of Sodom, both young and old, surrounded the house.“
Genesis 19:4
It does not say „men“ came but „enosh“ which is a collective term for mortals.
Why do you think it was only men ?
Could the “Pillar of Salt” have some reference to the temple
Temple pillars
Salt covenant
Could it be a representation of the “Asherah leaving the temple” theme? Those towns were sooooo wicked, the ONE good man and his “Asherah” left
I understand the geographical location with pillars of salt reference
But could it be a two-fold reference?
Random, unimportant comment, but everytime i hear the word provenance...my fan-brain jumps right to SPN.
I equate provenance with "chain of custody"...you have to be able to verify that chain of custody in order to even consider it genuine in any context.
It'd be helpful for you to provide Amazon links for recommended books above in Show More. Thanks.
✌️
I always saw the purpose of the story of Lot’s wife, turning into a pillar of salt, to emphasize obedience as the running theme of the Bible. The Bible has commandments and various rules but figures in the Bible who are major players seem to skate by violating these commandments and don’t seem very “righteous” but whenever there are instances of disobedience or questioning god, there is immediate consequence that is inappropriate to the offense.
Considering his linage, did Lot recognize them as Angles?
And you're sure it's not just a city in Rhode Island?
It only goes down to 10, and then Abraham stops there
This is one of the places that Judaism draws from for the idea of a minyan, a congregation
According to Judaism, there were 5 cities, such is the reason Abraham started at 50, 10 per city......and widdled down to 10, for, 1 congregation for 5 cities
Mounting male on male is dominance behaviour. How late in the evolution of people did that stop? Or did it?
The idea that it stopped is a typical Dan logical fallacy to get away with claiming that perhaps the biblical authors could have been okay with a perverse sexual orientation
@@tsemayekekema2918Dan isn't the only one that agrees that the text, understood in its original context, doesn't condemn homosexuality as we understand it.
This is surprising, because the Bible rarely shys away from declaring that its god desires immoral behavior. This means that when Christians are homophobic, they are homophobic because they want to be and not because their holy book is garbage.
@@Kyeudo many scholars don't argue with him. More importantly, many of the scholars who agree with him lack the intuitive understanding of the way pre-20th century minds worked, as they only grew up in late-20th century Western society. Scholarship doesn't remove all blindspots.
His theory depends on verifiably wrong assumptions such as: (1) sexual penetration not connoting dominance in modern times (social media language used by real modern people prove that wrong). (2) The laughably wrong assumption that ancient homoerotic relationships were not mostly loving & mostly consensual - this is based on the fallacy of projecting modern values of consent onto an ancient discussion; specifically, he assumes the laughable modern idea that dominance & extreme hierarchy in sexual relationships was ever viewed as mutually exclusive with mutual love & desire on the part of the receptive partner (receptive partners even in the so-called "abusive" situations usually longed for it even in ancient times).
(4) He has a gross misunderstanding of what ancient people meant by the word "abuse" that was regularly used by ancient writers to describe homoerotic activity-ancient people defined "abuse" literally as "deviance from heteronormativity", NOT lack of consent; that's a modern western definition that he & some biblical scholars incompetently project onto ancient texts that use the word abuse in homosexual contexts (even masturbation used to be called "self-abuse" by 19th century speakers who regarded it as wrong).
(5) Due to the fact that he is not a specialist in Greco-Roman CLASSICS & latin (he's really an ancient near eastern anyiquity)-he's ignorant of the fact that Greco roman physicians recognized homoerotic orientation in the modern sense & classified it as mental illness. This is why Gnostic Informant rightly says he should stick to the HEBREW bible-which is his only real supreme expertise
@@Kyeudo to be clear about debunking a myth peddled by some scholars-almost no receptive partners in ancient homoerotic relationships would have agreed with the idea that they are "victims". Modern classification of power imbalance in sexual activity as implying that the lesser partner is a "victim" is what is projected onto the mind of the biblical writers by Dr Mclellan. The biblical writers-who commanded & assumed subordination of wives-would not have agreed that inequality is what made a one-sided status of same-sex penetrator & receptor as wrong. In fact, modern ideas of equality & so-called "non-abusive" partnership would have been regarded as DOUBLY abomination - a fortiori
@@tsemayekekema2918
All you are telling me is that you don't listen to what Dan or other scholars say. The problem wasn't the one sided relationship. The problem was a one sided relationship where the participants are supposed to be social equals. Victimhood doesn't enter into the equation.
To eesh their own.....rofl
Informative and entertaining. As always. You two do a great Bob and Ray.
BUT
I am missing something.
"Hospitality to strangers" is an ideal in "this time period". In the story of Lot this ideal of the duties and responsibilities to the stranger/"guest" trumps all other considerations.
I don't get it.
The "explanation" in Ezekiel does not cut it. To say that the story of Lot is about the lack of a safety net in Sodom is way too much of a stretch for me. As rationalizations go, it is pathetic.
We live in the age of "stranger/danger". I can't get my head around the idea that there was a time when hospitality to strangers was not just "nice" but a absolute requirement.
Really?
Please splain this to me.
It makes sense in a world that wasn't as individualistic as ours! However, this historical fact gets abused by those who want to pretend as if the author of the story didn't regard homosexuality as evil in & of itself.
The greatest form of inhospitality is to allow your guest fall victim of people with a sexual orientation that all Israeliltes of the biblical period regarded as perverse. The fact that they didn't have the modern lingo of sexual orientation is irrelevant to the fact that the very concept of homoeroticism in all its forms was considered evil by Jews!!
a stranger in such a setting would have been vetted as not being some armed robber.
@@tsemayekekema2918 Good point. Lot's choice as the lesser of evils. I can buy that. But would offering up his daughters for gang rape have been considered evil? At this time and in this place? Or were his daugters his property to do with as he pleased?
@@delhatton daughters were the property of men before this gender equality madness started on the 20th century
@@delhattoncertainly at a later point in 2nd Temple Judaism, it was considered evil for a man to ever touch or shake hands with a female that wasn't his sister or wife-as any slightest mental thought of sexual excitation asides officially married spouses was considered evil. Jesus' saying about lustful thoughts being sinful represented the Jewish consensus from the Hasmonean period henceforth (and probably long before). Despite the uniquely modern prejudice against "child brides", BOTH raping and even having a mental "crush" on a female you weren't married to were considered equally evil by Hellenistic Jews. While modern liberals classify sexual morality based on CONSENT, Late-Second Temple Jews unanimously classified sexual morality based on MARRIAGE-they would therefore classify talking to a prostitute to be as evil as rape, as they both fell under the same equal category of extra-marital sin. The only difference would be that the rape victim could have the benefit of doubt of that she wasn't a willing partner in the evil sin of non-marital sex.
That summarizes how Jews of say 250 BC would have viewed the story of Lot & his daughters
I saw an interesting article that postulates this story is loosely based on an actual ancient meteorite strike that destroyed a city.
I was going to wait to comment until i completed the video.
I think the Abrahamic story is a story from the old babylonian/Kassite system.
- The god of Abram was not Yahweh, but El the head of the Canaanite pantheon.
I can basically argue that Abraham was against Sodom because it was a city, but notice very carefully one city Abram is not against, Shalim, because the official of that city is reverent to the El, the most high, this is obviously a reference to the old system of patronage established by the Sumerians along the Euphates and maintained by the Akkadians. Shalim is the bastard son between El and some canaanite woman. So Shalim is not a substrate god, but a babylonian god. I should point out that while we dont kniw how old trading directly into the s. levant from sumer/akkad is the egyptians note the name of a small town, likely the seat of Judah, Beth Lahmu, the guardian of Enki. And so this is deep into mesopotamian culture. So we can look at Jerusalem, a town devoted to El's son and an official devoted to El and Abram is in good accord.
Lets also look at the Abrams sons, do not marry from these locals, but go back to Ur/Haran to get wives, once again there is this slur against the substrate culture in favor of mesopotamian culture.
I propose the following explanation for these stories and they may have nothing to do with AAbram, or they might, depends on when (if) the Avbram figure lived.
One city we know was destroyed in the Akkadian/Sumerian period, Ai, but others like Jericho (on the Jordan jus north of the dead sea). And so we need a reason why these were destroyed, often centuries after the fact.
Here is what I think the core argument comes from and how it was executed. In the 4th millenium Sumer was having trouble with Middle Euphratean peoples as it wanted to trade up the Euphrates and with Cyprus. They built protoMari, but it was destroyed. One local people we know, the followers of Anah (Anat) and the other the Mar.Tu. After the flood they reestablished Mari and ~4.5 millenium ago attacked up the Euphrates and devolped an alliance with substrate Eblite culture and cooperative Canaanite cities. In the scheme of trade with Egypt the coastal areas were swampy and trade east of Bakaa afforded a watchful eye on trade going to the head waters of the Jordan river. The priests (Angels) of El could watch over Euphratean trade and north south trade from the Shaddu.
Lets think about this, what do they need to trade with Egypt. There are two cities, Jericho, this immensely old city with their exotic gods, Hazor and "Ai". They, Akkad/Sumer have noone there. But wait isn't Avram a pioneer? Judah, loyal to the god Yah according to the Yahwist before Exidus 6:3 called on the name of Yahweh. To the eblaites Ea and Yahu are the same, and the guardian of Enki is the patron god of bethlehem. So, ahah, we have a scraggly group of people loyal to Euphratean gods. What about shamgar, hes of Anath, another Euphratean god.
Ok, here is a Sodom and Gomorrah in a nut shell. IMO.
Mesopotamians: " Hey guys you want to be trading posts on our trade routes to Egypt"
Some canaanite citites "Lets say yes, but steal their trade goods and kill them, they have a big army but they will be gone soon, well show them"
Later
Mesopotamians "That didn't work, lets send out some pioneers and set up some trading posts, get those priest and acolytes of El to spy on the cities"
Some canaanite cities "Hey these guys are spies lets kill them"
Mesopotamians "Priests of El send your messengers to our trading partners and outposts lets raise an army. "
So the story has these cryptic layers. First Babel is not the oldest city, this flips between eridu and "Erech" So that story implies that israelite knowledge only goes as far back as babylon, and old babylon was not a tower of babel. But between Akkad and Israel we have Gutians, Sumer again, Babylon, Hittites, Kassites, post-Hyxsos Egypt/Assyria, Early LBAC.
The second problem is that no evidence ever that Israel could read or write akkadian cuneiform.
And so i think that Abrahamic period stories were a set of lessons concerning mores of loyalist to El. Trade is good, those who obstruct trade or harass traders are bad.
Does El of the most high places hate cities? Why does El not have a temple? Is the tabernacle a temple or satellite thereof, one could argue that Els temple is in Uruk, but his functionaries exist in high remote places overlooking trade. The functionary sites are mobile, there are at least three sites we know where functionaries of El pitched their tents. Why, The El priesthoods function is to observe trade and watch over sojourners and wanderers, not at the detriment of cities but for their benefit. When the Mari kings invaded Sumer they did not destroy the city gods, they placed the gods under an overarching pantheon, those that cooperated were protected, but those that defied were destroyed.
We have to look specifically at the details of the story and its functionaries
- Messengers, probably a priest of El and two acolytes, checking the state of the system
- Abram, a trader/shepherd familiar with both Egypt and mesopotamia, understands the system. Shepherds as part of the system
- Melchizedek, in a city of the system loyal to the local god, but also the overarching god El
- Amelikites (Some canaanites) and Egyptians, peoples exterior to the system, cannot be trusted.
Sodom, Gommorah, Lot and his family are just story props, the issue if you look at events before story of lot is how to integrate the belief system into the cultural system of trade such that trading cities are not at odds with each other.
Think about Abram, we see the bublical loyalist, but what is he. From Ur/Haran. He has a small militia of shepherds (common defense), they produce a product, wool, milk and meat. That product is traded for grain, metal objects, clothing. He is trading with cities. Was he a sustinace farmer in Ur? No. Did he go out of his way to avoid Egypt? No. Was period Israel (S. Canaan) unpopulated? No, A modified law of Hammurabi was found in Hazor, the cities had people writing akkadian cuneiform at the time Abram lived.
What we have in the Abramic stories are "Us" versus "Them" discriminators.
What needs to be done is place them correctly on the people group.
"Them" - Canaanites, Egyptians, Arabians
"Us" - From Haran (deity Suen/Nanna) and Ur (same gods) from Sumer (High gods Anu/Enki/Enlil) - syncresis El, Yahu.
"Them" - who abuse travelers
"Us" - travelers and traders.
"Them" - hamites, other sons of Noah
"Us" - Semites (Akkad, NW semitic languages, language of cooperators) , essentially the sanctioned sons of Akkad.
I think this is a more refined method of defining what aspect of badness the story of "Sodom and Gomorrah" the original story is attacking.
So a couple more issues
Agree with the "pillar of salt", but my sort of Elohimic apologetic here is the following, when the bible repeats something, it generally means there's an emphesis. Don't look back.
Once Jericho is destroyed dont rebuild it, once Ai is destroyed don't rebuild this. Don't look back, don't be nostalgic for the cultures that the priest of El formulated to destroy. Thats what I think the story is. Lot is now afraid, what other cities god has in store for destruction. Of course this is a tale. but think about this, when the Assyrians destroyed the northern kingdom, those that fled and lived in caves, surrounded by potential enemies everywhere (including the Judeans) how might they not felt their world had come to end. Marry the girl off to a sodomite and they will be destroyed, try to find a righteous man and risk being killed by him.
Again, from near Eastern Culture, from the perspective of the culture Israel was immersed in from the Akkadian to the Late Assyrian. Ishtar was a revered goddess. The grandchildren of Noah were coupling. Cousins marry cousins all the time in the near east. As my colleage told me if it came between marrying your sister and someone outside your village, of course you would marry your sister.
In the ANE, Ishtar was the Granddaughter of Enlil (equivilent to the all powerful in Yahweh). She begins one story by polishing her genetalia. She is going to her great uncles house, for she does not have enough power and she wants some of his wisdom. Enki sees her coming and has some of his most potent beer made up, hes going to drink her under the table, because no man or god can resist Ishtar (later Gilgamesh figures out his fate and does resist, she kills his friend), but Ishtar drinks him under the table and steals the Mes, and runs off to Uruk.
Later Ishtar wonders why she does not have a thrown as grand as her greatgrandfathers, El (il ilu, An). So once again, Ishtar takes her seductive form into her grandfathers house, we dont kniw what happens but she walks away with the thrown.
In the story of Tamar and Judah, Judah promised Tamar a functional husband, which in the end, he could not deliver, instead she recieved a boy. Tamar then goes to a place near a local temple (maybe to Anat or Astarte/Ishtar) and dresses up like a temple prostitute. Judah then pays to have sex with the women, Tamar then leverages her pregnancy and the items he gave her to basically take the position as his first concubine.
What these stories all have in common.
Istar - the male gods are depriving her of power.
Tamar - the sons of Judah are denying her the birthright of her sons.
lot's Daughter - Lot is denying them opportunity to find husbands, hes getting old and may die.
Ishtar - use the power of seduction to lift powers for herself (She does well, by Akkad she is the most powerful god)
Tamar - use the reverence for temple prostitutes and Judah's lustful nature to get a birthright for her sons.
Lot's daughters - Use alcohol and a scheme to get themselves pregnant by their insular father.
We see form these that the feminine is betrayed by men, she finds a weakness in their target male, then exploits that weakness to get what she deserves. In the Ishtar and the Mes story, Enki is wise, but his trickery and his weakness to alcohol are his downfall. In the Judah story judah conspiracy to deny Tamar a birthright and his weakness to women is part of his later shame. In the lot story, the belief that by running to a cave and getting drunk gets rid of the woes in the world results in the unthinkable.
There is a substrate story in the tale of Lot as how women respond when men deny them something they deserve by right, either by birth or by the the ability to give birth. This may reflect back to the time when there was great reverence for the womans body to create as a metaphor for the mother earth.
I’m old…. I’m pretty sure that if some girl gets me drunk….. I won’t be able to make a baby….😅😅😅😅
Provenance - prŏv′ə-nəns.
Wait doesn't the host send out his daughter as well with the guys concubine? Only to have the daughter die and the concubine die the next morning? Then the guy chops her up and sends her to the 12 tribes of Israel
I hope I remember Dan, right, and I understood the question. There are 2 stories in the bible where men try to SA angels. One is the more popular Sodom and Gomorrah, which involves two daughters. Despite being offered, the men leave them alone. The concubine is the second story. She was offered and taken, and then her master cut her up and mailed her around.
@parkerplumer6266 Yeah I know but I'm pretty sure the guy also sends out his daughter and she dies during the night. The concubine dies the next morning on the steps.
Think about this, when God destroyed the city, modern interpretation maybe that it was meteorites hitting the city. Fire and brimstone is Ocams Razor.
Pretty sure Occam’s razor would say that the story was just an ancient myth that never actually happened. Whatever the truth is, meteor hitting earth is definitely not the simplest possibility.
@@danielbeecher8053 Check out the science papers of Tall al-Hammam, melted ground and people by very high temperatures, superbolide airburst could be the only causation. Maybe, it was an idiom, 'turned into salt', really meant 'she was toast', dead and salted for preservation.
@@danielbeecher8053 There was actually a Christian archeologist group that "found" Sodom destroyed by meteors. They later admitted they made it all up lol
I guess you might say Biblical Archaeology Review.... *set the BAR* for archaeological news! 😀
.....I'll see myself out >.>
God knew were they were in the garden he was being polite.
The story of Lot's wife is yet another of the stories in Genesis that portrays women as disobedient or deceitful (in general, "Bad news"). The fact that she isn't even named just adds to the disrespect.
She turned to salt because she looked back at her sins but when one repents you shouldn’t look back but move forward. It’s the shin that holds you back. Salt is used because she doesn’t need to be tossed out unless she looses her savor. It’s probably metaphorical but hey that’s what the I was told in a vision. Ok kidding about the vision but …