Old Testament Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==Historicity== {{Further|Historicity of the Bible#Hebrew Bible/Old Testament}} === Early scholarship === Some of the stories of the Pentateuch may derive from older sources. American science writer [[Homer W. Smith]] points out similarities between the [[Genesis creation narrative]] and that of the [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] ''[[Epic of Gilgamesh]]'', such as the inclusion of the creation of the first man ([[Adam]]/[[Enkidu]]) in the [[Garden of Eden]], a [[Tree of the knowledge of good and evil|tree of knowledge]], a [[tree of life]], and a deceptive serpent.<ref>{{cite book |last=Smith |first=Homer W. |title=Man and His Gods |date=1952 |publisher=[[Grosset & Dunlap]] |location=New York |page=[https://archive.org/details/manhisgods00smit/page/117 117] |url=https://archive.org/details/manhisgods00smit|url-access=registration }}</ref> Scholars such as [[Andrew R. George]] point out the similarity of the [[Genesis flood narrative]] and the [[Gilgamesh flood myth]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=George |first=A. R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=21xxZ_gUy_wC&pg=PA70 |title=The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts |date=2003 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-927841-1 |page=70}}</ref>{{efn|The latter [[flood myth]] appears in a Babylonian copy dating to 700 BC,<ref>{{cite book |last=Cline |first=Eric H. |year=2007 |title=From Eden to Exile: Unraveling Mysteries of the Bible |publisher=National Geographic |isbn=978-1-4262-0084-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bJW-zhffwk4C&pg=PA20|pages=20–27}}</ref> though many scholars believe that this was probably copied from the {{nowrap|{{lang-akk|[[Atra-Hasis]]|script=Latn}}}}, which dates to the 18th century BC.<ref>{{cite book |last=Tigay |first=Jeffrey H. |author-link= Jeffrey H. Tigay | title=The Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic | publisher=Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers |year=2002 |orig-date=1982 |isbn=9780865165465 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cxjuHTH6I2sC |pages=23, 218, 224, 238}}</ref> George points out that the modern version of the ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' was compiled by [[Sîn-lēqi-unninni]], who lived sometime between 1300 and 1000 BC.<ref>{{cite book|translator=Andrew R. George|year=2003|orig-date=1999|title=The Epic of Gilgamesh|edition=reprinted|publisher=Penguin Books|location=London|isbn=0-14-044919-1|pages=ii, xxiv–v}}</ref>}} Similarities between the origin story of [[Moses]] and that of [[Sargon of Akkad]] were noted by psychoanalyst [[Otto Rank]] in 1909<ref>{{cite book |title=The myth of the birth of the hero: a psychological interpretation of mythology |author=Otto Rank |year=1914 |url=https://archive.org/details/mythofbirthofher1914rank |others=English translation by F. Robbins and Smith Ely Jelliffe |publisher=The Journal of nervous and mental disease publishing company |location=New York}}</ref> and popularized by 20th-century writers, such as [[H. G. Wells]] and [[Joseph Campbell]].<ref name="Wells">{{cite book |last=Wells |first=H. G. |title=The Outline of History: Volume 1 |year=1961 |orig-date=1937 |publisher=Doubleday |pages=206, 208, 210, 212}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Campbell |first=Joseph |title=The Masks of God, Vol. 3: Occidental Mythology |year=1964 |page=127}}</ref> [[Jacob Bronowski]] writes that, "the Bible is ... part folklore and part record. History is ... written by the victors, and the [[Israelites|Israelis]], when they burst through <nowiki>[</nowiki>[[Jericho]] ({{Circa|1400 BC}})], became the carriers of history."<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bronowski|first=Jacob|url=http://archive.org/details/ascentofman0000bron_y1z2|title=The Ascent of Man|publisher=BBC Books|year=1990|isbn=978-0-563-20900-3|location=London|pages=72–73, 77|orig-date=1973}}</ref> === Recent scholarship === In 2007, a historian of ancient Judaism [[Lester L. Grabbe]] explained that earlier biblical scholars such as [[Julius Wellhausen]] (1844–1918) could be described as 'maximalist', accepting biblical text unless it has been disproven. Continuing in this tradition, both "the 'substantial historicity' of the patriarchs" and "the unified conquest of the land" were widely accepted in the United States until about the 1970s. Contrarily, Grabbe says that those in his field now "are all minimalists{{snd}}at least, when it comes to the patriarchal period and the settlement. ... [V]ery few are willing to operate [as maximalists]."<ref name="GRABBE p.">{{cite book|last=Grabbe|first=Lester L.|title=Understanding the History of Ancient Israel|date=2007-10-25|publisher=British Academy|isbn=978-0-19-726401-0|pages=57–58|chapter=Some Recent Issues in the Study of the History of Israel|doi=10.5871/bacad/9780197264010.003.0005}}</ref> In 2022, archaeologist [[Avraham Faust]] wrote that in the 1990s a school known as [[biblical minimalism]] rejected the historical value of the Bible for the study of ancient Israel during the Iron Age, "but this extreme approach was rejected by mainstream scholarship."<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Ancient Israelite World |last=Faust |first=Avraham |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=2022 |isbn=978-1-000-77324-8 |page=79 |editor-last=Keimer |editor-first=Kyle H. |chapter=Between the Biblical Story and History: Writing an Archaeological History of Ancient Israel |editor-last2=Pierce |editor-first2=George A. |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4beREAAAQBAJ&pg=PA79}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. 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