Torah on parchment 3000 years ago?
Polar
The following paragraph in a book review by
Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
"...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
years ago."
??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
Is there an even earlier record of written material?
--
Polar
Polar
Forgot to add the footnote:
[1] Jonathan Kirsch is an attorney, LA Times book reviwer (son of the
late Robert Kirsch, longtime book editor) , and author of several
popular books, inter alia "The Harlot by the Side of the Road"
("forbidden" tales from the Bible), and "Moses: A Life".
--
Polar
Henry Goodman
"Polar" <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:orv00tom4vkra9r26...@4ax.com...
See Parshas Vayelech Deuteronomy 31 24-26
And as Moses finished writing the words of this Torah on a book till they
were finished. And Moses commanded the Levites who carried the Ark of the
Covenant of Hashem saying:
"Take this book of the Torah and place it beside the Ark of the Covenant of
Hashem your G-d and it will be with you for ever"
There is a dispute as to whether the last 8 verses covering the death of
Moses were included
--
Henry Goodman
henry....@virgin.net
Herman Rubin
Henry Goodman <henry....@virgin.net> wrote:
>"Polar" <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
>news:orv00tom4vkra9r26...@4ax.com...
>> The following paragraph in a book review by
>> Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
>> "...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
>> when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
>> years ago."
>> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>> When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
>See Parshas Vayelech Deuteronomy 31 24-26
>And as Moses finished writing the words of this Torah on a book till they
>were finished. And Moses commanded the Levites who carried the Ark of the
>Covenant of Hashem saying:
>"Take this book of the Torah and place it beside the Ark of the Covenant of
>Hashem your G-d and it will be with you for ever"
This is not too good a piece of evidence that the Torah was
not "planted" with a claim of antiquity. Also, the word
"torah" means teaching; it is not clear just how much of
the present Torah was included.
There clearly was writing more than 3000 years ago. Other
than inscriptions on clay or stone or metal, there is
nothing from even the time of Ezra available. We do have
the Moabite Stone, and Ugaritic clay tablets.
--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399
hru...@stat.purdue.edu Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558
Sheldon Glickler
> Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
>
> "...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
> when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
> years ago."
>
> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
> When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
IIRC, 671 B.C.E.
Shelly
Micha Berger
: Well written ink on parchment lasts a long time if
: treated well!
Two points:
1- 19th cent ink is better ground and mixed, not to mention the formula
probably improved, since the 1st Temple period.
2- There was a lot of trauma in Jewish life. Our artifacts weren't
coddled all these millenia.
-mi
Herman Rubin
Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>On 1 Nov 2000 20:41:13 GMT, Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>> The following paragraph in a book review by
>>Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
>> "...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
>>when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
>>years ago."
The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
Other than stone, clay, or metal, the writings from Asia
have not survived. Some papyri did survive in Egypt, but
I know of none from Asia.
>> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>The oral law was transmitted orally. The Torah (Genesis through
>Deuteronomy) was transmitted in writing from the very beginning.
This is a claim which has no evidence.
>It wasn't "Deuteronomy" that was found in the Temple in the days of
>Josiah. It was a full copy of the Torah.
There are those who question this. Their scholarship is
just as good as those who do not.
>> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
>What kind of record would you like?
We have writings on clay from Mesopotamia going back about
5500 years which got baked and survived. We have writings
on stone from there and from Egypt going back 5000 years.
I do not know the oldest date for papyrus, but it is more
than 4000 years. The oldest known alphabetic writing is
less than 4000 years old.
The only known writings from the Torah before the destruction
go back to the previous century, and are silver. They only
contain the priestly blessing and information about the owner.
The oldest documents from the Torah are from the Dead Sea
Scrolls, and are about 2250 years old.
Lisa Beth
MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
>From article <vq440t0n7kgf61do9...@4ax.com>,
>by meirm...@erols.com:
>
>> Parchment doesn't last as long as clay or stone or metal. When in
>> use, I think a Torah scroll lasts no more than 200 years, maybe much
>> less.
>
>The scroll we read from most every Shabbat is 100 years old this year,
>and in excellent condition. It goes back to a sofer once in a while
>for a checkup, but almost all of the original ink is still almost as
>good as new. Well written ink on parchment lasts a long time if
>treated well! Our second sefir Torah was commissioned by our
>congregation in 1911; we don't use it as often because it weighs much
>more, and as a result, it's in even better condition.
>
>But, 3000 years ago, they'd probably have used papyrus scrolls.
>Parchment didn't become the dominant writing material of the ancient
>world until around the turn of the era (say 250 bce to 250 ce). This,
>by the way, is why it's halachic to use a reed pen to write a Torah;
>reed pens were preferred for papyrus, and fell out of favor with the
>widespread use of parchment, when quills grew in popularity.
Actually, since using parchment is halakhically mandated, the fact
that it wasn't "the dominant writing material of the ancient world"
doesn't mean it was never used. By us, it was always used.
Lisa
meirm...@erols.com
>From article <vq440t0n7kgf61do9...@4ax.com>,
>by meirm...@erols.com:
>
>> Parchment doesn't last as long as clay or stone or metal. When in
>> use, I think a Torah scroll lasts no more than 200 years, maybe much
>> less.
>
>The scroll we read from most every Shabbat is 100 years old this year,
>and in excellent condition. It goes back to a sofer once in a while
>for a checkup, but almost all of the original ink is still almost as
>good as new. Well written ink on parchment lasts a long time if
>treated well! Our second sefir Torah was commissioned by our
>congregation in 1911; we don't use it as often because it weighs much
>more, and as a result, it's in even better condition.
>
>But, 3000 years ago, they'd probably have used papyrus scrolls.
>Parchment didn't become the dominant writing material of the ancient
>world until around the turn of the era (say 250 bce to 250 ce). This,
>by the way, is why it's halachic to use a reed pen to write a Torah;
>reed pens were preferred for papyrus, and fell out of favor with the
>widespread use of parchment, when quills grew in popularity.
>
> Doug Jones
> jo...@cs.uiowa.edu
>
> I make reed pens, collect oak gall,
> and otherwise fiddle with such issues.
Thanks for the info.
It's still true that, exxcept for the DSS, there are no remaining
parchment scrolls from 1200 years ago or some date earlier than that,
or at least that almost all of them are gone, so why shouldn't they
all be gone from before then.
mei...@QQQerols.com
e-mail by removing QQQ
Herman Rubin
It could not have been used before it existed. The word
"parchment" itself comes from Pergamom in Asia Minor, and
it did not even exist at the time of the Captivity. It
seems that there were some predecessors of parchment, but
they were not that much earlier.
Papyrus scrolls were very little used outside of Egypt, as
it was quite expensive. I do not know of any evidence of
papyrus scrolls in Asia, certainly not widespread use.
Talqcom
>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>Date: 11/03/2000 4:07 PM Eastern Standard Time
>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
And this naked conclusion you know as the result of what type of exhaustive
study, and what type of assumptions made about the plethora of Jewish sources
asserting the contrary??
Enlighten us -- instead of preaching as if your ideas were objective -- O
modern Pappos ben Yehuda!
>>The oral law was transmitted orally. The Torah (Genesis through
>>Deuteronomy) was transmitted in writing from the very beginning.
>
>This is a claim which has no evidence.
So is that one. BTW Jewish collective memory is not to be dismissed so
cavalierly, but you are an ersatz Pappos ben Yehuda, so I understand.
>There are those who question this. Their scholarship is
>just as good as those who do not.
Says you, not a Jewish or Rabbinic scholar. How would you truly know, being
ignorant of all semitic languages, I wonder.
One form of intelligence is the ability to know one's limits, O Pappos.
Ray
Jonathan J. Baker
>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
>And this naked conclusion you know as the result of what type of exhaustive
>study, and what type of assumptions made about the plethora of Jewish sources
>asserting the contrary??
Contra Herman, Dr. Meir Bar-Ilan writes in the Oxford Encyclopedia of
Archaeology in the Near East, "Early evidence for using skins for writing
comes from the 4th dynasty in Egypt, i.e., before 2750 BCE. However,
this practice was limited to religious and other special purposes (such
as the Book of the Dead)."
See entire article at <http://faculty.biu.ac.il/~barilm/parchmen.html>.
--
Jonathan Baker | Marches-wan, marches-two,
jjb...@panix.com | March the months all through and through
Web page update: Vidui, Siyum on Moed. http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker/
Macfig
scholars at Alexandria, writing under the auspices of Ptolomey II
Philadelphos, Pharoah of Egypt. The result was the Pentateuch in Greek or the
Torah in Hebrew. The result was also called the Septuaguint for the seventy
Jewish scholars who did the work. They relied on many papers, parchments,
engravings and oral traditions, in setting out the Torah. Perhaps you have
missed the fact that the best Hebrew scholars have established that the Jewish
religion is about three thousand years old. Best wishes, Jim B.
Lisa Beth
wrote:
You have no way of knowing that. And as far as the word goes, please
tell me you're joking. Did animals exist before then? Yes. Did they
have skin? I imagine they must have, or their internal organs would
have been dragging in the dust, and from an evolutionary point of view
(which I'm sure you would defend), that would probably have been bred
out over the generations.
So, we have animals, we kill animals for their meat, we have their
skins. And you say that because the word "parchment" (in what
language, incidentally) didn't exist at the time, they couldn't have
used it. I'm stunned and overpowered by the sublime logic of that
argument.
The Jews used parchment even before the word existed, Herman. That's
just the fact. We used animal skins for any number of things that
other people didn't use them for. We used them to make tefillin, we
used them to make parchment for our holy writings. That doesn't mean
they were used in general. We may not have used parchment for every
day writing until the custom became widespread among the goyim. It
may have been deemed inappropriate. But we *did* use parchment for
Torah scrolls and the insides of tefillin and for mezuzot.
And Herman, you *literally* cannot prove otherwise. Proving a
negative isn't something you can do, you know.
Lisa
Harry Weiss
You are confusing a translation with the original which was written by
Moshe.
--
Harry J. Weiss
hjw...@panix.com
meirm...@erols.com
star...@hotmail.com (Lisa Beth) posted:
>
>You have no way of knowing that. And as far as the word goes, please
>tell me you're joking. Did animals exist before then? Yes. Did they
>have skin? I imagine they must have, or their internal organs would
>have been dragging in the dust, and from an evolutionary point of view
>(which I'm sure you would defend), that would probably have been bred
>out over the generations.
Not necessarily. The pot-bellied pig developed during this skinless
period, for precisely the reason you mention. It was an endangered
species however, as you point out, until it developed skin. A small
number of skinless chickens have survived from the adermazoic period,
and are now being bred for sale for chicken meat, especially frozen.
Lisa Beth
wrote:
>In article <3a0121d5...@News.CIS.DFN.DE>,
>Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>On 1 Nov 2000 20:41:13 GMT, Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
>
>>> The following paragraph in a book review by
>>>Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
>
>>> "...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
>>>when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
>>>years ago."
>
>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
Oh, dear God. There is a difference between "was not in common use
yet" and "had not yet been invented". The Torah most certainly *was*
written on parchment back then. And Abraham owned camels, despite the
fact that they were not widely domesticated. And the Egyptians had
horses, despite the fact that they hadn't been introduced into Egypt
on a large scale at the time they are mentioned in the Torah.
History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
out archetypes and generalities.
>Other than stone, clay, or metal, the writings from Asia
>have not survived. Some papyri did survive in Egypt, but
>I know of none from Asia.
>
>>> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>>>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>
>>The oral law was transmitted orally. The Torah (Genesis through
>>Deuteronomy) was transmitted in writing from the very beginning.
>
>This is a claim which has no evidence.
No, it's actually your claim otherwise which has no evidence. The
entirety of rabbinic law and lore is evidence for my claim.
>>It wasn't "Deuteronomy" that was found in the Temple in the days of
>>Josiah. It was a full copy of the Torah.
>
>There are those who question this. Their scholarship is
>just as good as those who do not.
No, actually, it's not. Not in this case. It's post facto arguing,
created in order to defend an a priori theory which itself is
baseless. There is no J source and there is no E source. And there's
certain no D or P source. R is a figment of the imagination. This
alphabet soup is a joke, Herman. Not scholarship at all.
>>> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
>
>>What kind of record would you like?
>
>We have writings on clay from Mesopotamia going back about
>5500 years which got baked and survived. We have writings
>on stone from there and from Egypt going back 5000 years.
>I do not know the oldest date for papyrus, but it is more
>than 4000 years. The oldest known alphabetic writing is
>less than 4000 years old.
Parchment doesn't hold up as well. Particularly when rather than
lying in a pit for millenia, it's being used 4 times a week. And
being burned by our enemies whenever they get in a snit.
So if that's what you're looking for, sorry, but we can't help you
out.
>The only known writings from the Torah before the destruction
>go back to the previous century, and are silver. They only
>contain the priestly blessing and information about the owner.
Wrong. The only *extant* known writings from the Torah, is what you
should have said. Those who have a vested interest in delegitimizing
the Torah denied the possibility of texts from the Torah as old as
those silver inscriptions. They were shocked when they were
discovered. We weren't shocked at all. It happened that words of
Torah were committed to a medium that would last, and so it was
discovered. Parchment isn't like that. So it hasn't been discovered
and most likely won't be. And you'll be able to keep claiming that it
didn't exist at the time. Until the next copy of all or part of the
Torah is discovered on another lasting medium.
>The oldest documents from the Torah are from the Dead Sea
>Scrolls, and are about 2250 years old.
The only *extant* copies of such documents, Herman. Please be more
precise.
Lisa
--
I take responsibility:
I will be voting for Moshe Feiglin in the Likud primaries.
Ask me how you can, too.
Lisa Beth
wrote:
>In <> tal...@aol.com (Talqcom) writes:
>>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>
>>>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>>>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
>
>>And this naked conclusion you know as the result of what type of exhaustive
>>study, and what type of assumptions made about the plethora of Jewish sources
>>asserting the contrary??
>
>Contra Herman, Dr. Meir Bar-Ilan writes in the Oxford Encyclopedia of
>Archaeology in the Near East, "Early evidence for using skins for writing
>comes from the 4th dynasty in Egypt, i.e., before 2750 BCE. However,
>this practice was limited to religious and other special purposes (such
>as the Book of the Dead)."
>
>See entire article at <http://faculty.biu.ac.il/~barilm/parchmen.html>.
I am simply dying to hear what Herman has to say about this. After
coming off so utterly certain that the Torah could *not* have been
written on parchment way back when. Will he have the good grace to
apologize and admit that he was wrong? I think he might.
Lisa Beth
Perhaps you've missed the fact that 3000 years goes back *way* before
280 BCE. The fact that you chose "BC" as your way of numbering years
suggests that you are either not Jewish or not a particularly strongly
identified Jew. Which is okay, you know. Some of my best friends are
either not Jewish or not particularly strongly identified Jews.
But Jim, what non-Jewish scholarship, which is inalterably opposed to
anything that smacks of religion, might have to say about things is
kind of not relevant, if you know what I mean. There are Christian
and Islamic scholars who say that the blood libel (Jews killing
Christian children to use their blood for matza) is actually true. In
fact, one major Islamic scholar in Egypt just a day or two ago
reiterated this claim.
I think the scholars who claim that the Torah isn't what it is are
rarely, if ever, motivated by the kind of hate that those other
scholars are, but their conclusions are just as flawed. And the root
of the flaw is that they are coming from the outside. They lack
information and they lack perspective.
The Torah was given in its present form 3310 years, 5 lunar months and
2 days ago. But thanks for letting us hear your opinion on the
matter.
Lisa Beth
And there are people, some of whom post from time to time on this
newsgroup, who are so thin-skinned that the possibility must be
considered that they are descended from hominids with no skin at all.
Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879
by mac...@aol.com (Macfig):
> The Torah was written in its final form about 280 BC by Hellenic Jewish
> scholars at Alexandria, writing under the auspices of Ptolomey II
> Philadelphos, Pharoah of Egypt. The result was the Pentateuch in Greek
> or the Torah in Hebrew.
This is wrong. This is approximately correct for the translation of
the Torah into Greek, known as the Septuigant, after the 70 scholars
who did the translation. It is clear that they didn't work from today's
canonical text in some cases, but rather, from variant texts that were
only known to modern scholarship after the finding of the dead sea
scrolls.
The Torah existed in its final form before that, but other forms also
existed. The final culling of the texts to decide which text is canonical
happened hundreds of years later later.
Whatever the history of the text, however, the core messages, both the
prophetic message and the law code, were long established at the time of
the scholarly efforts that decided on a canonical text, so arguments
about the origin of the text as we know it today don't appear to have
bearing on when the religion was born.
Doug Jones
jo...@cs.uiowa.edu
Herman Rubin
Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>On 3 Nov 2000 21:07:28 GMT, hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>wrote:
>>In article <3a0121d5...@News.CIS.DFN.DE>,
>>Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>On 1 Nov 2000 20:41:13 GMT, Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote:
.................
>>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
>Oh, dear God. There is a difference between "was not in common use
>yet" and "had not yet been invented". The Torah most certainly *was*
>written on parchment back then. And Abraham owned camels, despite the
>fact that they were not widely domesticated. And the Egyptians had
>horses, despite the fact that they hadn't been introduced into Egypt
>on a large scale at the time they are mentioned in the Torah.
I am not sure about camels, although there are those who have
written that camels had not yet been domesticated at the time
of Abraham. However, we do know that the horse and the wheel
were introduced to Egypt by the Hyksos when they conquered it.
POSSIBLY around the time of Abraham. The Hyksos were Semitic.
>History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
>out archetypes and generalities.
I agree. That is why archaeologists dig up the evidence,
instead of going by traditions and what was written hundreds
or thousands of years after the events.
>>Other than stone, clay, or metal, the writings from Asia
>>have not survived. Some papyri did survive in Egypt, but
>>I know of none from Asia.
>>>> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>>>>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
The time of Josiah, I believe. This would be consistent
with it being written by Baruch, the scribe of Jeremiah.
This does not mean it is not at least somewhat based on
much older material.
>>>The oral law was transmitted orally. The Torah (Genesis through
>>>Deuteronomy) was transmitted in writing from the very beginning.
>>This is a claim which has no evidence.
>No, it's actually your claim otherwise which has no evidence. The
>entirety of rabbinic law and lore is evidence for my claim.
Now how far back does this go? And on what is it based?
This does not mean that there is not SOME truth in it, but
how much? We do not accept the Iliad and the Odyssey, or
the other Greek myths, as being literally true, and they
date to before the time of the Captivity.
>>>It wasn't "Deuteronomy" that was found in the Temple in the days of
>>>Josiah. It was a full copy of the Torah.
>>There are those who question this. Their scholarship is
>>just as good as those who do not.
>No, actually, it's not. Not in this case. It's post facto arguing,
>created in order to defend an a priori theory which itself is
>baseless. There is no J source and there is no E source. And there's
>certain no D or P source. R is a figment of the imagination. This
>alphabet soup is a joke, Herman. Not scholarship at all.
There are some rather good pieces of evidence, such as the
similarities of the names of the two lines of descent from
Adam, and the fact that the separated versions of the Flood
read more like single works than the combined version.
There is the problem with the 600,000 fighting men; the
various nations refusing permission would just have given
in to the largest fighting force of the time.
>>>> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
>>>What kind of record would you like?
>>We have writings on clay from Mesopotamia going back about
>>5500 years which got baked and survived. We have writings
>>on stone from there and from Egypt going back 5000 years.
>>I do not know the oldest date for papyrus, but it is more
>>than 4000 years. The oldest known alphabetic writing is
>>less than 4000 years old.
>Parchment doesn't hold up as well. Particularly when rather than
>lying in a pit for millenia, it's being used 4 times a week. And
>being burned by our enemies whenever they get in a snit.
And what about the rabbinical statements that the alphabet
was given at Creation? We do have inscriptions with stages
of development of the alphabet.
..............
Herman Rubin
I looked at the article; it is more vague than you think.
It would be a major effort for me to track down the
references. Some of the claims appear dubious.
However, the article does mention a means of producing
records from older times which should have provided some
written versions of these documents. it stated that the
Aramaic scribes wrote on clay tablets; some of these
should remain. Writing on prepared rocks is mentioned
near the end of Deuteronomy.
Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879
MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
> But, 3000 years ago, they'd probably have used papyrus scrolls.
> Parchment didn't become the dominant writing material of the ancient
> world until around the turn of the era (say 250 bce to 250 ce). This,
> by the way, is why it's halachic to use a reed pen to write a Torah;
> reed pens were preferred for papyrus, and fell out of favor with the
> widespread use of parchment, when quills grew in popularity.
On 6 Nov 2000 02:51:15 GMT, hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
wrote:
> It could not have been used before it existed. The word
> "parchment" itself comes from Pergamom in Asia Minor, and
> it did not even exist at the time of the Captivity. It
> seems that there were some predecessors of parchment, but
> they were not that much earlier.
What I said was that reed pens were allowed because, in the age when
the dominant writing material was papyrus, they generally worked better.
I didn't every say parchment didn't exist! Parchment may have existed
for millenia -- it probably did, given that animal hides have been around
for as long as animals. It is hard to argue whether the halacha of 3000
years ago required parchment for torah scrolls, because the oldest halacha
we are sure of -- the literal text of the Torah, does not require this.
All we have is the oral tradition, as it existed in the later years of the
second Temple.
We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
pareve, for example.
Perhaps you could argue that the halacha preferring parchment was older
based on the practices of the Samaritans, who also use parchment for their
Torah scrolls, but this could be economic necessity, since the manufacture
of papyrus paper seems to have died during the Roman era, so all written
traditions carried forward from that time had to be on parchment (well,
stone would work, but I'd hate to be stuck with the job of machbiach in
a community that used stone, particularly when we're at the beginning of
Genesis.)
Doug Jones
jo...@cs.uiowa.edu
Micha Berger
: This is wrong. This is approximately correct for the translation of
: the Torah into Greek, known as the Septuigant, after the 70 scholars
: who did the translation. It is clear that they didn't work from today's
: canonical text in some cases, but rather, from variant texts that were
: only known to modern scholarship after the finding of the dead sea
: scrolls.
Silly question: How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
rather than the variants are products of back-editing? To some communities
the Septuigant was more accessible to the layman than the original
Hebrew was. Wouldn't it be likely, therefore, that it would impact their
scribes' product?
-mi
--
Micha Berger When you come to a place of darkness,
mi...@aishdas.org you do not chase out the darkness with a broom.
http://www.aishdas.org You light a candle.
(973) 916-0287 - R' Yekusiel Halberstam of Klausenberg zt"l
Jonathan J. Baker
>Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>On 6 Nov 2000 03:47:59 GMT, jjb...@panix.com (Jonathan J. Baker)
>>>>>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>>>>>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
>>>>And this naked conclusion you know as the result of what type of exhaustive
>>>Archaeology in the Near East, "Early evidence for using skins for writing
>>>comes from the 4th dynasty in Egypt, i.e., before 2750 BCE. However,
>>>this practice was limited to religious and other special purposes (such
>>>as the Book of the Dead)."
>>I am simply dying to hear what Herman has to say about this. After
>>coming off so utterly certain that the Torah could *not* have been
>>written on parchment way back when. Will he have the good grace to
>>apologize and admit that he was wrong? I think he might.
>However, the article does mention a means of producing
>records from older times which should have provided some
>written versions of these documents. it stated that the
>Aramaic scribes wrote on clay tablets; some of these
>should remain. Writing on prepared rocks is mentioned
>near the end of Deuteronomy.
So when the mitzva was given for a king to write a Torah scroll
and carry it around with him, he was supposed to write it on prepared
rocks? Much more likely that the description of prepared rocks was the
*exception*, and the *assumption* would be that things were written
on parchment (or papyrus?).
By the way, re your Sapir-Whorfian argument that the word "parchment"
comes from "Pergamom", therefore parchment could not predate that
city's existence: the Hebrew word for parchment is "klaf", or more
generically "or" [skin] - neither of which is at all an analogue
of "parchment". So it holds no water.
Polar
MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
[...]
>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
>pareve, for example.
[...]
Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
Logical, BTW.
--
Polar
Polar
MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
[...]
>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
>pareve, for example.
[...]
Lisa Beth
wrote:
>In article <3a0654a4...@News.CIS.DFN.DE>,
>Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>On 3 Nov 2000 21:07:28 GMT, hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>>wrote:
>
>>>In article <3a0121d5...@News.CIS.DFN.DE>,
>>>Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>On 1 Nov 2000 20:41:13 GMT, Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
>
> .................
>
>>>The Torah could not possibly have been written on parchment
>>>3000 years ago, as parchment had not yet been invented.
>
>>Oh, dear God. There is a difference between "was not in common use
>>yet" and "had not yet been invented". The Torah most certainly *was*
>>written on parchment back then. And Abraham owned camels, despite the
>>fact that they were not widely domesticated. And the Egyptians had
>>horses, despite the fact that they hadn't been introduced into Egypt
>>on a large scale at the time they are mentioned in the Torah.
>
>I am not sure about camels, although there are those who have
>written that camels had not yet been domesticated at the time
>of Abraham. However, we do know that the horse and the wheel
>were introduced to Egypt by the Hyksos when they conquered it.
>POSSIBLY around the time of Abraham. The Hyksos were Semitic.
>
>>History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
>>out archetypes and generalities.
>
>I agree. That is why archaeologists dig up the evidence,
>instead of going by traditions and what was written hundreds
>or thousands of years after the events.
You mean instead of giving credence to written records. Because of
the religious connections of the Bible, the history contained therein
is ignored, and preference given to shards and sherds that have been
assembled like a jigsaw puzzle. Very objective.
>>>Other than stone, clay, or metal, the writings from Asia
>>>have not survived. Some papyri did survive in Egypt, but
>>>I know of none from Asia.
>
>>>>> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>>>>>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>
>The time of Josiah, I believe. This would be consistent
>with it being written by Baruch, the scribe of Jeremiah.
>This does not mean it is not at least somewhat based on
>much older material.
Wrong. It was given by God centuries before Baruch was born.
>>>>The oral law was transmitted orally. The Torah (Genesis through
>>>>Deuteronomy) was transmitted in writing from the very beginning.
>
>>>This is a claim which has no evidence.
>
>>No, it's actually your claim otherwise which has no evidence. The
>>entirety of rabbinic law and lore is evidence for my claim.
>
>Now how far back does this go? And on what is it based?
"I ain't never seen any sech varmint, so there ain't any sech
varmint". Ludicrous.
>This does not mean that there is not SOME truth in it, but
>how much? We do not accept the Iliad and the Odyssey, or
>the other Greek myths, as being literally true, and they
>date to before the time of the Captivity.
The Bible contains stories
The Iliad contains stories
The Iliad is not historically true
therefore,
The Bible is not historically true.
Very nice. Now shall I prove that Socrates is a fish?
Your logic is not logic, Herman. It is rhetoric.
>>>>It wasn't "Deuteronomy" that was found in the Temple in the days of
>>>>Josiah. It was a full copy of the Torah.
>
>>>There are those who question this. Their scholarship is
>>>just as good as those who do not.
>
>>No, actually, it's not. Not in this case. It's post facto arguing,
>>created in order to defend an a priori theory which itself is
>>baseless. There is no J source and there is no E source. And there's
>>certain no D or P source. R is a figment of the imagination. This
>>alphabet soup is a joke, Herman. Not scholarship at all.
>
>There are some rather good pieces of evidence, such as the
>similarities of the names of the two lines of descent from
>Adam,
And did you know that there were two US Presidents named Roosevelt?
And two named John Adams? And hey, did you know that both Israel
(during the time of the Judges) and the US had civil wars where the
losing side were called the Southerners (that's what Binyamin means,
after all)? And both had a kind of Reconstruction. Hey, maybe the
Bible postdates Abraham Lincoln, too.
You can't seriously be suggesting that similarities in names
constitute a reason to declare the Bible to be a patchwork.
>and the fact that the separated versions of the Flood
>read more like single works than the combined version.
>There is the problem with the 600,000 fighting men; the
>various nations refusing permission would just have given
>in to the largest fighting force of the time.
"Would have". It's amazing how when confronting biblical history, all
common sense gets set aside. You treat it like a coloring book.
"Would have".... Sheesh.
>>>>> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
>
>>>>What kind of record would you like?
>
>>>We have writings on clay from Mesopotamia going back about
>>>5500 years which got baked and survived. We have writings
>>>on stone from there and from Egypt going back 5000 years.
>>>I do not know the oldest date for papyrus, but it is more
>>>than 4000 years. The oldest known alphabetic writing is
>>>less than 4000 years old.
>
>>Parchment doesn't hold up as well. Particularly when rather than
>>lying in a pit for millenia, it's being used 4 times a week. And
>>being burned by our enemies whenever they get in a snit.
>
>And what about the rabbinical statements that the alphabet
>was given at Creation? We do have inscriptions with stages
>of development of the alphabet.
Prove it's development. I've seen styles of handwriting that I could
plausably argue predate Latin letters. They're clearly more primitive
and less well formed.
Lisa
Sheldon Glickler
"Micha Berger" <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote in message
news:8u9dv1$rbf$3...@bob.news.rcn.net...
> On 7 Nov 2000 15:39:36 GMT, Sheldon Glickler
<sheldonlg_f...@mediaone.net> wrote:
> :> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
> :> like the blood of bovines!
>
> : Moshe, I like my meat rare. That means that the juice that comes out is
red
> : (and probably has some blood content...
>
> It's the blood that was in visibly large circulatory vessels at the
> time of slaughtering that is non-kosher. If it was in tiny cappilaries
> or swimming between cells of muscle, it's okay.
Thanks.
>
> We have rules of thumb about soaking, salting and broiling, that tell
> us when we can be sure that at least all of that particular blood has
> been removed. It does not guarantee that the meat is totally bloodless.
I'll bypass the soaking and salting, thank you.
Shelly
Talqcom
>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>It could not have been used before it existed. The word
>"parchment" itself comes from Pergamom in Asia Minor, and
>it did not even exist at the time of the Captivity.
The word Synagogue did not exist until Greek existed. Nor Sanhedrin.
Is the rose just as sweet by any other name? Or is Shakespeare mistaken, and
reasoning by name (sharah-il-ism) a legitimate mode of analysis?
Ray
Talqcom
>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>I looked at the article; it is more vague than you think.
No more vague than your naked conclusory remarks. To say the least. Again,
please demonstrate the analysis behind your conclusions, or stste that they are
simply "beliefs".
Perhaps they are not even the belief of the one Herman Rubin, but of various
oral sources pre and post Herman Rubin, and merely attributed to him by the
redactor, or R-Rubin, a/ka/ Baruch the exploited graduate student?
>Some of the claims appear dubious.
Based upon?
Your honor, this witness repeatedly avoids the question. I think his testimony
should be excluded.
>Writing on prepared rocks is mentioned
>near the end of Deuteronomy.
>
Once. And numerous times "writing" in contexts not at all commensurate with
writing on stones.
Why ignore one and harp on the other? Bias?
Preconceived ideas projected upon the text?
A modern Uriel Da Costa approach?
Please explain.
Ray
Talqcom
> Parchment may have existed
>for millenia -- it probably did, given that animal hides have been around
>for as long as animals.
and were used as leather, and in the tabernacle.
> It is hard to argue whether the halacha of 3000
>years ago required parchment for torah scrolls, because the oldest halacha
>we are sure of -- the literal text of the Torah, does not require this.
It says nothing about the detail of any ritual it refers to. Yet obviously the
rituals were done somehow.
>All we have is the oral tradition, as it existed in the later years of the
>second Temple.
This is in error. Although this is the common Vissenschaft des Judentums based
opinion, it is ignorant of the Geonic writings (only recently published) and
the fact that most Jews throughout history never asserted a purely oral
transmission of the Oral Law. One should at least -- if they calim to be
scientific -- consider the geonic sources and their ramifications. Some have.
The Talmud carefully distinguishes between what is asserted as Sinaitic and
what is man made. All arguments are on man made law, including your chicken
with milk issue.
No one aserts biblical authority for the prohibition Halakha is not
homogenous, and one must distinguish the various categories.
Ray
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> jo...@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
>
> [...]
>
>>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
>>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
>>pareve, for example.
>
Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
communities.
> Logical, BTW.
But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
like the blood of bovines!
Moshe Schorr
It is a tremendous Mitzvah to be happy always! - Reb Nachman of Breslov
Sheldon Glickler
<mos...@mm.huji.ac.il> wrote in message
news:2000Nov...@mm.huji.ac.il...
> Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> writes:
> > jo...@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879)
wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
> >>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
> >>pareve, for example.
> >
> > Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
>
> Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
> communities.
>
> > Logical, BTW.
>
> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
> like the blood of bovines!
Moshe, I like my meat rare. That means that the juice that comes out is red
(and probably has some blood content. Dr. Backon, please?). When chicken
is juicy, the liquid is colorless. I doubt that it is blood.
That said, who consumes chicken blood? (besides the extreme health hazards
of undercooking chicken).
Shelly
Micha Berger
:> like the blood of bovines!
: Moshe, I like my meat rare. That means that the juice that comes out is red
: (and probably has some blood content...
It's the blood that was in visibly large circulatory vessels at the
time of slaughtering that is non-kosher. If it was in tiny cappilaries
or swimming between cells of muscle, it's okay.
We have rules of thumb about soaking, salting and broiling, that tell
us when we can be sure that at least all of that particular blood has
been removed. It does not guarantee that the meat is totally bloodless.
-mi
Simcha Streltsov
: You mean instead of giving credence to written records. Because of
: the religious connections of the Bible, the history contained therein
: is ignored, and preference given to shards and sherds that have been
: assembled like a jigsaw puzzle. Very objective.
Historians are simply following "Lo B Shamaim Hi"
--
Simcha Streltsov disclaimer, as requested by Mo-he S-rr
sim...@bu.edu all punctuation marks in this article
are equivalent to (-:
Herman Rubin
Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
>On 6 Nov 2000 15:38:36 GMT, Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879 <jo...@cs.uiowa.edu> wrote:
>: This is wrong. This is approximately correct for the translation of
>: the Torah into Greek, known as the Septuigant, after the 70 scholars
>: who did the translation. It is clear that they didn't work from today's
>: canonical text in some cases, but rather, from variant texts that were
>: only known to modern scholarship after the finding of the dead sea
>: scrolls.
>Silly question: How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
>rather than the variants are products of back-editing? To some communities
>the Septuigant was more accessible to the layman than the original
>Hebrew was. Wouldn't it be likely, therefore, that it would impact their
>scribes' product?
How do we know that the Septuagint is less accurate than
the present Masoretic text, as a version of what was
available at the time of Ezra? There are Septuagint-like
scrolls in the Dead Sea collection. There is much evidence
of editing by the scribes in this collection.
Herman Rubin
Sheldon Glickler <sheldonlg_f...@mediaone.net> wrote:
><mos...@mm.huji.ac.il> wrote in message
>news:2000Nov...@mm.huji.ac.il...
>> Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> writes:
>> > jo...@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879)
>wrote:
>> > [...]
>> >>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
>> >>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
>> >>pareve, for example.
>> > Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
>> Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
>> communities.
>> > Logical, BTW.
>> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
>> like the blood of bovines!
>Moshe, I like my meat rare. That means that the juice that comes out is red
>(and probably has some blood content. Dr. Backon, please?). When chicken
>is juicy, the liquid is colorless. I doubt that it is blood.
The juices of rare meat are not blood, but was assumed to
be so in ancient times.
If chicken is not sufficiently cooked, the juices are reddish.
One of the tests for doneness is that the juices run clear
when the thigh is punctured.
Eric Simon
>similarities of the names of the two lines of descent from
>read more like single works than the combined version.
This line of argument always confused me. It seems like Herman,
and/or the other proponents are simultaneously saying that R (the
"redactor") had to preserve all kinds of details, but that the largest
detail of all (that HaShem gave Torah in public, with everyone in
attendance) is a myth.
I'm not sure I'm articulating the inherant contradiction well (and if
I'm not, can someone elaborate?) -- but I think it's a question that
needs answering.
-- Eric
Micha Berger
: How do we know that the Septuagint is less accurate than
: the present Masoretic text, as a version of what was
: available at the time of Ezra?
We can't prove it, not having an example of what was available. But we
do know the Pharasees had this notion of not changing a single letter,
and we don't know if anyone else was that picky. The notion of halachah
creates this need for precision that other movements wouldn't necessarily
have had.
But what does this have to do with my question?
:> How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
:> rather than the variants are products of back-editing?
-mi
Moshe Shulman
>In article <8u78dt$k70$1...@bob.news.rcn.net>,
>Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
>>On 6 Nov 2000 15:38:36 GMT, Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879 <jo...@cs.uiowa.edu> wrote:
>>: This is wrong. This is approximately correct for the translation of
>>: the Torah into Greek, known as the Septuigant, after the 70 scholars
>>: who did the translation. It is clear that they didn't work from today's
>>: canonical text in some cases, but rather, from variant texts that were
>>: only known to modern scholarship after the finding of the dead sea
>>: scrolls.
>>Silly question: How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
>>rather than the variants are products of back-editing? To some communities
>>the Septuigant was more accessible to the layman than the original
>>Hebrew was. Wouldn't it be likely, therefore, that it would impact their
>>scribes' product?
>How do we know that the Septuagint is less accurate than
>the present Masoretic text, as a version of what was
>available at the time of Ezra? There are Septuagint-like
>scrolls in the Dead Sea collection. There is much evidence
>of editing by the scribes in this collection.
As you also know the number of MT type texts is many times those of LXX/GB.
Also the later (from what I recall) appear only in Biblical texts and not in
the non-Biblical expository texts.
moshe shulman mshu...@NOSPAMix.netcom.com 718-436-7705
CHASSIDUS.NET - Yoshav Rosh http://www.chassidus.net
Chassidus shiur: chassidus...@chassidus.net
Chassidus discussion list: chassidus...@egroups.com
Outreach Judaism http://www.outreachjudaism.org/
ICQ# 52009254
Herman Rubin
The redactor certainly did not preserve all the details,
and probably was unaware of the similarity of the names
in the two lines of descent from Adam. But he might
have had a problem in trying to "sell" the details to
the people who had been in Exile, and who might have
needed to be persuaded to accept the version of the
Ezra-Nehemiah priesthood. There were undoubtedly many
versions of the legends, and to hold the people together,
to get them to rebuild the Temple and to accept it as
THE unique seat of the religion, required a selling job.
I am not surprised that there was a legend of a mass
revelation; these are not that uncommon, even in cases
where this is passed off as a myth. Many tribal
religions have an encounter with a god or gods speaking
out of lightning or thunder or wind or volcanos. As
the Hindu saying goes,
Saints fly only in the eyes of their disciples.
Similarly, things seen or even imagined by a few get
passed off as mass revelations. Also, the alternate
reading of the sizes of the tribes makes much more
sense, but the redactor did not know the old meaning,
and read "squads" as "thousands" and added up the
numbers as such. Armies of 600,000 men were far too
large for the times.
Herman Rubin
Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
>On 7 Nov 2000 20:08:02 GMT, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>: How do we know that the Septuagint is less accurate than
>: the present Masoretic text, as a version of what was
>: available at the time of Ezra?
>We can't prove it, not having an example of what was available. But we
>do know the Pharasees had this notion of not changing a single letter,
>and we don't know if anyone else was that picky. The notion of halachah
>creates this need for precision that other movements wouldn't necessarily
>have had.
The Pharisees seem to come on the scene later than the
different versions. Also, the Masoretic type Dead Sea
Scrolls have a moderate number of differences with each
other, hardly consistent with the idea of not changing
a single letter. Even the Talmud states that the men of
the Great Assembly knew which words had the full, and
which the shorter, version, but they do not know. This
by itself is an admission that the copying was not letter
for letter.
>But what does this have to do with my question?
>:> How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
>:> rather than the variants are products of back-editing?
The same question can be asked for the Masoretic-type
scrolls. Tov seems to thing there was a fair amount of
back-editing in all.
>--
>Micha Berger When you come to a place of darkness,
>mi...@aishdas.org you do not chase out the darkness with a broom.
>http://www.aishdas.org You light a candle.
>(973) 916-0287 - R' Yekusiel Halberstam of Klausenberg zt"l
Lisa Beth
>hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>
>> >>>>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>>
>> The time of Josiah, I believe. This would be consistent with it
>> being written by Baruch, the scribe of Jeremiah. This does not mean
>> it is not at least somewhat based on much older material.
>
>At least one critical scholar, Richard Friedman, believes that it was
>the Law Code from Deuteronomy, not all of Deuteronomy. And he accepts
>that it was honestly discovered there, not some kind of "pious fraud".
<dryly> How charitable of him. But since there's no reason to think
that what was found there was another but a complete Sefer Torah, his
charity isn't all that necessary.
Look at how much Torah has been forgotten in secular communities here
in Israel. I remember reading an article by Rav Lau about when he
went to speak at a secular high school on the first night of Hanukkah.
The students prepared a room for him, because they knew he wouldn't be
able to travel until after Hanukkah. A 12th grader came up to him and
asked, "Rabbi, tell me the truth. Moshe Rabbenu: did he exist or
not?"
And what we've gone through here doesn't even begin to compare to the
57 year anti-Jewish period of Josiah's father and grandfather. It's
so shocking that a Sefer Torah was found open to the passages
describing the repercussions of our violating the commandments, and
that Josiah freaked?
Lisa
Hadass Eviatar
> Look at how much Torah has been forgotten in secular communities here
> in Israel. I remember reading an article by Rav Lau about when he
> went to speak at a secular high school on the first night of Hanukkah.
> The students prepared a room for him, because they knew he wouldn't be
> able to travel until after Hanukkah. A 12th grader came up to him and
> asked, "Rabbi, tell me the truth. Moshe Rabbenu: did he exist or
> not?"
Couldn't travel until after Hannukah??? Since when is Hannukah a Yom
Tov? Or is that your point? 8-)
Kol tuv, Hadass
--
Hadass Eviatar
Winnipeg, Canada
http://www.superhwy.net/~eviatar
Keep me far from petty thoughts and petty pride, far from anger,
impatience, despair, gossip and all bad traits - Yom Kippur liturgy.
Micha Berger
:>We can't prove it, not having an example of what was available. But we
:>do know the Pharasees had this notion of not changing a single letter...
: The Pharisees seem to come on the scene later than the
: different versions....
Not really relevent. The question is which text of the bible is most
likely to be similar to the ones in the days of Ezra. I'm saying that
the guys with the most detail-obsessive religion are going to be the
most likely candidates.
: Scrolls have a moderate number of differences with each
: other, hardly consistent with the idea of not changing
: a single letter...
I disagree. Do you assume that perfection is possible, and therefore
imperfection was a willfull change?
: Even the Talmud states that the men of
: the Great Assembly knew which words had the full, and
: which the shorter, version, but they do not know.
And that the GA version was the correct, truer one. BTW, the Talmud
refers to "malei and chaseir", which although it means "full and deficient
[spelling]" it more often is used to mean "[hermeneutics based on oddities
in] full or deficient [spelling]". I would not hazard to guess which
the Talmud means here. However, the first sentence of this paragraph
stands.
:>But what does this have to do with my question?
:>:> How do we know the Septuigant worked from these scrolls
:>:> rather than the variants are products of back-editing?
: The same question can be asked for the Masoretic-type
: scrolls. Tov seems to thing there was a fair amount of
: back-editing in all.
This isn't a competition. I asked a simple question. Nothing about launching
a debate.
Theory is that information went from some alternative variant to the
septuagint. I asked why the theory isn't that it went from the septuagint
to the variant. I didn't mention mesoretic text anywhere.
I explained why the masoretes are the least likely people to allow
errors to creep into the text. While that doesn't reduce the odds to 0,
it does make it most likely that such errors are few and are limited to
spelling issues and the like.
-mi
Eric Simon
>>and/or the other proponents are simultaneously saying that R (the
>>"redactor") had to preserve all kinds of details, but that the largest
>>detail of all (that HaShem gave Torah in public, with everyone in
>>attendance) is a myth.
>
Did not?! Then what are all those details doing there to being with?
>and probably was unaware of the similarity of the names
>in the two lines of descent from Adam.
Unaware?
(This is a sincere line of inquiry).
I had thought that those who proposed a "Redactor" thought he was
brilliant.
So, please, answer me this one: if this redactor was unaware of
details such as the similarity of the names in the two lines of
descent from Adam, then why, when he integrates the stories, are there
exquisite symmetries and so forth.
I mean, how is it that the story of Noah talks about a seven day
period, a 40 day period, then a 150 day period, and then another 150
day period, then another 40 day period, followed by a seven day
period.
Was this coincidence? Or did the Redactor plan this while integrating
two stories? And, if he planned this, then how could he not know of
simple things like the two lines of descent from Adam that almost
match, or the two versions of the Ten Commandments which don't match
("remember" and "observe" the Sabbath, e.g.)
>I am not surprised that there was a legend of a mass
>revelation; these are not that uncommon, even in cases
>where this is passed off as a myth. Many tribal
>religions have an encounter with a god or gods speaking
>out of lightning or thunder or wind or volcanos. As
>the Hindu saying goes,
>
> Saints fly only in the eyes of their disciples.
I have heard, and I have never heard disputed, that the mass
revelation at Siani is the _only_ story of _mass_ revelation where,
according the story itself, every single person of the nation was
there.
How does one go about making something like this up?
Why is it that no other religion has claimed such a thing?
>Armies of 600,000 men were far too
>large for the times.
Well, didn't the Redactor know this?
Or is it possible that 600,000 was a metaphor (just like, "I told you
a million times . . . )?
-- Eric
Herman Rubin
Eric Simon <er...@radix.net> wrote:
>>>This line of argument always confused me. It seems like Herman,
>>>and/or the other proponents are simultaneously saying that R (the
>>>"redactor") had to preserve all kinds of details, but that the largest
>>>detail of all (that HaShem gave Torah in public, with everyone in
>>>attendance) is a myth.
>>The redactor certainly did not preserve all the details,
>Did not?! Then what are all those details doing there to being with?
>>and probably was unaware of the similarity of the names
>>in the two lines of descent from Adam.
>Unaware?
>(This is a sincere line of inquiry).
The two lines are not intermingled. The descendents of Adam
through Cain are given first, and then the descendents of
Seth are given. Unlike Kings and Chronicles, there is no
attempt to keep it as a single chronology. Some of the names
match exactly, but some do not. I suspect the redactor just
put in both legends, with a minimal amount of editing.
>I had thought that those who proposed a "Redactor" thought he was
>brilliant.
I do not know of any claims of extraordinary brilliance.
>So, please, answer me this one: if this redactor was unaware of
>details such as the similarity of the names in the two lines of
>descent from Adam, then why, when he integrates the stories, are there
>exquisite symmetries and so forth.
>I mean, how is it that the story of Noah talks about a seven day
>period, a 40 day period, then a 150 day period, and then another 150
>day period, then another 40 day period, followed by a seven day
>period.
>Was this coincidence? Or did the Redactor plan this while integrating
>two stories? And, if he planned this, then how could he not know of
>simple things like the two lines of descent from Adam that almost
>match, or the two versions of the Ten Commandments which don't match
>("remember" and "observe" the Sabbath, e.g.)
He had two flood stories to merge. He did not merge the
two lines of descent; both stories are there almost as
the separate legends were in the folklore.
The flood stories read quite well as separate stories,
but he could hardly have two floods.
>>I am not surprised that there was a legend of a mass
>>revelation; these are not that uncommon, even in cases
>>where this is passed off as a myth. Many tribal
>>religions have an encounter with a god or gods speaking
>>out of lightning or thunder or wind or volcanos. As
>>the Hindu saying goes,
>> Saints fly only in the eyes of their disciples.
>I have heard, and I have never heard disputed, that the mass
>revelation at Siani is the _only_ story of _mass_ revelation where,
>according the story itself, every single person of the nation was
>there.
>How does one go about making something like this up?
It is not difficult.
>Why is it that no other religion has claimed such a thing?
They haven't?
>>Armies of 600,000 men were far too
>>large for the times.
>Well, didn't the Redactor know this?
Would a Jewish priest have known the sizes of armies?
>Or is it possible that 600,000 was a metaphor (just like, "I told you
>a million times . . . )?
This could possibly be the case for the 600,000 at the
time of leaving Egypt. But in the two censuses, the
figures are given for each tribe, in thousands and
smaller numbers. The figures are somewhat reasonable
if one takes, for each tribe, the "thousands" as some
such military units as "squads", and the other figure
as the approximate number of fighting men in the tribe.
But then these are added up, and a total obtained which
corresponds to the customary interpretation. It does
not say, 598 squads and 5,000+ men, but 603,000+ men.
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> <mos...@mm.huji.ac.il> wrote in message
>> Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> writes:
[...]
>> > Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
>>
>> Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
>> communities.
>>
>> > Logical, BTW.
>>
>> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
>> like the blood of bovines!
>
> Moshe, I like my meat rare. That means that the juice that comes
> out is red (and probably has some blood content. Dr. Backon,
> please?). When chicken is juicy, the liquid is colorless. I
> doubt that it is blood.
I assume that means that whoever prepares your chickens _drains_ or
possibly _salts_ the blood away.
My point was that _halachikly_ the blood of chockens is forbidden
_Bibically_ just like the blood of bovines. So someone keeping kosher
might get confused.
> That said, who consumes chicken blood? (besides the extreme health
> hazards of undercooking chicken).
Halachikly, if the blood is not drained by salting or roasting over
an open fire, then to amount of cooking will eliminate the blood
content.
Lisa Beth
wrote:
>In article <3a089628...@news.erols.com>,
>Eric Simon <er...@radix.net> wrote:
>>>There are some rather good pieces of evidence, such as the
>>>similarities of the names of the two lines of descent from
>>>Adam, and the fact that the separated versions of the Flood
>>>read more like single works than the combined version.
>
>>This line of argument always confused me. It seems like Herman,
>>and/or the other proponents are simultaneously saying that R (the
>>"redactor") had to preserve all kinds of details, but that the largest
>>detail of all (that HaShem gave Torah in public, with everyone in
>>attendance) is a myth.
>
>>I'm not sure I'm articulating the inherant contradiction well (and if
>>I'm not, can someone elaborate?) -- but I think it's a question that
>>needs answering.
>
>The redactor certainly did not preserve all the details,
>and probably was unaware of the similarity of the names
>in the two lines of descent from Adam. But he might
>have had a problem in trying to "sell" the details to
>the people who had been in Exile, and who might have
>needed to be persuaded to accept the version of the
>Ezra-Nehemiah priesthood. There were undoubtedly many
>versions of the legends, and to hold the people together,
>to get them to rebuild the Temple and to accept it as
>THE unique seat of the religion, required a selling job.
And no trace of that has remained. The entire Jewish people just...
acquiesced to the creation of this myth. You have a wonderful
imagination, Herman.
Lisa
Lisa Beth
>hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>
>> Many tribal religions have an encounter with a god or gods speaking
>> out of lightning or thunder or wind or volcanos.
>
>Including tribal religions in Canaan. There are close similarities
>between Ugaritic descriptions of Ba`al's theophanies in thunderstorms
>(sometimes on a mountain) and hashem's theophanies in the Bible.
Funny that. I wonder if the fact that the Ugaritic documents postdate
the Bible by centuries might have something to do with that.
Lisa
--
I take responsibility:
I will be voting for Moshe Feiglin in the Likud primaries.
Ask me how you can, too.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: Or is it possible that 600,000 was a metaphor (just like, "I told you
: a million times . . . )?
I have heard two other explanations for the 600,000. I do not claim
that either is "Orthodox" or that either is particularly likely; I am
only presenting them.
(1) The "numerical" designations do not refer to actual numbers, but to
military units of different sizes (hence "captains of tens, captains of
hundreds," and so on). Thus, instead of "600,000," we should read "600
brigades" or whatever, which could be a number far smaller than 600,000.
(2) Supposedly, according to the cosmology of the Babylonians, there are
600,000 stars in the sky.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad."
Micha Berger
: (1) The "numerical" designations do not refer to actual numbers, but to
: military units of different sizes (hence "captains of tens, captains of
: hundreds," and so on). Thus, instead of "600,000," we should read "600
: brigades" or whatever, which could be a number far smaller than 600,000.
The idea that elef means "aluf", a military unit, as opposed to meaning
"one thousand" has been raised on scj on more than one occasion.
This doesn't work, since the math in the count toward the end of Numbers
(in Parashas Pin'chas) requires carrying from the 100s colums to the
thousands column.
: (2) Supposedly, according to the cosmology of the Babylonians, there are
: 600,000 stars in the sky.
This isn't likely. One thing historians of astronomy note is that the
Babylonians paid little attention to the fixed stars. Their zodiac was
only 36 stars each (3 per god / month). They didn't ascribe any importance
to them or their number.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: I am simply dying to hear what Herman has to say about this. After
: coming off so utterly certain that the Torah could *not* have been
: written on parchment way back when. Will he have the good grace to
: apologize and admit that he was wrong? I think he might.
Apparently, you haven't been reading *.jewish.* long enough. I've been
here over 15 years, and in all of that time, the only mistake that
Professor Rubin ever admitted was one that he had not in fact made.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
:>History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
:>out archetypes and generalities.
:
: I agree. That is why archaeologists dig up the evidence,
: instead of going by traditions and what was written hundreds
: or thousands of years after the events.
Does the name Schliemann ring a bell?
Herman Rubin
Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>On 8 Nov 2000 02:12:51 GMT, hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>wrote:
>>In article <3a089628...@news.erols.com>,
>>Eric Simon <er...@radix.net> wrote:
.............
>>The redactor certainly did not preserve all the details,
>>and probably was unaware of the similarity of the names
>>in the two lines of descent from Adam. But he might
>>have had a problem in trying to "sell" the details to
>>the people who had been in Exile, and who might have
>>needed to be persuaded to accept the version of the
>>Ezra-Nehemiah priesthood. There were undoubtedly many
>>versions of the legends, and to hold the people together,
>>to get them to rebuild the Temple and to accept it as
>>THE unique seat of the religion, required a selling job.
>And no trace of that has remained. The entire Jewish people just...
>acquiesced to the creation of this myth. You have a wonderful
>imagination, Herman.
I certainly do not get that impression from reading Ezra,
Nehemiah, and Chronicles. To them, it was not a myth;
the legends were the ones they had built up before, and
probably embellished during the Exile, and they go beyond
the Torah. You should read Friedman's _The Hidden Book
in the Bible_.
Herman Rubin
Micha Berger <mi...@aishdas.org> wrote:
>On 8 Nov 2000 16:45:21 GMT, sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il wrote:
>: (1) The "numerical" designations do not refer to actual numbers, but to
>: military units of different sizes (hence "captains of tens, captains of
>: hundreds," and so on). Thus, instead of "600,000," we should read "600
>: brigades" or whatever, which could be a number far smaller than 600,000.
>The idea that elef means "aluf", a military unit, as opposed to meaning
>"one thousand" has been raised on scj on more than one occasion.
>This doesn't work, since the math in the count toward the end of Numbers
>(in Parashas Pin'chas) requires carrying from the 100s colums to the
>thousands column.
However, it supports the idea that the original meaning
was lost, and that the redactor just took the numbers and
added them.
>: (2) Supposedly, according to the cosmology of the Babylonians, there are
>: 600,000 stars in the sky.
>This isn't likely. One thing historians of astronomy note is that the
>Babylonians paid little attention to the fixed stars. Their zodiac was
>only 36 stars each (3 per god / month). They didn't ascribe any importance
>to them or their number.
Even if they did, the number of visible stars is small
enough so that if they started listing them, they would
find the number well within their capabilities; I may have
misremembered the exact numbers, but I seem to recall 3000
visible at one time of the year, and a total visible from
that latitude about 4500.
One gets the impression of a huge number only by going by
impressions.
Micha Berger
:>This doesn't work, since the math in the count toward the end of Numbers
:>(in Parashas Pin'chas) requires carrying from the 100s colums to the
:>thousands column.
: However, it supports the idea that the original meaning
: was lost, and that the redactor just took the numbers and
: added them.
Now we're in real absurdity land. He added a dozen verses in Nasso and
Pin'chas, but won't normalize text to eliminate contradictions?
:>This isn't likely. One thing historians of astronomy note is that the
:>Babylonians paid little attention to the fixed stars. Their zodiac was
:>only 36 stars each (3 per god / month). They didn't ascribe any importance
:>to them or their number.
: Even if they did, the number of visible stars is small
: enough so that if they started listing them, they would
: find the number well within their capabilities; I may have
: misremembered the exact numbers, but I seem to recall 3000
: visible at one time of the year, and a total visible from
: that latitude about 4500.
In either case, not 600K. It's not a number invented to match G-d's
promise to Abraham (they will be like the stars of the sky ... you will
not be able to count them from their quantity).
Herman Rubin
>In article <8u6skh$2k...@odds.stat.purdue.edu>, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>:>History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
>:>out archetypes and generalities.
>: I agree. That is why archaeologists dig up the evidence,
>: instead of going by traditions and what was written hundreds
>: or thousands of years after the events.
>Does the name Schliemann ring a bell?
I never said that there was NO truth in the legends. However,
that Troy existed where the Greek names indicated it should
(Dardanelles, etc) does not make the stories in the Iliad and
the Odyssey correct. If they had 1000 ships, this would make
about 50,000 men, a large army at the time, but not too large.
I agree that there was an Israelite presence in Egypt, and
that somehow or other it left or was kicked out. I have
seen about a dozen scenarios for this, all of which contradict
the Book of Exodus.
The evidence seems to be that there Moses, an Egyptian prince,
who was a leader in the movement. How much of the rest is real,
how much is a distortion, and how much is invented, I leave to
good historians and archaeologists to fight out.
Polar
>
> The following paragraph in a book review by
>Jonathan Kirsch [1] caught my eye:
>
> "...why the Bible is as lively and meaningful today as it was
>when its earliest passages were first set down on parchment 3,000
>years ago."
>
> ??? I thought it was transmitted orally for quite some time.
>When was the alleged "Deuteronomy" found in the Temple?
>
> Is there an even earlier record of written material?
Thanks to all who have written on this subject.
I really appreciate the info; have learned a lot!
--
Polar
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
:>: (2) Supposedly, according to the cosmology of the Babylonians, there are
:>: 600,000 stars in the sky.
:>This isn't likely. One thing historians of astronomy note is that the
:>Babylonians paid little attention to the fixed stars. Their zodiac was
:>only 36 stars each (3 per god / month). They didn't ascribe any importance
:>to them or their number.
: Even if they did, the number of visible stars is small
: enough so that if they started listing them, they would
: find the number well within their capabilities; I may have
: misremembered the exact numbers, but I seem to recall 3000
: visible at one time of the year, and a total visible from
: that latitude about 4500.
People tend to vastly overestimate the number of visible stars. My
guess is that it's because the stars range in brightness from quite
bright to just barely visible, and the number increases as the brightness
decreases. Thus, there are a lot of stars just at the limit of vision,
which gives the impression of some uncountable number, especially since the
ones at the limit of vision will fade in and out of vision.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: The evidence seems to be that there Moses, an Egyptian prince,
: who was a leader in the movement. How much of the rest is real,
: how much is a distortion, and how much is invented, I leave to
: good historians and archaeologists to fight out.
What "evidence"? Be specific.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"How many boards would the Mongols hoard if the Mongol hordes got bored?"
Lisa Beth
>star...@hotmail.com (Lisa Beth) writes:
>
>> On 8 Nov 2000 13:18:12 GMT, Philistine <a_a_...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>> >
>> >> Many tribal religions have an encounter with a god or gods
>> >> speaking out of lightning or thunder or wind or volcanos.
>> >
>> >Including tribal religions in Canaan. There are close similarities
>> >between Ugaritic descriptions of Ba`al's theophanies in thunderstorms
>> >(sometimes on a mountain) and hashem's theophanies in the Bible.
>>
>> Funny that. I wonder if the fact that the Ugaritic documents
>> postdate the Bible by centuries might have something to do with
>> that.
>
>As you know, according to critical scholars the Ugaritic tablets
>pre-date the written Hebrew sources which later became the Bible. In
>other words, you either believe the Ugaritic tablets were written
>earlier than the biblical documents, or you believe that the Torah was
>given by God at Sinai.
Actually, those aren't the only two possibilities. There are a great
many people who date the Ugaritic tablets to centuries after the time
of the Exodus without any religious beliefs whatsoever.
Strawman arguments are not honest, Aaron.
>I don't want to bother "discussing" any of that with you. I'm just
>pointing it out for the sake of anyone else who may be reading.
You don't discuss. You engage in hit-and-run style tactics.
Lisa
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> Lisa Beth wrote:
>> Look at how much Torah has been forgotten in secular communities here
>> in Israel. I remember reading an article by Rav Lau about when he
>> went to speak at a secular high school on the first night of Hanukkah.
>> The students prepared a room for him, because they knew he wouldn't be
>> able to travel until after Hanukkah. A 12th grader came up to him and
>> asked, "Rabbi, tell me the truth. Moshe Rabbenu: did he exist or
>> not?"
>
> Couldn't travel until after Hannukah??? Since when is Hannukah a Yom
> Tov? Or is that your point? 8-)
I understood that to be precisely Lisa's point. They assumed Hannukah
was like Shavuot and travel was forbidden for a "rabbi". I put
rabbi in parenthesis, _not_ to belittle R. Lau, but rather to make it
a subset of Jews according to those students - "those Jews who don't
travel on a Holiday".
BTW, I don't understand the point of a smiley. I think <sigh> would
be more appropriate.
Lisa Beth
>In article <3a065679...@News.CIS.DFN.DE>, Lisa Beth <star...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>: I am simply dying to hear what Herman has to say about this. After
>: coming off so utterly certain that the Torah could *not* have been
>: written on parchment way back when. Will he have the good grace to
>: apologize and admit that he was wrong? I think he might.
>
>Apparently, you haven't been reading *.jewish.* long enough. I've been
>here over 15 years, and in all of that time, the only mistake that
>Professor Rubin ever admitted was one that he had not in fact made.
Guess you're right. The truth is, I only added that last sentence
because I was afraid the moderators would bounce it as an "attack"
otherwise. I knew he wouldn't admit his mistake.
Lisa
Simcha Streltsov
: attempt to keep it as a single chronology. Some of the names
: match exactly, but some do not. I suspect the redactor just
: put in both legends, with a minimal amount of editing.
this sounds good, but do you have a simple consistent hypothesis
that explains the whole book? can you explain the whole Humash,
or Tanach, by the "minimal editing" approach where details are
not made consistent? maybe, such theory exists, but I just
want to make it clear that it is necessary here as it is
not scientifically valid to have a separater explanation for
each issue.
--
Simcha Streltsov disclaimer, as requested by Mo-he S-rr
sim...@bu.edu all punctuation marks in this article
are equivalent to (-:
Hadass Eviatar
> > Couldn't travel until after Hannukah??? Since when is Hannukah a Yom
> > Tov? Or is that your point? 8-)
>
> be more appropriate.
The smiley was laughing at myself for being so dense about Lisa's point.
But I did have to ask, just in case I was completely wrong about
Hannukah (glad to hear that I'm not 8-)).
Yitzchak Moran
>
> Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> writes:
> > jo...@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
> >>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
> >>pareve, for example.
> >
> > Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
>
> Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
> communities.
>
> > Logical, BTW.
>
> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
> like the blood of bovines!
Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
and cheese sandwitches. Turkey tetrazini. Chicken ravioli in cream
sauce. Etc. etc. We're talking whole vistas of cuisine, here.
For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
--
Yitzchak Moran | "...for what reason was the School of Hillel entitled
Professional Dad | to have the law determined according to their rulings?
from the Home Office | Because they were kindly and humble, and because they
dou...@earthlink.net | studied their own rulings and those of Shammai..."
Lisa Beth
>star...@hotmail.com (Lisa Beth) writes:
>
>> On 8 Nov 2000 16:53:18 GMT, Philistine <a_a_...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >As you know, according to critical scholars the Ugaritic tablets
>> >pre-date the written Hebrew sources which later became the Bible.
>> >In other words, you either believe the Ugaritic tablets were
>> >written earlier than the biblical documents, or you believe that
>> >the Torah was given by God at Sinai.
>>
>> Actually, those aren't the only two possibilities. There are a
>> great many people who date the Ugaritic tablets to centuries after
>> the time of the Exodus without any religious beliefs whatsoever.
>
>Please try to read more carefully. I didn't say anything about anyone
>believing the Ugaritic tablets pre-dated the Exodus (if there was such
>a thing). I said critical scholars believe they pre-dated the early
>biblical documents, which of course describe the Exodus among other
>events.
There are no "early biblical documents".
Lisa
meirm...@erols.com
hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) posted:
>In article <8uc3sc$a1v$3...@news.huji.ac.il>, <sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il> wrote:
>>In article <8u6skh$2k...@odds.stat.purdue.edu>, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>
>>:>History is not a comic book, Herman. It's not stick figures playing
>>:>out archetypes and generalities.
>
>>: I agree. That is why archaeologists dig up the evidence,
>>: instead of going by traditions and what was written hundreds
>>: or thousands of years after the events.
>
>>Does the name Schliemann ring a bell?
>
>I never said that there was NO truth in the legends. However,
>that Troy existed where the Greek names indicated it should
>(Dardanelles, etc) does not make the stories in the Iliad and
>the Odyssey correct. If they had 1000 ships, this would make
>about 50,000 men, a large army at the time, but not too large.
>
>I agree that there was an Israelite presence in Egypt, and
>that somehow or other it left or was kicked out. I have
>seen about a dozen scenarios for this, all of which contradict
>the Book of Exodus.
You spend so many posts trying to assert the same thing. I can't help
wondering why it is so important or what good you think it does?
(no attempt at humor)
>
>The evidence seems to be that there Moses, an Egyptian prince,
>who was a leader in the movement. How much of the rest is real,
>how much is a distortion, and how much is invented, I leave to
>good historians and archaeologists to fight out.
mei...@QQQerols.com
e-mail by removing QQQ
Herman Rubin
>Herman Rubin (hru...@stat.purdue.edu) wrote:
>: attempt to keep it as a single chronology. Some of the names
>: match exactly, but some do not. I suspect the redactor just
>: put in both legends, with a minimal amount of editing.
>this sounds good, but do you have a simple consistent hypothesis
>that explains the whole book? can you explain the whole Humash,
>or Tanach, by the "minimal editing" approach where details are
>not made consistent? maybe, such theory exists, but I just
>want to make it clear that it is necessary here as it is
>not scientifically valid to have a separater explanation for
>each issue.
I suggest you read Friedman's book; it goes into more details.
There are some questions, which we cannot resolve.
One is just what legends and accounts were circulating at
the time. Another is how well and how strongly they were
believed, And there is also the question of fitting them
in with the Redactor's agenda.
We can only see the results, and the editing seams show.
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> Polar <sme...@mindspring.com> writes:
>> > jo...@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879) wrote:
>> >
>> > [...]
>> >
>> >>We know that the halacha of second Temple times had many more variant
>> >>traditions than the halacha of today -- in some communities, chicken was
>> >>pareve, for example.
>> >
>> > Bring back the Second Temple, complete with pareve chicken.
>>
>> Um Polar, that wouldn't help you much. It was _only_ in "some
>> communities.
>>
>> > Logical, BTW.
>>
>> But could be confusing. The _blood_ of chickens is forbidden just
>> like the blood of bovines!
>
> Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
> enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
> potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
> and cheese sandwitches. Turkey tetrazini. Chicken ravioli in cream
> sauce. Etc. etc. We're talking whole vistas of cuisine, here.
What's wrond with peanut butter and jelly? It's even pareve _and_
vegetarian, too!
> For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
> chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
>
> o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
If you're looking for inconsistencies, consider that cows are "meat"
and the milk they produce is "milk".
> o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
As I tried to explain, because they're similar to bovines in
other ways.
Jonathan J. Baker
>mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> like the blood of bovines!
>Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
What's the problem here? Mashed potatoes aren't dairy. Turkey & mashed
potatoes are often served together in kosher restaurants, or at my parents'
home, etc.
>potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
So what's wrong with margarine?
> Turkey tetrazini.
Isn't that a cleaning fluid? Or an antibiotic?
> Chicken ravioli in cream
>sauce.
Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
>For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
>chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
>o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
>o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
Poultry is only considered meat as a result of a rabbinic ruling that
didn't become universally followed until about 1700-1800 years ago (when
Rebbi Yosi's community in the Galil died out). So (b) is not particularly
relevant, and (a) is a consequence of it - if milk, a cow product, is
dairy (under most circumstances), if honey, a bee product is kosher
(bees not being kosher themselves), why shouldn't eggs, a bird product,
be kosher/pareve?
--
Jonathan Baker | Marches-wan, marches-two,
jjb...@panix.com | March the months all through and through
Web page update: Vidui, Siyum on Moed. http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker/
Yitzchak Moran
>
> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
> > mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
> >
> > enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
> > potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
> > and cheese sandwitches. Turkey tetrazini. Chicken ravioli in cream
> > sauce. Etc. etc. We're talking whole vistas of cuisine, here.
>
> vegetarian, too!
Nothing at all; I eat it a lot. The other advantage is, you can have
your chocolate dessert immediately, rather than waiting for a a few
hours. But it doesn't hurt to have other stuff in one's diet, eh?
meirm...@erols.com
Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> posted:
>mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>>
>> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
>> > mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> >
>> > Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>> > enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
>> > potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
>> > and cheese sandwitches. Turkey tetrazini. Chicken ravioli in cream
>> > sauce. Etc. etc. We're talking whole vistas of cuisine, here.
>>
>> What's wrond with peanut butter and jelly? It's even pareve _and_
>> vegetarian, too!
If we spliced a cow gene into the peanuts, instead of having to gather
them by hand, we could just round them up while riding horses. We
would however face the question as to whether they are fleishig.
If we spliced a pig gene in, we could just gather the peanuts by
calling 'soooeeee'.
Same thing with jelly.
>Nothing at all; I eat it a lot. The other advantage is, you can have
>your chocolate dessert immediately, rather than waiting for a a few
>hours. But it doesn't hurt to have other stuff in one's diet, eh?
Yitzchak Moran
>
> In <8ufmji$caq$1...@condor.nj.org> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
> >mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
> >> like the blood of bovines!
>
> >Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
> >enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
>
> potatoes are often served together in kosher restaurants, or at my parents'
> home, etc.
Mashed potatoes are frequently made with milk. At least in the house
where I grew up (non-Jewish household, remember). Hence the problem.
> >potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
>
> So what's wrong with margarine?
Nothing per-se, except it doesn't taste as good to me.
> > Turkey tetrazini.
>
> Isn't that a cleaning fluid? Or an antibiotic?
"It's a floor wax *and* a dessert topping!"
It's a turkey-cheese-noodle dish. The I probably mis-spelled.
> > Chicken ravioli in cream
> >sauce.
>
> Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
> made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
Sure. We even have it here at home, as my son is lactose intolerant.
It doesn't taste the same.
> >For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
> >chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
>
> >o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
> >o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
>
> Poultry is only considered meat as a result of a rabbinic ruling that
> didn't become universally followed until about 1700-1800 years ago (when
> Rebbi Yosi's community in the Galil died out).
Thanks for the details; I knew the general outline, but not the specifics.
>So (b) is not particularly
> relevant, and (a) is a consequence of it - if milk, a cow product, is
> dairy (under most circumstances), if honey, a bee product is kosher
> (bees not being kosher themselves), why shouldn't eggs, a bird product,
> be kosher/pareve?
It depends on how one views eggs, as well as the interpretation of the
mitzvah itself. Or so it seems to me. (But let us bear in mind that
I am new to all this, and while I have read as much as I can, and
talk to people all the time, I am *not* a Torah scholar. I don't
even play one on Usenet. And believe me, I'm aware of it.)
At the risk of boring folks: The way the mitzvah has been explained
to me ("Do not seethe the kid in its mother's milk"), one should separate
the milk from the meat because we eat meat as a compromise to vegetarianism,
and as such, it behooves us to be as merciful to the animals that we
eat as possible (e.g., by butchering as painlessly as possible). As such,
isn't it awful to boil the meat in the milk of (potentially) it's
own mother? Yuck. To say the least.
After that, it's just the "fence around the Torah" thing, i.e., best
not even goof with it, and separate dairy products from meat products
all together. Why risk it?
However, chickens don't produce milk. It's impossible to seethe the
meat of a chicken in its mother's milk. So why separate chicken and
milk? Or chicken and cheese?
With regard to eggs, eggs are embryonic chickens; milk is not an
embryonic cow (or goat, or lamb, or whatever). While I understand
considering an egg to be a chicken "product," it's not, in my
biological opinion, the same kind of "product" as milk. An egg
is a chicken's way of making more chickens. Milk is a cow's way
of feeding her young. Similarly with bees and honey. This seems
to me to be a big difference.
(One could argue that one shouldn't mix chicken and eggs by this
logic, by the way. Is there a responsa on that issue somewhere?)
A much more compelling reason that I have been given is that if one
were to eat cheese (or drink milk) with one's chicken, it would become
easier to do the same with meat. For me, this makes a lot more sense.
Even just thinking about it, personally, I find myself thinking, "Well,
heck, if I can eat a turkey and cheese sandwitch, why not a roast
beef and cheese sandwitch?" To which the other part of my brain
replies, "Duh!"
Anyway, I *do* separate them. I just disagree, is all. But as I said,
I'm hardly a Torah scholar.
(Posted and mailed)
Eric Simon
>> relevant, and (a) is a consequence of it - if milk, a cow product, is
>> dairy (under most circumstances), if honey, a bee product is kosher
>> (bees not being kosher themselves), why shouldn't eggs, a bird product,
>> be kosher/pareve?
>
>It depends on how one views eggs, as well as the interpretation of the
>mitzvah itself.
Right. For starters, we 'interpret' by looking at the Talmud.
>At the risk of boring folks: The way the mitzvah has been explained
>to me ("Do not seethe the kid in its mother's milk"), one should separate
>the milk from the meat because we eat meat as a compromise to vegetarianism,
>and as such, it behooves us to be as merciful to the animals that we
>eat as possible (e.g., by butchering as painlessly as possible). As such,
>isn't it awful to boil the meat in the milk of (potentially) it's
>own mother? Yuck. To say the least.
Ahh, here's the problem.
You see, most things in Judaism have multiple reasons for them.
One of the major reasons for not eating milk and meat is because that
is what pagans did at the time, and we try to distance ourself from
that.
>However, chickens don't produce milk. It's impossible to seethe the
>meat of a chicken in its mother's milk. So why separate chicken and
>milk? Or chicken and cheese?
It's not so much that we want to separate chicken and milk, but we
want to define chicken as a "meat".
Why?
Again . . . for many reasons.
Two that I have heard:
1. Back when the fence was enacted, apparently many people had a hard
time telling the difference (e.g., in a stew).
2. It is considered a mitzvah to honor shabbos, in part, by having a
fancy meal on Friday night. For most of time, this meant having a
meat meal. By calling chicken "meat", one could have a "meat" meal on
shabbos at much less the cost -- an aid for those who couldn't afford
beef.
In summary, one should be very careful about ascribing reasons to a
particular mitzvah -- for just this reason. It's too easy to "see"
that the reason doesn't apply, while not seeing that there are a whole
host of other reasons.
I'm afraid I haven't made myself very clear. And I've probably made
mistakes.
I trust others more knowegable than I will clean up after me. <g>
-- Eric
Jonathan J. Baker
>"Jonathan J. Baker" wrote:
>> In <8ufmji$caq$1...@condor.nj.org> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
>> >mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> >> like the blood of bovines!
>> >Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>> >enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
>> What's the problem here? Mashed potatoes aren't dairy. Turkey & mashed
>> potatoes are often served together in kosher restaurants, or at my parents'
>> home, etc.
>Mashed potatoes are frequently made with milk. At least in the house
>where I grew up (non-Jewish household, remember). Hence the problem.
So I've heard. There are plenty of ways to spice up mashed potatoes
without milk, though.
>> >potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
>> So what's wrong with margarine?
>Nothing per-se, except it doesn't taste as good to me.
Plenty of us grew up with it. My mother put me on it as a child for
weight-loss purposes, and let's face it, regular margarine is lots
better than "lite" margarine. It's all in where you start...
>> > Turkey tetrazini.
>> Isn't that a cleaning fluid? Or an antibiotic?
>"It's a floor wax *and* a dessert topping!"
>It's a turkey-cheese-noodle dish. The I probably mis-spelled.
I know that. I was just playing off tetrazzini (sp?) - [carbon]
tetrachloride - tetracycline.
>> > Chicken ravioli in cream
>> >sauce.
>> Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
>> made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
>Sure. We even have it here at home, as my son is lactose intolerant.
>It doesn't taste the same.
No, it doesn't, but after 25-30 years, it really doesn't matter any more.
We gave up pork, and meat&milk in about 1973. Shellfish went in about
1977.
>However, chickens don't produce milk. It's impossible to seethe the
>meat of a chicken in its mother's milk. So why separate chicken and
>milk? Or chicken and cheese?
Because we are commanded to schecht chickens like meat, and to cover
the blood like meat, so there was some concern that the same knives
would be used for both kinds of shechita, the same utensils used for
kashering, which would turn the fowl into effectively fleishic food
(same as using a knife on pareve food today makes it into effectively
the polarity of the knife).
>With regard to eggs, eggs are embryonic chickens; milk is not an
Actually, no. Eggs are *carriers* of embryonic chickens. We are
forbidden to eat embryonic chickens - any egg with a blood spot
may not be eaten. None of the eggs that we eat today (unless maybe
if you get it from a farm directly) come in contact with rooster
sperm, so there are no embryonic chickens to eat.
>embryonic cow (or goat, or lamb, or whatever). While I understand
>considering an egg to be a chicken "product," it's not, in my
>biological opinion, the same kind of "product" as milk. An egg
Effectively, it is: it is food for the immature form of the animal.
Cow milk is food for calves. Egg is food for embryonic chickens.
>is a chicken's way of making more chickens. Milk is a cow's way
>of feeding her young. Similarly with bees and honey. This seems
>to me to be a big difference.
Actually, as above, it is not a difference, it describes the common
element among honey, milk and eggs.
>(One could argue that one shouldn't mix chicken and eggs by this
>logic, by the way. Is there a responsa on that issue somewhere?)
I think, when it comes to that, each is different anyway. Milk and
cow may not be mixed. Egg and chicken may be mixed (e.g., egg in
the breading of fried chicken). Honey and bees may not be mixed
because the bees are ab initio not kosher.
>A much more compelling reason that I have been given is that if one
>were to eat cheese (or drink milk) with one's chicken, it would become
>easier to do the same with meat. For me, this makes a lot more sense.
That's also a plausible rationale.
>Even just thinking about it, personally, I find myself thinking, "Well,
>heck, if I can eat a turkey and cheese sandwitch, why not a roast
>beef and cheese sandwitch?" To which the other part of my brain
>replies, "Duh!"
>Anyway, I *do* separate them. I just disagree, is all. But as I said,
>I'm hardly a Torah scholar.
You may not actually disagree, when you come to learn in depth - I've
found that happening many times. I disagree with the simplistic,
superficial treatment of an idea in Torah, but when I learn it in
depth, it no longer seems so outlandish, but is instead well-considered.
By the way, why Moran? It still sounds Irish, just as O'Morain does.
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
>> > mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> >
>> > Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>> > enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before. Baked
>> > potatoes with sour cream and butter *with* the baked chicken. Turkey
>> > and cheese sandwitches. Turkey tetrazini. Chicken ravioli in cream
>> > sauce. Etc. etc. We're talking whole vistas of cuisine, here.
>>
>> What's wrond with peanut butter and jelly? It's even pareve _and_
>> vegetarian, too!
>
> Nothing at all; I eat it a lot. The other advantage is, you can have
> your chocolate dessert immediately, rather than waiting for a a few
> hours. But it doesn't hurt to have other stuff in one's diet, eh?
I wouldn't know. Half the things on your list I never heard of.
Others I never ate. So how can I answer your question?
Yitzchak Moran
>
> > Nothing at all; I eat it a lot. The other advantage is, you can have
> > your chocolate dessert immediately, rather than waiting for a a few
> > hours. But it doesn't hurt to have other stuff in one's diet, eh?
>
> I wouldn't know. Half the things on your list I never heard of.
> Others I never ate. So how can I answer your question?
I figured. It was more a "Yitzchak does not live by peanut butter
alone" kind of rhetorical question.
Jonathan J. Baker
>2. It is considered a mitzvah to honor shabbos, in part, by having a
>fancy meal on Friday night. For most of time, this meant having a
>meat meal. By calling chicken "meat", one could have a "meat" meal on
>shabbos at much less the cost -- an aid for those who couldn't afford
>beef.
That's not necessarily so. Yes, whole doves (I don't know if they
had chicken yet in the Middle east) are cheaper than whole cows for
sacrificial purposes, but per pound, the relationship between the
prices of beef & poultry have varied up & down.
When they said, during the New Deal, "a chicken in every pot", they
meant the chicken as a luxury item, rather than the beef that everyone
ate as cheap meat. 70 years ago, chicken was more expensive than beef.
>In summary, one should be very careful about ascribing reasons to a
>particular mitzvah -- for just this reason. It's too easy to "see"
>that the reason doesn't apply, while not seeing that there are a whole
>host of other reasons.
As I said in the other post, the superficial answer is not necessarily
the most logical one. Don't reject the idea because you've only heard
a "crazy" explanation.
meirm...@erols.com
jjb...@panix.com (Jonathan J. Baker) posted:
>
>That's not necessarily so. Yes, whole doves (I don't know if they
>had chicken yet in the Middle east) are cheaper than whole cows for
>sacrificial purposes, but per pound, the relationship between the
>prices of beef & poultry have varied up & down.
>
>When they said, during the New Deal, "a chicken in every pot", they
>meant the chicken as a luxury item, rather than the beef that everyone
>ate as cheap meat. 70 years ago, chicken was more expensive than beef.
Any chance it was pork that was the other choice, not beef? Just a
guess.
hsc
news:8umbue$3b4$1...@panix6.panix.com...
[sd]
> Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
> made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
The Onion of Orthodox Rabbis (the only vegetable on the breastplate of the
Kohan Gadol) declared that medieval-recreationism is not Judaism (although
Jonathan's kosher friends are probably still Jews).
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> "Jonathan J. Baker" wrote:
>> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
>> >mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> >> like the blood of bovines!
>>
>> >Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>> >enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before.
>>
>> mashed potatoes are often served together in kosher restaurants,
>> or at my parents' home, etc.
>
> Mashed potatoes are frequently made with milk. At least in the house
> where I grew up (non-Jewish household, remember). Hence the problem.
More culinary discussion, snipped. I want to get to a different point.
>> >For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
>> >chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
>>
>> >o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
>> >o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
>>
>> Poultry is only considered meat as a result of a rabbinic ruling that
>> didn't become universally followed until about 1700-1800 years ago (when
>> Rebbi Yosi's community in the Galil died out).
>
> Thanks for the details; I knew the general outline, but not the specifics.
>
>> So (b) is not particularly
>> relevant, and (a) is a consequence of it - if milk, a cow product, is
>> dairy (under most circumstances), if honey, a bee product is kosher
>> (bees not being kosher themselves), why shouldn't eggs, a bird product,
>> be kosher/pareve?
>
> It depends on how one views eggs, as well as the interpretation of the
> mitzvah itself. Or so it seems to me. (But let us bear in mind that
> I am new to all this, and while I have read as much as I can, and
> talk to people all the time, I am *not* a Torah scholar. I don't
> even play one on Usenet. And believe me, I'm aware of it.)
That's an excellent starting point.
> At the risk of boring folks: The way the mitzvah has been
> explained to me ("Do not seethe the kid in its mother's milk"),
> one should separate the milk from the meat because we eat meat
> as a compromise to vegetarianism,
I'm not aware of that "compromise". Adam was permitted only to eat
vegetables and fruit. Noah recieved permission for meat as well.
That's a historical sequence but I don't know if it's a "compromise".
> and as such, it behooves us to be as merciful to the animals that
> we eat as possible (e.g., by butchering as painlessly as possible).
Interesting idea. Could also be, that by doing things as painlessly
as possible, we reinforce our _own_ feelings of compassion.
> As such, isn't it awful to boil the meat in the milk of
> (potentially) it's own mother? Yuck. To say the least.
Another interesting idea.
The problem with this and other "explanations" of the various
mitzvot, is that they're one-dimensional. They might be _a_ correct
idea, but they cannot _totally_ explain any mitzvah. G-d is Infinite
and His thought (as conveyed in the Torah) is Infinite.
What often happens, is that an explanation for a mitzvah is given.
That in itself is fine. But when we start judging the mitzvah by how
well it conforms to the "explanation", we're putting the cart in
front of the horse.
> After that, it's just the "fence around the Torah" thing, i.e.,
> best not even goof with it, and separate dairy products from meat
> products all together. Why risk it?
It is true that many of the seperations we do is a "fence around the
Torah" thing. I wouldn't call it "just". If you consider violating
a Torah law to be _devestating_, then that fence is mighty welcome.
But, and this is very important, it's a "fence around the _Torah_"
and not a fence around a particular "explanation".
> However, chickens don't produce milk. It's impossible to seethe the
> meat of a chicken in its mother's milk. So why separate chicken and
> milk? Or chicken and cheese?
As I said before, to avoid mix-ups. You recognize this at the end of
your post.
> With regard to eggs, eggs are embryonic chickens; milk is not an
> embryonic cow (or goat, or lamb, or whatever). While I understand
> considering an egg to be a chicken "product," it's not, in my
> biological opinion, the same kind of "product" as milk. An egg
> is a chicken's way of making more chickens. Milk is a cow's way
> of feeding her young. Similarly with bees and honey. This seems
> to me to be a big difference.
>
> (One could argue that one shouldn't mix chicken and eggs by this
> logic, by the way. Is there a responsa on that issue somewhere?)
Never heard of one. The fact that it's totally permissable to mix
eggs and chickens, should give us an indication that the explanation
you mentioned, is _not_ the be all and end all of the mitzvah.
> A much more compelling reason that I have been given is that if one
> were to eat cheese (or drink milk) with one's chicken, it would become
> easier to do the same with meat. For me, this makes a lot more sense.
> Even just thinking about it, personally, I find myself thinking, "Well,
> heck, if I can eat a turkey and cheese sandwitch, why not a roast
> beef and cheese sandwitch?" To which the other part of my brain
> replies, "Duh!"
Exactly. Espescially when in regard to other laws, poultry and
"real" meat are the same. They both require shechita - [ritual
slaughtering] and the blood of both is forbidden.
> Anyway, I *do* separate them. I just disagree, is all. But as I
> said, I'm hardly a Torah scholar.
I wouldn't say "disagree". "don't understand" I'm sure, is a more
accurate description.
Moshe Schorr
It is a tremendous Mitzvah to be happy always! - Reb Nachman of Breslov
(mailed & posted)
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> "Jonathan J. Baker" wrote:
>> Yitzchak Moran <dou...@earthlink.net> writes:
>> >mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> >> like the blood of bovines!
>>
>> >Yes, but it would mean that we could have grated cheese on our chicken
>> >enchiladas. Mashed potatoes *with* the Turkey, instead of before.
>>
>> mashed potatoes are often served together in kosher restaurants,
>> or at my parents' home, etc.
>
> Mashed potatoes are frequently made with milk. At least in the house
> where I grew up (non-Jewish household, remember). Hence the problem.
More culinary discussion, snipped. I want to get to a different point.
>> >For the record, I separate my milk and meat, even when that "meat" is
>> >chicken. That said, it still don't make no sense to me that:
>>
>> >o) eggs are parve but chicken isn't
>> >o) chickens don't lactate, but are considered "meat"
>>
Sheldon Glickler
<meirm...@erols.com> wrote in message
news:i6211t0te61jq0guu...@4ax.com...
Here is an unkosher bit of added knowledge. During American colonial times,
when a colonist had company he would serve salt pork. That was the
expensive delicacy item. He would never serve the cheap food of the working
class called lobster. My, how times have changed.
Shelly
Herman Rubin
Eric Simon <er...@radix.net> wrote:
>>>So (b) is not particularly
>>> relevant, and (a) is a consequence of it - if milk, a cow product, is
>>> dairy (under most circumstances), if honey, a bee product is kosher
>>> (bees not being kosher themselves), why shouldn't eggs, a bird product,
>>> be kosher/pareve?
>>It depends on how one views eggs, as well as the interpretation of the
>>mitzvah itself.
>Right. For starters, we 'interpret' by looking at the Talmud.
>>At the risk of boring folks: The way the mitzvah has been explained
>>to me ("Do not seethe the kid in its mother's milk"), one should separate
>>the milk from the meat because we eat meat as a compromise to vegetarianism,
>>and as such, it behooves us to be as merciful to the animals that we
>>eat as possible (e.g., by butchering as painlessly as possible). As such,
>>isn't it awful to boil the meat in the milk of (potentially) it's
>>own mother? Yuck. To say the least.
It may have been explained this way, but this does not make
it so. Groups of people were vegetarian only when they
could not do anything about it, and the religious exegesis
just plain disregards what we know about ancient man. In
fact, the use of milk is the more recent human activity.
The last letter of the Torah commandment cannot be read
as other than limiting the prohibition to the milk of
the mother of the kid. What was being prohibited was a
religious practice of some of the surrounding tribes, I
believe to sanctify the milk for human use, as in those
days, one usually did not get milk except by killing the
kid.
But then we get those who cannot accept the plain meaning,
and insist that there must be more. The Torah is in the
language of man, and these hidden meanings are inventions.
Jonathan J. Baker
>>That's not necessarily so. Yes, whole doves (I don't know if they
>>had chicken yet in the Middle east) are cheaper than whole cows for
>>sacrificial purposes, but per pound, the relationship between the
>>prices of beef & poultry have varied up & down.
>>When they said, during the New Deal, "a chicken in every pot", they
>>meant the chicken as a luxury item, rather than the beef that everyone
>>ate as cheap meat. 70 years ago, chicken was more expensive than beef.
>Any chance it was pork that was the other choice, not beef? Just a
>guess.
I'm going by what my father told me. He was born in 1921, so he remembers
the Depression era quite clearly.
Jonathan J. Baker
>[sd]
>> Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
>> made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
>[sd]
>The Onion of Orthodox Rabbis (the only vegetable on the breastplate of the
>Kohan Gadol) declared that medieval-recreationism is not Judaism (although
>Jonathan's kosher friends are probably still Jews).
That's as may be, but the two are not incompatible. Mar Yaakov
Hamizrachi, who passes for a lawyer in real life, and his wife
Lady Rivka bat Shaul, who works as a pharmacist in real life,
originally from Carolingia, East, now in Storvik, Atlantia.
There are lots of Jews in the SCA, but most of them aren't
religious. My wife & I know Adelle Stavis' sister from
those circles (who is religious, IIRC).
Hadass Eviatar
> I'm not aware of that "compromise". Adam was permitted only to eat
> vegetables and fruit. Noah recieved permission for meat as well.
> That's a historical sequence but I don't know if it's a "compromise".
I've always found it fascinating that the permission to eat meat was
given at the same time as the admission that "the inclination of Man is
evil from his youth", and the decision never again to bring a flood upon
the earth. It would suggest that G-d gave up on trying to perfect
humanity, and permitted meat since Man was evil anyway ... but
surrounded it with fences so we shouldn't get too cocky and arrogant
about taking other creatures' lives for our own pleasure.
hsc
> >> Ever hear of almond milk? Soy milk? I've had chicken in almond milk,
> >> made by kosher medieval-recreationist friends.
> >[sd]
> > In <m> "hsc" <harve...@home.com> writes:
> >The Onion of Orthodox Rabbis (the only vegetable on the breastplate of
the
> >Kohan Gadol) declared that medieval-recreationism is not Judaism
(although
> >Jonathan's kosher friends are probably still Jews).
Jonathan J. Baker <jjb...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:8us69c$20a$1...@panix6.panix.com...
> That's as may be, but the two are not incompatible. Mar Yaakov
[sd]
Oops. Forgot to put the smiley after "Jonathan's kosher friends are probably
still Jews." Sorry.
I was just riffing on the UOR's pronuncamientos re non-O.
meirm...@erols.com
jjb...@panix.com (Jonathan J. Baker) posted:
>In <> meirm...@erols.com writes:
>>jjb...@panix.com (Jonathan J. Baker) posted:
>
>>>That's not necessarily so. Yes, whole doves (I don't know if they
>>>had chicken yet in the Middle east) are cheaper than whole cows for
>>>sacrificial purposes, but per pound, the relationship between the
>>>prices of beef & poultry have varied up & down.
>
>>>When they said, during the New Deal, "a chicken in every pot", they
>>>meant the chicken as a luxury item, rather than the beef that everyone
>>>ate as cheap meat. 70 years ago, chicken was more expensive than beef.
>
>>Any chance it was pork that was the other choice, not beef? Just a
>>guess.
>
>I'm going by what my father told me. He was born in 1921, so he remembers
>the Depression era quite clearly.
I stand corrected by you and Shelly. I wonder what changed since then
that made pork cheaper than beef.
mei...@QQQerols.com If you email me only, please say, so I won't
e-mail by removing QQQ wait forever for a post and then forget to
answer the email at all. If you post &
mail, please say, so I will wait for the post.
Herman Rubin
Hadass Eviatar <evi...@superhwy.net> wrote:
>mos...@mm.huji.ac.il wrote:
>> I'm not aware of that "compromise". Adam was permitted only to eat
>> vegetables and fruit. Noah recieved permission for meat as well.
>> That's a historical sequence but I don't know if it's a "compromise".
>I've always found it fascinating that the permission to eat meat was
>given at the same time as the admission that "the inclination of Man is
>evil from his youth", and the decision never again to bring a flood upon
>the earth. It would suggest that G-d gave up on trying to perfect
>humanity, and permitted meat since Man was evil anyway ... but
>surrounded it with fences so we shouldn't get too cocky and arrogant
>about taking other creatures' lives for our own pleasure.
I can find nothing here with which to agree. We have
evidence from anthropology and paleontology that ancient
humanoids ate meat when they could get it. At best, we can
try to get the moral implications of Genesis, and separate
it from the legends, but original sin has never been part of
Judaism; I agree with Art Kamlet that the moral meaning of
Eden is that Adam and Eve were put to the test, and passed!
Nature was never vegetarian, from well before there were any
kind of creatures on the land. Maimonides was quite aware
that the lion could not survive on grass.
The prohibition of cooking a kid in ITS mother's milk, where
I emphasize the possessive as clear from the Hebrew, seems
to be one of the prohibitions against heathen rites, as at
that time, it was almost necessary to kill the kid to use
the milk. But when something like this gets into the hands
of those seeking to prohibit, the "seven mistakes in the
spelling of Noah" (two letters in Hebrew) takes over.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: I agree with Art Kamlet that the moral meaning of
: Eden is that Adam and Eve were put to the test, and passed!
Maybe I'm just contrarian, but if "passing" a moral test includes
trying to lie your way out of being caught red handed, I hesitate
to think what "failing" would involve.
: The prohibition of cooking a kid in ITS mother's milk, where
: I emphasize the possessive as clear from the Hebrew, seems
: to be one of the prohibitions against heathen rites, as at
: that time, it was almost necessary to kill the kid to use the milk.
I have asked you this some very large number of times without receiving
a response. Maybe I'll get lucky this time: can you cite a single
competent source that attests to cooking a kid in its mother's milk
as an essential part of a specific heathen rite? And how do you
know that the correct reading is "chalav" (milk) and not "chelev" (suet)?
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"How many boards would the Mongols hoard if the Mongol hordes got bored?"
Herman Rubin
>In article <8v0mk0$3m...@odds.stat.purdue.edu>, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>: I agree with Art Kamlet that the moral meaning of
>: Eden is that Adam and Eve were put to the test, and passed!
>Maybe I'm just contrarian, but if "passing" a moral test includes
>trying to lie your way out of being caught red handed, I hesitate
>to think what "failing" would involve.
Was this the test? This was just the aftermath; the test was
whether to stay ignorant and "innocent", or to start to acquire
knowledge, and so become a conscious decision maker in tiqqun
olam, rather than just a "programmed" pawn in the game. It was
the decision to eat the fruit and become enlightened, or to
blindly follow the prohibition and remain ignorant.
Once they passed, they could no longer stay in Eden, as they
could eat from the tree of knowledge, rather than having to
use their mental abilities and observation.
>: The prohibition of cooking a kid in ITS mother's milk, where
>: I emphasize the possessive as clear from the Hebrew, seems
>: to be one of the prohibitions against heathen rites, as at
>: that time, it was almost necessary to kill the kid to use the milk.
>I have asked you this some very large number of times without receiving
>a response. Maybe I'll get lucky this time: can you cite a single
>competent source that attests to cooking a kid in its mother's milk
>as an essential part of a specific heathen rite? And how do you
>know that the correct reading is "chalav" (milk) and not "chelev" (suet)?
I have read that Maimonides knew of it being practiced by
some African tribes. I had come to the conclusion that this
is what must have been the case when I visited India, and
were told that the peasants killed calves at a very early
age (too early to eat them) to be able to milk the cow.
I do not know when and where the early Jews saw this rite
practiced. However, the three occurrences of this sentence
in the Torah seem somewhat out of place, and are really not
three different ones, but two, as there is an entire section
copied. The editing seams show.
Whether it is milk and not suet, how likely is the fat of the
mother likely to be used to cook the calf? Why would one
bother? And if you know anything about cooking meat, you
would not cook it in the amount of fat indicated reading it
as "suet".
But in any case, the Torah text cannot be read without the
"its mother" interpretation. This plain reading limits the
prohibition.
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
:>I have asked you this some very large number of times without receiving
:>a response. Maybe I'll get lucky this time: can you cite a single
:>competent source that attests to cooking a kid in its mother's milk
:>as an essential part of a specific heathen rite?
: I have read that Maimonides knew of it being practiced by
: some African tribes.
Is Maimonides always a competent source for reporting practices of the
heathens of his day, or only when he agrees with you?
: I had come to the conclusion that this
: is what must have been the case when I visited India, and
: were told that the peasants killed calves at a very early
: age (too early to eat them) to be able to milk the cow.
That has nothing to do with boiling a kid in it's mother's milk (and note
that it's a *kid*, not a calf). You can't get any milk from a cow until
the cow has given birth, but if all you want is the milk, then the calf
could very well be more of an expense than it is worth. And if all you
want is the milk, why would you waste it boiling the calf, since the
calf can't be eaten anyway?
So my question remains unanswered.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad."
Polar
On 16 Nov 2000 18:57:34 GMT, hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
wrote:
>In article <8v0qo9$ucu$1...@news.huji.ac.il>, <sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il> wrote:
>>In article <8v0mk0$3m...@odds.stat.purdue.edu>, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>
>>: I agree with Art Kamlet that the moral meaning of
>>: Eden is that Adam and Eve were put to the test, and passed!
[...]
For another (very clever) interpretation, see:
http://www.bib-arch.org/bro00/winner.html
the Serpent's story.
--
Polar
Herman Rubin
>In article <8v1ana$3j...@odds.stat.purdue.edu>, Herman Rubin <hru...@stat.purdue.edu> wrote:
>:>I have asked you this some very large number of times without receiving
>:>a response. Maybe I'll get lucky this time: can you cite a single
>:>competent source that attests to cooking a kid in its mother's milk
>:>as an essential part of a specific heathen rite?
>: I have read that Maimonides knew of it being practiced by
>: some African tribes.
>Is Maimonides always a competent source for reporting practices of the
>heathens of his day, or only when he agrees with you?
To prove an existence theorem, you only need ONE example.
I am willing to cite Maimonides for what was actually done,
from his personal knowledge. This is quite different from
his conclusions.
>: I had come to the conclusion that this
>: is what must have been the case when I visited India, and
>: were told that the peasants killed calves at a very early
>: age (too early to eat them) to be able to milk the cow.
>That has nothing to do with boiling a kid in it's mother's milk (and note
>that it's a *kid*, not a calf). You can't get any milk from a cow until
>the cow has given birth, but if all you want is the milk, then the calf
>could very well be more of an expense than it is worth. And if all you
>want is the milk, why would you waste it boiling the calf, since the
>calf can't be eaten anyway?
I know that it mentions kid; one could, in my opinion,
reasonably argue the extension to some other animal. Was
"kid" generic for the young of an animal, or a milk animal?
We are reasonably sure that the Jews of 2000-3000 years ago
would not use its mother for a generic female animal of the
same species.
>So my question remains unanswered.
Does it?
Talqcom
>From: hru...@stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
>It may have been explained this way, but this does not make
>it so.
It was never explained this way traditionally.
>The last letter of the Torah commandment cannot be read
>as other than limiting the prohibition to the milk of
>the mother of the kid.
True. But the Oral Tora is the interpretor system, and the Written the
interpreted.
It takes a unique kind of literalism and ignorance to insist that the ambiguous
as to all details Humash is the source of any law.
>I
>believe to sanctify the milk for human use,
The notion of "sanctify" in this sense is a pagan and Christian one. Since you
refuse to admit that thinking in Hebrew is a prerequisite to understand the
Hebrews, I am certain you will disagree.
Of course this restricts Judaism and the meaning of the Humash to your
subjective assumptions, both conscious and unconscious.
>as in those
>days, one usually did not get milk except by killing the
>kid.
Nonsense. Proof, please.
>But then we get those who cannot accept the plain meaning,
>and insist that there must be more.
The reasoned opinion of one who cannot read Hebrew!
>The Torah is in the
>language of man
Precisely why it must be interpreted in its own contextual, idiomatic, and
metaphoric realm.
Ray