TTF "Read Da Book": The Christian Bible

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 9:58 am

This arose out of a recollection of timothy42b, of a now lost thread on the AKO (Army Knowledge Online) forums, where, in his own words
Here on TTF we've had a long-running general religious interest strand, attracting input from a good mix of the religious (mostly flavours of Western Christianity - but members of all other religions and denominations are welcomed with open arms) and the non-religious, and a group of us think it could be rather enjoyable to attempt the same here. Maybe we'll complete it and move on to further books... Maybe we'll get nowhere with it... We won't know unless we try.

Ground rules

1) Summarise a chapter at a time. We start with Genesis 1, and, if we ever get there, finish with Revelation 22. That's 1,189 chapters in total. Some are longer, some are shorter - please, make each summary of a whole chapter at a time. You are free to summarise it however you see fit, as Tim described, "as reverently or irreverently" as you wish. At the end of each book, it might be nice if someone posts an overall book summary to tie things together.
2) Keep it moving. Yes, we want to discuss what we find interesting. Maybe sometimes we'll find nothing to talk about in a particular chapter. Maybe other times we'll want to spend pages digging into something small. But beyond a page or so of discussion on a single summary, please take digressive side points to other threads in order not to obscure this one.
3) It's important to specify which version is to be used for this. We will work from the English Standard Version (ESV). This was chosen from the myriad options for several reasons: i) There's an easily navigable online version; ii) It's a relatively modern version of the text, with respected scholarship; iii) It has widespread approval within the various pieces of the Western Christian world.
4) The aim of this is to provide an overview of the text for a group of us with diverse religious interests, piece by piece, not to resolve difficult matters of academic scholarship. Make pet points of translation if you wish - refer to other versions in contrast too if you want to - but in general try to keep it pithy enough to easily keep people's interest. As a rough rule-of-thumb guideline, if a summary gets as long as this kick-off post, it probably shouldn't get any longer. Various whole chapters are in their entirety shorter than this post...
5) If you want to make a chapter summary, just dive in. Check what the next due chapter is, then post it. If you're midway on preparing a summary, then someone else posts, then your summary thoughts will make a good reply to their post. [NB We started out with a roster, but abandoned it, finding it limiting.]

Do get involved! Or don't. Contribute, comment, read silently, as you wish. But please feel free to volunteer to jump in and add your own summary of the next chapter at any point. An endeavour such as this always benefits from new blood, at any stage. Don't feel either under- or over-qualified for this, just read up and post away - it is whatever it turns out to be. We want a diversity of viewpoints making summaries - it'll be much more interesting that way.

So - Ready... Set... Go! Martin (drizabone) has volunteered to kick us off with his summary of Genesis 1 - over to you, Martin...

For reference, here is a link to the list of chapter links for the ESV online; the entire text may be read at this link.

List of links to individual summaries (to be updated every 10 chapters or so):
Genesis 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 10:00 am

And, as I don't think anyone has volunteered for anything since Martin's offer to start us off, I'll put my name down for Genesis 2 once we're done with the first chapter...

ttf_John the Theologian · Sun Aug 23, 2015 10:13 am

I believe that Martin is almost ready to post on Genesis 1, correct?

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 10:15 am

That's my understanding too - Sunday morning in Australia at the moment, though - as a devout chap, he might well be at his church right now...

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 2:11 pm

Its 7:10am now, Monday morning.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 2:27 pm

I thought it would be useful to introduce Genesis too for two reasons.

1: its a good idea to know some background on a book you're reading and
2: because there are a lot of ways of understanding Genesis, and I'd like to get them in the open rather than keeping them as unstated assumptions.

So its the old questions again: who, what, when , where and why. And for a book that's: author, text type/genre, structure, when, where and purpose.

Who wrote it?

[li]Jesus and Hebrew tradition ascribes the Pentateuch (the first books of the bible) to Moses, so that carries a lot of weight for me[/li][li]But there are also parts of the text that deal with events both before Moses was born and after he died[/li]

There are a number of answers, including:

[li] Moses wrote it all, with input from oral histories and God's revelation[/li][li] Moses wrote it with input from oral histories and God, and then others fixed it up[/li][li] It was a compilation of different texts written by people with different interests and then redacted to produce the current texts we have.[/li]

I go for the second option. Moses wrote it and someone else (Samuel would be a good candidate I think) added a few things without substantially changing it.

Genre/ Text type : are we dealing with a Myth or a science thesis? Or neither.

[li]The first chapter has its own very structured form. Like a poem or song. So I think this is a different text type to the rest of the book. More poetic than prose.[/li][li]For the rest we have lists of genealogys and narrative.[/li][li]Genesis is divided up by a series of "These are the generation of..." Have a look at these when you see them. There are different theories on their significance and meaning.[/li][li]When and Where : The latest Moses could have written it was while Israel was wandering around the Wilderness in Sinai. So that's when I place it.[/li]

Purpose

[li]Given who I think wrote it and when and where it was written, I think its purpose was to prepare Israel to live in their new homeland.[/li]

So that's what I think. What do you guys think?

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 3:00 pm

Chapter 1 and a bit of Chapter 2
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth: the earth was formless and empty and dark: just Gods Spirit hovering over the deep.

So God commanded order

-   Day 1 : He ordered Light : and separated it from Darkness
o     Day 2 : He ordered water by making a firmament to separate the waters below it (oceans etc) from the waters above (?). He called the firmament Heaven. He made dry land appear and called it Earth. He called the waters, Seas.
   Day 3 : He ordered the earth by making vegetation, plants and trees grow according to their kinds

And then filled what he had ordered.

-   Day 4 : He put lights in the heavens to separate day from night, and for signs and seasons, and to rule the day and night and to give light. And God say that it was good.
o   Day 5 : He filled the seas with swarms of fish and the firmament with birds. And God saw that it was good.
      Day 6 : He put amimals on the land. And God say that it was good.
          He made man in his image, in his likeness and gave them dominion over the fish, birds and animals.
      God blessed them and it was very good.

Day 7 : God rested
This is the story of the heavens and the earth.

PS I tried to show that day 1 goes with day 4, 2 with 5 and 3 with 6.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Sun Aug 23, 2015 3:01 pm

My Commentary:

[li]God created everything (the heavens and the earth) in the beginning[/li][li]Ive tried to show the structure of the passage: where first God orders the creation which then was in chaos, and then he fills it.[/li][li]Ive read that Light, the Sun, the Moon, stars, oceans were worshipped as gods by other nations around Israel. So this chapter can be seen as a polemic, putting the supposed gods into place. They were just lights and signs, not beings to rule over us, but tools for our use, and subject to God.[/li][li]Text type : given its high degree of structure like the verses of a poem, I suggest thats its more poetry than anything else. [/li][li]Author : pretty contentious I know. Im going with mainly Moses, with someone else compiling it and adding a few extras to fill in or explain bits to his audience, but with a light touch. I reckon that Samuel would be a good candidate. I expect this will be heartily discussed.[/li][li]Purpose : As I think its written by Moses during the 40 years in the wilderness I think it was written to prepare Israel to live in the Promised Land. So its concerns are to reassure Israel that God is the creator, he has a plan that they are part of, and that he is faithful to his promises despite our sin; that he is God and not the things worshipped by their neighbours[/li]

ttf_John the Theologian · Sun Aug 23, 2015 4:56 pm

Good summary, Martin. The basic thing that I would add is that the text is probably structured the way it is because it is likely, in part, a rebuttal of the Enuma Elish, the most common creation story in the Ancient Near East among the neighbors of the Hebrew people. That story began with sweet water and salt water accidentally mixing, leading the creation of the gods-- mostly astral-- who in turn made humans to be their slaves. The Genesis account, on the other hand has the biblical God creating by his word, not by accident, completely controlling the heavenly bodies, and creating humans in his own image to rule over the rest of creation. The contrast is obvious.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 3:15 am

A nice start, thank you Martin (and sorry for implying that Australia is on the other side of the Date Line!). Already I am learning things. I completely understand why you spilled over into the first small portion of Chapter 2 - this section seems that it belongs more naturally in Chapter 1. Googling around, it seems that the current agreed chapter divisions were the work of Stephen Langton, who was Archbishop of Canterbury in the early 13th century (then, pre-Reformation, a Catholic post). It seems a strange choice to have separated the end of the narrative in this way. Do we have any idea why this was done?

I like John's relating of Genesis to the Enuma Elish. Are there similarities? Are there differences? Are there other creation stories from the same general region that we might see similar or contrasting elements in?

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 23, 2015, 03:01PMIve tried to show the structure of the passage: where first God orders the creation which then was in chaos, and then he fills it.
Good point. I actually hadn't made that 1-2-3 = 4-5-6 association before, but it is clear when pointed out.

By the by, I'm sure I'm not the only person here at the moment with the masterful work of Joseph Haydn rattling around his head as he reads...

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 23, 2015, 03:01PMIve read that Light, the Sun, the Moon, stars, oceans were worshipped as gods by other nations around Israel. So this chapter can be seen as a polemic, putting the supposed gods into place. They were just lights and signs, not beings to rule over us, but tools for our use, and subject to God.
This seems insightful to me too - with my heathen hat on, I can absolutely see why the writer wanted to sell their god idea as being superior to all other prevailing god ideas. "You might worship xyz, but xyz takes their cue from our God." A powerfully persuasive notion when coupled with a lack of need to show rigorous evidence.

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 23, 2015, 03:01PMText type : given its high degree of structure like the verses of a poem, I suggest thats its more poetry than anything else.
This would certainly chime with it being a writing down of a long-maintained oral tradition, which would seem a reasonable way for this initial creation story to have evolved - oral histories are more easily remembered if the words strike rhythmically.

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 23, 2015, 03:01PMAuthor : pretty contentious I know. Im going with mainly Moses, with someone else compiling it and adding a few extras to fill in or explain bits to his audience, but with a light touch. I reckon that Samuel would be a good candidate. I expect this will be heartily discussed.
So, this is the kind of thing that the inquiring faithful have thought about more than I have, but even I'm aware that this glosses over an amount of detail, and the internet tells me more that I had forgotten / never known.

A cursory reading of the issues suggests that modern scholarship is of the opinion that the web of relevant anciently authored texts can be broadly categorised into four 'independent' sources, classified by peculiarities of words and phrasing, which were put together in their final form at some point in the vague region of a thousand years after a historical Moses might have lived. There are competing hypotheses, but this type of scheme has a ring of actuality to it. It would certainly have been extremely difficult for a basically single text authored that long before to have survived in that environment for that long without undergoing inadvertent major evolution. How long would the written media of Mosaic times have survived? How many copyings would they have undergone? How reverently were the copyings treated? What contrasting political needs did the copyists serve? One can see quite easily how, even if one did start with a single source text, it would fragment into competing versions in that much time in that environment.

Shall I aim to post Chapter 2 tomorrow? Or sooner?

ttf_Taytay051 · Post by **ttf_Taytay051** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 3:49 am

Ignore this, Im only posting so I can remain alerted every time someone replies.

I think this thread has great potential, I hope it works out

Please, Dont let me de-rail you

ttf_ddickerson · Post by **ttf_ddickerson** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 5:31 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 03:15AMA cursory reading of the issues suggests that modern scholarship is of the opinion that the web of relevant anciently authored texts can be broadly categorised into four 'independent' sources, classified by peculiarities of words and phrasing, which were put together in their final form at some point in the vague region of a thousand years after a historical Moses might have lived. There are competing hypotheses, but this type of scheme has a ring of actuality to it. It would certainly have been extremely difficult for a basically single text authored that long before to have survived in that environment for that long without undergoing inadvertent major evolution. How long would the written media of Mosaic times have survived? How many copyings would they have undergone? How reverently were the copyings treated? What contrasting political needs did the copyists serve? One can see quite easily how, even if one did start with a single source text, it would fragment into competing versions in that much time in that environment.

Let me start out saying well done Martin! Great job!

Dave, your findings seem to implicate that the scripture could have been fragmented and distorted, but in 2 Tim 3:16

2 Timothy 3:16 English Standard Version (ESV)

16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

One can never forget that our scripture is the Word of God given by divine inspiration to a select few men. In this case, Moses. So, personally, I don't think that Moses compiled the first chapter of Genesis through fragmented verbal stories handed down through the times.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 5:45 am

Quote from: Taytay051 on Aug 24, 2015, 03:49AMIgnore this, Im only posting so I can remain alerted every time someone replies.

I think this thread has great potential, I hope it works out

Please, Dont let me de-rail you

Thanks! I think it has a lot of potential too. Do you fancy putting your name down for a chapter or two? We're still working out the details of how best to allocate/volunteer chapters - looks like we have the first 5 chapters covered at the moment.

Quote from: ddickerson on Aug 24, 2015, 05:31AMYour findings seem to implicate that the scripture could have been fragmented and distorted, but in 2 Tim 3:16

2 Timothy 3:16 English Standard Version (ESV)

16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

One can never forget that our scripture is the Word of God given by divine inspiration to a select few men. In this case, Moses. So, personally, I don't think that Moses compiled the first chapter of Genesis through fragmented verbal stories handed down through the times.

Not my findings - rather what the internet tells me is the current academic consensus. Assuming I read it all correctly, anyhow!

But don't forget that as a non-Christian I (and more generally, scholars) am/are not bound by your rule - if it seems historically and textually most plausible that the Pentateuch came together over a vast span of years, there's no imperative to automatically reject that conclusion simply because someone else later on in the same book (in a passage authored a further millennium later on) says that it can't be so. Similarly, scholars seem quite divided on whether Moses himself was a historical personage - certainly they have had a very hard time trying to match his times and deeds up with say the more rigorously chronicled history of Egypt.

You take as axiomatic that what is in this book that we consider is True. I don't. That's cool - though I do reserve the right to point out interesting moments of contradiction within it as they arise - just as you reserve the right to scorn my lack of faith as demonstrated in pointing those out. It's all cool, and helps create the diversity of opinion that we're aiming for in this thread. By the way, can I talk you into contributing a summary or two as we go on?

ttf_ddickerson · Post by **ttf_ddickerson** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 6:01 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 05:45AM just as you reserve the right to scorn my lack of faith as demonstrated in pointing those out.
Dave, please don't interpret my post as scorning you for your lack of faith. I wanted to remind the readers that there are other views, before we move on to the next chapter. Throughout the Bible, we are told that the Word of God is His direct divine revelation to us, and Jesus Himself certainly treated the Scriptures as the divine Word of God. I understand that we as people who don't fully understand a lot of things always want to find simple theories on how the scriptures came about and lasted through the ages. That's why I consider the Bible itself as a Miracle in its own right.

Right now, I have too much on my plate to do a workup analysis on a chapter. I appreciate the offer, and maybe later on, I will find time to pony up.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 6:16 am

I'll leave it until this evening UK time (say, 6 hours time) to post Chapter 2 - to give our various US posters a chance to chip in on Chapter 1. Much of the discussion so far is general to Genesis or the Pentateuch and not chapter-dependent.

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 7:49 am

Quote from: ddickerson on Aug 24, 2015, 05:31AM

2 Timothy 3:16 English Standard Version (ESV)

16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

One can never forget that our scripture is the Word of God given by divine inspiration to a select few men.

Off topic, but then, 2 Timothy might not be completely on topic for Gen 1? But anyway:

How do we know scripture is reliable? Because 2 Timothy says so.

How do we know 2 Timothy is right? Because it's in the scripture.

Now back to your regular scheduled program.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 7:51 am

It's a pity that Timothy never got as far as the second revision of his 42nd epistle...

ttf_ddickerson · Post by **ttf_ddickerson** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:05 am

Matthew 5:17English Standard Version (ESV)

Christ Came to Fulfill the Law

17 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

Jesus in His own words Tim always treated the Scriptures as the divinely inspired Word of God, not just Timothy.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:09 am

Tim's point still stands -

How do we know scripture is reliable? Because Matthew says so.
How do we know Matthew is right? Because it's in the scripture.

ttf_ddickerson · Post by **ttf_ddickerson** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:22 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 08:09AMTim's point still stands -

How do we know scripture is reliable? Because Matthew says so.
How do we know Matthew is right? Because it's in the scripture.

Jesus says so. Its His words.

ttf_bhcordova · Post by **ttf_bhcordova** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:23 am

No. We know it's the truth because the Catholic Church says so. (Remember, we put the New Testament together, and existed before the books were written)

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:26 am

"Jesus says so". As reported in Matthew. The connection from Jesus to us goes through Matthew here.

Billy, we're in danger of getting sidetracked from the thread content here. I could take extensive issue with that stance, but I'm not going to, in the interests of staying on-topic. Perhaps you could make the same statement in the RM3 topic?

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 8:36 am

Quote from: ddickerson on Aug 24, 2015, 08:05AMMatthew 5:17English Standard Version (ESV)

Christ Came to Fulfill the Law

17 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

Jesus in His own words Tim always treated the Scriptures as the divinely inspired Word of God, not just Timothy.

dd,
You're the one who dragged 2 Timothy into a discussion of Gen 1, so don't blame me.

1. You're still stuck in the same circular do loop. How do we know Jesus treated the scriptures as divinely inspired? The scriptures say so. How do we know that is right? 2 Timothy says so. How do we know 2 Timothy is right? It's in the scriptures.

2. I quote, Quotenot just Timothy Not just? Did you really just say that? Jesus died decades before Timothy was written. Not to mention scholars agree 2 Timothy wasn't written by Paul. Jesus would have had only portions of the OT (the canon of which was not fixed until about 70 AD).

3. The relevance to Genesis is in the Documentary Hypothesis, that tracks the Pentateuch to its 4 sources.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 11:21 am

So, let's keep this moving - here's my summary of Genesis 2. What do we think of it? NB No need to curtail discussion of Genesis 1 at this point if the conversation isn't finished - the two flow into each other.

Highlights

- Day 7 = rest
- Creation of Adam and Eve

Summary

- We open (as already noted by Martin) with a brief conclusion to the events of Genesis 1 - it is noted that the "heavens and the earth" are now completed, and that after 6 days' labours, the 7th day is a day of rest.
- The remainder of the chapter deals with the start of humanity - Adam is raised from dust; God plants a garden in Eden, where he places Adam, and in which all that he needs to live may be found.
- The hydrography of the area is given in surprising detail, with the river of the garden splitting to become four rivers - Pishon, Gihon, Tigris, and Euphrates.
- Adam is given the instruction to "work" and "keep" the garden - agriculture is officially sanctioned.
- He is also forbidden to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, on pain of death.
- Adam names the beasts and the birds.
- God creates a companion for him (not yet named), constructed from Adam's rib while he sleeps.

Questions

1) The seventh day is specified as 'blessed' and 'holy' because God rested on it. How do we get from there to the injunction that we should rest on it? And how do we determine what day of the week is the seventh?
2) What is it that is breathed into Adam's nostrils by God? Does it correspond to a known concept?
3) Eden is described as "in the East", and some of the rivers listed as issuing from it are tantalisingly easily identified. What historical info do we have that might bear on its location?
4) Had the fall never occurred, how far do "work" and "keep" extend? Presumably the increasing population over generations would have necessitated an increase in food production in time. In what ways would this have been permissible?
5) The penalty for eating from the Tree of Knowledge is (slow) death. Were Adam and Eve immortal prior to eating from it? If so, would their children also have been? If so, how do we reconcile this intent with the knowledge that this implies an ever-increasing population? God must have known that this would become a problem in time with the initial conditions as set up. So did God know/intend from the start that the Tree of Knowledge would be eaten from? And hence did he set them up for a fall (pun fully intended)?
6) Is the medical fact that men and women have the same number of ribs a problem?

ttf_Piano man · Post by **ttf_Piano man** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 1:15 pm

I'm just posting to lurk (I think Moomin Dave has the right attitude toward this, but I think in general it will be more illuminating without the Christians circling the wagons against heathens such as myself).

I will say that in the interest of theology, I spent a lot of time in my teens and twenties carefully counting women's ribs.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 1:50 pm

Tim (or any other liberalish christian)

while I was researching this I looked up "best commentaries" to update my resources. The answers were always fairly conservative commentaries. I expext that's because the people that provided those reviews were conservative themselves. But that leads to the question as to why liberals don't rate commentaries?

So my questions are:
- do liberals read and write commentaries? if not, then why not?
- what are some liberal commentaries that are respected, have good explanations of their understanding, are not too big and are at the easy/intermediate level?

thanks

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 2:16 pm

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 11:21AMSo, let's keep this moving - here's my summary of Genesis 2. What do we think of it? NB No need to curtail discussion of Genesis 1 at this point if the conversation isn't finished - the two flow into each other.

Highlights

- Day 7 = rest
- Creation of Adam and Eve

Summary

- We open (as already noted by Martin) with a brief conclusion to the events of Genesis 1 - it is noted that the "heavens and the earth" are now completed, and that after 6 days' labours, the 7th day is a day of rest.
- The remainder of the chapter deals with the start of humanity - Adam is raised from dust; God plants a garden in Eden, where he places Adam, and in which all that he needs to live may be found.
- The hydrography of the area is given in surprising detail, with the river of the garden splitting to become four rivers - Pishon, Gihon, Tigris, and Euphrates.
- Adam is given the instruction to "work" and "keep" the garden - agriculture is officially sanctioned.
- He is also forbidden to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, on pain of death.
- Adam names the beasts and the birds.
- God creates a companion for him (not yet named), constructed from Adam's rib while he sleeps.

Questions

1) The seventh day is specified as 'blessed' and 'holy' because God rested on it. How do we get from there to the injunction that we should rest on it? And how do we determine what day of the week is the seventh?
2) What is it that is breathed into Adam's nostrils by God? Does it correspond to a known concept?
3) Eden is described as "in the East", and some of the rivers listed as issuing from it are tantalisingly easily identified. What historical info do we have that might bear on its location?
4) Had the fall never occurred, how far do "work" and "keep" extend? Presumably the increasing population over generations would have necessitated an increase in food production in time. In what ways would this have been permissible?
5) The penalty for eating from the Tree of Knowledge is (slow) death. Were Adam and Eve immortal prior to eating from it? If so, would their children also have been? If so, how do we reconcile this intent with the knowledge that this implies an ever-increasing population? God must have known that this would become a problem in time with the initial conditions as set up. So did God know/intend from the start that the Tree of Knowledge would be eaten from? And hence did he set them up for a fall (pun fully intended)?
6) Is the medical fact that men and women have the same number of ribs a problem?

Good stuff, Dave.

You didn't notice that in verse 5 that "no small plant of the field had yet sprung upfor the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground". That seems to me an indication that God wasn't doing things without normal cause and effect applying, otherwise the logic of the verse wouldn't work.

My answers to your questions are:
1. The Sabbath : you have to wait until Exodus 28: 8-11 to find out about that.
2. What is breathed into Adam's nostrils? Breathe is the same word as spirit. And I think its deliberately ambiguous - referring both to our actual breathe and to life.
3. We don't know exactly where Eden is. It was "hidden" when Adam and Eve are evicted.
4. The Fall. You're getting ahead of yourself. Just be patient grasshopper, all will be explained in the next chapter.

5. Ditto
6. I used to wonder about that when I was younger. But always got distracted. I expect that the number of ribs we have is determined by our genes and not whether God pinched one of Adams to make Eve. So its not a problem. (Reminds me of a brain teaser : An archeologist found 2 very old dead bodies and immediately knew who they were. How?)

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 2:45 pm

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 24, 2015, 02:16PM1. The Sabbath : you have to wait until Exodus 28: 8-11 to find out about that.
8 And the skillfully woven band on it shall be made like it and be of one piece with it, of gold, blue and purple and scarlet yarns, and fine twined linen. 9 You shall take two onyx stones, and engrave on them the names of the sons of Israel, 10 six of their names on the one stone, and the names of the remaining six on the other stone, in the order of their birth. 11 As a jeweler engraves signets, so shall you engrave the two stones with the names of the sons of Israel. You shall enclose them in settings of gold filigree.

Exodus 20:10 looks a more likely candidate, but not the only one.

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 24, 2015, 02:16PM2. What is breathed into Adam's nostrils? Breathe is the same word as spirit. And I think its deliberately ambiguous - referring both to our actual breathe and to life.
I wonder if it has any relation to the religious concept of the soul?

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 24, 2015, 02:16PM3. We don't know exactly where Eden is. It was "hidden" when Adam and Eve are evicted.
Was it? Genesis 3:23-24 simply says

23 therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. 24 He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

That makes it sound to me as if it should still be there, along with the guards and their flaming swords. Which, completely tangentially, sparks me to recommend a (comedy) book: Good Omens, by (the sadly recently deceased) Terry Pratchett and (the happily not deceased yet) Neil Gaiman. You can read a slightly buggy version of the text online here - the first page makes clear the reason for the thought to have occurred here and now. One of my favourite books.

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 24, 2015, 02:16PM4. The Fall. You're getting ahead of yourself. Just be patient grasshopper, all will be explained in the next chapter.

5. Ditto
Okay, I'll ask these again after John posts his summary of Chapter 3 when we've finished talking about this material.

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 24, 2015, 02:16PM6. I used to wonder about that when I was younger. But always got distracted. I expect that the number of ribs we have is determined by our genes and not whether God pinched one of Adams to make Eve. So its not a problem. (Reminds me of a brain teaser : An archeologist found 2 very old dead bodies and immediately knew who they were. How?)

I concur - for a loss of a body part in life to propagate to the next generation would be an example of Lamarck's long-discredited theory of heritability. But I wondered if it had at any point sparked theological debate.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 3:18 pm

I've created an online Google spreadsheet which anyone can edit to keep track of who is due to summarise which chapters.

If you can't work it (some phones don't work well with Google sheets, for example), just make a post here, and I or another will modify it for you. I've also altered the initial post of this thread to contain the same link.

ttf_John the Theologian · Mon Aug 24, 2015 3:39 pm

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 05:45AMThanks! I think it has a lot of potential too. Do you fancy putting your name down for a chapter or two? We're still working out the details of how best to allocate/volunteer chapters - looks like we have the first 5 chapters covered at the moment.

Not my findings - rather what the internet tells me is the current academic consensus. Assuming I read it all correctly, anyhow!

But don't forget that as a non-Christian I (and more generally, scholars) am/are not bound by your rule - if it seems historically and textually most plausible that the Pentateuch came together over a vast span of years, there's no imperative to automatically reject that conclusion simply because someone else later on in the same book (in a passage authored a further millennium later on) says that it can't be so. Similarly, scholars seem quite divided on whether Moses himself was a historical personage - certainly they have had a very hard time trying to match his times and deeds up with say the more rigorously chronicled history of Egypt.

You take as axiomatic that what is in this book that we consider is True. I don't. That's cool - though I do reserve the right to point out interesting moments of contradiction within it as they arise - just as you reserve the right to scorn my lack of faith as demonstrated in pointing those out. It's all cool, and helps create the diversity of opinion that we're aiming for in this thread. By the way, can I talk you into contributing a summary or two as we go on?

Actually, it's not really accurate to say it's a consensus. I was a Teaching Assistant under a very liberal Jewish rabbi who taught at the University of Iowa and he made fun of the so-called Documentary Hypothesis every opportunity he could and said that it was just a bunch of foolish speculation. I wasn't particularly enthralled with his own interpretation at all, but he very much upheld the integrity of the authorship of the text and quoted a number of other academics who were by no means conservative Christians who felt the same way.

The best critique of the whole tendency to find multiple authors in Bibical books is by British Old Testament scholar David Clines. You'll notice that it is rather humerous and thus very entertaining.

http://www.academia.edu/3176336/New_Directions_in_Pooh_Studies_%C3%9Cberlieferungs-_und_traditionsgeschichtliche_Studien_zum_Pu-Buch

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 4:06 pm

Very amusing! Somebody invested a lot of time working that up, time well spent.

If I might be so churlish as to raise objections to the charming analogy of Milne versus Moses:
- We are dealing with a much more recent and well-documented span of time
- We are dealing with a much shorter span of time, and possess the original manuscripts of Milne, as well as instances of all subsequent published editions, knowing the provenance of all of these documents from start to present, plus also substantial independent corroborating information detailing Milne's life
- We are dealing with a span of time and place where orthography and language have been relatively highly standardised, and literacy is widespread; the generation and verification of copies of a text is a much more straightforward process than in the first and second millennia BC
- Alas, the Pooh corpus has not attracted the strong and potentially distorting motives of interpretation that the Pentateuch has

I am not dogmatically stating that the documentary hypothesis (or rather, one of its modernly refined successors, e.g. ) is correct. Rather I am saying that it strikes me as intuitively very sensible to acknowledge that the transmission of important behaviour-regulating texts over vast tracts of time by a societal elite is very unlikely to result in 100% perfect transmission, and that to the non-religious (and maybe to the religious also?), it seems very plausible that the elite would every so often find the need to revise the manual to bring it up to date.

ttf_John the Theologian · Mon Aug 24, 2015 4:16 pm

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 04:06PMVery amusing! Somebody spent a lot of time working that up, time well spent.

If I might be so churlish as to raise objections to the charming analogy of Milne versus Moses:
- We are dealing with a much more recent and well-documented span of time
- We are dealing with a much shorter span of time, and possess the original manuscripts of Milne, as well as instances of all subsequent published editions, knowing the provenance of all of these documents from start to present, plus also substantial independent corroborating information detailing Milne's life
- We are dealing with a span of time and place where orthography and language have been relatively highly standardised, and literacy is widespread; the generation and verification of copies of a text is a much more straightforward process than in the first and second millennia BC
- Alas, the Pooh corpus has not attracted the strong and potentially distorting motives of interpretation that the Pentateuch has

I am not dogmatically stating that the documentary hypothesis (or rather, one of its modernly refined successors, e.g. ) is correct. Rather I am saying that it strikes me as intuitively very sensible to acknowledge that the transmission of important behaviour-regulating texts over vast tracts of time by a societal elite is very unlikely to result in 100% perfect transmission, and that to the non-religious (and maybe to the religious also?), it seems very plausible that the elite would every so often find the need to revise the manual to bring it up to date.

Dave, glad you enjoyed it. What you are overlooking is the tenacity by which the Jewish tradition has upheld the biblical texts whenever we can check their transmission. A good example is the Dead Sea Scrolls of Isaiah. When they were discovered they approximately 1,000 years older than any other texts of the book of Isaiah and yet the differences were tiny. In fact, what was discovered was that the text of the DSS actually clarified a few texts that scholars assumed had minor corruptions because they did not flow well, but couldn't prove. In several of those few-in-number-spots, the DSS made their guesses make sense and/or fit with the Greek translations of the Septuagint. However, nothing, however, of serious consequence was found. The Jewish tradition had a remarkable ability to transmit texts quite accurately.

ttf_HeRoze · Post by **ttf_HeRoze** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 6:18 pm

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 23, 2015, 03:00PM====
Day 7 : God rested
This is the story of the heavens and the earth.
===
One of the more contentious points is how long is a "day?" My literalist side wants to believe they are 24 hour days. That had led to a young earth philosophy that does not seem to jibe with the fossil records, so I'm left torn; although truthfully it doesn't matter much to my belief system. It matters greatly to some I know.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Mon Aug 24, 2015 6:43 pm

Quote from: HeRoze on Aug 24, 2015, 06:18PMOne of the more contentious points is how long is a "day?" My literalist side wants to believe they are 24 hour days. That had led to a young earth philosophy that does not seem to jibe with the fossil records, so I'm left torn; although truthfully it doesn't matter much to my belief system. It matters greatly to some I know.

Yeah its certainly contentious. I can't see any reason why God couldn't have created everything in 24x6 hour days if he wanted. But the passage seems to focus on other concerns rather than being a narrative/report of what happened and how and doesn't answer the questions that we think are important.

Its ironic that you quoted Day 7 which theologically speaking is the one that is least likely to be 24 hours.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 2:58 am

Quote from: John the Theologian on Aug 24, 2015, 04:16PMDave, glad you enjoyed it. What you are overlooking is the tenacity by which the Jewish tradition has upheld the biblical texts whenever we can check their transmission. A good example is the Dead Sea Scrolls of Isaiah. When they were discovered they approximately 1,000 years older than any other texts of the book of Isaiah and yet the differences were tiny. In fact, what was discovered was that the text of the DSS actually clarified a few texts that scholars assumed had minor corruptions because they did not flow well, but couldn't prove. In several of those few-in-number-spots, the DSS made their guesses make sense and/or fit with the Greek translations of the Septuagint. However, nothing, however, of serious consequence was found. The Jewish tradition had a remarkable ability to transmit texts quite accurately.

A good piece of evidence to introduce, explicitly reassuring regarding transmission fidelity in the years since, and implicitly suggesting it in the years before. But while suggestive, it doesn't do the whole job by a long way:
- The Book of Isaiah was written (the internet tells me) somewhere around 800-700 BC, while the Isaiah Scroll dates from somewhere around 200-100 BC. There's still half a millennium of transmission unaccounted for, at the initial period during which the text was most likely to be of use, and hence amenable to political massaging.
- Further, I read that the authorship of the Book of Isaiah is very widely agreed to have been a composite effort between three time-separated authors, taking place over a span of many years.

I also ponder on the individual susceptibilities of these various texts. Isaiah's topic material deals with the destiny of the Jews - on the face of it a set of ideas eminently suited to political tinkering. The Pentateuch covers both long-range setting of the temporal stage and many explicit law commandments - while the former one might expect to pass through transmissions fairly unscathed (the major risk is probably the carelessness of a bored copyist in genealogies etc.), the law commandments one would expect to require regular revision.

The transmission of the Pentateuch heads further back into history for its origins than Isaiah. If it came from Moses (if he is historical), then quite a few hundred years - if compiled, then over a span of time that includes that of the composition of Isaiah, but extending back further - and presumably drawing on older oral traditions.

I could summarise my position as:
- It is possible that the Pentateuch broadly came from one person.
- It is possible that that one person was the Moses described within it.
- To claim either or both of these things satisfactorily requires a level of proof that we haven't yet seen, and that is (sadly) probably vastly higher than any potential available proof that might be found.
- So we fall back on probabilities; we note all the possibilities, and we weigh them for likelihood, taking the greatest of care not to let our individual prejudices influence us (e.g. "wouldn't it be nice and clean (also religiously satisfying) if Moses had written this?")
- And that's where we are, standing here chatting about competing hypotheses...

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:45 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 24, 2015, 02:45PM

I wonder if it has any relation to the religious concept of the soul?

Danger, Will Robinson!

The concept of the soul did not exist at this time. It is a much later Greek concept grafted into Judaism to a limited extent during 2cnd Temple days.

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:48 am

Quote from: HeRoze on Aug 24, 2015, 06:18PMOne of the more contentious points is how long is a "day?" My literalist side wants to believe they are 24 hour days. That had led to a young earth philosophy that does not seem to jibe with the fossil records, so I'm left torn; although truthfully it doesn't matter much to my belief system. It matters greatly to some I know.

I think the intention of the authors (well, storytellers; these were oral tales for at least 1000 years before being written down) was for literal 24 hour days. These read like Kipling's "just-so" stories and I think were intended to be taken as such.

It is only IF you decide to take them as historical scientific fact that you run into a problem with 24 hour days and the age of the Earth, and that results in some mental gymnastics with respect to longer days.

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:51 am

Quote from: John the Theologian on Aug 24, 2015, 04:16PM The Jewish tradition had a remarkable ability to transmit texts quite accurately.

And a lot of examples where they didn't, especially the Septuagint myth.

But the point is you can faithfully transmit texts written by multiple authors (the J, E, P and D sources). The faithfulness of transmission does not affect the authorship.

ttf_John the Theologian · Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:55 am

Quote from: timothy42b on Aug 25, 2015, 04:51AMAnd a lot of examples where they didn't, especially the Septuagint myth.

But the point is you can faithfully transmit texts written by multiple authors (the J, E, P and D sources). The faithfulness of transmission does not affect the authorship.

Except that the JEDP theory is based on the idea that the text was transmitted quite UNFAITHFULLY until the final editors got a hold of it. The t ideas are going in opposite directions for a considerable time. The strong majority of our examples are of faithful transmission, not extremely garbled transmission, which the JEDP theory would seem to require.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 5:27 am

There's a difference between garbling a text in copying and editing several texts into one.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 5:36 am

Quote from: timothy42b on Aug 25, 2015, 04:45AMDanger, Will Robinson!

The concept of the soul did not exist at this time. It is a much later Greek concept grafted into Judaism to a limited extent during 2cnd Temple days.

Verse 7 reads "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." So I'm not sure whether you think this was inserted late or whether its not really talking about a soul?

But ISTM that God took a body, breathed life/spirit into it and it became a living soul.

ISTM
- If you become something then you are one. So we have a spirit and a body but we are souls.
- so its not really correct to say that we have a soul
- our soul refers to us as a living breathing being.

The Greeks thought that the spirit survived in the afterlife without a body didn't they?

- And while we're talking about souls its worth while noting that our resurrection is bodily not just spirit. In the afterlife the bible says that we will get a brand new shiny immortal body which and a spirit and so we become immortal souls.

Which I'm pretty sure isn't what the Greeks thought.

And don't ask me what enables the connection between our identities now and after death. Cause I don't know. I could speculate that God just restores a backup of our database into the new soul.

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 5:47 am

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 25, 2015, 05:36AMI could speculate that God just restores a backup of our database into the new soul.

This causes the same interesting question to arise as does the SciFi notion of teleportation - if the atoms that make you up cease to fulfil that function while continuing to exist, while other atoms elsewhere simultaneously form an exact duplicate of you at that moment, can you as a single entity meaningfully be said to have continued existing? Or should we instead think of two instances of you, which just happened not to overlap in time? And what does that imply happened to the original consciousness?

I must say, I'd feel pretty uneasy about going through a teleporter... Something very like death would be implicit.

ttf_Baron von Bone · Post by **ttf_Baron von Bone** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 6:10 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 25, 2015, 05:47AMI must say, I'd feel pretty uneasy about going through a teleporter... Something very like death would be implicit.
Mindscan by Robert J. Sawyer
The Prestige

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 7:49 am

Quote from: John the Theologian on Aug 25, 2015, 04:55AM
Except that the JEDP theory is based on the idea that the text was transmitted quite UNFAITHFULLY until the final editors got a hold of it. The t ideas are going in opposite directions for a considerable time.
Not at all.

The JDEP theory simply observes that separate versions of stories are all transmitted together, without an attempt to mingle and reconcile them. That is why we have two creation stories, two flood stories, two versions of David v Goliath, two versions of the conquest of the promised land, etc.

It would have been simple, and unfaithful, to gather the common elements of each story from the various traditions and construct one more coherent version. But, they didn't do that. The JEDP theory is the most logical explanation for what we actually observe in the text.

ttf_timothy42b · Post by **ttf_timothy42b** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 7:54 am

Quote from: drizabone on Aug 25, 2015, 05:36AMVerse 7 reads "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." So I'm not sure whether you think this was inserted late or whether its not really talking about a soul?

But ISTM that God took a body, breathed life/spirit into it and it became a living soul.

That's not the meaning we usually ascribe to the word soul now. And that's a big part of the problem. It is very hard to escape reading ancient texts with our modern filters in place.

In OT times breath was life. When breath stopped so did life. There was no separate soul that survived to an afterlife, that is a MUCH later concept borrowed from Greek mythology.

In OT times, people believed that when you died you died. Period. No afterlife. BUT, a powerful God could reanimate you; the idea of resurrection existed though it was far from universally accepted.

ttf_drizabone · Post by **ttf_drizabone** » Tue Aug 25, 2015 2:20 pm

Quote from: timothy42b on Aug 25, 2015, 07:54AMThat's not the meaning we usually ascribe to the word soul now. And that's a big part of the problem. It is very hard to escape reading ancient texts with our modern filters in place.

In OT times breath was life. When breath stopped so did life. There was no separate soul that survived to an afterlife, that is a MUCH later concept borrowed from Greek mythology.

In OT times, people believed that when you died you died. Period. No afterlife. BUT, a powerful God could reanimate you; the idea of resurrection existed though it was far from universally accepted.

I agree its hard to escape our modern filters. I try to. I also acknowledge that I privilege exegesis over eisegesis (because I know how to spell it).

Interesting aside: I recently listened to a program on our NPR equivalent which talked about how the ancient greeks viewed colour using their literature as evidence. It wasn't used that much and it seems that when it was it wasn't used to describe frequency but intrinsic characteristics of the objects that had the colour. eg green things were full of life.

But back to here I'm trying to deal with the text as we get to it, so look forward to discussing this when it mentions soul or afterlife. the OT treatment of afterlife is sparse but Enoch and Job are relevant and maybe Samuel and the witches of Endor.

And could you point out parts of the the text that you think are inconsistent with a basically Mosaic authorship and support the JDEP hypothesis when we get to them. TIA. Has there been anything yet?

And are there any parts of the text we've covered where the meaning according to the documentary hypothesis is different to what we've said?

ttf_John the Theologian · Tue Aug 25, 2015 7:37 pm

Quote from: timothy42b on Aug 25, 2015, 07:49AMNot at all.

The JDEP theory simply observes that separate versions of stories are all transmitted together, without an attempt to mingle and reconcile them. That is why we have two creation stories, two flood stories, two versions of David v Goliath, two versions of the conquest of the promised land, etc.

It would have been simple, and unfaithful, to gather the common elements of each story from the various traditions and construct one more coherent version. But, they didn't do that. The JEDP theory is the most logical explanation for what we actually observe in the text.

I will have to stand with the significant number of biblical scholars, from both liberal and conservative camps who disagree with that conclusion. See the section on weakening of support for the Documentary Hypothesis in the Wikipedia link below:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis

In addition, here's a good summary of the major critiques of the DH from a classmate of mine at seminary, Duane Garrett, who has been an OT professor at several seminaries for his whole career. He is the author of numerous scholarly commentaries, a Hebrew grammar and several monographs, including one on early Genesis, in the 2nd link below.

http://www.biblearchaeology.org/post/2010/09/24/the-documentary-hypothesis.aspx#Article

http://www.amazon.com/Rethinking-Genesis-Source-Authorship-Pentateuch/dp/1857925769/ref=pd_sim_sbs_14_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=1PCXZN4PFBPSN3SK9XZB

ttf_John the Theologian · Tue Aug 25, 2015 7:43 pm

Quote from: timothy42b on Aug 25, 2015, 07:54AMThat's not the meaning we usually ascribe to the word soul now. And that's a big part of the problem. It is very hard to escape reading ancient texts with our modern filters in place.

In OT times breath was life. When breath stopped so did life. There was no separate soul that survived to an afterlife, that is a MUCH later concept borrowed from Greek mythology.

In OT times, people believed that when you died you died. Period. No afterlife. BUT, a powerful God could reanimate you; the idea of resurrection existed though it was far from universally accepted.

Tim, again, you make some rather strong dogmatic statements, stronger I might add than some fundamentalists that I know. There are a number of OT scholars who would disagree with the dogmatic statement that there was absolutely no notion of an afterlife with an intermediate state in the OT until late, under Greek influence. I would certainly agree that it's a fairly minor theme, but there are a number of hints. I don't want to derail the discussion of Genesis one on this theme, but please remember that dogmatism can come in many forms.

Here's a good summary of a dissenting position to the one you set forth from a respected OT scholar. T. Desmond Alexander (PhD, The Queen's University, Belfast) is senior lecturer in biblical studies and director of postgraduate studies at Union Theological College in Belfast, Ireland.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/tgc-documents/journal-issues/11.2_Alexander.pdf

ttf_MoominDave · Post by **ttf_MoominDave** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 1:45 am

Well, Martin wasn't wrong in suspecting that his authorship assertion would spark debate! It's a very interesting strand, not least because there's a vast amount of self-interested serious literature out there on it - and the self-interest means that we are (or at least I am) in the slightly awkward position of deciding whether to accept the analysis of those who definitely know more, but also definitely have more of an axe to grind. As when other such non-emergency situations arise in life, I shall be filing this under "Would be a really interesting future project to get to grips with the detail of this in order to give myself some confidence in my own analysis, but for now I simply note the competing theories, the reasonableness with which they are advanced, and the apparent level of independence of conclusion from starting belief in those advancing them". Please don't take that as any kind of request for cessation, it's fascinating, please don't stop - just noting that I find myself in a difficult position here - insufficiently educated and hearing competing potentially self-interested strong opinions. I intellectually deal best with this kind of position by letting it settle/stew for a while in my brain, then coming back later to develop my own approach in the knowledge that I need to bring my own approach to the table in order to engage sensibly with other approaches.

I think at this point we're ready for Genesis 3 to be dropped into the mix when you are, John. By the way, I have an MSc degree from the same university as the author of that latest link - small world. It's a pretty little campus and a quality institution.

ttf_Baron von Bone · Post by **ttf_Baron von Bone** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 4:04 am

Quote from: MoominDave on Aug 26, 2015, 01:45AM ... and the self-interest means that we are (or at least I am) in the slightly awkward position of deciding whether to accept the analysis of those who definitely know more, but also definitely have more of an axe to grind.
That's an easy call a lot of the time though. Bias will always trump scholarship and intelligence if the bias is very strong at all. We human brain owners are sacred cow machines. That's what science and intellectual rigor are all about, and for good reason. That's why we have to invest in a sound, rigorous system of epistemology in order to manage it rather than deciding which conclusions are right and investing in them.