Doublet in Genesis

[systemstrike_7]

I found this very interesting. I got much of this information from a book called "Who Wrote the Bible" by Richard Elliot Friedman.

I put in red letters the story by the author "E" and in regular the author "J"

Read through each version without reading the other one and you will see a complete story by each author. Even some contradictions.

(Translation-KJV)

Genesis 6

5And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

6And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

7And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.

8But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.

9These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

10And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

11The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.

12And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.

13And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

14Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.

15And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits.

16A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.

17And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.

18But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.

19And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.

20Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive.

21And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.

22Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.

Genesis 7

1And the LORD said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.

2Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female.

3Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.

4For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.

5And Noah did according unto all that the LORD commanded him.

6And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.

7And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.

8Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,

9There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.

10And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.

11In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

12And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.

13In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark;

14They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort.

15And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life.

16And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him: and the LORD shut him in.

17And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth.

18And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters.

19And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.

20Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.

21And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man:

22All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.

23And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.

24And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days.

Genesis 8

1And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged;

2The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained;

3And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated.

4And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.

5And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month: in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the mountains seen.

6And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made:

7And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth.

8Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground;

9But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark.

10And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark;

11And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.

12And he stayed yet other seven days; and sent forth the dove; which returned not again unto him any more.

13And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth: and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and, behold, the face of the ground was dry.

14And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, was the earth dried.

15And God spake unto Noah, saying,

16Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee.

17Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply upon the earth.

18And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him:

19Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and whatsoever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went forth out of the ark.

20And Noah builded an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.

21And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.

22While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

The number of animals on the ark, the raven/dove contradiction... These are two seperate accounts from two different people combined to make a single story. Its done pretty well, but not perfectly. This is only one instance in Genesis. There are many more throughout the Pentatuech. Try doing this with another story. You might be surprised...

Edited January 6, 2007 by systemstrike_7

[systemstrike_7]

Anyone wanna try this one?????

[ayin jade]

I might in a few days. Im not feeling that well tonight so Im not up for writing a deep post tonight. I just posted this to let you know its not being ignored by me at least.

[systemstrike_7]

I might in a few days. Im not feeling that well tonight so Im not up for writing a deep post tonight. I just posted this to let you know its not being ignored by me at least.

Thats fine, take your time. I'm looking forward to a reply and will do some searching of my own in the mean time.

I hope you feel better!!!

[eric]

System,

Try what........... What point, if any, are you trying to make?........ What are you trying to prove?

[cjrose]

System,

Try what........... What point, if any, are you trying to make?........ What are you trying to prove?

Uh huh....

[Leonard]

The problem arises in texts like these because we early 21st Century Westerners, expect everybody on earth to write and think the way we do.

The Oriental mind, and the ancient Jewish mind did not reason through our Greek catagories, and when we begin IMPOSING our views of 'how it ought to be' on these ancient Oriental writings, we come to bizarre conclusions. It's analogous to trying to use a screwdriver when a pliers is needed!

One very common Rabbinical way of writing is to first give 'the big picture' without much detail, and then to GO BACK, and focus very tightly on the 'important' part of the big story, and write about it with great detail, without bothering much about the big story. Although this methodology would have been very clear to ancient Jewish readers, I find it confuses 20-21st Century Americans.

You can see another example of this sort of thing in Genesis chapters 1 and 2. This has been reviewed and explained many, many times in various scholarly journals. I suggest Keil and Delitzsche, and also Edersheim for starters.

Now, Systemstrike; in another thread you wax woeful, claiming that you're simply a wounded Christian seeking assistance, and stating that you're "only asking questions." Yet here and elsewhere you are stating positions (all long refuted incidentally) AS FACTS ("These are two separate accounts by two separate people" hardly sounds tentative, my boy!).

So make up your mind and keep your stories consistent; right now I am obliged by the observed facts to think you are a liar, and a psuedo-intellectual twit who only came here trying to harm others, and that you are thus quite unworthy of the excellent education I could give you.

I hope you will prove me wrong, but until you do, I will not be wasting my time with such a one.

[Floatingaxe]

I fail to see any contradiction. Moses was the writer of Genesis.

[systemstrike_7]

Ok, Leonard.

So far, everytime I have given you something to answer, you merely tell me that it has "long been refuted". I recall in another thread where you were telling off some athiest about the books he reads because these books are just athiests quoting other athiests. Well it sounds like your doing the same thing. I put up these questions in this hard fashion, not to tick you off, but to encourage you to answer them more fervently.

I cannot really see any "twit" kind of comment here. I laid it all out. Did you read the account like I asked you too? It really does sound like two different stories, and I cannot see how you can see it otherwise. If I'm missing something here, then please tell me. I am very willing to accept defeat, but not an attack on my intellectual honesty or integrity. You are being rude. I am here to find answers and this is one of my questions.

Please, I'm asking you in all honesty and not to be mean or rude, but can you give me an answer other than "it has long been refuted". I can't find these answers. The book that I derived this information from, where it is stated above, was written by a Christian author.

I'm not here to hurt anyone. I just want to ask these questions and see some ideas from people or get links from people to learn more on the subject. I understand that I am not quite as educated as you are, Leonard, but please, if you can find it in you then educate me.

In my new bible called the Harper/Collins Study Bible(NRSV) ((which is called one of the most up to date scholarly bibles by various scholarly circles)) agrees with the above statement, and gives the divine credit to the Combiner of the accounts. It is a Christian bible with Christian motives(and I love it, great notes and introduction ).

Now about the top of your post. I think I see where you are going with this(and correct me if I'm wrong), but the writers were more interested in the specific detail of an individual story rather than focus on the whole story as an entirety. Or do you mean it in a more general way? Such as, they were more worried about the individual stories rather than the entirity of the book? I probably didn't state this very well, and I'm sorry if I did, but maybe you kind of follow me here.

I'm not going to take offense to any of your comments because I think you were merely being honest and will accept alot of what you said. I am 19 and am lacking in the education you now possess(from my understanding you are a professor? Thats what I want to work towards! )

I see how you think I am a liar, but I'm really not. I just want to ask these questions in a strong manner so that others will strongly refute my claims. I'm not stating fact, and I certainly am not so arrogant as to think I'm always right. I hope I'm not, life would turn rather boring if that was the case.

I hope you understand where I am coming from.

And floatingaxe, concerning your post. From what I have read, I have come to understand that Moses' writing of his death, and the different writing styles used rules out the possibility of him being the author. I COULD BE WRONG, I'M NOT STATING FACT. And I wasn't yelling, just clearing that up....

[systemstrike_7]

And the contradictions are as follows.

In one story there are 2 of every animal put on the ark.

In the other story, there are 2 of every unclean animal, and 7 of every clean animal.

In one story Noah sends out a dove, in the other one he sends out a raven.

In one story the flood lasts 40 days and 40 nights.

In the other story the flood lasts 300 days.

Again, if I am wrong, please correct me.