More Babel and Genesis on Quora

On Babel, Archaeology and Historic Linguistics · More Babel and Genesis on Quora

Q I

How did Medieval Catholicism explain the differences between the cultures of their day?
https://www.quora.com/How-did-Medieval-Catholicism-explain-the-differences-between-the-cultures-of-their-day/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

John K Williamsson

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 1m ago

Partly diversity between Romans, Greeks, Arabic, Germanic, Celtic, Slavic and Hungarian tribes, and this in turn going back to table of nations and language split after Babel.

Note, each then existing nation was not seen as one of the immediate results of the Babel split, since which nations had both split and merged.

Q II

Is Mesopotamia considered a city, a country, a region, or a civilization?
https://www.quora.com/Is-Mesopotamia-considered-a-city-a-country-a-region-or-a-civilization/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Gary Goh

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 6m ago

Mesopotamia is a region between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris.

It is in Turkey, Iraq, Syria, with North Mesopotamia straddling the three and South Mesopotamia being mid Iraq.

One also refers to Mesopotamian civilisation as one starting with Sumerians and ending its period of independence with Assyrians and Neo-Babylonians. It is named "Mesopotamian civilisation" for having Mesopotamia as its geographic theatre.

However, the region existed before that civilisation and it still exists after it.

Q III

What written account of a people’s ancient history have archaeologists supposedly proven to be false besides Israel’s?
https://www.quora.com/What-written-account-of-a-people-s-ancient-history-have-archaeologists-supposedly-proven-to-be-false-besides-Israel-s/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Robert Sockett

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 15m ago

Thank you for supposedly, since they have not proven Israel's ancient history to be false.

I actually don't know of any, unless Mahabharata (31:st C. BC according to Kali Yuga) is supposed to come after Ramayana, with about 1000 years between, but even then, it is more on Biblical than on archaeology as such grounds that I reject this.

Q IV

Were Adam and Eve Neanderthals or humans?
https://www.quora.com/Were-Adam-and-Eve-Neanderthals-or-humans/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 2h ago

First, Neanderthals are humans.

Then, in pre-Flood times, Cro-Magnon, Neanderthals and Denisovans (who are probably same as Antecessor and Heidelbergian) came from Adam and Eve, some possibly by nephelim or transgenics.

Then some Neanderthal and Denisovan, but mainly Cro-Magnon heritage went on the Ark.

Since Noah was only tenth from Adam, Adam might have been closer to Cro-Magnon than to Neanderthal and Denisovan.

Q V

Were Adam and Eve adults when God created them?
https://www.quora.com/Were-Adam-and-Eve-adults-when-God-created-them/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 3h ago

Yes, they were physically adults and also had adult mental capacities.

Only, they did not have a modern adult experience, and the one we have is so dependent on their sin and its consequences that they couldn’t have had it.

Q VI

If God just created Adam and Eve, where did Neanderthals come from?
https://www.quora.com/If-God-just-created-Adam-and-Eve-where-did-Neanderthals-come-from/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 3h ago

From Adam and Eve.

Q VII

Does the Old Testament/Tanakh explain why many people (Adam, Noah, etc.) lived so long and why we no longer do?
https://www.quora.com/Does-the-Old-Testament-Tanakh-explain-why-many-people-Adam-Noah-etc-lived-so-long-and-why-we-no-longer-do/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Answer requested by

Michael Hogan

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 3h ago

Genesis 6:3

And God said: My spirit shall not remain in man for ever, because he is flesh, and his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.

Challoner comment : [3] "His days shall be": The meaning is, that man's days, which before the flood were usually 900 years, should now be reduced to 120 years. Or rather, that God would allow men this term of 120 years, for their repentance and conversion, before he would send the deluge.

Douay-Rheims Bible (Genesis 6)

Now, if the former meaning is taken, the post-Flood generations in Genesis 11 show a gradual descent to the age 120 years (or younger) at death.

Douay-Rheims Bible (Genesis 11)

These are the generations of Sem: Sem was a hundred years old when he begot Arphaxad, two years after the flood. And Sem lived after he begot Arphaxad, five hundred years, and begot sons and daughters. … And Nachor lived nine and twenty years, and begot Thare. And Nachor lived after he begot Thare, a hundred and nineteen years: and begot sons and daughters. (verses 10,11 and 24,25)

600 years for Sem down to 148 years for Nachor, his son however a rise to 205 years …

Q VIII

Why are cavemen, dinosaurs, neanderthals, etc. not mentioned in the Bible?
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-cavemen-dinosaurs-neanderthals-etc-not-mentioned-in-the-Bible/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered 19h ago

Who says they aren’t?

First of all, if Noah’s family lived as cavemen after the Flood and Noah became a husbandman only late near his death, why would the Bible mention the cave dwelling if it was not relevant?

Second, the Bible mentions dragons, more than once, and also unicorns, which can be ceratopsians.

Third, Neanderthals would have been part of the ancestry of one daughter in law of Noah, but even so the Bible need not mention her ancestry, since it didn’t even mention her name (or the other daughters in law’s names).

Q IX

Are the Sumerians mentioned in the Bible?
https://www.quora.com/Are-the-Sumerians-mentioned-in-the-Bible

2 Answers

A 1

Answer requested by

Ayana Ates

Jay Altieri

Commercial General Contractor and Bible Student

Answered Mon

The Sumerians predate most of the biblical history. Their glory days would have been after Tower of Babel (Gen 11) and before birth of Abram (Gen12). Their history is not relevant to the history of salvation and God's dealing with humanity, so it is skipped.

There is a possible anachronistic mention of a famous Sumerian city, that Abram was born in: Ur of the Chaldees.

In Abram's time (about 2000bc), the Sumerians were winding down. The Akkadians took over and then the Gutians, then Ur had a 3rd dynasty. The exact timing of how all of that coincides with Abram's life is disputed and not really known. But Ur is almost certainly one of the great Sumerian city states. Calling the city "of the Chaldees" is an anachronism. Chaldean people didn't show up till 100's of years after Abram, in the neo-Babylonian period. This redaction edit was probably added by Ezra or whoever did the final tweaking and polishing of Genesis during the Persian period.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

20h ago

“Their glory days would have been after Tower of Babel (Gen 11) and before birth of Abram (Gen12).”

Sorry, but while Abraham was born in 2015 BC, arguably that would carbon date as 4000 BC or older, so Ur would have been around from his birth or youth or so.

The carbon dated 2000 are way later, after Joseph in Egypt, c. 1700 BC, since Joseph is Imhotep, whose Pharao Djoser’s coffin is carbon dated to 2600 BC.

“Calling the city "of the Chaldees" is an anachronism.”

Unless it’s another place than Ur of Woolley …

“Their history is not relevant to the history of salvation and God's dealing with humanity, so it is skipped.”

The time of their history can’t be. Everything from Adam and Eve to us and to Doomsday is salvation history. From Our Lord to us, we have the Church mentioned.

A 2

David Musgrove

studied The Bible & Theology (1985)

Answered Sun

Yes but Sumer is Shinar in the bible.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Tue

I think you are wrong.

Shinar was all of Mesopotamia, not just Sumer. Both Sumer and Sinjar may have been named for Shinar, without exercising effective control over it (confer how Murrican and Americano are used these days, neither having full control over all Americas).

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Just now

Wait, I might be overdoing it. In Genesis 11, Shinar is Mesopotamia, but in Genesis 14, Amraphel may have been king of only Sumer.

Q

Is there an attempt to make ancient civilisations consistent with the biblical narrative, namely dividing historic periods according to antediluvian, pre-Babel, and post-Babel, instead of the present classification based on materials?
https://www.quora.com/Is-there-an-attempt-to-make-ancient-civilisations-consistent-with-the-biblical-narrative-namely-dividing-historic-periods-according-to-antediluvian-pre-Babel-and-post-Babel-instead-of-the-present-classification/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl-1

Hans-Georg Lundahl

none/ apprx Masters Latin & Greek, Lund University

Answered Tue

Well, I am doing one and I am also basing it on materials.

Materials dated “3500 BC” by carbon are from Abraham’s lifetime. Genesis 14 describes the occasion on which Amorrhites left En-Geddi (=Asason-Tamar), and reed mats a bit away from the place with chalcolithic temple treasures from it have been carbon dated to 3500 BC. Real date would be around 1940 - 35 BC, when Abraham was c. 75 - 80.

Material carbon dated 9600 - 8600 BC (Göbekli Tepe) would be Babel.

Material carbon dated 38 000 - 9600 BC would be post-Flood and pre-Babel.

Or, a material carbon dated 38 000 BC could be just at the end of the pre-Flood era, in the year of the Flood.