The Old Testament Myth or Truth
The Old Testament is a compilation, and like every compilation it has a wide variety of contributors who have their individual influence upon the final work. “Today, thanks to the rediscovery of (ancient) literature, it is possible to recognize that the Old Testament is in fact saturated with the popular lore of the Ancient Near East”1 I will enumerate the influences these cultures had on what we now know as the Old Testament. Each culture that existed before and during the writing of the Old Testament lent their own specific myths and some myths that were common to all cultures such as the creation of the Earth. We see in the Bible that each of these cultures has given to it a myth of their own, whether the writers of the Bible use them as references or the basis to some of their tales is unknown; but one can see the parallels from the very beginning. First, one has to understand the people of the era of which we are talking about. To get a clear picture of the way the Book of Genesis may have been formed, we must place it somewhere in time, and then define the cultures of that time. The influences must be explained, and then we may draw our conclusions. If we trace back to the first appearance of the Bible in written form
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Book Genesis, Hebrew God, Apsu Tiamat, Enuma Elish, Genesis God, Principle Nature…and, Earth Heaven, Euphrates Haran, Middle Kingdom, Babylonian Dynasty, hebrew god, enuma elish, book genesis, god all-powerful, monotheistic religion, ancient near, god 'let, e texts, 650 bc, seventh day, 650 bc j, ideas borrowed earlier, near eastern texts, separate body water, j e texts,
Approximate Word count = 2783
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)
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