Is There a Good Argument Against the Bible?

@jehova
Not a chance. Where'd you come up with that nonsense from?

@jehova

From my studies Gilgamesh was not Greek mythology, the Gilgamesh saga was from ancient Sumer.

Ancient Sumer was full of cities / Mesopotamia which still exist in name, but the most important was Ur. Abraham was from the city of Ur, the city in which God told him to leave.

https://www.historyonthenet.com/sumer-the-first-mesopotamian-culture



It was not plagarized // they were same people (mothers, fathers, nieces , nephews, aunts, uncles, cousins) separated by tribes but fairly closely related.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/the-epic-of-gilgamesh.html#:~:text=Show-,What%20is%20the%20Epic%20of%20Gilgamesh?,influenced%20epic%20poetry%20throughout%20time

https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/literature-and-writing/analysis-epic-gilgamesh#:~:text=Translator:%20Nancy%20Sandars-,Summary%20Overview,initially%20recorded%20for%20his%20court.

Jerusalem before King David gave it that name was called Salem. Salem was a Canaanite City near to ancient Sumer.

Sodom and Gomorrah were Canaanite Cities, close to ancient Sumer.

@GodSpeed63
From Gilgamesh.

@DocSavage The Epic of Gilgamesh, a key text in the religion of ancient Sumeria, written in Cuneiform (letters made with a stylus pressed into clay tablets and baked in a kiln, or carved in stone). It is the first written story we have on record.
For more detail, read the entry in Wikipedia.
For double-checking of sources, see the bibliography.
Carbon dating on individual tablets shows that the story evolved in various version across a period of 2,000 years.
The many different versions show how the story evolved.

Gilgamesh is portrayed as a tyrant and giant of a man who overcomes all obstacles, including offending against the gods, for which he and his accomplice are punished. In grief at the loss of his friend, Gilgamesh seeks the secret of eternal life, eventually learning that it doesn't exist, thus finally discovering a little wisdom.

Quoted from Wiki:
"Relationship to the Bible
Various themes, plot elements, and characters in the Hebrew Bible have been suggested to correlate with the Epic of Gilgamesh – notably, the accounts of the Garden of Eden, the advice from Ecclesiastes, and the Genesis flood narrative.

Garden of Eden
The parallels between the stories of Enkidu/Shamhat and Adam/Eve have been long recognized by scholars.[67][68] In both, a human is created from the soil by a god and lives in nature. He is introduced to a female congener who tempts him. In both stories the man accepts food from the woman, covers his nakedness, and must leave his former home, unable to return. The presence of a snake who steals a plant of immortality from the hero later in the epic is another point of similarity. However, a major difference between the two stories is that while Enkidu experiences regret regarding his seduction away from nature, this is only temporary: After being confronted by the god Shamash for being ungrateful, Enkidu recants and decides to give the woman who seduced him his final blessing before he dies. This is in contrast to Adam, whose fall from grace is largely portrayed as a punishment for disobeying God and the inevitable consequence of the loss of innocence regarding good and evil.

Advice from Ecclesiastes
Several scholars suggest direct borrowing of Siduri's advice by the author of Ecclesiastes.[69]

A rare proverb about the strength of a triple-stranded rope, "a triple-stranded rope is not easily broken", is common to both books. [citation needed]

Noah's flood
Andrew George submits that the Genesis flood narrative matches that in Gilgamesh so closely that "few doubt" that it derives from a Mesopotamian account.[70] What is particularly noticeable is the way the Genesis flood story follows the Gilgamesh flood tale "point by point and in the same order", even when the story permits other alternatives.[71] In a 2001 Torah commentary released on behalf of the Conservative Movement of Judaism, rabbinic scholar Robert Wexler stated: "The most likely assumption we can make is that both Genesis and Gilgamesh drew their material from a common tradition about the flood that existed in Mesopotamia. These stories then diverged in the retelling."[72] Ziusudra, Utnapishtim and Noah are the respective heroes of the Sumerian, Akkadian and biblical flood legends of the ancient Near East.

Additional biblical parallels
Matthias Henze suggests that Nebuchadnezzar's madness in the biblical Book of Daniel draws on the Epic of Gilgamesh. He claims that the author uses elements from the description of Enkidu to paint a sarcastic and mocking portrait of the king of Babylon.[73]

Many characters in the Epic have biblical parallels, most notably Ninti, the Sumerian goddess of life, was created from Enki's rib to heal him after he had eaten forbidden flowers. It is suggested that this story served as the basis for the story of Eve created from Adam's rib in the Book of Genesis.[74] Esther J. Hamori, in Echoes of Gilgamesh in the Jacob Story, also claims that the story of Jacob and Esau is paralleled with the wrestling match between Gilgamesh and Enkidu.[75]

Book of Giants
Gilgamesh is mentioned in one version of The Book of Giants which is related to the Book of Enoch. The Book of Giants version found at Qumran mentions the Sumerian hero Gilgamesh and the monster Humbaba with the Watchers and giants.[76]" Wikipedia

I got this from Wikipedia.
It has a bibiography of sources which makes it easy to check the veracity of the evidence.

What is more significant than the scholarly interpretations is the dating. The epic predates the first written versions of the Bible by roughly 2,500 years and was written long before any concept of a One God had evolved.

@hartfire yes i know. Conclusion? The bible waz plagarized from gigamesh and zorarathustrah prior to that; history on repeat.

@hartfire

Some refuse to accept that they were all the same people. No plagiarism.

@Charity could be but even if the person was the same. . . That would strongly imply reincarnation. That is not supported by the Christain ethos.
Therefore if they are all drawing from the same foundational stories, and not giving credit to previous telling(s), that is lterally plagarism. Did the Christains tell you Jesus wss jewish? Yes. Did the Hebrews tell you Sameal and Naomi, their adam and eve, were Persain? No. did zorarathustrah, realize he was the first. To sign every document and hope to be given credit for the story? No. Were the Egyptains or the Japanese or greeks aware the story was good enough to be stolen? Probably not.
My point is without a bibliography, it IS plagarism.

@jehova

I didn't say same person / I said same people.

Maybe you can understand, related relatives, family, kinsman. Mothers, fathers, nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles, cousins, throughout a span of hundreds of years.


There are a lot of different people from what we today term different nationalities that became a part of the Hebrew / Israelite /Jewish history in both Old and New testaments of the English Bible, and the Hebrew Bible is the Old Testament.

You can't plagiarize something that comes from your own related people.

Now you can say the Romans and the Greeks plagiarized from the Egyptians, and the Egyptian told the same stories as the Sumerians who were ancestors of the ancient Hebrews, according to occupancy of the lands. Abraham was from the land of Ur, Ur was of Sumeria.

@Charity okay but all those people* are copying each others relatives (ancestors). Do i know who wrote it first to speculate accurately that they are all from the same bloodline (family)? I only know geneology (as a scientific field) was conceptualized in the late 19th century. Therefore for being so new how can we know it is accurate with any confidence? And as youve mentioned it all comes from Sumeria. Trust that each step documented the previous translation accurately. Lot of holes in that bibliography.
Therefore unreliable at best and mostly plagarized without credit given.
Thats the human experience!

@jehova

History - migration -

You don't rely on history, yet "your" biology cannot disprove the writings of discovered history.

https://www.worldhistory.org/Sumerians/

https://www.turkiyetoday.com/culture/origins-of-sumerians-pre-turk-57506

They considered themselves the black haired people, not separate but whole though individual.

@GodSpeed63
The fact that the epic of Gilgamesh is hundreds of years older and predates the bible.

@Charity you said it yourself the story spread by migration. Its a STORY spread verbally over vast areas and generations. literally hearsay.

@jehova

NO where did I say the story was spread through migration, those are your words and your views.

I said they are the same people, related!

You, continue to ignore Abraham was from Ur, Ur was a city of ancient Sumeria, which makes him a Sumerian. Gilimash was from a city of ancient Sumer which makes him a Sumerian.

I posted the cities of ancient Sumer now I post scripture that tells Abraham was from Ur. Genesis 11:31 where God told him to move from his people the Chaldeans, to the land of Canaan, which was right around the corner. Abraham was called a Hebrew.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%2011%3A31&version=KJV

And I say again closely related people cannot plagiarize events.

As it is your right to believe whatever you choose you continue to believe whatever you. But there are some out there who will not ignore facts.

@Charity if a person other than the one who originally published something takes credit for what was published without giving credit to the source of the information, it IS PLAGARISM. Indeed even with citation given which it was not provided. As you noted Ur was the "original" location of his hallucination (alleged reception of god's message) and probably drug induced (or water\food deprived) interpretation of a vision.

These ancient documents are thousands of years old, completely unreliable. Yet two related peoples are still arguing about these events. My point is its time to grow up and move on.
How many generations ago were these communications? The bible is a collection of letters about things that happened regarding jesus (LITERALLY hearsay).
Believe whatever you want. I look at reality. A collection of letters from 1000s of years ago are being used to justify war ,and murder. Civilian casualties in the name of unverifiable nonsense.
And yes unless first hand accounts are presented by the still living involved parties (witnesses) and subject to cross examination by the oppossion party. It is hearsay.
The witnesses are dead. As such it is plagarized from previous tellings. From uhr from Sumer from persia from Israel from dead people from the past.
And you continue to cite the work itself to justify how it must be true. A passage from the scripture being used as proof a different section of the same scripture is true.
Sumer canaan different names same place. Its now the year 2025. . . When did all of this allegedly happen? More then 30 years ago(the statute of limitstions); end of story.

@jehova

What is wrong with you? Your Very first paragraph cannot be applied to anything written before current laws come in.

Most people in the 18th century worldwide did not know how to read or write and you're putting 20th 21st century rules to writings of thousands of years ago.

You considered what the ancient wrote unreliable go right ahead. They were people who built artifacts that still stand today. They were people smart enough to lay the foundations of what is used today. They were not lazy people unlike many or most of today, but toiled from dust to dawn.
They didn't pollute the Earth the air or the waters like those of today. Those FEW who knew the craft of reading and writing wrote of their times and events of their times.

A g a i n think if you want to think, when I get into these conversations it is not for the person I am having the conversation with but for the readers. Think as you wish.

My participation in this conversation is over.

@Charity

@Charity thanks for the perspective. Story on repeat is all im saying if those telling the story again had any knowledge of it being told previously or heard\were exposed to it by others. Yes it was plagarized. Do i know the order of events\tellings or credits given or who spoke to whom? No. Whom wrote letters or who collected and translated them? each and every time for absolute certain? No. Does anyone? Probably not. That all in trying to say. Its unreliable at best. Thanks for your feedback. Have a good one.