Which is older Genesis, Epic of Gilgamesh and Sumerians?

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Look at them side by side again:

Let’s look at a couple of the Giglamesh vs Bible points:
  1. Size of ark
Bible - 450x75x45
Gig - 200x200x200 - ( a cube? probably not seaworthy)
  1. How did deity react to flood?
Bible - God is in control
Gig - gods ran away from waters
  1. How long did it rain?
Bible - 40 days
Gig - 7 days
  1. What was the roof made from?
Bible - wood
Gig - slate
  1. Who made the decision to flood?
Bible - God
Gig council of gods
  1. What happened after the flood?
Bible - God promised to destroy humanity by a flood ever again
Gig - gods quarrel with each other, god Ea lies to Enlil. Utnapishtim and wife given immortality like the gods

Bible - God tells Noah and his family to procreate
Gig - Ea and Mami created 14 human beings to procreate
  1. What was the reason for the flood?
Bible - people were wicked
Gig - people were nosiy

Bible - God is sorry He made men because of their wickedness
Gig - gods could not sleep
  1. When told about impending flood
Bible - Noah warned his neighbors
Gig - Told by Ea to lie to neighbors so that they would help build the ark

How was the ark launched?

Bible - by flood
Gig - pushed to the river

How long did flood last?

Bible - 370 days
Gig - 14 days

Giglamesh is a corruption of the Hebrew account.
 
Gorgias said:
You attempted this assertion a while back. How do these differences imply order, or point to one as a corruption of the other?
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I don’t have a clue that’s whay to me the only logical thing to do is accept the one that’s older and by test it’s the summerian story. I mean if it’s older by time and date then how is it not older ? And if it’s older how is it not before the other?
 
Gorgias said:
You attempted this assertion a while back. How do these differences imply order, or point to one as a corruption of the other?
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Look closely at the differences. Which one’s make more sense?
 
buffalo said:
Look closely at the differences. Which one’s make more sense?
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Ask an ancient Sumerian, and he’d say, “My version!”. What does that have to do with anything?

To tell the truth, the commonly-encountered idea – that as time progressed, the story was molded and revised – is more reasonable than your notion of “corruption”. Stories don’t corrupt over time, they get polished. That’s why I think that you need to provide a more compelling case than simply pointing to a laundry list of comparisons and simply saying “corruption!”…
 
Vladd said:
I’ve got to admit , you just got my attention! Thank you 🙂
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There is so much more to the faith than Genesis. The Old Testament is fulfilled in the New Testament and the New Testament is revealed in the Old Testament. The whole of Salvation is tied to Jesus Christ and his agony, suffering, death and miraculous resurrection.

Imagine this: the open mouth of a funnel facing to the left and the open mouth of another funnel facing right, the narrow ends of both funnels meeting in the center. Genesis is on the left, all of the Old Testament getting drawn into the center point, the birth of Jesus and the New Testament growing large and spreading the Good News out the right side of the funnel.

If you are giving the faith one last shot, go talk to a priest and ask about RCIA. You do not have to believe 100% and accept everything, you only need to want to believe and let God do the rest. Stop searching and let the answer come to you.

Be still and know that I am God.

Listen.

God Bless!
 
Gorgias said:
Ask an ancient Sumerian, and he’d say, “My version!”. What does that have to do with anything?

To tell the truth, the commonly-encountered idea – that as time progressed, the story was molded and revised – is more reasonable than your notion of “corruption”. Stories don’t corrupt over time, they get polished. That’s why I think that you need to provide a more compelling case than simply pointing to a laundry list of comparisons and simply saying “corruption!”…
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Stories get more polished, they do not corrupt?

If one looks at it from a common sense viewpoint the Biblical version makes more sense.

OK - so you claim is that Sumerian version gets more polished. So the story starts out the boat is a 200x200x200 turns into 450x75x45.

The boat roof made out of slate polishes to wood?

gods ran from the waters to God in control?

It is easier to see how the Biblical version got corrupted.

The boat 450x75x75 (cubits) gets turned in to a cube. (seaworthy to maybe not seaworthy

The boat roof made from wood polishes to slate - (seaworthy to maybe not so sea worthy)

God in control to gods run away. (God in control to gods fearful)

See what I am getting to? The Biblical version is also consistent with other Biblical knowledge of God.
 
buffalo said:
OK - so you claim is that Sumerian version gets more polished.
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Sure… I’ll play devil’s advocate. Why not…?
So the story starts out the boat is a 200x200x200 turns into 450x75x45.
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Yep – a cube turns into something that “looks” more like a boat.
The boat roof made out of slate polishes to wood?
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What were the roofs of the day made out of? Couldn’t this be a reflection of a cultural difference in building methods?

In any case, how does this difference matter?
gods ran from the waters to God in control?
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This seems to fit my “hypothesis”: you go from something that the gods can’t handle, to something ordained by God.
The boat 450x75x75 (cubits) gets turned in to a cube. (seaworthy to maybe not seaworthy
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The boat roof made from wood polishes to slate - (seaworthy to maybe not so sea worthy)
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OK – so how does making a story more implausible help the story at all?

Does “not seaworthy” help the story? Does the “not seaworthy” aspect come into play in the story? No!
God in control to gods run away. (God in control to gods fearful)
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Why would one who is telling the story turn a story with God in control into one in which there’s no control?
See what I am getting to? The Biblical version is also consistent with other Biblical knowledge of God.
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Not really. The Sumerian version, btw, is also consistent with other Sumerian “knowledge” of their gods. I don’t think that proves anything…
 
bmullins said:
The earth would be roughly 6000 years old, if the bible were literal. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. I don’t think it was written to be taken literally, I think it was written to teach spiritual truths. Now the earth being 6000 years does not mean the flood was 6000 years ago, but rather that if the bible were true chronologically, the flood would have happened roughly between 2500 BC and 2300 BC. Which is interesting, because if memory serves (and I’m no expert on it) but the Gilgamesh scrolls speak of the era from 2150-2000 BC. Which means both could be talking about the same flood.

Neither of which means “Moses” stole the story. In fact, Abraham was from the same area as Sumeria which would mean it was a story he would be familiar with as well. That’s not stealing, it means they both have the same heritage.

Now the thing is we believe that the Bible is divinely inspired. Which means the story, in the form it is in, in the Bible… is the one God wants us to have. It is to teach us a specific lesson about mankind, and about the flood.

One other thing to consider, Christians and Jews both see the Torah as the written word of God. We don’t believe it only came into existence when Moses wrote it down. We believe that it has existed eternally, and people wrote it down as they were inspired by God… but it has always existed.
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I’ve been thinking about the earth age issue, there is enough evidence and proof that the earth is atleast 4.4 billion years old! As far as the bible saying 6 k , is it possible that the Hebrews back then thought of years different ? For example what if that 6 k is really suppose to be 6,000,000? What do you guys think? I’m just keeping a very open mind here looking for logical answers And to me this is the most logical answer . The only other logical answer can be that the Hebrews did not want us to know the earth was any older because they didn’t want us to find out they stole stories, which one is it? The bible has lots of truths that I personally know of but also many many contradictions and God says he is not the author of confusion and anything contradicting is very confusing, I have a open mind so basically any thoughts on this will be accepted by me.People I’ll say this , it is one of the two explanations above as there is no other logical explanation, I guess it will ultimately come down to what the individual chooses to believe as there is no way to prove either case, right?
 
Vladd said:
I’ve been thinking about the earth age issue, there is enough evidence and proof that the earth is atleast 4.4 billion years old! As far as the bible saying 6 k , is it possible that the Hebrews back then thought of years different ? For example what if that 6 k is really suppose to be 6,000,000? What do you guys think? I’m just keeping a very open mind here looking for logical answers And to me this is the most logical answer . The only other logical answer can be that the Hebrews did not want us to know the earth was any older because they didn’t want us to find out they stole stories, which one is it? The bible has lots of truths that I personally know of but also many many contradictions and God says he is not the author of confusion and anything contradicting is very confusing, I have a open mind so basically any thoughts on this will be accepted by me.People I’ll say this , it is one of the two explanations above as there is no other logical explanation, I guess it will ultimately come down to what the individual chooses to believe as there is no way to prove either case, right?
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I think there are many other options besides one of the two scenarios you mentioned. The second one I find sort of accusatory. To think that someone would write the story in a certain way to ‘hide’ a theft that they would have no need to hide? What do they have to gain from that? I don’t think the 6k has to mean 6,000,000 either. Could it? I suppose. The bible never says “The earth is 6000 years old.” Men do. Men count how old people were, time markers (this person said this in this year) etc and try to find out how old the bible implies the earth is. Does that mean the earth is 6000 years old? Well it could be. It also could not be. Did people live to be 900 at one point? I don’t know. They might have. They might not have.

God is not the author of confusion. On this you are correct. All of the things you are finding confusing are not things God asked to be written. They are things that we men have tried to come up with to explain what was written. Take the bible at face value. Read it as a book about faith. Instead of looking to see did this occur 6000 years ago or 6,000,000, look at it to see “what am I supposed to learn form this story?”

The story of Noah isn’t just about a historical or non-historical account of something. It’s about salvation. Unlike in Gilgamesh where the gods are angry because someone is keeping them awake (what kind of god needs to sleep?) the story of Noah is about sin. It’s about a world where everyone was evil, except one man and his family, who looked up to God and trusted. So God saved him, and from his line repopulated the earth. It’s a shadow of things to come. It’s a shadow of an event that would happen many years later, in which again through one man who was righteous, humanity would be saved from a sinful world.
 
Vladd said:
I’ve been thinking about the earth age issue, there is enough evidence and proof that the earth is atleast 4.4 billion years old! As far as the bible saying 6 k , is it possible that the Hebrews back then thought of years different ? For example what if that 6 k is really suppose to be 6,000,000? What do you guys think? I’m just keeping a very open mind here looking for logical answers And to me this is the most logical answer . The only other logical answer can be that the Hebrews did not want us to know the earth was any older because they didn’t want us to find out they stole stories, which one is it? The bible has lots of truths that I personally know of but also many many contradictions and God says he is not the author of confusion and anything contradicting is very confusing, I have a open mind so basically any thoughts on this will be accepted by me.People I’ll say this , it is one of the two explanations above as there is no other logical explanation, I guess it will ultimately come down to what the individual chooses to believe as there is no way to prove either case, right?
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How about this?

Gen 1 seems to be written from God’s perspective. Imagine a rolled up tape measure. God sees is all at once, sees the layers. We live on the tape and have to look back along the graduations.
 
bmullins said:
I think there are many other options besides one of the two scenarios you mentioned. The second one I find sort of accusatory. To think that someone would write the story in a certain way to ‘hide’ a theft that they would have no need to hide? What do they have to gain from that? I don’t think the 6k has to mean 6,000,000 either. Could it? I suppose. The bible never says “The earth is 6000 years old.” Men do. Men count how old people were, time markers (this person said this in this year) etc and try to find out how old the bible implies the earth is. Does that mean the earth is 6000 years old? Well it could be. It also could not be. Did people live to be 900 at one point? I don’t know. They might have. They might not have.

God is not the author of confusion. On this you are correct. All of the things you are finding confusing are not things God asked to be written. They are things that we men have tried to come up with to explain what was written. Take the bible at face value. Read it as a book about faith. Instead of looking to see did this occur 6000 years ago or 6,000,000, look at it to see “what am I supposed to learn form this story?”

The story of Noah isn’t just about a historical or non-historical account of something. It’s about salvation. Unlike in Gilgamesh where the gods are angry because someone is keeping them awake (what kind of god needs to sleep?) the story of Noah is about sin. It’s about a world where everyone was evil, except one man and his family, who looked up to God and trusted. So God saved him, and from his line repopulated the earth. It’s a shadow of things to come. It’s a shadow of an event that would happen many years later, in which again through one man who was righteous, humanity would be saved from a sinful world.
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Chiastic Structure of the Flood Story

A violence in creation (6:9-12)
B God resolves to destroy (6:13-22)
C God commands Noah to enter (7:1-10)
D flood begins (7:11-16)
E flood waters rise (7:17-24)
X God remembers Noah (8:1)
E’ flood waters recede (8:2-5)
D’ the earth dries (8:6-14)
C’ God commands Noah to leave (8:15-19)
B’ God resolves to preserve order (8:20-22)
A’ covenant with creation (9:1-17)
 
buffalo said:
Chiastic Structure of the Flood Story

A violence in creation (6:9-12)
B God resolves to destroy (6:13-22)
C God commands Noah to enter (7:1-10)
D flood begins (7:11-16)
E flood waters rise (7:17-24)
X God remembers Noah (8:1)
E’ flood waters recede (8:2-5)
D’ the earth dries (8:6-14)
C’ God commands Noah to leave (8:15-19)
B’ God resolves to preserve order (8:20-22)
A’ covenant with creation (9:1-17)
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Very good point, thank you for your time and patience 🙂 also this may come into play I talked to my grandmother whom is Jewish, she said the Jewish folk received the word on mt. Sinai 3300 years ago, could this be those tablets in the British museum?
 
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