Are there any other historical records that corroberate or contraindicate the events of the Bible?
I know that archaeologists have looked for evidence of the Exodus, but have had no luck. I’ve heard Jewish scholars on the radio talking about how the whole myth of the Israelites being enslaved in Egypt is just that - a myth. It looks like the Israelites were indigenous to the area they’re in now.
complex question. There are a lot of archaeological findings regarding things mentioned in the Bible, but I don’t think many, if any, events are corrobborated.
The Egyptian Merneptah Stele, IIRC, mentions the Habiru, who are generally accepted to be the Hebrews. (Not everyone agrees on this). Again, IIRC, it says that theyu were destroyed, which obviously isn’t correct if it meant all the Hebrews.
There’s a Mesopotamian Stele that shows king Jehu. I’m told it’s the only representation of a king of Israel anywhere. (He’s bowing down to the Mesopotamian ruler, and wearing an odd-looking hat).
There are many finds with inscriptions bearing the names of Biblical characters.
But I don’t know about any records that corroborates any of the occurrences in the Old Testament, for instance. Not even the fairly commonplace things, let alone the events of, say, Exodus.
There are parallel myths to things in the OT, of course. There’s the Sumerian myth of the Flood and Ziusudra, and the 11th tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh with its account of Utnapishtim and the Flood. This made a big stor when it was first translated over a hundred years ago. “A Babylonian Account of the Deluge”, read the books. There are many similarities, and many differences.
There are several parallels with other Mesopotamian writings, and Egyptian writings as well. See a book called, I think, Ancient Near East Texts Relating to the Old Testament, edited by Pritchard. My own take is that there was a lot of influence between Egyptian, Babylonian, and Greek mythology and the OT (which, as an agnostic, I regard as largely mythical, too).
The Epic of Gilgamesh is the oldest story of which a complete written record exists. Or a record that is nearly complete: the two manuscript versions which were found are both incomplete, yet overlap. There is a reference to a monster in one version which may or may not be a giant scorpion mentioned in the other. If it is not, at least one incident in the legend is still missing.
In any case, during his travels King Gilgamesh seeks out the oldest man in the world to ask him the meaning of life. The old man survived the great flood which wiped out everyone except a few people on a boat. When The Epic of Gilgamesh was discovered in the 19th Century, scholars were terribly excited to have found a story paralleling the legend of Noah’s Ark.
It was already known that the Greeks and Romans had a similar legend. There was even a classical comedy where the boat builder messed up and took one of each species, and then tried to figure out which animals he could match up. Luckily, in the end it turned out there was another ark full of animals besides his.
It has since been found that nearly all cultures have a myth about how Mankind was virtually wiped out in a disaster, but a handfull of people–sometimes it is just two–survived. In the Mideast this takes the form of a legend about a great deluge. In other cultures there are all sorts of explanations as to what happened–fire falling from the sky, etc.
In the 19th Century Western archeologists and historians were prone to accept pretty much anything as a confirmation of Biblical literalism. For instance, some scholars argued that the great pyramids–though they are nearly solid stone inside–were the grain storehouses built at the direction of Joseph during the seven years of plenty.
Some Biblical literalists today argue that since the stories of a great catastrophe become less like the Biblical account the farther one travels from The Holy Land, the Biblical account must be the original story which became corrupted over time. As Charles Fort wrote, though, one can begin measuring a circle from anywhere. A person who is disposed to believe instead that an Inuit or an Aztec or a Chinese legend was the original version of the story could point out that all of the different versions around the world vary in accordance to how far one travels from their favorite source.
Oddly, while the story of The Deluge (or a similar catastrophe) is found in nearly all cultures, I remember reading once in an anthropology text that the fairy tale of The Musicians of Bremen is found in some version in absolutely every culture. Here too there is tremendous variety in the details. In the version by The Brothers Grimm, the “musicians” were an old horse, an old cow, an old dog, an old cat and an old rooster. In a version from the Pacific Northwest, one of the characters is a piece of dung.
The story of The Tower of Babel is widely believed to have been inspired by the sight of a particularly tall temple which the Israelites would have seen during the Babylonian Captivity. This tower was listed as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. IIRC, Herodotus refers to the liberation of the Israelites when discussing Cyrus the Persian and how he had conquered Bablyon. In the time of Jesus, some Jews believed that the promised Messiah had already come, and that scripture was merely referring to how King Cyrus would bring them back to their homeland.
To follow up on a previous post, as for The Flight Out of Egypt, I read once that the closest archeologists have been able to find to an independent account is a remark in an official report that there are a lot fewer foreign slaves around in a particular area than their used to be. This, of course, does not come very close to being a confirmation of the story.
A Roman writer recorded that the James who was executed in Jerusalem recently was a brother of the (apparently well-known) Jesus who was executed there a few years before.
This sounds like you’re quoting Josephus. I haven’t cited Josephus as an independent authority on the OT, because that’s clearly where he got his information from in the first place. As far as his corroborating NT events, a lot of people think that his writings have been tampered with or added to by later copyists. I’m one of them – when Josephus unequivocally states that Jesus was the Messiah, you have to seriously question if an unconverted Jew would have written it.
Isn’t there a pile of SDStaff Reports on this stuff?
There is independent historical confirmation of King Solomon (mid-10th century BCE), who built the First Temple, and was the son and successor of King David. He is the earliest Biblical figure whose existence is independently confirmed. More here.
I have nothing to add here except that I enjoyed slipster’s post very much.
The short answer is “no” to 99% acuracy.
The “Who Wrote the Bible?” series of Staff Reports:
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mbible1.html
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mbible2.html
and so on.
See specifically this in number 2:
and
And Cecil:
"Is there any historical basis for the events of the Jewish Exodus? "
CalMeachum is correct as to my source for the reference to the execution of James, the brother of Jesus.
Jesus is mentioned twice in Josephus’ book Antiquities.
The first discusses Jesus directly. It is the one which is generally figured to have been tampered with, as it contains a statement that Jesus was the Messiah. Josephus was not a Christian. He began as a rebel against the Roman occupation but later changed sides, and wrote his history while working for the Emperor Vespasian, during whose reign the Temple in Jeusalem was razed.
It is the second, and shorter, passage discussing Jesus to which I was referring. It does not show evidence of tampering by other hands.
**Bruce_Daddy: **thanks.
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It seems that almost all ancient peoples had legends of a ‘great catastrophe’ that nearly wiped out the race, except for a few devout ones who were saved, along with the needed animals.
But it strikes me that the ‘great catastrophe’ always seems to be the opposite of what is common in their locality. The arid, desert-like Middle East peoples’ stories told of a ‘great flood’. The stories from the snowy norse regions tell of fire falling from the skies in a massive volcano, presumbly. And didn’t some of the South American people, in a very hot, jungle like area, have the story of a year of all winter?
Is there some reason for this tendancy, or is it just that storytellers choose something that is very unlikely in their normal climate as their ‘great catastrophe’?
</slight hijack>
I have not seen any reputable sources that thought that Josephus’s line about “James the brother of Jesus” is added or forged. It seem to recount the sort of occurance Josephus is known to cover, and it is completly secular. It certainly can be interpreted as saying that there was a locally famous man named Jesus, and his brother was executed later, due to following his teachings. Sure, that does say that there was an “historical Jesus”, but no mainstream historian doubts that. Not even Cecil. 
Of course, it does not mean that ANY of the events in the Gospels happened like that. Just that there was a man (likely a religous leader) named Jesus, and they killed his brother.
As to the OT- the older you get the more you get into “myth & legend”. Anything pre-David is “legendary”, and even David is 99% legendary (outside the Bible, of course). As we get later & later, more & more events jibe with history. Of course, since all historical & archeaological records from that period are sparse, it COULD be that the Bible is correct, and we just haven’t found the evidence yet. However, several Biblical accounts found in the “pre-David” period do not seem to jibe with the archeaological evidence.
Note that various events recounted in the tombs of Pharohs are also not verified from outsides sources- in fact few period historical documents can be so verified- except for the raw basics. (Such as there was a City named “X”, a King named "Y"etc). And, in a decade, two different eminent archeaologists can do a “dig” at the same site, and report widely different conclusions. So even physical evidence, like potsherds & skeletons, are subject to interpretations.
Let us just say that the OT was about as accurate as the other “historical” writings of the same periods, and let it go at that.
toadspittle quotes a Brilliant Staff Report on Sennacherib’s invasion, which is effectively the only outside documentation of any event in the Hebrew Bible. Sorry, Walloon, but despite evidence of “Solomon’s Temple”, the existence of an ancient Temple doesn’t validate the existence of Solomon. Archaeologists are divided on whether David and Solomon were real historic figures, there is no incontrovertible evidence. And there is no evidence whatsoever of any earlier people or events.
Some of the events in the book of Maccabees (rejected from the Hebrew Bible but part of the Christian Old Testament) are reasonably confirmed.
In terms of New Testament, we have reasonable confirmation of the existence of people like Pontius Pilate (although it’s not what you’d call overwhelming evidence, see “Who Killed Jesus?”), and many events (pilgrimages to Jerusalem for Passover) are reasonably confirmed, but the existence Jesus is not.
Josephus is highly suspect as a source, because his works were preserved by the early Christian scribes who very likely added comments to his writings.
She was reputed to have visited King Soloman…and she (supposedly) hailed from a place which is now Yemen. There seems to be no independent proof of her existance. Another thing…the Egyptians travelled to a semi-mythical place called thre land of “Punt”…nobody knows where this place was…archaeologists speculate that “Punt” was in present-day Somalia. This sin’t tooo far away…yet the eguyptian scribes describe the voyage to Punt as if it was at the end of the world!
And, if Solomon was such a magnificent ruler (a real “big shot”), his kingdom should have ahd regular contact with Egypt-they certainly must have exchanged ambassadors…yet, the Egyptians don’t mention the Kingdom of Judah at ALL!
Why is this? Was it because Solomon was really a petty little tribal chief, and his “palace” was a mud hut?
I could give you sources, but you could weasel out by saying they’re not “mainstream”. There certainly are folks out there who doubt the existence of Jesus, and others who simply look with skepticism on the editions of Josephus we have :
They’re certainly not all marginal authors, by any means.