Tiny tablet provides proof for Old Testament

[LightEye]

dear friends,

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...ntablet111.xml

be well, be love.

david

tiny tablet provides proof for old testament

by nigel reynolds, arts correspondent
last updated: 2:28am bst 11/07/2007

the sound of unbridled joy seldom breaks the quiet of the british museum's great arched room, which holds its collection of 130,000 assyrian cuneiform tablets, dating back 5,000 years.

this fragment is a receipt for payment made by a figure in the old testament

but michael jursa, a visiting professor from vienna, let out such a cry last thursday. he had made what has been called the most important find in biblical archaeology for 100 years, a discovery that supports the view that the historical books of the old testament are based on fact.

searching for babylonian financial accounts among the tablets, prof jursa suddenly came across a name he half remembered - nabu-sharrussu-ukin, described there in a hand 2,500 years old, as "the chief eunuch" of nebuchadnezzar ii, king of babylon.

[Kenneths149]

jeremiah 39:13-14 tells of the service neb u zar adan did for jeremiah the prophet. it is a loving story of service by a group of men to help jeremiah to restore him to his home. yesterday , today, and tomorrow speak to me about united service to help each other. this tablet connects to a deeper story of dedicated service ( eunuchs)and a very important message of hope in self acceptance. it is light to my feet as i stubble around . thank you !
kenneths149

[Frankensign]

thanks for the post lighteye, but i'm don't think that this proves a whole lot.

a quote from alex in the comments section of the article:

interesting. so, the tablet mentions someone and their position the same as in the bible. that doesn't prove that every word in the bible is a fact. it is a historical fact that jeremiah was begun around 585 bce and received its completion about 525-530 bce. it's also pretty much a given that jeremiah was in the court of nebuchednezzar and obviously not doing too badly. the name could have easily been injected during the last writing which was obviously done by one of jeremiah's followers. no one knows precisely when or who wrote what.
posted by alex on july 12, 2007 8:40 pm

and again a quote from dr. hector avalos's comment from the article:

before people become too excited, let’s
examine more carefully the implications of this
tablet. i can read cuneiform, and i know dr.
irving finkel, who is an excellent scholar.

this tablet an important find, but it does
not have the more exaggerated biblical
fundamentalist implications that are being
assigned to it by some.

first, it is a mistake to assume that because
one biblical claim mentioned in the bible is
confirmed by an independent source, then all
claims in the bible are true. this tablet certainly
would confirm nothing about the supernatural
claims in the bible.

second, if one is going to assume that
everything is true in the bible because one claim
is proven true, then one must apply this rationale
to all religions, including the babylonian
religion.

[about 6 paragraphs have been deleted for brevity and can be found here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...ntablet111.xml ]

so, yes, thank goodness for mesopotamian
texts which have helped us immensely to
understand how mythological and how textually
corrupted biblical texts can be.

posted by dr. hector avalos on july 12, 2007 5:25 pm

afterall, this is only a receipt which "may" prove that this person existed in that time period mentioned in the bible. what else then does it prove? not that i doubt that there were real events that took place in the bible which can be proven and that there is some truth to the bible but they need to specify a little more on what this proves. based on fact? ok...all of it? but seriously...we need a little more evidence then this to prove that the old testament is entirely based on fact. i think that much of the text could have been written to suit a certain agenda or idea of the time. it was written by humans and should always be assumed that there can be mistakes and/or intentional misguidance.

~frankensign

~frankensign