he has written several books containing such evidence;
There is no evidence in these books for the Pentateuch being written from a visit to the library of Alexandria. There is conjecture, argumentation, whatever. But no evidence.
How do you know that? I have read one of his books - the 2006 volume - and in it he presents evidence for his claim that the Pentateuch originated in Alexandria.
Are you confusing evidence with proof? Because evidence can be made to support very crazy and even impossible claims while remaining evidence, just as words can form gcrazy sentences while remaining words.
Where they exist. But surely, to continue the analogy, most sexual encounters become untraceable after 72 hours or so. What percentage of manuscripts survived? .000000001%??? Who knows. But a miniscule amount.
That's the thing about this theory. It counts on bad faith to work. If someone is honest having a fragment of Exodus in the fucking desert from around 250 BCE of a different text type (MT rather than LXX) already makes the theory untenable. But as I said, it counts on dishonesty. It counts on people being unreasonable and unfair.
Like vegetarians who've never eaten meat saying "they know" it tastes disgusting.
But why do we allow Gmirkin to "cheat" and rescue 270 BCE from the Aristeas story and throw the rest away (it being a translation rather than an original composition). 250 BCE + or - fifty years is basically the same as 270 - 220 BCE.
What's the earliest LXX manuscript? I don't know. Let's say it's from 100 BCE. If the LXX came 170 years earlier why is it crazy to suppose there was a Hebrew text 170 years before 4Q17 or 400 BCE?
It's like mountainman. You don't need Dura Europa to know his theory is stupid. But there is Dura Europa. There isn't that kind of evidence against the Alexandrian library hypothesis.
Secret Alias wrote: ↑Mon May 01, 2023 4:20 pm
That's the thing about this theory. It counts on bad faith to work. If someone is honest having a fragment of Exodus in the fucking desert from around 250 BCE of a different text type (MT rather than LXX) already makes the theory untenable. But as I said, it counts on dishonesty. It counts on people being unreasonable and unfair.
Why do you say that? A lot can happen in 20 years. Edgar Allan Poe, for example, kept revising his stories so that there is no single correct version of some of them - and that is not even counting changes made by publishers.
Last edited by ABuddhist on Mon May 01, 2023 5:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Secret Alias wrote: ↑Mon May 01, 2023 4:20 pm
But why do we allow Gmirkin to "cheat" and rescue 270 BCE from the Aristeas story and throw the rest away (it being a translation rather than an original composition). 250 BCE + or - fifty years is basically the same as 270 - 220 BCE.
Gmirkin has written a book setting out his reasoningfor that, including his evidence. Why do you refuse to read it? An academic publisher thought his work to be reputable enough to be published - which makes him more credible than Mountainman.
I am saying that the twenty years doesn't even exist. You can't take the earliest possible date for the theory you like and the latest possible date for the explanation you don't like. There is no evidence for when the translation of the LXX took place. If we accept Aristeas's story as basically true you can perhaps say it was the earliest date possible. But if you're arguing Aristeas is inaccurate about the text being a translation and it really was this Alexandrian library visit composition then Aristeas can't be relied upon for a date either. It could be 270 - 170 BCE. Also it's not realistic to imagine the SP, the MT both being created in this time window and a fragment of the "MT which derived from the LXX" circa 250 - 200 BCE if the LXX is dated to 270 - 170 BCE.
I just explained. If you reject Aristeas's account of the LXX being a translation rather than an account of the creation of the exemplar of the Pentateuch, how can you date the composition to the earliest date possible based on a text you've just rejected? That's cheating. What's the evidence for the origin of the LXX without the assumptions of Aristeas? It could have been written anytime before the earliest LXX fragment. You can't just choose the date that "saves the theory." That's ridiculous. Jews "could have" went to the library of Alexandria anytime since it opened until the date of the earliest fragment of the LXX.
Last edited by Secret Alias on Mon May 01, 2023 5:38 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Secret Alias wrote: ↑Mon May 01, 2023 5:31 pm
If we accept Aristeas's story as basically true you can perhaps say it was the earliest date possible. But if you're arguing Aristeas is inaccurate about the text being a translation and it really was this Alexandrian library visit composition then Aristeas can't be relied upon for a date either. It could be 270 - 170 BCE.
Gmirkin provides evidence, based upon the situation within the Pentateuch, the vocabulary used in the Greek version, and the parelells between the Pentateuch and other texts, to date the Pentateuch to c. 270 BCE.
Would there be any circumstances in which you would agree to read the 2006 book in which he makes this argument and presents his evidence? Or will you be like a person who, having refused to open eyes, complains about being unable to see?
I say this not because I think that Gmirkin's theory is true, but rather because your claims about his theory would be exposed to you as false if you were to read even his 2006 book.