Down an Unfamiliar Road

I was reading about the life of the great Jewish thinker Moses Maimonides and the times in which he lived, and came across this story that touched me. Four Jewish Rabbi’s were sailing on a ship from the port city of Bari on the SE coast of Italy, on a fund raising tour to gather money for the Jewish Academy in Sura, Babylonia – SE Iraq today. The ship was hijacked by Ibn Romahis, commander of the naval forces of Abd-er-rahman al-nasr, and the rabbis taken prisoner. One of the prisoners, Rabbi Hushiel, was sold into slavery and sent to Kairuan in Tunisia. Another captured Rabbi named Shemarjaru was sent as a slave to Alexandria, Egypt. Rabbi Moses was sold into captivity and ended up in Cordova, Spain. The fourth Rabbi’s name was never recorded.

When the Jewish communities in all the cities where these Rabbis ended up found out about their plight, they raised the appropriate ransom money and had them redeemed back to their own people. Rabbi Moses, who found himself in Cordova, Spain, the capital of the Muslim caliphate that had taken over Spain, was more than happy to attend the Synagogue on the first Sabbath since he was set free.

The leader of the local Synagogue in Cordova was a well respected scholar, Rabbi Nathan. On this Sabbath, Rabbi Nathan was expounding on the Jewish Talmud, which is a collection of teachings by Jewish scholars. When it came question and answer time, Rabbi found himself unable to give a satisfactory answer to a question that was raised. So he looked around for anyone who might have some input.

Rabbi Moses, because of his ordeal was poorly dressed, and did not appear to be a very educated individual. So when he raised his hand, everyone was surprised. Not only did he answer the question thoroughly, but answered several other difficult questions handed him. At the end, Rabbi Nathan stood up and declared to the assembly: “I am no longer your leader; that stranger in his sackcloth shall henceforth be my teacher, and you shall appoint him as your chief.” When the Muslim admiral heard how astoundingly brilliant Rabbi Moses was, he tried to cancel the ransom deal, but the king would not allow it.

I can only imagine this is how the Pharisees and scribes felt when they tried to teach the people and Jesus dressed in His simple Galilean attire stood up and not only answered all the questions, but showed Himself to be of such persuasion and authority, that even the great Jewish scholar Nicodemus sought Him out. Perhaps this same opportunity can be in our destiny if we vigorously study God’s Word and become familiar with the voice of the Holy Spirit.

WELL, WHAT ABOUT THAT! (Part 3)

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

TAKING MADNESS OUT OF THE METHOD

While speaking to a young college student who volunteered at an American Cancer Society Lodge for cancer patients, the subject turned to music. When asked for one of my favorite songs, I mentioned “Some Enchanted Evening” from the movie South Pacific. The twenty-year old volunteer looked at me as though I spoke in Latin. It didn’t take long before I found out that she knew little of Pearl Harbor, the Battle at Midway, and General Douglas MacArthur’s famous line concerning the Philippines, “I shall return.”

In reflecting on how time changes each generation’s perspective about important people and events, I dare say that subjects and incidents that I used in sermons and lectures some twenty years ago, where I trusted the audience to immediately identify with what I mentioned, no longer proves true. This demonstrates that in order for people to communicate effectively and meaningfully they must be on the same page when it comes to words, terms, phrases, ideas, concepts and themes.

I tried to teach my students in Homiletics that for any audience to truly understand what they communicated and get the main point, they must meet them on the same level of cognition. In order to help them understand this concept I drew a grid with five columns and five rows, creating twenty-five boxes. In the top row, beginning with column two, I wrote: Researched Content; in column three – Sermon Organization; in column four – Spoken Language; and in column five – Sincere Delivery, which spells the acronym COLD. Then in the far left column, starting at the beginning of row two I put: Scripture Factor; in row three – Occasion Factor; in row four – Audience Factor; and in row five – Preacher Factor, which creates the acronym SOAP. Together they spell COLD SOAP, a phrase designed to help them remember it better.

Then I told them to cross reference each box where the row and column met inside the grid. For instance, if they chose the Sermon Organization on top, and Occasion Factor on the left side, then follow the column and row to where they intersect within the grid, allowing them to focus on the importance of knowing how these two factors affect one another in helping the speaker communicate more effectively with the listener. In other words, when a person anticipates giving a lecture or preaching a sermon, they must keep in mind who they plan to speak to. Determine the composition of the group, whether they consist mainly of believers, or unbelievers or a mix of both. Does the group reflect a younger or older generation or both. Does the occasion celebrate a special day or event. This Occasion Factor must then influence the Sermon Organization.

By establishing these factors, the speaker then needs less time to explain the words, terms, phrases, ideas, concepts and themes employed. By being on common ground with the audience, they achieve a common core of comprehension. This leaves the listeners with more time to assimilate the message without constantly struggling over words or phrases they don’t understand because of their being popular before their generation. While the King James Version of the Bible remains eloquent with its Shakespearean form of English, I rarely, if ever, recommend it to a young Christian for daily Bible reading.

They same goes when we study ancient texts, especially for ministers when they go to the original Greek or Hebrew in preparing a sermon. We cannot always take the words as used back then to mean what they mean to us today. Along with the problem of translation, there also exists the need to understand the effect of culture on what the writer wrote or speaker said in their own dialect, time, and place. I insisted that my students remember that each time they chose a particular verse or verses from the Scripture to read as a text, to always inform the audience as to: who wrote it, when they wrote it, to whom they wrote it, why they wrote it, what constitutes the main subject, what problem did they address, if any, and how it relates to the message they’ve prepared for delivery. When a speaker does not do this, many audiences cannot figure all this out even after the sermon comes to a close.

The same lack of general understanding occurred when these ancient manuscripts and tablets, referred to in our opening chapter, came to light in the Near East. The consideration of culture and language did not open the doors to civil dialogue, thus putting all sides on the defensive. So the debate began on whose religion proved more authentic; whose virtues and ethics appeared superior; which document writers borrowed from whom; and whose codes of conduct and laws might be declared as original. They made scant effort to understand why the ancient’s thought the way they did about themselves and their world.

Whenever comparing documents and scrutinizing them for originality, the burden rests on the researcher to determine whether one copied from another, or if by living in proximity to each other under like conditions led to similar conclusions. Also, did these people ever come into contact with each other and share ideas and concepts. Little consideration seemed to be given to the fact that all of these nations descended from one source, through which basic their understanding about God, creation, ethics and values got passed from one generation to another.

If members of one tribe living in one part of the Near East looked up at the sky every night and interpreted what they saw as being so vast and brilliantly displayed that some genius power created it and wrote it down, while members of another tribe hundreds of miles away came to the same conclusion which they wrote down as such, then their geological location, their place in time, and their cultural background and genesis must be taken into consideration. One group while looking up into the sky might conclude they see a polyverse with many gods, while another group looking into the same sky sees a universe with one God.

Therefore, when finding narratives in all these documents related to their understanding of the cosmos and earth’s relationship to it, along with stories of how life came to be here on earth and the acceptance of a higher power, no matter what name they gave him, and a list of certain events of the past as well as those occurring during their time, the question of how did the children of Abraham come into possession of similar subject matter while identifying other origins and outcomes, the question does not become whether they borrowed this from some earlier culture, but that people living in near proximity to each other during that period shared similar ideas and ideals with them.

It must be recognized that a considerable gap exists between one culture borrowing thoughts, concepts and ideas from another then claiming them as their own, and the reality that such ideas infiltrated their culture from outside sources and became part and parcel of how they thought and lived. When such similarities of expression and concepts evidence themselves in subsequent literature, that does not dictate that an indictment of borrowing or coping be levied against one or the other.

For instance, common verbal expressions of my day included, “One bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” Also, “A penny saved is a penny earned.” Therefore, when I passed them on to my children, did that make me guilty of plagiarism? I think not! These ideas came into my conscious mind by way of hearing. When I used them in a lecture or sermon, did I purposely borrow them from some other sermon and then present them as being original with me? No! I lived in a world and at a time when these maxims existed as part of the culture.

One of the more intriguing encounters in the Old Testament occurred when Abram, who came from the city of Ur in Chaldea (modern Iraq), found himself needing to rescue his nephew Lot, who lived in the twin cities of Sodom and Gomorrah near the Dead Sea, from the hands of king Kedorlaomer and his army who took them captive. So after assembling a small army of some 318 trained fighters, Abram chased after the enemy and in a surprise attack successfully rescued Lot and his family. On his way back home, Melchizedek, the king of Salem and a priest of the Highest God, waited for him in the Valley of Shaveh, where they served Abram and his entourage bread and wine. Upon greeting Abram, Melchizedek said, “Abram, may you be blessed by the Highest God, the one who made heaven and earth. And we praise the Highest God, who helped you defeat your enemies.”

Moved by this expression of support and honor, Abram gave Melchizedek one-tenth of everything he had taken during the battle. No known evidence exists that Abram and Melchizedek previously met. So how did they come to share the same belief in this higher power, this Highest God? Certainly they did not read the same manuscripts, nor enjoyed being taught by the same teacher. Such belief in a divine power existed among most, if not all, the cultures of that day. So Melchizedek did not borrow the idea from Abram, but Abram immediately recognized this belief in the Highest God and responded to it favorably.

At this point we must understand that only pure conjecture allows for any postulation that Abram and Melchizedek fully comprehended the same depth of knowledge concerning this Highest God that later came to the people of Israel through the revelation Moses received on Mt. Sinai. After all, Abram was not a Jew, but a descendant of Shem, the son of Noah, while Melchizedek lived where the descendants of Noah’s grandson Canaan, the son of Ham, lived. This clearly points to their arriving at the same conclusion about this Highest God from that passed down to them by their ancestors. So the question of who borrowed from who does not apply here. To take this further, what Moses wrote about concerning his understanding of this Highest God does not include what Isaiah saw in visions and wrote about this Highest God. By the same token, no Old Testament prophet came to know as much about God as those privy to the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth.

So in this case, the cultural trail appears more evident than a literary trail. Universities did not exist at this time in human history, therefore acceptance of what many thought of as the obvious became part of their common core belief system via verbal traditions. Today we hear this concept referred to as universal consciousness and the metaphysical aspect of reality. It addresses the inner guidance by a higher power found in almost all religions to which each culture gives different names and identities.

This of course, leads us back to the idea of a common creator of all things, one who said He desired to make man in His own image; one who breathed into mankind His breath that brought not only life, but that inner guidance we know as conscience. Therefore, no matter how far apart the descendents of Noah dispersed after the flood, they carried this with them. As cultures changed based on location, time, influence from others, and the need to survive, this inner guidance led to expressions of faith in something not seen but the presence of which remained an accepted fact. This substantiates the fact that essence precedes existence. In other words, creation does not prove the existence of God but the essence of God. Therefore, the essence of God proved necessary before creation came into existence.

WELL, WHAT ABOUT THAT! (Part 2)

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

LETS TAKE A LOOK AT IT

When I lived in Europe and Asia, I experienced people coming up to me and telling me that their relative lived in the United States, and asked how close I lived to them, and sometimes even asked if I knew them. It did not take long for me to realize they did not fathom the immense land size of the United States. Not only that, but I discovered when living in Germany, that the dress, dialect and cuisine in north Germany proved much different than that down in Bavaria to the south. Likewise in the USA. Texans do not sound like people from Boston, who do not converse like those from California.

So, do we not all stand guilty of being shortsighted to believe that the Syrians, Babylonians, Hittites, Moabites and Egyptians all shared the exact same culture, philosophies and religions. Furthermore, the Babylon of Noah’s day differed from what it became in Abram’s day, and what it developed into during the time of Hammurabi and later under Nebuchadnezzar. As a matter of fact, when the King of Babylon took Daniel and his three friends along with the other wise and talented young men from Jerusalem back to Babylon with him, I wonder how many of them actually knew that they now lived close to the very spot where Abraham lived at one time before God instructed his father Terah to move everybody to Canaan.

Nevertheless, through archeological discoveries and ancient forms of writing and record keeping, we discover that many of the kingdoms and empires of those days did adhere to certain mutual cultural and religious norms. And since civilization did not exist as vast and developed as today, these descendants of Noah held common views on many things that gave them a certain sense of understanding for each other’s worldview.

Two ways exist to examine these factors in order to discover specifics about what they thought and what they taught and how they lived in an orderly society. One involved doing a background examination of what they wrote in order to gain a meaningful understanding of their religion, culture, beliefs, virtues and ethics. This can be called Cultural Studies. Not to be done as a way to find fault nor critique their effectiveness, but merely understand what made them tick, as we say. Another option involves taking what we can learn from all these cultures and lay them side by side to take note of any similarities or mirror images of thought and teaching among them. Scholars call this Comparative Studies. They did not designed this study to find out who copied who and who borrowed what from whom. Rather, to answer if they learned from each other and when they compared their worldviews, did it result in any changes, additions or morphing of ideas?

This can be done by examining their writings, art, tools, artifacts, as well as their rules, codes, behavior, forms of government, and social norms. The area of literature often proves to be the most fruitful in that their ways of expression, the idioms they used, and the colloquialisms they employed when telling their stories, myths, parables, allegories and metaphors come to light. Again, this must not lend itself to finding fault with them or form the opinion that they stood somehow uninformed and closed-minded. Rather, they arrived at these conclusions by skillfully employing what information and facts they possessed at the time. Even though many of them lived great distances apart and never interacted with each other, it surprises scholars to find out that although they provide their own version of certain events such as the existence of God, creation, the flood, and religion, worship and morals, a common thread runs through all of them. In so doing, did a higher power hereby shows His influence on the thinking and reasoning of mankind?

Unfortunately, people like Friedrich Delitzsch and his fellow Assyriologists became distracted from such high and lofty goals due to their ulterior motives of destroying one thing in order to superimpose another thing in its place. Whether they defended the validity of Biblical accounts or critiqued them, or if they did the same to these discoveries of Near East writings in pursuit of Cultural Studies or Comparative Studies, their findings became distorted and sunk into a raging polemics. This becomes an important word to understand in such efforts to find the origins of certain practices and beliefs. The word “polemic” means a strong verbal or written attack on someone or something in order to destroy its credibility through condemnation and ridicule. In other words, we see no effort to understand the other side or the opposing point of view. Instead, it must be done away with in the most embarrassing way so as to shame them for even considering it valid in the first place.

So when it came to Judaism and Christianity, some chose to take that being learned from the Near East writings to show that the Bible consists of a fuller and more complete revelation of God, arrived at through the unction and guidance of divine wisdom, while on the other hand others concluded that these two great religions and their holy scriptures existed as products of copycats and plagiarist who did not possess the courage or ethics to confess where their ideas really came from, wanting rather to take credit for it themselves.

It took years for this polemic to play out, and for those on both sides to chose between widening the divide rather than narrowing the debate. Some remained unapologetic and even more adamant in their views to accept no compromise or accommodation of taking a second look. However, we see that others did come together to develop a cooperative method of examination through comparison studies to develop a more definitive picture of what actually took place in the cross-transmission of these concepts.

It becomes important for both sides to understand the Bible and appreciate what these writings of the Near East brought us in the way of new information on the thoughts of men during those ancient periods of enlightenment. Bible scholars must accept that Assyriology, Egyptology and like cultures did develop valid linguistic, academic and cultural disciplines and sciences that they taught and practiced to better themselves in a law abiding society with high goals to excel in ethics and virtues. A comparative study helps Christian scholars appreciate what these civilizations had, so as to better appreciate what their Judaic-Christian ethics delivered to them down through the centuries.

CAN WE LEARN FROM THE PAST?

In the late 9th century, King Alfred, ruler of the kingdom of Wessex (now southwestern England), became concerned about the declining state of learning and the growing unfamiliarity by the citizens of books and works that at one time were considered great works. So he wrote a letter to his bishop, expressing his thoughts and feelings about this situation.

Although it occurred over 1,000 years ago, we see a similar trend today. When you read this letter, where it states England, think United States. See if you can detect where England went and where the United States is going. The text reads somewhat old fashion, but it conveys King Alfred’s thoughts very clearly.

“King Alfred bids bishop Wærferth to be greeted with loving and friendly words; and bids you to know that it very often comes to my mind what wise men there formerly were throughout England, both of sacred and secular orders; and how happy the times were then throughout England; and how the kings who then had power over the people obeyed God and his ministers; and they maintained their peace, their morality and their power within their borders, and also increased their kingdom without; and how they prospered both with war and with wisdom; and also how eager the sacred orders were about both teaching and learning, and about all the services that they ought to do for God; and how men from abroad came to this land in search of wisdom and teaching, and how we now must get them from abroad if we shall have them. So completely had wisdom fallen off in England that there were very few on this side of the Humber estuary who could understand their rituals in English, or indeed could translate a letter from Latin into English; and I believe that there were not many beyond the Humber. There were so few of them that I indeed cannot think of a single one south of the Thames when I became king.

Thanks be to God almighty that we now have any supply of teachers. Therefore I command you to do as I believe you are willing to do, that you free yourself from worldly affairs as often as you can, so that wherever you can establish that wisdom that God gave you, you establish it. Consider what punishments befell us in this world when we neither loved wisdom at all ourselves, nor transmitted it to other men; we had the name alone that we were Christians, and very few had the practices.

Then when I remembered all this, then I also remembered how I saw, before it had all been ravaged and burnt, how the churches throughout all England stood filled with treasures and books, and there were also a great many of God’s servants. And they had very little benefit from those books, for they could not understand anything in them, because they were not written in their own language. As if they had said: ‘Our ancestors, who formerly held these places, loved wisdom, and through it they obtained wealth and left it to us. Here we can still see their footprints, but we cannot track after them.’ And therefore we have now lost both the wealth and the wisdom, because we would not bend down to their tracks with our minds.

Then when I remembered all this, then I wondered extremely that the good and wise men who were formerly throughout England, who had completely learned all those books, would not have translated any of them into their own language. But I immediately answered myself and said: ‘They did not think that men ever would become so careless and learning so decayed: they deliberately refrained,for they would have it that the more languages we knew, the greater wisdom would be in this land.’

Then I remembered how the law was first composed in the Hebrew language, and afterward, when the Greeks learned it, they translated it all into their own language, and also all other books. And afterward the Romans in the same way, when they had learned them, translated them all through wise interpreters into their own language. And also all other Christian peoples translated some part of them into their own language. Therefore it seems better to me, if it seems so to you, that we also translate certain books, which are most needful for all men to know, into that language that we all can understand, and accomplish this, as with God’s help we may very easily do if we have peace, so that all the youth of free men now in England who have the means to apply themselves to it, be set to learning, while they are not useful for any other occupation, until they know how to read English writing well. One may then instruct in Latin those whom one wishes to teach further and promote to a higher rank.

Then when I remembered how knowledge of Latin had formerly decayed throughout England, and yet many knew how to read English writing, then I began among the other various and manifold cares of this kingdom to translate into English the book that is called in Latin Pastoralis, and in English “Shepherd-book,” sometimes word for word, and sometimes sense for sense, just as I had learned it from Plegmund my archbishop and from Asser my bishop and from Grimbold my masspriest and from John my masspriest. When I had learned it I translated it into English, just as I had understood it, and as I could most meaningfully render it. And I will send one to each bishopric in my kingdom, and in each will be an æstel worth fifty mancuses. And I command in God’s name that no man may take the æstel from the book nor the book from the church. It is unknown how long there may be such learned bishops as, thanks to God, are nearly everywhere. Therefore I would have them always remain in place, unless the bishop wishes to have the book with him, or it is loaned out somewhere, or someone is copying it.

It was only a few years after this letter was written, that a new religion was born in Arabia known as Islam and began to spread to Europe and other parts of the world. Let us pray to God that with the threat of this monotheistic religion now raising its head again, but in a more fanatic and radical form, that our country will realize how vulnerable it has become because the works that once stood as the foundation of this country are now no longer read, studied or even considered necessary. God help us!

WELL, WHAT ABOUT THAT!

By Dr. Robert R. Seyda

TELL IT LIKE IT IS

It seems that each generation closes the door behind them to shut out the noise and interference coming from their parents and grandparents about how their way of doing things and their way of dealing with situations proves more superior than the way it’s being done now by their children and grandchildren. While this does not represent the reinvention of the wheel, it does lend itself to a lack of understanding and insight so necessary in coping with what’s happening in their world.

Nothing appears more vulnerable in the process of not learning from history, than our cultural, philosophical, social and religious heritage. As such, we tend to see current breakdowns in virtues and corruption of ethical norms as something new, rather than a recurrence of an old virus that’s been around a long time. For instance, little did I know a few years ago that my sudden case of shingles exploded around my waist due to the fact that I contracted chickenpox as a child. In other words, it lay there all the time but chose to evidence itself only after my immune system weakened due to surgery. The same holds true of the fall of man into periods of disbelief, misbelief and unbelief.

The importance of such reasoning derives from the fact that when we become aware of what our ancestors did to cope with these irregularities, it provides us clues and ideas on how to deal with them today. If we knew how it started, then we can better understand why it expresses itself the way it does at our time and place in God’s ongoing plan of redemption and salvation of mankind. Atheist, skeptics, agnostics, doubters, and naysayers represent a long line into the past, and appear to be reproducing at a healthy rate. While Churches appear as sacred structures and Bibles revered as holy scriptures by many, those for who it remains a farce, an illusion, and the opiate of the people, populate our society in abundance.

Back in the mid 1700’s, scholars dug through the treasure troves of ancient Egyptian documents and etchings that spawned further exploration during the mid 1800’s into the area of Mesopotamia that includes modern day Kuwait, Iraq and parts of Syria. European archeologists and historians deciphered ancient languages and translated the tens of thousands of texts and studies for important content to be shared with colleagues back home.

The texts themselves spoke of a time and era when men thought, perceived, and interpreted their world in ways commensurate with their understanding at the time. But this led to a confluence of conflicting ideas. The ancient writers penned their words to explain their comprehension of the world they live in based on knowledge, history, philosophy, religion and cultural norms not too far removed from the time of Noah’s flood. But the ones translating these texts where looking at them through the eyes of their 18^th and 19^th century knowledge, history, philosophy, religion and cultural norms.

As such, there developed a strange form of apologetics that skeptics today might call identify as cognitive biases. In other words, they looked for ways to debunk those things held as sacred and holy by most religions in their era, especially Judaism and Christianity, while explaining away the veracity of those ancient ideas with scientific reasoning. They did not look for the truth, they looked for ways to encourage and embellish what they saw as the truth in their minds. Not only did religious and philosophical prejudices get woven into the mix, but the added color of politics gave it a special sheen and gloss.

All of this led to various camps of researchers being divided into those who defended Judaism and Christianity and their Bible, and those who sought to show that these borrowed ideas all came from the ancients who told a different story with a unique explanation on how it all happened. So in 1902, under the auspices of the German Oriental Society, a series of scheduled lectures brought together a stream of intellectuals and Bible apologists. Even Kaiser Wilhelm II decided to attend. They planned it to be an historical event designed to lay to rest the argument forever as to where the writings of Moses came from and how they got into the Bible.

While serving as a faculty member at the European Bible Seminary in Wienacht, Switzerland in the 1960’s, I came to appreciate the works and commentaries of Franz Delitzsch, a well-known conservative Lutheran theologian and expert in the Hebrew Language. I used his books for research in my class notes, especially the ten volume commentary he and C. F. Keil wrote on the Old Testament, as well as his commentary on the Psalms.

His son, Friedrich Delitzsch, came cut from the same cloth as his father, but not in the identical pattern or style. He proved to be a product of his day, where instead of intellectuals researching and studying ancient texts in order to validate and corroborate the faith of their fathers, they did the opposite. They drove themselves to find errors and raise questions as to the authenticity of the ancient Jewish and Christian manuscripts.

Friedrich Delitzsch became a noted Assyriologist and lecturer of comparative studies on the relationship between the cuneiform and writings in Syria and Babylon and those writings that purport to be original with Hebrew authors in the Bible. Delitzsch designed on of his lectures entitled “Babel und Bibel,” to focused attention on the impact that Assyriology brought to the formation of Old Testament writings. But one of Delitzsch’s most controversial claims, however, remained that the literature of the Bible depended on, and even borrowed from, the literature of the dominant culture represented in the region of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. He contended that the evidence unearthed in Mesopotamian showed not just parallels to Old Testament customs and ideas, but genuine evidence showing that they in fact existed as the original source of such customs and ideas.

This led to the inevitable conclusion that the inception of the Old Testament text came from human sources, not divine. In other words, that the Jewish and Christian faiths owed their existence to pagan mythology. Young Delitzsch authored two more lectures expounding on this thesis over the next two years. The second one proved even more objectionable than the first. In it Delitzsch questioned the validity of using traditional theological terminology to describe the Bible as a “divine revelation” or authored by “divine inspiration,” in light what had been discovered in these ancient texts.

When this all began, many Assyriologists and researchers identified themselves as people of faith. This resulted in young Delitzsch being vehemently criticized in their written critiques of his lectures. As time when on, however, Assyriology became increasingly influenced by secular ideas, and its scholars began to lose their concerned about the authenticity of the Bible, and instead embraced the secular tenets of critical scholarship. As such, Friedrich Delitzsch’s lectures and writings became accepted as the dividing line that separated the sacred from the secular in comparative studies.

Instead of each side trying to find ways to harmonize their findings, these disagreements only drove them further and further apart. Unfortunately, instead of taking the scientific approach and debating only their differences of opinion, they began to make personal attacks on one another. Those who embraced deeply held Jewish and Christian beliefs in the validity of their faith and the inerrancy of the scriptures, saw these textual discovers as proof of man’s continuing search for meaning and understanding God, which prompted the necessity of Moses’ revelation on Mt. Sinai and the coming of Christ as the final word. On the other hand, those who held secular views argued that the texts contained in the Bible proved mere adaptations of the mythology contained in these earlier manuscripts, and therefore offered nothing new or unique to enhance the dialogue.

Therefore, secular scholars began to label their opponents as naïve traditionalist, while those who held fast to their faith described their adversaries as godless heretics. Not exactly the atmosphere that leads to greater understanding of each other’s points of view. But what established an even more perplexing dilemma, involved the seemingly overwhelming evidence from these ancient Syrian and Babylonian manuscripts that left the traditional scholars scratching their heads for lack of any conclusive explanation on these documented similarities. On the other hand, the secularists found themselves on the defensive when their efforts to uncover the hidden truth about the origin of religious truths as they saw it, received shouts of disdain and ridicule.

When Delitzsch contended that the Jewish Old Testament did not qualify as a valid book to be accepted as part of Christian theology, and ought therefore be excluded and denied having any place in Christian faith, the religious scholars dug in deeper and refused compromise as the arguments drove them further and further apart. As a result, over time Delitzsch’s impact on the religious community began to wane when evidence appeared that showed him to be ardently anti-Christian and anti-Semitic. Instead of being motivated by scientific objectivity, his biases and prejudices fully exposed his gross naiveté in his understanding of Old Testament and New Testament material, and in particular, the person and ministry of Jesus Christ.

This concept of the Old Testament being replete with revised stories taken from ancient myths, and the New Testament made up of wives tales and anecdotes still exists today. Bill O’Reilly in his book entitled “Killing Jesus” makes it clear that most of the Bible contains folk lore borrowed from ancient religions. But as one discovery after another came to light since the 1920’s, the initial excitement by scholars who heralded their arrival as being epic in proportion to our understanding the real story of the Bible, careful study and a contextual approach proved that many of the claims made upon initial exposure of these texts as being exaggerated.

Thus as believers today, two primary points of view stand to be reasoned with. We can either see these ancient manuscripts and parallel accounts of things like the creation of the universe, of earth, of man, of society, Noah’s flood, the commandments, beliefs in God and Angels, heaven and hell as the evolution of religious thought with each succeeding generation building on those ideas of the past, or that what the Bible represents as ultimate truth appears silhouetted against the backdrop of man’s own efforts to explain what God Himself eventually revealed in His Word and through His Son.

Some scholars say there remain two choices. Either we ascribe to what they call parallelomania: the phenomenon where apparent similarities and construct parallels and analogies can be perceived and accepted without historical basis, or parallelophobia, which corresponds to an aggressive attack on or refutation of the opinions or principles of another point of view. The writer of Hebrews, in Chapters 8 & 9, gives us the best example of interpretation on this subject. Said the writer, “The work that these priests do is really only a copy and a shadow of what is in heaven. That is why God warned Moses when he was ready to build the Holy Tent: “Be sure to make everything exactly like the pattern I showed you on the mountain” (Heb. 8:5).

To take that one step further, all the laws and codes written after Noah’s flood, as seen in the Law Codes of Ur-Nammu and Hammurabi, for example, simply foreshadowed what God planned to reveal more fully to Moses in the Ten Commandments and Levitical Laws. These in turn prefigured what the Word who was God, and was with God, coming in human flesh to give God’s final say on the subject. As the writer of Hebrews goes on to say in 8:6, “But the work that has been given to Jesus is much greater than the work that was given to those priests. In the same way, the new agreement that Jesus brought from God to His people is much greater than the old one. And the new agreement is based on better promises.”

Such a concept does not harmonize well with secular-humanist logic, and those who try constantly find themselves running into a wall of disbelief in accepting such a construct as being true without passing the test of scientific evidence. Humanist find it hard to accept the fact that there exists a vast difference between the secular worldview and the sacred view of the other world. This gap cannot be bridged by intellect alone, just ask Nicodemus. Faith and belief persist as the only two elements that transcend the world below into the world above. And the only way to come into possession of this ability of a faith that serves as the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen, relies on being born anew. Not in the flesh, but in the Spirit.