Makes sense: Babylon had it's on creation tales and history and the Jews one too and more likely wanted to one up those in Babylon. Kind of supports the theory that the Hebrew bible was started in captivity.

I continue to note that my challenge to Brackite goes unmet. Here it is again:

Is Abraham a real person? If so, when did he live? Proof?

To spread the gospel blessings abroad, the Lord has centered his work in a people specially chosen for the task. At first this people were the righteous Saints who followed Adam, Enoch, and the other faithful patriarchs. Around 2000 B.C. Abraham was selected to head this covenant race from that time forward. God, on His part, promised to make Abraham the “father of many nations” and to give the land of Canaan to Abraham and his seed “for an everlasting possession” (Genesis 17:4, 8). “And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee” (Genesis 17:7).

Dating and historicity


Traditional dating

According to calculations directly derived from the Masoretic Hebrew Torah, Abraham was born 1,948 years after biblical creation and lived for 175 years (Genesis 25:7), which would correspond to a life spanning from 1812 BCE to 1637 BCE by Jewish dating. The figures in the Book of Jubilees have Abraham born 1,876 years after creation, and 534 years before the Exodus; the ages provided in the Samaritan version of Genesis agree closely with those of Jubilees before the Deluge, but after the Deluge, they add roughly 100 years to each of the ages of the Patriarchs in the Masoretic Text, resulting in the figure of 2,247 years after creation for Abraham's birth. The Greek Septuagint version adds around 100 years to nearly all of the patriarchs' births, producing the even higher figure of 3,312 years after creation for Abraham's birth.

Other interpretations of Biblical chronology place Abraham's birth at 2008 AM (Anno Mundi). In Genesis 11:32 : Abraham was the youngest son of Terah who died in Haran aged 205, in year 2083 AM. In Gen.12:4 we learn that at that time Abraham was 75 years old. In other words Abraham was born when his father Terah was 130 years old. (205-75 = 130). Therefore Abraham was born in year 2008 AM.

History of dating attempts

When cuneiform was first deciphered, Theophilus Pinches translated some Babylonian tablets which were part of the Spartoli collection in the British Museum. In particular, he believed he found in the Chedorlaomer Text, currently thought to have been written in the 6th to the 7th century BCE, the names of three of the kings of the Eastern coalition fighting against the five kings from the Vale of Siddim in Gen. 14:1. This is the only part of Genesis which seems to set Abraham in a context of wider political history, and the idea of many 19th/early 20th century exegetes and assyriologists was that it seemed to offer an opening to date Abraham, if the kings in question could only be identified. In 1887, Schrader then was the first to propose that Amraphel could be an alternate spelling for Hammurabi (cf. the ISBE of 1915, s.v. "Hammurabi").

In other words, if we accept that Abraham lived sometime between 2200 B.C.E. and 1500 B.C.E. (again, our Bible Dictionary places his birth at 1996 B.C.E.), then there shouldn't be anything within its pages that could only be known to someone living after that point.

Is that an 800 VFR in your photo? I have one.

Thanks for your posts Brackite and CK; CK, I think you have described the best possible apologetic response, and John W did a way better job than me of laying out the problem. The current focus on Olishem is a red-herring I think. Even if someone found a signpost saying "Plain of Olishem" that does not explain why JSjr elaborated so much on the Chaldeans.

When I first looked at this online (in about 1999) an article on FAIR attempted to establish that the Hebrew word for Chaldeans, 'Kaldu', was the same as the modern 'Kurd', thus Abraham's Chaldeans were Kurds. It didn't take much digging around to establish that the link was nonsense. Another article claimed that Ur was located in Lebanon. Both articles have completely disappeared of course - I had them printed out, but wouldn't have a clue where they are now. I am sure these arguments would be denied now.

As to trying to place Abraham 1000 years later. That would pretty much trash the OT. Abraham, and all thereafter would appear within the period of history for which there is increasing external documentation of significant people and events.
http://scriptures.lds.org/en/bd/chrono

I no longer think that there is any reason to believe that Abraham is a real person. From my reading on this, it was politically expedient, during the exile, to claim that Hebrew ancestors came from Mesopotamia, and possibly even the Chaldeans in particular. Josephus would have drawn on tradition elaborating on the bible.

The almost complete lack of apologetic response is fast becoming more interesting than the blatant JSjr borrowing of a biblical anachronism. (bcspace excluded, but even then he only addressed the Olishem red herring).

To tell You the truth, I am not really sure if Abraham was a real Person or not.

Then I'd say your argument is like angels dancing on the head of a pin.

Gen 21:34 And Abraham sojourned in the Philistines’ land many days.

Then I'd say your argument is like angels dancing on the head of a pin.

I'm much more interested in what the Book of Abraham has to say. And, thus far, although it's never been a major focus of my attention, I've published twice on that topic:

* With John Gee and William Hamblin. “‘And I Saw the Stars’: The Book of Abraham and Ancient Geocentric Astronomy.” In John Gee and Brian M. Hauglid, eds. Astronomy, Papyrus, and Covenant (Provo: FARMS, 2005), 1-16.

* “News from Antiquity [‘Evidence supporting the book of Abraham continues to turn up in a wide variety of sources’].” The Ensign 24/1 (January 1994): 16-21.

Bumping.

Given Daniel's response on another thread thus:

I am looking forward to reading his views on this topic.

But then, Metcalf, like so many other critics, is not concerned with what the text actually says, and there's a very good reason for this.

That's not a particularly useful area of inquiry for a critic to pursue.

Do you agree with or not with what the The LDS Old Testament Student Manual Stated about when Abraham lived? Here is (again) Where it Stated, When Abraham lived:

That is convenient for you!

Actually the truth claim that Brackite, CK, myself and others have made is that Abraham did not exist even remotely near the period of time that the Chaldeans existed as a people. Whether he did or did not exist at any other time is not relevant.

Let's say that Abraham did not exist later than the establishment of either the Kingdom of Israel, or the Assyrian empire.

Whether he, or a person of Mesopotamian origin who was an Israelite ancestor, existed prior to that time is not of importance.

Three years later, still no answers.