Tom and Anne Donlon wrote:

>Adam,
>
>I have seen more than one anti-religious remark since I joined this list.
>Since no one objected, I happily assumed that this was a rare group in which
>people allowed others to have differing opinions without necessarily needing
>to point that out.
>
>Therefore I thought it'd be OK to discuss food and agriculture as mentioned
>in texts that are thousands of years old and considered sacred by a vast
>number of the earth's inhabitants in several religions.
>
>All the best in non-proselytizing imperfect paleoness :)
>
>Anne
>
>
I'm not really anti-religion. That's too broad. I may be somewhat
anti-Christian, but really it's more anti-dogma. If you are one of those
folks who believes that there is no need to search for answers, because
the answers are all right here, then you and I *are* enemies.

The Torah was not meant to be taken as a literal description of the way
things were 10,000 or so years ago. It is a synopsis of a whole lot of
history. It is literally filled with abstractions. People who try to
take it as a verbatim account of the way things were need their heads
examined. In the original Hebrew it is tough enough to understand
exactly what is being described. Then you get this hillbilly Gaul king
who was inspired by a pilgrimage to Rome, and he comes sweeping around
Europe browbeating everyone with his under-educated version.

Very little has changed since then. The version you are reading is an
unispired translation that is really more of an interpretation. And it's
an interpretation by someone who buys all the dogma unquestioningly and
doesn't understand the literary devices. And you get the full benefits
of his ignorance. BTW, the "Old Testament" was written in Hebrew. The
New was written in Latin and Greek and NOT in Aramaic. The only texts in
Aramaic are parts of the Gnostic gospels and other scriptures that
didn't make the official cut (For example, the books of Thomas and Mary
Magdelene, both of which were considered important by the Gnostics, are
originally in Aramaic.) There are a few Aramaic words here and there,
but there isn't as much as a full sentence anywhere.

Also, BTW, Gnosticism is a beautiful religion. So are some forms of
Judaism (NOT Orthodox  Judaism which is fully possessed of the
fundamental dogmatism I object to.) It is really the fundamentalist,
dogmatic Christianity that I object to. And, if you think you can get
serious dietary advice from Genesis you'd have to be towing that line
pretty hard.

As far as Paleo, and how far off topic we are IMNSHO, the works we are
discussing were written by advanced agricultural societies. They are
tens of thousands of years out of scope, at best.

Thanks,
Adam