code of Hammurabi

[one love]

I was doing some studying and found this interesting and wondered if any of you history buffs are familiar with this. I know Rambo Preacher and TW study history and may know some thing about this ruler.

Hammurabi was the ruler who established the greatness of Babylon. Babylon which many know is considered to be the worlds first metropolis and what I was reading is that he is mostly responsible for this.
What I found interesting was that we know that Babylonian captivity had effect on Israel in many ways.

This book says that this time period and the laws in place by this ruler is where Israel got there "eye for an eye" practice. I am not saying it is so but the book is interesting.

Laws for instance that is one is a witness in a trial and testifies falsely was to be put to death. I glance at over some 200 laws and almost everyone ended with being put to death.
If someone house fell on them and they were killed the builder of the home was then killed. If when the house fell and it killed the owners son then the builders son was killed.


Anyway was curious if any here have heard of this ruler it was pretty interesting. They were also famous for throwing one in the river and if they made it back they were telling the truth , if they drowned they were guilty because swimming was not really practiced, so it was there way of letting the God's decide.

[Full Quiver]

Israel came out of Egypt and God gave them their laws which included eye for eye practices. This was prior to Babylon.

[one love]

I was thinking the same thing as well but it is an interesting book even that aside. But you are right.
He had so many laws that kept a form of government that seemed ahead of his time but I could be wrong I am not as much in to history as others yet I enjoy it.

[Pastor Gary]

I am familiar with Hammurabi and the Code of Hammurabi. (Didn't you take a World History course in High School? Required where I went to school...)

[TW]

Hammurabi predates Moses by over 400 years, reigning Babylon from 1795 - 1750 B.C.. Moses died at the age of 120 in the year 2488 by the Jewish calendar (1272 B.C.). By subtracting the 40 years the Jews spent in the wilderness, the exodus from Egypt was in 1312 B.C. I believe that Full Quiver has applied the date of the defeat of the Kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar, which occurred in 586 B.C. The Code of Hammurabi is notable because it is the oldest set of written laws known.


TW

[one love]

I am familiar with Hammurabi and the Code of Hammurabi. (Didn't you take a World History course in High School? Required where I went to school...)

do you want to know what I was doing in high school? I learned street knowledge All my learning was what i wanted to know in school then college and my own studies

[one love]

Hammurabi predates Moses by over 400 years, reigning Babylon from 1795 - 1750 B.C.. Moses died at the age of 120 in the year 2488 by the Jewish calendar (1272 B.C.). By subtracting the 40 years the Jews spent in the wilderness, the exodus from Egypt was in 1312 B.C. I believe that Full Quiver has applied the date of the defeat of the Kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar, which occurred in 586 B.C. The Code of Hammurabi is notable because it is the oldest set of written laws known.


TW

TW I knew you could shed some light on this, thank you. I started reading it last night so I felt you or Rambo would have info on it. When it talked about Israel I didnt get the dates right in my mind I knew it 1795 bc but i could not remember the date of moses. Thanks again.

[RamboPreacher]

Chronologies are not my forte'. However, when having discussions with secular theologians and other non-believers and especially the anti-believers, it is important to know what you know, and why.

Yes, TW is correct there is some predating of Moses. and this is also true of the Gilgamesh epic, and the flood tablets (cuneiform). So what those others will automatically conclude is that the monotheistic Israelites (though many will not even say they really were monotheistic) copied their religion and "laws" from the previous records and civilizations.

There seems to be evidences of this as well. So some Christians when they see or read these kinds of things will have a conflict. they want to believe God's Word (The Bible), but they see the evidences presented, and will usually do one of two things: ignore the science and archaeological findings and conclude that science and the Bible are contradicting, so man's science is all wrong.

Or, perhaps the conflict is overwhelming, and the Christian will at least in part lose faith at least in a given area of the Bible, unfortunately. Which is what the anti-believers desire, and the non-believers want so that their non-God beliefs are also backed up.

What isn't done very often is to question the science and beliefs of this particular assumption (not all science), and understand that what they are saying is based in assumption and speculation. it is presented a priori, and so as we read or hear it, we are automatically lead to a point that it is supposed to be factual, when it isn't.

In this case; the assumption is that the earlier written record supersedes the oral traditions and later written records. While it may sound logical, but the fact of the matter is: there really is no evidence (let alone proof), only speculation and assumptions.

It is "reasonable" or "logical" that the earlier written record came before the latter, right? not really, especially when it comes to God's Word. There are many other explanations for these kinds of circumstances, and we all probably have experiences of circumstances that when you look back, wonder how that ever happened, or say to yourself that it could have been easier if...

In any case, a previous written record, only shows that there is a previous written record. it doesn't show a civilization copied.

In fact, what may have happened, is that the Babylonian civilization copied from even earlier Israelite oral and civilization traditions (pre-writing).

the Hammurabi laws, may in fact be copied from the Israelite Law that was from God. The flood tablets and Gilgamesh epic that seems to have so many parallels to the Noachide flood; may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, but it too could have just as well have been copied from the Israelites.

So of course their versions are going to be different. (in my opinion, and beliefs) they heard the Semitic truth, and then embellished, since they had no fear of the One True God (yet); they had only their empire/civilizations so-called history to add to it and sprinkle into it.

This is just as much a scientific approach as their assumptions that the "smaller" and conquered kingdoms and peoples inherited and copied from the larger/conquerors. Especially when in fact, there are other evidences that this copying was happening both ways, and had little or nothing to do with conqueror/conquered or large/small; and more to do with what seemed to work or not.

Bottom line is that oldest written does not equate oldest. a simple analogy would be a child/parent. a child is raised by their parents and learns much, before the child could write it down. Also, the Parents learn much from the child, and can write it down.

[dolfan]

The flood tablets and Gilgamesh epic that seems to have so many parallels to the Noachide flood; may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, but it too could have just as well have been copied from the Israelites.

This is probably a stupid question, but if I don't ask it, I'll remain stupid:
How can the cuneiform accounts of the flood post-date Israelite writings when the cuneiform predates Israelites??

[Pastor Bill]

The flood tablets and Gilgamesh epic that seems to have so many parallels to the Noachide flood; may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, but it too could have just as well have been copied from the Israelites.

This is probably a stupid question, but if I don't ask it, I'll remain stupid:
How can the cuneiform accounts of the flood post-date Israelite writings when the cuneiform predates Israelites??

"copied" doesn't mean copied from a written text, this could be based just as easily on earlier aural accounts, which blended their way into many cultures.

If you accept the flood as true, wouldn't ALL people descend from that 7 people? as different cultures formed, many lost the relationship to God, but may have kept much of the aural history, and as it blended into the new cultures it was eventually written down. The Israelites were not the first to begin writing, but that does not mean they had no history.

[RamboPreacher]

The flood tablets and Gilgamesh epic that seems to have so many parallels to the Noachide flood; may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, but it too could have just as well have been copied from the Israelites.

This is probably a stupid question, but if I don't ask it, I'll remain stupid:
How can the cuneiform accounts of the flood post-date Israelite writings when the cuneiform predates Israelites??

it didn't. cuneiform and the gilgamesh/flood tablets are a written record that predates. I said that it may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, it could have been copied from the Israelites. this doesn't mean they copied the Semitic written history/"myth". it means that perhaps they copied the oral tradition and their expression of the story.

Sorry that wasn't very clear. the copying wasn't an epigraphical copy, but a tradition-copy.

[Gerald Creasy]

The flood tablets and Gilgamesh epic that seems to have so many parallels to the Noachide flood; may have been written in cuneiform before the Semitic writing, but it too could have just as well have been copied from the Israelites.

This is probably a stupid question, but if I don't ask it, I'll remain stupid:
How can the cuneiform accounts of the flood post-date Israelite writings when the cuneiform predates Israelites??

"copied" doesn't mean copied from a written text, this could be based just as easily on earlier aural accounts, which blended their way into many cultures.

If you accept the flood as true, wouldn't ALL people descend from that 7 people? as different cultures formed, many lost the relationship to God, but may have kept much of the aural history, and as it blended into the new cultures it was eventually written down. The Israelites were not the first to begin writing, but that does not mean they had no history.

This is the thing that gets me. IF an event occurs to a set of people and the gradchildren of Couple A write about the event and then the great great granchildren of couple B write about the even as passed down to them via word of mouth, IT DOES NOT MEAN the descendants of Couple B COPIED their story from the grandchildren of Couple A.

Shoddy logic has been passed of as historical fact.

[dolfan]

Gerald, that's not how I think of copying either. "Passing along" the oral traditions would be repeating them --- with whatever variations may naturally arise or not; "copying" would be applying the grandparents' story as something that happened to someone else (i.e., the way the Gilgamesh flood epic is attributed by bible skeptics as being copied in the OT). I guess that's why I got confused. Told y'all I ain't right.