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Talk:YHWH/Archive1
Isn't that odd? I've never seen it with a W before, I've always seen it written as YHVH. --Kels 06:50, 12 September 2007 (MDT)
Am I totally off to think vaguely that the original four Hebrew letters were an anacronym for "The Great I Am"? And also, can we mention that the reason there are no vowels is that the language it was written in had no vowels? human 14:53, 26 January 2008 (EST)
- Yes, I believe the acronym YHWH, "Ya-WAY", (YHVH is almost always associated with the New World Translation, [Jehovah's Witness' version], vocalised as "Ya-VAY", which supposedly transliterated into "JehoVah") is the "name" of the Abrahamic deity and renders down to "I am that I am" or simply "I am my own cause", hence, God. I would only make mention of it having no vowels if one has an article on the ancient Hebrew language itself to link to. Warren Terra 15:28, 26 January 2008 (EST)
Kels: The W and the V transcriptions are interchangeable, as in fact would be Y and J. EVDebs 19:48, 11 April 2008 (EDT)
- Hence the pronunciation "Jehovah". Makes sense. The Heidelberg Kid (talk) 01:26, 16 January 2012 (UTC)
Reminds me of an episode of Il Etait Une Fois...L'Homme (Once Upon a Time... Man) from my childhood. When Moses is pleading with Ramseses II as in the Exodus narrative, he pronounces it "Yahvah". I also remember the music, and the raining frogs. The Heidelberg Kid (talk) 01:26, 16 January 2012 (UTC)
Contents
Yahweh the volcano deity[edit]
[show]One note concern who was banned from wikipedia for this shit |
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This section was copied from the talk page of the Jehovah article after merging the two. Proxima Centauri (talk) 07:05, 26 October 2012 (UTC) Given the hundreds of verses such as this..... Nahum 1:5-6 The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein. Who can stand before his indignation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? his fury is poured out like fire, and the rocks are thrown down by him. .....it is I think a good idea to now start to open up the debate on the likelihood Yahweh, the god of the ancient Hebrews, was in fact an imaginery volcano deity that was finally spun out into an all present, all knowing invisible god for anyone who wanted him. The ancient Hebrews did live in a highly volatile location, which is where two continents are pulling apart. Mount Sinai (not the pretend one but the real one of unknown location) is described as a volcano in the Old Testament. God is not described as being seperate to the volcano and operating it from afar but said to reside in the volcano....his temple. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 01:03, 25 October 2012 (UTC))
Good question, albeit sarcastic. To know where the volcanoes are, one only needs to know where the rips are. Look at the land formation on a satalite image and you will see where the land has ripped on either side of the Sinai Peninsular. The Red Sea, the Suez Canal, the Gulf of Aqaba, the Sea of Galillee, the Dead Sea, the Jordan River. That is where the Leviathans reside ;) The land volcanoes are in Saudi, Jordan, Syria, East Africa. The most likely locations for Mount Sinai are North-west Saudi or Jordan to the West of the top of the Gulf of Aqaba. The most significant volcano in the Bible story is more than likely Santorini, the cause of the ten plagues of egypt. That was the god 'that brought you out of Egypt' that the Hebrews were forever indebted to. Israeli Jews will want you to believe the Jews never lived anywhere else but they are not exactly motivated to letting the world know they actually worshipped their god in Saudi are they?(Oh My Volcano (talk) 13:00, 25 October 2012 (UTC))
This subject is obviously all very new to you so I would recommend you do some research into it. There is plenty to go on on the internet. We live in the age of information. Please make use of it. If you have questions based on a foundation of information then I will be happy to answer them. Prior to that, my efforts would be futile. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 13:26, 25 October 2012 (UTC))
Weirdstuff...if you could only get your angries out you might have space for some information. Please re-read my earlier reply....
Did you not see that the first time? By the time the Israelis moved up the their promised land, volcano worship became history. They carried on using the same terminology to describe god's wrath and what god had done for them in the past but it bore no relation to what they experienced. They worshipped volcanoes when in Saudi/Jordan and that is where they established their laws but, being human, they abandoned their brimstone spewing deities for more pleasant land. That is in keeping with all other volcano worshippers. The Israelites were constantly reminded of 'the god that brought them out of Egypt'...the volcano god....to try to keep them loyal. I do hope you're not going to ask me to name a volcano in Israel again because that would be seriously irational. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 22:32, 25 October 2012 (UTC)) (Oh My Volcano (talk) 22:34, 25 October 2012 (UTC))
There seems to be a lack of rational thought in RationalWiki. Maybe it's teething problems. The jury is out on the origins of the Hebrews. My belief is that they were a random collection of vagrants, migrants and refugees from all over the place including Greece. The telve tribes was a euphemism for 'random bunch' and the tribes whose worship history fitted the chosen one for the newly formed alliance was used to add credibility and prestige. Here are a few ideas....mine fits with the Habiru one... http://atheism.about.com/od/biblepeoplenewtestament/a/Origins-Israelites-Bible.htm If they or some of them did originate from Mesopotamia, volcanoes would have been close by. This map shows how Mesopotamia borders very mountainous regions of Turkey and Iran. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Karte_Mesopotamien.png Right in the middle of this mountainous region, on the border between Iran and Turkey, lies Mount Ararat where the great flood story is said to originate. http://www.volcanolive.com/ararat.html As you can see, it's quite a significant volcano and would certainly have been worshipped by Mesopotamiams, their land encroaching Iran and Turkey. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 00:02, 26 October 2012 (UTC))
Weirdstuff. It was not me who said the Hebrews came from Mesopotamia. I simply toyed with that suggestion after it was put to me. The jury is out, as I have said before. In my opinion, it is irrelevant where they originated from, how many gods the Hebrews worshipped in total, where Mount Sinai really was, whether they were ever in Egypt, whether their genealogy is authentic, etc. Volcano worship runs through the Bible, it caused the most significant event in Biblical history (ten plagues), was evident when the laws were decided upon (at Mount Sinai) and was the inspiration for wrathful vengence for millenia. Forget the details and try to get a sense for the theme. It takes an empathic mind. You have to switch off your prejudism and open your mind. To me, it's glaringly obvious but I am very well aware that mind control can be so powerful that a person can look at themselves in the mirror, fail to recognise themselves and become extremely angry when told they are looking at themselves. In the few years I have been working on this theory, I have found that the most hostile to it are atheists who were never theists. I suspect that is because instead of being atheist because they struggled to believe, they are atheist because they are angry with 'god'. I've heard or read many atheists saying 'god is a hateful, angry, violent, nasty piece of work'. You would never hear an ex-theist say that. In my experience, the more hostile a person is to this theory the more they unconciously believe in god. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 01:22, 27 October 2012 (UTC))
Storm God?[edit]Isn't Yahweh a Storm god or am i just being lazy about keeping up on ideas?--Mikal Harass Follow 02:02, 27 October 2012 (UTC) Yahweh is a storm god and a chief god and possibly a volcano god. The Ancient Israelites incorporated a great many ideas from a great many polytheistic cultures round them when they developed the concept of Yahweh. Proxima Centauri (talk) 06:59, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
http://jot.sagepub.com/content/38/4/387.full.pdf+html The reason for this is obvious and clear even though we know the persona of Ba'al had been usurped into the persona of Yahweh. In the Narratives the thunder and lightning is in the same body of text as other key descriptions. Meaning for the argument to hold above, one must woefully ignore the other descriptors in the body of the texts. Descriptors in which depict a burning mountain in smoke and fire to which quakes greatly.. Thunderstorms and lightning are key phenomenon of volcanic activity, and you can't intellectually cut these descriptions apart in the narrative and come out with a proper context of what the narrative is describing. The Storm GOD argument cannot actually stand up academically, it can only in reality be understood as usurped epithets from Ba'al to which become a part of the persona of Yahweh. SniprKlr August 27 around 1am Volcano God Hypothesis[edit]Actually Yahweh is an usurping of many deities including Ba'al. If you really want to look into the evidence supporting the Volcano GOD hypothesis, and yes storms are associated to volcanoes, you can feel free to read the following 7 chapter article, and two others that address in detail the subject:
These articles don't just spit out bible verses with unreasonable assertions and theories like I found and read on the blog mentioned. What I found interesting is the use of academic citations to which this person uses, and the articles themselves seem to be just a review of the evidence for Freud's hypothesis. It appears that for the most part, some time after the Theran eruption, there was a merger between two of the most prominent forms of worship in Mesopotamia and the Levant region. This to being the merger of moon and mountain god worship. Both El(El Shaddai) and Sin were considered the Creators and held a lot in common within their Epithets. Though it is still up for debate on whether or not Thera in itself was the basis for the story of Exodus, but it is clear that it is the best possible candidate for this likely fictional tale in regards to the eviction of the Hyksos rulers from Egypt who were known to combine and affiliate Egyptian deities with their Asiatic Ba'al Ha'ran.. A deity also known as the Moon God Sin to which Mt Sinai is named after. Hence Mt Sinai according to the sources means "Moon Mountain" while El Shaddai means "God of the Mountains", and "He who dwells on his shining mountain". I may be paraphrasing a bit on the last quote, but the evidence is pretty damn well presented in those articles. SniprKlr 12:47 AM Sunday, May 11, 2014 (EDT)
Bob M, I would argue that is true, but when you read the descriptions cited, the phenomenon are connected and most often together in a single event.. Hence the thunder, hail, lightning, earthquake, pillar of fire and smoke ect ect ect are all in singular description and often back referenced such as in the case of Revelations in which back references to Exodus. The description in the bible, not just in Exodus, can only be matched to a volcanic event as there are no other natural phenomenon that can match the descriptions given. In my own conjecture I would argue that what likely happened here was that they realized at some point that all the phenomenon they witnessed can be attributed to volcanoes. Especially if any of them had bore witness to the Theran Eruption. This of course would be giving them logical reason to attribute the epithets to a single god, and usurp many of the other gods into one deity. That is my personal thoughts on it of course. And there was clearly a political conflict between establishing Yahweh vs El Sahddai (El the head of the Canaanite pantheon)as the GOD of Judah. This to where eventually the Yahwists "J" equated Yahweh with El Shaddai even though Yahweh was regarded as just one of the 70 sons of El according to the academic citations noted in the articles. It's actually rather interesting. Furthermore, it's not just merely an event being subscribed since the bible in fact depicts this deity as not only the GOD of the Mountain, but also as the mountain itself. I noticed this when reading the articles to which I don't think the author addressed or noticed. Psalms 18 and other areas do this specifically. From what I can tell, this is a very classical case of animism and anthropomorphism. So Yeah, it's very complicated, but theme is indeed very persistent throughout. I would say in my opinion that it's obvious and hard to ignore to where it just makes sense. I would even say it makes other areas of the bible more coherent, such as in the case of Hebrews 1 where it discusses the lords radiance and how he makes flames of fire his servants. I would argue that the person that brought this up has a valid argument even though their blog "Oh My Volcano" seems really not well put together, or dogmatic. This is why I referenced the above articles for consideration giving he at least used sources and citations to back himself up with. And if you haven't read the second chapter in the first listed article, I would recommend doing so because I think it's incredibly the most interesting on the subject. SniprKlr 3:57 AM Sunday, May 11, 2014 (EDT)
--- Bob_M,
You made the claim of the intentions of the author without actually reading and addressing what they author wrote. You assumed he had hand picked a handful of verses and made a claim as your basis for argument for dismissal. That is pretty close to being an Ad Hominem.. However you may be right that this might not quite fit as an Ad Hominem as I would perhaps instead cite : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacies_of_irrelevance Now I think we both share the view that the bible is largely a collection of fairy tales. But even fairy tales often stem from something of reality. Tales of floods, storm, earthquake, the stars themselves have influenced the very making of these fairy tales. However, I will leave this discourse with the argument that the hypothesis has enough evidence to support it to consider it a reasonable hypothesis.SniprKlr
It is very close to being an ad hominem giving you didn't actually address the arguments and content. You but rather made assumptions about the author's intentions and assumed quality of the Author's writing. That could be considered an ad hominem to some degree, but it definitely falls under a logical fallacy of irrelevance. Hence the point is, you used an informal fallacy to make an argument, and I am not wrong about that. The Author also presents clear evidence that the deity in question is indeed a mountain god. Not only does El Shaddai mean "God of the Mountains", he is also referenced as:
So no he didn't just simply present scripture from the bible, he presented actual evidence backing it up. And this is the deity Yahweh was equated to in Exodus 6:2 even though evidence in the article shows that Yahweh was one of the 70 son's of EL (El Shaddai) to whom usurped the Pantheon by getting equated to El. This also academically supported and cited by the Author of the articles in question. I suggest taking the time to fully read all the articles because when all the evidence is presented, there is sufficient evidence to support the hypothesis being questioned. So far, he's the only person I've ever seen really get into the details of the matter. SniprKlr
You aren't interested in it and yet you find the need to comment here? You are then just wasting space here, and I am inclined to delete it all to keep this subject focused. And so you know, claiming he uses ramblings and therefore he is wrong is pretty close to an ad hominem. It's a fallacy argument to which you used regardless. SniprKlr
Does it matter? It's either a typo, or spelled that way. Curious to what your point is and how that is relevant to what is quoted.SniprKlr
The sources are cited in the articles.. Sources are as follows to which denote El Shaddai as a Mountain GOD, or cite the quoted text you are asking about:
mountains").17 Presumably he gained this designation because he was thought to dwell in mountains in general
The only source I noticed to which was questionable was #2 to which seems to cite a discussion on the Tablet. The rest comes from published journals and works.. Now mind you, I didn't make this list as I copied it from the articles I presented. What you have to consider here is that the articles on that blog are essentially for the most part a review of the sources it cites. I am also indifferent to this as well.. Now I will agree that there are quieter mountains too, but in ancient cultures it is the mountains in which are seen responsible for such phenomenon like weather, lightning, and floods ect. This is cited in various other sources he has noted. But one thing you need to realize is that the descriptions go beyond that to include earthquakes and streaming rivers of fire.. When you places those together, the only natural phenomenon you have to which can match that description is a volcano. Hence your argument of quieter mountains is not really relevant, and even volcanoes have their quiet time. If you read the second article, it even goes into comparative religion in which shows the descriptions and language used in the bible is consistent with the hypothesis. And there has already been high quality references that make the argument that MT Sinai is a volcano. The one's that don't out right ignore the descriptions given, or chop them up into pieces to suggest other phenomenon. It's dishonest to ignore the descriptions given, and the direct associations given. Even ignoring the fact that the burning bush is on the side of Mt Sinai seems to be a common issue in debate. I think there is little doubt that El Shaddai was a mountain god, but the question remains if Yahweh was originally so, or came to be through usurping El Shaddai and his epithets.
Furthermore you can read this journal on "“Traces Of The Moon God SIN Among The Early Israelites“: http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3264069?uid=3739952&uid=2134&uid=379000883&uid=2&uid=379000873&uid=70&uid=3&uid=3739256&uid=60&purchase-type=article&accessType=none&sid=21102529333967&showMyJstorPss=false&seq=1&showAccess=false SniprKlr "YHWH was a volcano god" is a running joke on /r/badhistory[edit]Just saying.--AndYourFoesShallRejoice... (talk) 14:39, 11 May 2014 (UTC) I went to this only to find non-academic discussion. As in the main form of discourse in that link consisted of personal attacks and ad hominems. What I found there was that nobody was actually addressing the arguments, or even the evidence presented. However it seems to be largely a discussion about that same "Oh My Volcano" blog. The running joke to which avoids actually addressing anything in formal discourse is meaningless. Ad hominems are meaningless. I would not recommend using reddit as some sort of academic authority argument / fora, especially when you cite a forum discussion that does everything but discuss the subject academically. There simply is far to much usage of formal and informal logical fallacies used for there to have had been any meaningful discourse. SniprKlr10:22 PM Sunday, May 11, 2014 (EDT) New academic paper published on the subject of Yaweh being a volcano god[edit]Jacob Dunn new paper published in the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 'A God of Volcanoes: Did Yahwism Take Root in Volcanic Ashes?' JSOT 38 no. 4 (2014): pp. 387-424 "Since time immemorial, countless scholars have sought to discover the location of Mount Sinai and the origin of the deity Yahweh. One theory, the Midianite-Kenite hypothesis, places the early Yahwistic tradition and the sacred mountain associated with it in Midian on the eastern shores of Aqabah, far south of Canaan proper. This study combines the southern geographical placement of Yahweh's sacred mountain in Midian with biblical descriptions of the theophany at Sinai/Horeb—descriptions which have prompted scholars to interpret the events at the ‘mountain of God’ as volcanic in nature. Because the thesis of Yahweh as a volcanic-god has virtually disappeared from the current scientific literature, it is worth being presented once again. First revisiting the history of the ‘Volcano hypothesis’ and prior scholarship, this study next advances an interdisciplinary approach and a new reformulation of the Midianite-Kenite hypothesis, combining geography, geology, and volcanology with the textual element that deals with ancient Midian and the Sinai/Horeb theophany tradition. Finally, this study seeks to offer an in-depth analysis of the texts, both poetic and narrative, which seem to indicate Sinai/Horeb was a volcanic mountain and pilgrimage site in northwest Saudi Arabia." (Oh My Volcano (talk) 01:35, 17 August 2014 (UTC))
Isn't it correct that reversals of edits should be followed up with an explanation? Why is it that my edit last night that included the new academic paper was removed without my knowledge? That is blatant prejudice. I have put it back where it belongs so everyone can see it and make their own minds up about it. Views should not be cleansed from the page based on personal opinion. Right now IS is going around killing every man and raping every woman. Isn't it time we got to the bottom of this thing and put an end to this misery? I'm know what Jesus would say. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 13:38, 17 August 2014 (UTC))
On what grounds? It has been made a permanent section of the Yahweh page on Wiki so what grounds do you dismiss it here? Saying you don't like it or agree with it is not grounds for dismissal. An academic has taken the time to expand our understanding and we should give him the same exposure as anyone else. If you do not replace my edit then you will be censoring with prejudice. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh (Oh My Volcano (talk) 16:15, 19 August 2014 (UTC)) I just looked up what the point of Rationalwiki is and found your number 1 aim is '1.Analyzing and refuting pseudoscience and the anti-science movement.' Well, you're doing a fine job of standing in the way of science you great clots...Geomythology...the study of scientific explanations for mythological stories and creatures...making RATIONAL sense of it all like sensible people. Volcanoes were worshipped all over the world yet you think it's a crank idea not worth even being given public airing that the Hebrews could possibly have been worshipping a volcano and not a speaking mountain. And you think you're rational. We need a new Rationalwiki. It'll have to be called 'The Really Rationalwiki'. (Oh My Volcano (talk) 16:38, 19 August 2014 (UTC))
YHWH the volcano god[edit]Jacob Dunn's new academic paper published in the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 'A God of Volcanoes: Did Yahwism Take Root in Volcanic Ashes?' JSOT 38 no. 4 (2014): pp. 387-424 "Since time immemorial, countless scholars have sought to discover the location of Mount Sinai and the origin of the deity Yahweh. One theory, the Midianite-Kenite hypothesis, places the early Yahwistic tradition and the sacred mountain associated with it in Midian on the eastern shores of Aqabah, far south of Canaan proper. This study combines the southern geographical placement of Yahweh's sacred mountain in Midian with biblical descriptions of the theophany at Sinai/Horeb—descriptions which have prompted scholars to interpret the events at the ‘mountain of God’ as volcanic in nature. Because the thesis of Yahweh as a volcanic-god has virtually disappeared from the current scientific literature, it is worth being presented once again. First revisiting the history of the ‘Volcano hypothesis’ and prior scholarship, this study next advances an interdisciplinary approach and a new reformulation of the Midianite-Kenite hypothesis, combining geography, geology, and volcanology with the textual element that deals with ancient Midian and the Sinai/Horeb theophany tradition. Finally, this study seeks to offer an in-depth analysis of the texts, both poetic and narrative, which seem to indicate Sinai/Horeb was a volcanic mountain and pilgrimage site in northwest Saudi Arabia." [[1]] (Oh My Volcano (talk) 13:24, 17 August 2014 (UTC))
But to sum things up, Yes El Shaddai and EL were mountain GODS.. Yes the Hyksos Asiatic deity was Ba'al Harran (Moon god Sin), and yes El Shaddai and Sin were likely, according to academia the same god. The link is further noted that MT Sinai means "Moon Mountain" while El shaddai means God of the Mountains and is known as he who dwells on his shining mountain.. This as the academic citations noted to which I had earlier provided. There are some apologetics out there that claim Mt Sinai stems from another Hebrew term, but it is very unlikely as it does not make any sense in the narrative. But one thing she cannot do is make a positive claim since yawheh is most likely a product of monotheistic strict Yahwists attempting to usurp various pagan pantheons, oral traditions, and deities into one religion. It is possible however that after the Theran Eruption the evicted Hysksos rulers returned to their native lands in lower Canaan and Syria, joining the semi-nomadic tribes in what they saw as the promise land. This noted also from an academic citation I already presented above. Basically it's possible that Yahweh's origins may stem from the Shasu of YHW in lower Canaan. There are some clues to suspect this, but nothing yet definitive. Hence no positive claim can officially be made, or accepted at this time as further evidence is necessary. So Exodus may be mostly fictional, but it might be a fictional tale based on a real event with quite a bit of exaggeration and propaganda. So is Yahweh a Volcano GOD? No, he's a mixed breed through the process of usurping.. But I would agree that this and moon god worship had become much a part of his identity more so than any others giving moon and mountain god worship were the most widely prevalent, and with the most influence during the eras in question. For a better word, Yahweh should be considered a mutt God in my opinion. SniprKlr
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