Take One Tablet, And Bingo! The Bible Is Fact!

Cross-posted at God is for Suckers!

I came across this bit of tomfoolery, and I gotta say:

Are you kidding me?

"The sound of unbridled joy seldom breaks the quiet of the British Museum's great Arched Room, which holds its collection of 130,000 Assyrian cuneiform tablets, dating back 5,000 years.

"This fragment is a receipt for payment made by a figure in the Old Testament."

Oh yippee.

"But Michael Jursa, a visiting professor from Vienna, let out such a cry last Thursday. He had made what has been called the most important find in Biblical archaeology for 100 years, a discovery that supports the view that the historical books of the Old Testament are based on fact."

Oh, one tiny piece of evidence is suddenly pivotal? Is the case for the 'historical' bible that flimsy?

Apparently so.

"Searching for Babylonian financial accounts among the tablets, Prof Jursa suddenly came across a name he half remembered - Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, described there in a hand 2,500 years old, as "the chief eunuch" of Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon."

"Prof Jursa, an Assyriologist, checked the Old Testament and there in chapter 39 of the Book of Jeremiah, he found, spelled differently, the same name - Nebo-Sarsekim."

My question is: how common was this name?

"Nebo-Sarsekim, according to Jeremiah, was Nebuchadnezzar II's "chief officer" and was with him at the siege of Jerusalem in 587 BC, when the Babylonians overran the city."

Oh, how nice for y'all. No evidence of any of the big names in the bible, but one minute find can make all the difference!

That is, if you're reaching.

"The small tablet, the size of "a packet of 10 cigarettes" according to Irving Finkel, a British Museum expert, is a bill of receipt acknowledging Nabu-sharrussu-ukin's payment of 0.75 kg of gold to a temple in Babylon.

"The tablet is dated to the 10th year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II, 595BC, 12 years before the siege of Jerusalem.

"Evidence from non-Biblical sources of people named in the Bible is not unknown, but Nabu-sharrussu-ukin would have been a relatively insignificant figure."

And insignificant it remains...to the world at large. In fact, it's just foolish to think that one small find contradicts the vast amount of historical data which proves that old grimoire false.

"This is a fantastic discovery, a world-class find," Dr Finkel said yesterday. "If Nebo-Sarsekim existed, which other lesser figures in the Old Testament existed? A throwaway detail in the Old Testament turns out to be accurate and true. I think that it means that the whole of the narrative [of Jeremiah] takes on a new kind of power."

'New kind of power'? Have these yobbos even read the narrative? It's chock full of historical errors. The entire Old Testament is filled to bursting with inaccuracies, as I've shown here. Jeremiah made all kinds of fuck-ups, from how long the Israelites would be restored from the Babylonian captivity, to the relatively 'minor' error that the temple would never be destroyed again.

"The full translation of the tablet reads: (Regarding) 1.5 minas (0.75 kg) of gold, the property of Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, the chief eunuch, which he sent via Arad-Banitu the eunuch to [the temple] Esangila: Arad-Banitu has delivered [it] to Esangila. In the presence of Bel-usat, son of Alpaya, the royal bodyguard, [and of] Nadin, son of Marduk-zer-ibni. Month XI, day 18, year 10 [of] Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.

Next thing you know, they'll be producing Moses' left testicle.

It's an allegorical leap of faith, to think that some miniscule detail of minor import is going to lend credence to a defunct tome. And that chasm they're leaping across? It's a loonngg way down.

Metaphorically speaking, of course.

This is the Apostate, signing off.