From Gods to God : how the Bible debunked, suppressed, or changed ancient myths & legends /
Avigdor Shinan and Yair Zakovitch ; translated by Valerie Zakovitch.
- Philadelphia : Jewish Publication Society, (c)2012.
- 1 online resource (xi, 301 pages)
Includes bibliographies and index.
Cover; Title Page; Copyright Page; Contents; Acknowledgments; Translator's Note; Introduction: When God Fought the Sea Dragons; Part 1. The World of Myth; 1. Eden's Winged Serpent; 2. When Gods Seduced Women; 3. Moses or God? Who Split the Sea of Reeds?; 4. What Is Manna?; 5. The Hero Who Stopped the Sun; Part 2. Cult and Sacred Geography; 6. The Wandering Gate of Heaven; 7. Seeing and Weeping: Managing the Story of a Divine Defeat; 8. Where Were Rachel and Jacob Buried?; 9. Where in the Wilderness Did Israel Receive the Torah?; 10. Some More Reasons for Eating Matzah. 11. Was Worshiping the Golden Calf a Sin?12. Where Was the Law Given? In the Wilderness or in the Land of Israel?; 13. When and How Was the City of Dan Sanctifi ed?; Part 3. Biblical Heroes and Th eir Biographies; 14. What Did Ham Do to His Father?; 15. Out of the Fire: Recovering the Story ofAbraham's Origins; 16. Th e Reinterpretation of a Name: Jacob's In Utero Activities; 17. Were the Israelites Never in Egypt? A Peculiar Tradition about Ephraim; 18. Moses's Most Miraculous Birth; 19. Moses's African Romance; 20. Moses's Necessary Death. 21. Son of God? Th e Suspicious Story of Samson's Birth22. A Cinderella Tale: Clues to David's Lost Birth Story; 23. Finding the Real Killer of Goliath; 24. How a Savior Became a Villain: Jeroboam and the Exodus; Part 4. Relations between Men and Women; 25. Sister or Not: Sarah's Adventures with Pharaoh; 26. Th e Story of Rebekah and the Servant on theRoad from Haran; 27. Reuben, Bilhah, and a Silent Jacob; 28. Seduction before Murder: Th e Case of Jael; 29. No Innocent Death: David, Abigail, and Nabal; 30. Not Just Riddles; In Closing; Glossary of Extra-Biblical Sources; Index.
The ancient Israelites believed things that the writers of the Bible wanted them to forget: myths and legends from a pre-biblical world that the new monotheist order needed to bury, hide, or reinterpret. Ancient Israel was rich in such literary traditions before the Bible reached the final form that we have today. These traditions were not lost but continued, passed down through the ages. Many managed to reach us in post-biblical sources: rabbinic literature, Jewish Hellenistic writings, the writings of the Dead Sea sect, the Aramaic, Greek, Latin, and other ancient.