From: mls@cbnewsm.cb.att.com (mike.siemon)
Subject: Re: More (verbal) Flooding of "the" flood
Organization: AT&T
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 00:40:06 GMT
Summary: archaeology against The Flood(tm)

In article <1992Nov19.172101.23598@news.nd.edu>, scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu
(scharle) writes:

> I had (I have to resist the temptation to post stuff without checking
> first).  I'm glad that my misinformation got corrected.

I don't think you posted any misinformation, rather a good off-the-cuff
understanding.  I replied mostly to amplify (and to make the point that
we *don't* have any early-enough Meso-American history to be relevant.)

Let me go a step further.  In some ways, the pyramids are less good data
against the flood than other (contemporary and earlier) Egyptian evidence.
We don't really need the Turin papyrus records [and there are gaps in that
because of ill-treatment in the last century, when European archaeology
was little more than grave robbing and trophy-gathering.]  Before the
pyramid thing took off in the 3rd dynasty, Egyptian kings, like their 
nobles, were buried in "mastabas" -- mud-brick constructions vaguely like
a southwestern mesa in profile.  These go back through the 1st and 2nd
dynasties (and hence to 3000 B.C.E. or before) with *all* the kings of
the kinglist accounted for.  Moreover, the Germans at Abydos have just
recently unearthed tombs of kings over upper and lower Egypt from BEFORE
the "1st" dynasty and the legendary "unifier" Menes.  That takes us back
well into the 3rd millenium -- and mud brick was used on the margin past
the Nile's flood-plain and cultivation.  These things would be very ill-
served by any abnormal flood.  The mastaba evidence then gets us to a
time *earlier* than the flood-story from Sumeria.

And we can keep on going back -- before the mastabas, the Egyptians (at
least those in upper Egypt) just placed the bodies directly into the sand
-- and the result was the dessication that then became their later goal
by artificial means of mummification when they no longer did this.  The
mummies of Egypt testify to the absence of a catastrophic Flood.

Some Flood apologists attempt to evade the historical data by impugning
the clear word of scripture (and the calculations of such men as the Right
Reverend Bishop Ussher :-)) by waving vaguely into the pre-historic era as
the time of The Flood.  But archaeology everywhere on earth says a strong
NEGATIVE to this.  The mud-brick constructions of Egypt are merely among
the very best of counter-examples.  (The pyramids were largely "quarried"
of their outer facing during medieval times, so they provide less data
here, even assuming that the sand-storms of millenia would not have wiped
out any testimony from them to direct laboratory investigation for a layer
of mud :-))

One can "force" the flood story of Genesis to "match" archaeology only by
such cavalier treatment of it as to leave me, a devout Christian, gasping
at contemptuous manipulation of the text.  Talk about twisting scripture!
-- 
Michael L. Siemon		   "Oh, stand, stand at the window,
					As the tears scald and start;
mls@usl.com			   You shall love your crooked neighbor
standard disclaimer			With your crooked heart."
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