Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

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_Kishkumen
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Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Kishkumen »

As many of you are aware by now, Dr. John Gee, Egyptologist and apologist for the Book of Abraham, has decided to take on Dr. David Bokovoy's posts on the Hebrew Bible. Gee believes in the historical accuracy of the scriptural record, a position that is not well supported by the evidence but supported by Gee's faith. Gee continues not to address the generic issues involved with the writing of history, which he dismisses as the misguided views of people who are only trained in literature.

One wonders who it is that Gee might be talking about. One is liable to infer that he is referring to the person he is attempting to rebut, Dr. Bokovoy.

Dr. John Gee wrote:One problem with those who do not take the historical authenticity of the Hebrew Bible seriously is that they cannot seem to do much with the historical information actually contained in the Bible. Many of them have been trained solely in literary approaches to the Bible and the ancient Near East. (For example, when I took Ugaritic we only read literary texts from Ugarit; we did not read any of the historical ones; I discovered the historical texts later on my own.) Literary approaches have some merit, but they are only one approach and not always the best one. Lacking training with historical documents, some biblical scholars can only deal with ancient texts as literature and sometimes lack any feel for using documents to answer historical questions. Many biblical studies programs simply do not teach their students about history or archaeology. I feel sorry for those who come out of such programs.


See http://fornspollfira.blogspot.com/2015/01/notes-on-israelite-scribal-training-i.html.

If he intends to describe Dr. Bokovoy here, then he is laboring under a false assumption. Dr. Bokovoy studied in a Hebrew Bible program that is deeply historical in its focus. Gee, not knowing better, seems to imagine he is dealing with a Comp. Lit. student of some kind. Sorry, Dr. Gee. Just because a man teaches a Book of Mormon as Literature course does not pigeonhole him as someone who is "trained solely in literary approaches." Doubtless Dr. Gee is not referring to me, but, on the off chance that someone draws that connection--and because I agree with Dr. Bokovoy--let me point out that my training is also in history.

In other words, it is not history and literature that divides Bokovoy and Gee. It is two different approaches to history and the Hebrew Bible. As an historian, I see greater merit in Bokovoy's approach.

Now that we have covered the attempt to disparage and misrepresent Dr. Bokovoy's training, we can set it aside.

The bulk of Gee's argument is about scribal culture in ancient Israel. Gee stresses the idea that "scribal culture", something which he characterizes as this monolithic variable in the cross-cultural Near Eastern milieu, is mostly consistent throughout, so we can more or less rely on references to royal scribes in 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles and the like as evidence of a deep commitment in the Hebrew court to an accurate representation of the past. In other words, if we have scribes mentioned, then citations to annals and the like must be reliable. And the books they are citing must have accurate historical information in them.

The layers of problems in this argument are many. First of all, the books being cited for the mention of scribes are likely dated to the 7th or 6th century BCE. Yet, because these books mention scribes in earlier periods, we, in Gee's view, are to trust that those references are accurate, and that the later representation of scribes and scribal culture in Israel of a markedly earlier period is reliable. As someone who is not a scholar of the Hebrew Bible, but who has wrestled with the problem of sources of other ancient civilizations, I am deeply suspicious of the assumption that records written centuries after the events described are consistently reliable.

Gee does not even raise the issue of Josiah's reforms and their impact on the content of the Hebrew Bible.

The truth is that one cannot simply point to "scribal culture" as a known variable that can be slotted in to explain things. It is most likely more problematic than that. History does not stand still. Structures change. Social and professional roles are malleable. One needs to know more than just the word "scribe" in order to determine what it was the scribe was doing. Was the text of Homer a reliable guide to Late Bronze Age warfare? The text mentions chariots, but did the poet have an accurate understanding of the use of chariots in the Late Bronze Age?

We can't take for granted that he did.

In order to be completely confident about the content of alleged annals of earlier periods, one needs to have access to those annals. Nothing prevents an author from fabricating, misquoting, or misinterpreting the material he quotes. If I want to understand Roman religion, I simply cannot rely uncritically on St. Augustine's quotes of Varro, for instance. As has been shown clearly by Professor Clifford Ando, St. Augustine distorts his source, and it has impacted our reading of Varro ever since.

Clifford Ando is an ancient historian, not a wide-eyed Comp. Lit. graduate student. In other words, as an historian, he understands how crucial it is to read our sources critically, particularly when they are quoting and characterizing the works of earlier authors.

So, from my position as a non-specialist in ancient Israel, who is nevertheless fairly well versed in the study of ancient history, I am not buying Gee's argument. I think it is a shame that he continues to misrepresent Dr. Bokovoy as he forwards an untenable argument. The deficient argument is bad enough on its own.
"Petition wasn’t meant to start a witch hunt as I’ve said 6000 times." ~ Hanna Seariac, LDS apologist
_Everybody Wang Chung
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Everybody Wang Chung »

Excellent post, Reverend.

John Gee's entire career has consisted entirely of one giant boner after another. I'm sure he would give just about anything to jump in a time machine and start all over.

I feel a great deal of pity for him. His "career" was doomed from the start.
"I'm on paid sabbatical from BYU in exchange for my promise to use this time to finish two books."

Daniel C. Peterson, 2014
_Symmachus
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Symmachus »

A fine post, sir, and an excellent riposte to the "Gay" Chair.

Gee seems unable to tell the difference between history and name-lists, and he makes his (very 19th century) distinction between ancient "literature" and historical writing (neither of which were ever separate categories until the Enlightenment) with as much arrogance as he does ignorance of his own suppositions. You are absolutely right to bring in Ando, and to be honest in my experience the problem, especially with ancient historians, is usually the other way around: they too uncritically accept their "primary sources" as if they are objective "documents" (Gee's phrase) rather than constructed texts. And to be frank, it's quite astounding to see an Egyptologist hold forth on how to read historical "documents." Most of that field is on the verge of just coming into the 20th century. I can't wait until Gee starts touting Clifford Ando in about 30 years as if he's someone new that we young'ns have yet to discover. I will relish your analysis, Kishkumen, when Gee uses Ando to argue that historicity is a constructed category serving a larger ideological purpose and that we shouldn't be too concerned if the Book of Mormon is not strictly historical.

And speaking of his discovery of Ugaritic historical documents on his own (as opposed to the "literary" stuff he was subjected to by Ugaritic "literary" scholars whose ubiquitous literary studies we all know...not): I'm quite puzzled, since there aren't any. Quotidian, rather un-literary texts (administrative lists, letters, etc.) outnumber the meager corpus of "literary" texts by a large margin, but there are no Ugaritic annals, and certainly no Ugaritic historiography. Gee and I learned Ugarit (well at least one of us did) at the same school, so perhaps he missed a few days or perhaps the entire field forgot things by the time I started, but in any case, Gee should publish his independent discovery of these historical texts soon. Dozens of people around the world will welcome the news.

The Gay Chair in Egyptology wrote:There is an argument making its rounds that (1) the historical authenticity of the scriptures (2) is unnecessary because (3) the biblical authors did not do history because (4) they did not cite sources, because (5) their sources were all made up, because (6) ancient Israelite scribes did not keep historical records like annals. I have been involved in this discussion. Point (1) is important. I see point (2) as misguided. I see point (3) as a silly opinion, and I see points (4) - (6) as factually wrong. I have dealt with points (4) - (6) before and here I am only going to deal with point (6).


He really doesn't grasp the arguments that Bokovoy is making. As usual, old school FARMSians don't deal with the arguments in front of them but rather the sorts of arguments with which they would prefer to deal.

They have a hammer, so everything is a nail to them.
"As to any slivers of light or any particles of darkness of the past, we forget about them."

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_DrW
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _DrW »

Great critique, Reverend.

in my opinion, Bro. Gee lost any real world professional credibility he had some time ago, and things seem to have gone downhill from there.
David Hume: "---Mistakes in philosophy are merely ridiculous, those in religion are dangerous."

DrW: "Mistakes in science are learning opportunities and are eventually corrected."
_Bazooka
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Bazooka »

Dr Gee has unwittingly made a case for ignoring the advocacy of the Church and, instead, research historical matters for oneself using external resources.

"Many biblical studies programs simply do not teach their students about history or archaeology. I feel sorry for those who come out of such programs."

Me too Dr Gee, me too....
That said, with the Book of Mormon, we are not dealing with a civilization with no written record. What we are dealing with is a written record with no civilization. (Runtu, Feb 2015)
_Kishkumen
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Kishkumen »

Symmachus wrote:Gee seems unable to tell the difference between history and name-lists, and he makes his (very 19th century) distinction between ancient "literature" and historical writing (neither of which were ever separate categories until the Enlightenment) with as much arrogance as he does ignorance of his own suppositions. You are absolutely right to bring in Ando, and to be honest in my experience the problem, especially with ancient historians, is usually the other way around: they too uncritically accept their "primary sources" as if they are objective "documents" (Gee's phrase) rather than constructed texts. And to be frank, it's quite astounding to see an Egyptologist hold forth on how to read historical "documents." Most of that field is on the verge of just coming into the 20th century. I can't wait until Gee starts touting Clifford Ando in about 30 years as if he's someone new that we young'ns have yet to discover. I will relish your analysis, Kishkumen, when Gee uses Ando to argue that historicity is a constructed category serving a larger ideological purpose and that we shouldn't be too concerned if the Book of Mormon is not strictly historical.

And speaking of his discovery of Ugaritic historical documents on his own (as opposed to the "literary" stuff he was subjected to by Ugaritic "literary" scholars whose ubiquitous literary studies we all know...not): I'm quite puzzled, since there aren't any. Quotidian, rather un-literary texts (administrative lists, letters, etc.) outnumber the meager corpus of "literary" texts by a large margin, but there are no Ugaritic annals, and certainly no Ugaritic historiography. Gee and I learned Ugarit (well at least one of us did) at the same school, so perhaps he missed a few days or perhaps the entire field forgot things by the time I started, but in any case, Gee should publish his independent discovery of these historical texts soon. Dozens of people around the world will welcome the news.


Oh, Symmachus, you and I are on the very same page here. Unfortunately, I am only really well versed in issues of less-ancient history, so I could not speak to the Ugaritic. I remember sitting in on one of Hoskisson's courses in Ugaritic for the first day, and he basically chased out all of those who had not done Biblical Hebrew already (I had not). He did it in the kindest way, of course.

Your general point, however, about un-literary, un-historiographic texts is very well made, indeed. I was almost on the point of expecting Gee to school his readers on the historiography of Bronze Age seals! Of course, we should have seen this coming, since this is the gentleman who brought our attention to a magic spell with the name of Abraham jumbled into a mix of magical names as evidence supporting the Book of Abraham.

Any person with even the slightest familiarity with the popularity of Hebrew names in ancient Mediterranean magic spells was unimpressed to say the least.

If one can spin the mere appearance of the name Abraham in an ancient document into a theory supporting Mormon scripture, surely one sees nothing wrong with representing citations of lists as full-blown historiography of the most factually reliable kind.
"Petition wasn’t meant to start a witch hunt as I’ve said 6000 times." ~ Hanna Seariac, LDS apologist
_Bazooka
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Bazooka »

Kishkumen wrote:Oh, Symmachus, you and I are on the very same page here. Unfortunately, I am only really well versed in issues of less-ancient history, so I could not speak to the Ugaritic. I remember sitting in on one of Hoskisson's courses in Ugaritic for the first day, and he basically chased out all of those who had not done Biblical Hebrew already (I had not). He did it in the kindest way, of course.

Your general point, however, about un-literary, un-historiographic texts is very well made, indeed. I was almost on the point of expecting Gee to school his readers on the historiography of Bronze Age seals! Of course, we should have seen this coming, since this is the gentleman who brought our attention to a magic spell with the name of Abraham jumbled into a mix of magical names as evidence supporting the Book of Abraham.

Any person with even the slightest familiarity with the popularity of Hebrew names in ancient Mediterranean magic spells was unimpressed to say the least.

If one can spin the mere appearance of the name Abraham in an ancient document into a theory supporting Mormon scripture, surely one sees nothing wrong with representing citations of lists as full-blown historiography of the most factually reliable kind.


You know, Bazooka Kish, I understand that DCP Gee is unpopular, and that he has done a fair number of things many of us find objectionable, but really.

Is it necessary to pile on in this way? I personally find it unseemly.

Dr. Peterson Gee is an accomplished person with a vast store of knowledge. He has written good things.

We can disagree with some of his methods and some of his views, but I don't think it does anyone credit to minimize and misrepresent his work and accomplishments.

:wink:
That said, with the Book of Mormon, we are not dealing with a civilization with no written record. What we are dealing with is a written record with no civilization. (Runtu, Feb 2015)
_Kishkumen
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Kishkumen »

Bazooka wrote:You know, Bazooka Kish, I understand that DCP Gee is unpopular, and that he has done a fair number of things many of us find objectionable, but really.

Is it necessary to pile on in this way? I personally find it unseemly.

Dr. Peterson Gee is an accomplished person with a vast store of knowledge. He has written good things.

We can disagree with some of his methods and some of his views, but I don't think it does anyone credit to minimize and misrepresent his work and accomplishments.

:wink:


Think about the difference between substantive criticism of an argument (or methods) and misrepresentation of the facts.
"Petition wasn’t meant to start a witch hunt as I’ve said 6000 times." ~ Hanna Seariac, LDS apologist
_Bazooka
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Bazooka »

Kishkumen wrote:Think about the difference between substantive criticism of an argument (or methods) and misrepresentation of the facts.


You mean, what your opinion is on the difference between substantive criticism and misrepresentation of the facts, right? :wink:

Still waiting on the other thread for you to show where I have misrepresented what you say I have misrepresented.....
That said, with the Book of Mormon, we are not dealing with a civilization with no written record. What we are dealing with is a written record with no civilization. (Runtu, Feb 2015)
_Kishkumen
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Re: Gee's Latest Volley on Hebrew Bible

Post by _Kishkumen »

Bazooka wrote:You mean, what your opinion is on the difference between substantive criticism and misrepresentation of the facts, right? :wink:


No, I do not.
:rolleyes:
"Petition wasn’t meant to start a witch hunt as I’ve said 6000 times." ~ Hanna Seariac, LDS apologist
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