The Gospel of Thomas

ThatOwlWoman said:
Agree. The flood stories being so ubiquitous across continents and cultures tells us that *something* happened at some time, but may be lost in the mists of times with only the stories remaining.
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Floods happen with climate change as we are seeing now. Israel and other nations in the Middle East are located in the "Fertile Crescent"...which was a lot more fertile thousands of years ago. Tie catastrophic floods with the point about lack of regional, much less global communications, and there are new flood stories for Campfire Tale Nights.

https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology...troyed-the-bible-s-ancient-kingdoms-1.5279322
Between 1250 and 1100 B.C.E., all the great civilizations of the eastern Mediterranean – pharaonic Egypt, Mycenaean Greece and Crete, Ugarit in Syria and the large Canaanite city-states – were destroyed, ushering in new peoples and kingdoms including the first Kingdom of Israel.

Now scientists are suggesting a climatic explanation for this great upheaval: A long dry period caused droughts, hunger and mass migration. Such is the conclusion of a three-year study published this week in Tel Aviv: Journal of the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University.

The researchers drilled deep under the Kinneret, retrieving 18-meter strips of sediment from the bottom of the lake. From the sediment they extracted fossil pollen grains. "Pollen is the most enduring organic material in nature," says palynologist Dafna Langgut, who did the sampling work.
 
Matt Dillon said:
Yes, and with 200 million years of everything multiplying exponentially, the Earth would be miles deep in bones and there would be millions more fossils.
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You are not accounting for chemical degradation, erosion, predation, and the sheer rarity of the geochemical conditions necessary for even the possibility of the preservation of bones as fossils.

Thousands of people far smarter than you or me have spent their lives thinking about how fossilization works, and they have it pretty dialed in.
 
Mr Apollyon said:
I think you're time line is off,at least for Ohio,where the ice left about 12000 years ago.
NW Ohio is flat as a pancake from the two miles of ice that were here.
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Look at the latitude of Ohio and compare it to the Mediterranean. The Med was high and dry 12,000 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Glacial_Period
800px-Weichsel-W%C3%BCrm-Glaciation.png


https://www.cdm.org/mammothdiscovery/wheniceages.html
icemaps.gif
 
Cypress said:
I think you're right.

I have always assumed Islam and Christianity offer a type of spiritual equality and salvation that can be highly appealing, especially to disadvantaged people.

The second century Greek philosopher Celsus denigrated Christianity as a religion of slaves, women, and the poor.
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It has been called that off and on ever since. As you mentioned earlier, Jesus's ministry was to the marginalized, downtrodden types of His day. That has great appeal to similar people in any era.
 
Dutch Uncle said:
A good theory but the time span is a bit long even given a 5,000 year transition. The last ice age ended 25,000 years ago.

https://www.cdm.org/mammothdiscovery/wheniceages.html
There were at least 17 cycles between glacial and interglacial periods. The glacial periods lasted longer than the interglacial periods. The last glacial period began about 100,000 years ago and lasted until 25,000 years ago. Today we are in a warm interglacial period.


Another interesting theory, but even longer ago, is when the dam burst at the Rocks of Gibraltar and let the Atlantic into the Mediterranean basin. Kinda like flooding Death Valley with the Pacific if it was closer.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012825219302521
About six million years ago, the Mediterranean Sea underwent a period of isolation from the ocean and widespread salt deposition known as the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC), allegedly leading to a kilometer-scale level drawdown by evaporation. One of the competing scenarios proposed for the termination of this environmental crisis 5.3 million years ago consists of a megaflooding event refilling the Mediterranean Sea through the Strait of Gibraltar: the Zanclean flood.


Although I don't know how they'd know at the time, it's possible ancient humans found signs of flood...or just fossilized seashells and "theorized" a great flood much like some found dinosaur bones and "theorized" about dragons.
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Someone -- Celticguy, I think -- posted a similar article from the Smithsonian magazine, regarding the flooding of the Black Sea by the Mediterranean, only it was during the age of human settlement in the area. Let me see if I can find it.

Here it is:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/evidence-for-a-flood-102813115/
 
Mr Apollyon said:
No they don't. My point exactly about staying on the outside looking in.
I had zero interest in Religion till dragged in kicking and scream to get someone else, when I had my Epiphany!
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Your wording is confusing.

You asked a poster why he was interested in religious history...after noting that he had no religious "beliefs."

You seemed to be saying you saw something incongruous about that. There is no incongruity. Anyway, you apparently are not going to address the issue in a clear way.

Fine, we'll leave it be.

But...you suggest you had an "epiphany."

What exactly was that? What is it that became clear to you...or revealed to you?

That might be interesting.
 
Matt Dillon said:
Fossilized clam beds on mountaintops in America isn't something to question for you?

Let's talk about supposedly extinct Trilobytes, I know right where to find some, they're a type of horseshoe crab.

They're pretty ugly, look like a roly-poly with a shell.

Will I post on the internet where they are? Hell no! Some atheist whackjob might go and kill them all.
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My brother the geologist said that shifting of the tectonic plates created those. The mountains in some places use to be sea beds!
 
Phantasmal said:
So, how did the fresh water creatures survive if the salt water rose to cover the Earth? God make them immune to it? Was all the vegetation killed as well from the salt water?
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I don't think the water covered all the land,I do think it wiped out secular society!
The key phrase is rained 40 days and 40 night,and the subterranean waters came forth.
I think the subterranean eaters came from places like the dead sea.
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
That reminds me of something I've pondered off and on. Do certain religious beliefs -- and religions -- have more appeal to the poor and downtrodden? Both Islam and Christianity, for instance, promise "wealth" in the next life. Both seem to have great appeal to those who suffer much in this world.
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Christianity started amongst the soldiers, slaves and lower classes, so it seems to be the case.
 
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