re: The bible doesn't forbid homosexuality - the left

Jesus explained that it was wrong.

Jesus said in Matthew 19:5-6

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'For this reason a man will leave his father and his mother and will live with his wife. The two will become one.' So they are no longer two but one.

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Checkmate

Your move queers

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Abraham was from a sumerian city. I believe UR. so would think baylonian influence predates babylonian exile.

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Ur of the Chaldees.

It is certainly possible that Abraham came from a city called Ur in the Fertile Crescent. As I recall, there was even a period when the EARLY Sumerian Empire extended into the Levant. He might even have migrated during that time period.

There was also (briefly) a small country called Chaldea, but it never extended into the modern Levant. If Abraham came from there, he would have been truly leaving his country. Of course, that is not outside the realm of possibilities.

There were several cities called Ur in the Fertile Crescent in various places over a period of several thousand years. Here, we have been talking about the neo-Babylonian Empire (even when using shorthand).

To make the chronology work, Abraham would have had to relocated during an earlier period, perhaps during the OLD Babylonia Empire, which followed the Sumerians but pre-dated the neo-Babylonians by about a thousand years. There were SEVERAL intervening empires in the same territory, between the time of the Old Babylonian Empire and the Neo-Babylonian Empire.

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yeah. was suggesting pagan influence from sumeria could far predate the babylonian exile.

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Gotcha.

I sometimes get confused because there are just so DAMNED MANY different kingdoms and empires that ruled all or part of the Fertile Crescent over a period of thousands of years.

I try to use "Fertile Crescent" for the region and the specific name of a given polity when relevant. Probably pedantic.

And it is basically impossible NOW to determine exactly WHEN he may have migrated and what polity would have controlled the northern parts of the Fertile Crescent at the time.

In Mark chapter 10 Jesus said "But from the beginning of creation, God CREATED THEM MALE AND FEMALE. 7. FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER, 8. AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH; so they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9. Therefore, what God has joined together, no person is to separate.”

This ruled out a man and a man, a woman and a woman, a man and multiple women, a man and an animal, etc.

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The idea that the Babylonians took the entire population of Judea to Babylon is ... questionable

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Definitely NOT the entire population.

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So, the Persians kick the Babylonians' butts and send the Judean elite home to run the province of Judea for their Persian overlords. It does not seem to have taken long (a couple of centuries maybe) for Aramaic to have taken the place of the primary language not just in Judea, but also in the areas of the former Northern Kingdom

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I have my doubts that there even was an actual Norhtern Kingdom and Southern Kingdom, at least in the sense we think of it.

From Philip R. Davies: In Search of 'Ancient Israel', 1992

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There is no evidence of any united kingdom of Israel and Judah. The archaeological evidence tells us that the northern and southern highlands were settled and developed independently. There was no link between them. It is implausible to suggest Israel (which did evolve into a small kingdom) broke away from Judah (which was nothing more than very sparse and insignificant settlements.)

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I have my doubts that there even was an actual Norhtern Kingdom and Southern Kingdom, at least in the sense we think of it.

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There is no evidence of any united kingdom of Israel and Judah

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I too have my doubts about the historical existence of a United Kingdom, and I think that a Southern Kingdom (Judea) and a Northern Kingdom (Israel) developed separately but largely contemporaneously.

The latter appears to me to have been based in Samaria and to have been destroyed by the Assyrians when they conquered the area. I do have my doubts about the Assyrians affirmatively scattering the entire populations of the Ten Tribes who supposedly lived in the Northern Kingdom. It seems more likely that they either fled south to Judea (some of them) or just blended into the new Assyrian polity. The Abrahamic religion does not appear to have been fully-formed at this time, so it would have been VERY easy for them to slide back into the Canaanite religion and disappear like a drop of ink in a lake.

But I see the HUGE similarities between the Samaritan (Samaria??) religion and Judaism (Judea), including a VERY similar Torah, as being evidence of vestiges of the destroyed Northern Kingdom.

Hell, the Samaritans and the Jews have been arguing for at least 2500 years about which is the "authentic" Abrahamic religion.

On the United Kingdom matter, I do have one theory on which I waffle.

Sometimes I consider the possibility that the Northern and Southern Kingdoms existed and that there may have been some sort of dynastic marriage to unite them under the leadership of an historical Saul, albeit only for a couple of generations. Kind of like the Austro-Hungarian empire, with one guy having two separate thrones and two separate crowns.

Then you get rival sons, and the two kingdoms split up again. A bit like the Carolingian split at the death of Charles Martel.

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Was the original marriage valid?

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Why wouldn’t it be? Bible is pretty clear on divorce.

Please look back. I edited to clarify at the same time you were typing.

I can see two kingdoms developing completely separately and then attempting a dynastic consolidation, which failed.

I think that is a good bit different than the Biblical narrative.

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You have more confidence in the narrative than I do

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I do tend to think that there ARE kernels of historical fact in much of the Biblical narrative, though I MAY try too hard to tie most of them to something ACTUALLY historical.