@LeeWoofenden Because it is entirely possible that the evidence we have suggests a false reality. All we really have to go on with the dating here is the manuscripts and their datings. It's entirely possible that libraries containing older OT manuscripts were destroyed in any one of the dozen or so times Jerusalem was sacked.

The evidence we have does not suggest it, but that evidence is hardly conclusive. It is realistically possible that an entire body of evidence has not survived the sands of time, skewing our perception of what actually happened.

Yes, their motivations are religious, but so what? That's what they're vested in, and to the rest of us, it's not really that important.

@fredsbend You still have to draw conclusions based on the evidence you have, not on the evidence you don't have.

@fredsbend That site makes a big deal about flood myths having "common elements" including "the warning of the coming flood, the construction of a boat in advance, the storage of animals, the inclusion of family, and the release of birds to determine if the water level had subsided." But really, if you think about it, any flood myth has to have most of those elements. Maybe not the birds, but if there's a huge flood that wipes out the human race,

someone has to make preparations ahead of time, or we're no longer here. And if that person doesn't take any animals or seeds, there's no animals and plants.

But if you look at the Cherokee flood myth, for example, there's nothing beyond the most basic necessary elements to even suggest a relationship to the Noah story.

Or take the Australian aborigine flood myth about the frog who drank all the earth's water, and then flooded the earth when he laughed; it's completely foreign to the Noah story.

The only ones that resemble the Bible story are those from the Middle East. Which makes sense, because those are the cultures the Hebrews interacted with.

Do they really think they are going to convince anyone who isn't already committed to believing the Noah story is factual?

And where's this release of birds they're talking about? I don't see anything about birds in the Cherokee story, and in the Aborigine one the only significant bird is the pelican who goes around in a canoe rescuing Aborigines.

@fredsbend They're really just fighting a rearguard battle against science. If the Bible, not science, tells us the truth about history and the physical universe, why even bother trying to make the Bible's statements look scientific? If they truly had faith in the Bible, they'd just ignore science altogether, not try to make the Bible look scientific.

The reality is that science is a serious challenge to their particular type of (literalistic and rather materialistic) faith. So they have to fight against it. They're making an effort to do it on science's own ground, and they're losing badly.

The advent of modern science is pushing Christians to become more spiritual and less materialistic in their beliefs. The YECs and other fundamentalists are doing their damnedest not to become more spiritual in their beliefs, but to hang onto their literalism and materialism with their dying breath. And I do think they're dying as a church, despite their apparent resurgence.

@LeeWoofenden That's probably a wiser approach.

David Stratton thinks it's acceptable, however, reasoning:

@BruceAlderman I had an answer that briefly hints on why there's so many flood myths. It's because floods are the most common natural disaster.

After learning this, then taking a close look at purportedly similar flood myths, as you have done, I decided that the reasoning may hold up if the similarities were actually there, but they just aren't.

@LeeWoofenden Only time will tell. History has taught me that the last nail is never really driven in. Old ideas re-surge even centuries later, even if they've been thoroughly squashed before.

@David I know this is old, but if that moment comes, doesn't that make you wonder why God gave you shoddy material to hang your faith on?

I mean, I picture you with great faith, finally coming before the Lord, then in that moment, doubting more than you ever had before. What a horrible irony!

@fredsbend I realize that a lot of Christians think that way. But I still think it's based on a materialistic idea of the Bible, Christianity, and God. Jesus practically begs us to read the Scriptures spiritually rather than literalistically and materially ("according to the flesh," etc.), but we keep on reading it materially rather than spiritually anyway.

@fredsbend To me, the solution to this whole "problem" is to recognize that like the other ancient flood myths, the story of the Flood in Genesis uses a dramatic natural occurrence experienced by many people, in many cultures, to express spiritual themes about the unfolding state of humanity in relation to God.

Here is my telling of some of the spiritual themes involved, written for a general audience: Noah’s Ark: A Sea Change in the Human Mind.

@fredsbend Perhaps your pessimism about the progress of humankind is more realistic than my optimism that things actually are getting better, and we actually are outgrowing some of our more boneheaded perspectives on life. In this case, I do think that the growth of scientific knowledge is increasingly marginalizing Biblical literalism, and will eventually drive it to the fringes of society. But perhaps it will take longer than I think and hope it will.

It seems clear to me, at least, that the explosion of scientific knowledge in the last few centuries is unprecedented in human history. And I do think that it will make lasting changes in humanity's perspective on reality, both physical and spiritual.

In fact, I happen to think that the explosion of scientific knowledge is a result of spiritual forces and events associated with the promised Second Coming of Christ, which I understand not as a physical coming, but as a spiritual coming. The human mind has now been freed from the shackles of a long-corrupted "Christian" church, and the result is the explosion of new knowledge pouring out since the Enlightenment.

That new knowledge, is, in turn, pounding more and more nails into the coffin of that old and corrupted form of Christianity. I believe that the damage to the old Christianity is irreversible, and will increasingly destroy the church that attempted to suppress knowledge and understanding for so many centuries.

@LeeWoofenden I think it's going to take a long time, at least in the USA. Polls over the last 30 years show a remarkable consistency in the percentage of Americans believing in YEC, never dipping below 40% or rising above 47%. Many of those who hold such a view are so deeply committed to it that they can't imagine keeping their faith without it.

And the fear that they may lose their faith keeps them from exploring other ways of reading the Bible, or other ways of understanding the interplay between faith and science.

@BruceAlderman Yes, though it's supposed to be faith-based, it is actually fear-based. And faith is supposed to banish fear, not foment fear.

@LeeWoofenden The terrible irony is that, when the time comes that they can no longer hold all the pieces together, they are likely to reject God altogether rather than ever explore a different way of relating to God.

My own faith has increasingly involved becoming not at all fearful of what we will discover, or where humanity will go. If God really is God, and the creator of the universe we see, how can learning more about the universe God has created cause us to lose faith in God? It should have the opposite effect.

@BruceAlderman Yes. Two and a half centuries ago Swedenborg predicted that the doctrines held in Protestantism (which was his religious background) would lead to atheism. And today we find that many atheists are former fundamentalist Christians, and that Christianity itself is one of the biggest promoters of atheism through its backward, illogical, and frankly, quite horrible doctrines.

I have come to believe that atheism itself is not only a result of the corrupted Christianity I mentioned just above, but also an antidote to it. Though atheists themselves would, I'm sure, object, I've come to think of atheism as a tool in the hand of God to hasten the destruction of a doctrinally and spiritually bankrupt "Christianity" that has long since abandoned the teachings of Christ.

I hope you're right.