Part 2 of the current proposed outline for the course:
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Part 2: Defining Biblical
The ANE use of language to indicate, not discrete objects and ideas, but moral importance — parabolic and symbolic, indicative.
1. Ancient Near East
We see a clear sense of fatalism as a tendency and the intensely personal nature of things. Despite the language of mythology sounding like a unitary universe, the actual belief is likely different due to how laguage use is different.
2. Abraham and Mesopotamia
Abraham carried the germ of this broad civilization into a nomadic lifestyle, which modified the moral expectations.
3. Covenant Nation
The sojourn in Egypt reawakened an awareness of The Otherness of God and the higher realm. It was Solomon’s court, though not necessarily Solomon himself, that brought back the germ of materialism.
4. Hellenization
Devastating perversion built on centuries of slowly losing the grip on genuine mysticism.
5. Judaizers
Perverted the early church away from pure Hebraic outlook.
