Secret Origins of the Bible

by Tim Callahan

• Clearly written and easily understandable by the lay reader.
• Thoroughly author's points are backed by references in the writings of acknowledged scholars.
• Special features of the lavishly illustrated with multiple images in each illustration that show at a glance the mythic themes paralleling the bible. This book demonstrates that the stories and themes of the Bible were part of the great mythic systems of the ancient world by u sing comparative mythology, tell tale verses in the Bible and archaeology. The abstract God of modern monotheistic Judaism, Christianity and Islam is a comparatively recent creation. In later times the myth of a messianic deliverer was combined with that of the pagan god-man who suffered a horrible, excruciating death but was physically resurrected to produce the Christ myth.

Genres: Religion, History, Nonfiction, Atheism, Theology, Christianity, Historical

468 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Tariq Mahmood · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tim has done a great job in pointing out the many contradictions in the Bible based on context and the different authors over time. The Bible is based on great tales. It is often the case that fundamentalists while maintaining that all of the Bible is true, interpret it in an exclusionary manner favoring their own political views. If Biblical are held to be sacrosanct, if we must accept them as literally true, if we are forbidden from looking beneath the surface of myths, their secret meanings will remain dark and unprobed. When myths are distorted as literal truth they will almost surely be used by agents of repression, burdening society with unreasonable limitations and irrational directives, and in extreme cases inciting assassination and war.

Now all we need a similar analysis done of the Holy Quran.

[Terry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not for the Biblical lightweight. I traversed most of the pages with my Oxford New Revised Standard Edition in my left hand and this in my right. The notions of Biblical events being revisions to mythic narratives are not new and the author does a very good job separating accepted Biblical Scholarship and established Hermeneutics from his conjectures. To properly read this book, I probably should have had a better guide to the apocrypha and deuterocanonical texts as the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Book of Thomas, the Gnostic Gospels and the book of Maccabees are all references of which only the last was in my NRV copy.

While not the main focus of the book, I very much enjoyed his references problems for believers in Biblical Inerrancy (which he simply calls fundamentalists) as well as the apologetics often used. He doesn't venture into counterapologetics which is fine.

His discussion of language and language transformation was easy to follow and the consonant outlines of names helped explain how names of heroes, gods and deities could shift across languages, explaining some assumed parallels that other authors do not challenge.

When talking about the synoptic gospels (Matthew, mark and Luke) he brings a cultural understanding of events that help prove why some events probably didn't happen such as the Passion and how it probably would have worked out in the actual Roman empire which was much quicker to put down rebellion or challenges to authority.

[Marshall · Rating 3 out of 5]

This enormous book examines the entire Bible, from cover to cover, Hebrew Bible and New Testament, from a comparative mythology perspective, incorporating what we know now from other sources, such as archeaology, history, culture, and newly unearthed gospels. It attempts to separate myth from truth in the Bible. The end result: the Bible is mostly myth.

There is so much in the Bible that is just totally illogical. It contains a lot of contradictions and absurdities, but it actually makes a lot of sense if you account for the cultural context in which it was written. Much of it was written as political propaganda, often to justify various wars. It borrowed heavily from other mythologies, particularly Greek and Egyption mythologies.

It was written over many years, and it shows many indications that it started as a tribal mythology in which Yahweh was one of many gods, only later evolving into monotheism. It was in this process that an afterlife, the devil, and hell were grafted on much later to make sense of things which were formerly attributed to other gods. Biblical scholars have also discovered that the Hebrew Bible is more like a documentary, interpolated from four different sources.

Most of this book covers the Hebrew Bible, but the last four chapters discusses the New Testament. There is very little evidence outside the New Testament that Jesus existed or that any events involving him were real. The hypothesis is that he was the leader of one of the many messianic uprisings that drew the fire of the Romans. A lot of his radical teachings make a lot more sense when seen in its apocalyptic context. Jesus very explicitely taught that the end of days were upon them. Paul developed early Christianity with the same apocolyptic assumption.

The Israelites never considered Yahweh to be perfect or omnipotent, these features only added on later by early Christians, which necessitated a lot of logical gymnastics to make sense of such a god in the context of his earlier behaviors, which resembled more the polytheistic mythology it had evolved from than modern Christianity. Hence Original Sin and other new additions by the Catholic Church. This book also shows some of the stretching of meaning fundamentalists have had to do to make sense of the Bible as the inerrant and universal word of God, willfully refusing to account for the culture in which it was developed over many years.

All of this is extremely relevant, considering most people in the world believe in Judiasm or one of its offshoots (Islam and Christianity), including nearly all of our politicians, and they believe the Bible is the word of God. The very last paragraph of this book sums up its relevance perfectly: "When myths are distorted as literal truth they will almost surely be used by agents of repression, burdening society with unreasonable limitations and irrational directives, and in extreme cases inciting assassination and war."

As you can see, I got a lot out of this book, but nonetheless, it was painful to read. The entire Bible along with comparative mythology packed tightly in 450 pages. It's definitely not light reading. It's pretty overwhelming, but I got through it. If you want to really understand the Bible and its origins, I suggest you do too.

[Shannon · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've really struggled with how to rate this book. I was not raised a Christian and have never been a Christian, so my criticisms have nothing to do with the themes of the book. I have read most of the Bible and can't understand how anyone with even a moderate amount of critical thinking skills could ever think the Bible was true. Also, I think Callahan does a good job of proving his main thesis - that the stories of the New and Old Testament are at least moderately based on other faiths, myths, and stories current at the time when the books of the Bible were being written down and codified. Additionally, I really appreciated the insight that when something doesn't make much sense in the Bible, it's likely that part of the story is missing, and that the missing parts are things that the authors, for various reasons, didn't want included.

However, this book is unbelievably tedious. Like watching paint dry tedious. Maybe if I had more familiarity with the Bible stories, it would have been more interesting. As it was, I had to force myself to finish it. Callahan also frequently takes small, even tiny, snippets of information and runs with it, far beyond what the scant evidence can truly support. Despite this, he often takes Christian Fundamentalists to tasks for doing the exact same thing. Only once does Callahan acknowledge that he is stretching the evidence and that his suppositions may not be correct. Callahan also has many, many bones to pick with Christian Fundamentalists in general and specific Fundamentalists in particular, and often goes to town on these themes. I found this petty and distracting.

Overall, a problematic book that is likely much more appreciated by those with a better familiarity with the Bible and fondness for debating mind-numbing minutiae.

[William Schram · Rating 5 out of 5]

Author Tim Callahan examines the mythology, history, and cultural influences that make up the Holy Bible. Callahan goes further by explaining how they appraise texts and other literary works, demonstrating this with Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. The book is really well done, very lucid, and easy to understand.

I don't know if the book's title is apt, but I suppose people do try to suppress ideas that inconvenience them. I enjoyed the book, but after all, I am the target audience. I didn't read anything groundbreaking or eye-opening. Thanks for reading my review, and see you next time.

[Ceaserchembezi]

A very sober analysis of the Bible and it's short comings. A great read that is worth giving time to.

[wayne goelst · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, the only book you will ever need to finally debunk those myths in the bible that Western Christians take as "Gospel"

[Debora Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

So far this book is very informative...lots of new information.

[George Mills · Rating 4 out of 5]

Readers of the Bible may fall anywhere along a continuum. It starts with those who believe that every single word is literally true, having been dictated directly by God, or, in the case of the later histories, directly inspired by God. The other end of the continuum is made up of those who see it as a collection of myth, history, folk-tale, wisdom literature, poetry, and (at worst) as the stories of a tribal god now being used to justify the belief of that tribe's descendants that they and no one else has a right to a given portion of this planet. Fortunately, Tim Callahan does not have a political or religious agenda - his interest is purely academic and his goal is to demonstrate to the general reader how the stories in the Bible came to be, on what they were originally based, what they meant to the original authors and how that meaning changed over history. He adroitly demonstrates how the great mythic themes of the Middle East, Egypt, and Mesopotamia were adopted and adapted by the early Hebrews to tell a story that would hold a disparate group of people together. He explains and demonstrates how the same stories were told differently by different groups (such as the priests who traced their lineage to Moses and those who traced their lineage to Aaron) with different agendas and how both (or more than two) versions were merged into a single story. Callahan takes the Bible as a great archaeological dig and discovers more than I can begin to describe and these discoveries do not reduce the Bible. To the contrary, they increase its importance, power, and its truly trenchant nature. All of creation, but most of all our consciousness, are mysteries that are beyond the ability of our minds to understand, so we must create myth and allegory that somehow provide us with insights that go beyond those that cold hard data can provide. Research such as Callahan's is as important as any being carried out today because it demonstrates both how our consciousness is evolving and how our ancestors understood and conceptualized this evolution. By studying this, we can come to a greater understanding of our perceptions of the evolution of our consciousness and how these perceptions can affect that evolution.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's the first time I've encountered by literary and source criticisms of The Bible and was a real eye opener. While like most literary things, much of it still too wishy-washy for my tastes but it did a good job of elucidating some of the more difficult to understand portions of the old testament, and putting much of the rest in it's proper context.

The author has a good understanding of the scriptures and apologetics, the mythology and culture of ancient Israel, the linguistics, as well as the problems with translation and hermeneutics.

[Bob Mann · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most insightful books on where the Bible comes from. This author knows comparative religions prior to the time and during the time of the writing of the Bible.
He covers the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation and attempts to separate myth from reality in the scriptures. A must read for anyone who want to get closer to the truth of Christianity.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great introduction to the use of comparative mythology in analyzing the bible. Although I was vaguely aware of the borrowing of myths in developing the still-evolving Yahwist myths, this book helped greatly in clarifying that awareness. I will definitely read more Callahan in the future.

[Vince · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not an easy read. The Bible is derived from many cultures and religions, but In comparison of tales author made multiple tangent interpretations which not always resonated, i.e. Samson's hair was root of strength because he was mythical sun god? Author stretched for conclusions.

[Cws]

220.1

[Cicely · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked this! An eye opener

[Darryl Hall · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading some history of the Mesopotamian civilization, decided to go back and reread this book. First time around was overwhelming in information.

[Tough · Rating 5 out of 5]

An important read for those who understand the role of myths in culture and its influence on the religious works.