The Skeptical Review Online - Tilling Turkel’s “Land Ahoy” / Part Seven

Turkel(1):

Gen. 15:3 And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.

Till(1):
The emphasis on "heir" was Turkel's, but why he felt the need to emphasize it is beyond me.

Turkel(2):
The emphasis on "heir" and on words below is intended to identify for the reader the place where yarash appears in the Hebrew, as is made clear by my explanatory comment, and as our opponent does grasp in the next paragraph.

Till(2):
At the end of Part Six of my replies, Turkel was claiming that he had never implied that he "rejected the understanding of yarash" as it had been presented in various English versions, so if this is true, why does he feel the need to emphasize words like heir to let readers know that these were places where yarash appeared in the Hebrew text? He doesn't reject the understanding of yarash as it was translated in other versions, yet he feels some need to let readers know what English words were used to translate yarash. How much sense does that make?

Of course, I know why Turkel makes a big display of telling readers what Hebrew words were used in passages that he quotes. It's his way of saying to readers, "Hey, look at me; I know Hebrew." It is an attempt to sway the opinion of his readers by leaving the impression that he is an authority in biblical languages.

Till(2):
****

Off-topic bantering was snipped here.

Till(1):
(H)e apparently emphasized "heir" intending to signal that the word used in Hebrew was yarash. If so, all he has shown us is that Hebrew, like probably all other languages, had homographs, i.e., words spelled alike and pronounced alike that had different meanings.

Turkel(2):
This is a nice lecture on homographs, but since I am not arguing any point relative to yarash having different meanings -- I agree that it does have different applicability according to context -- this is a distraction in context.

Till(2):
Well, if Turkel is not "arguing any point relative to yarash having different meanings," why has he wasted so much time quoting English passages that have the words heir and possess in them and then telling us that the Hebrew word here was yarash?

You see, here is the predicament that Turkel is in. He thought he could sling some Hebrew words around and impress his readers, but when I took the time to point out that all of his references to yarash are meaningless unless he can cite evidence that the word conveyed some sense that was not accurately represented by the English words heir and possess used in various English translations, he didn‘t know what to say. Unable to explain any special meaning that yarash conveyed that cannot be conveyed by the English words heir and possess, he winds up looking silly and now doesn't quite know how to extricate himself from his silliness.

I have a suggestion for him. Why doesn't he just say, "Yes, Till is right. I was trying to sway readers by making them think that I had some special linguistic insights, but now that I have been exposed, I'll apologize for wasting time and promise not to do this again"?

Till(1):
Bear and bear in English are homographs, but when we see one of them in context, we are able to determine what it means. For example, if one whose native language is English encountered the sentence, "I can't bear the boredom any longer," he would never think that bear was referring to a carnivorous mammal of the Ursus family.

Turkel(2):
Again, this is a nice lecture on homographs, but since I am not arguing any point relative to yarash having different meanings -- I agree that it does have different shades of meaning, albeit not as radical as the "bear" example -- this is a distraction in context.

Till(2):
Then why has Turkel wasted our time pointing out over and over that yarash was the Hebrew word used here and there and everywhere else he quoted? If he is not "arguing any point relative to yarash having different meanings, then what was his purpose in saying over and over, "The Hebrew word used here was yarash"?

I'm sure I know the answer to that question. I just stated it above, so readers can scroll up and read it again.

Till(1):
So it is with yarash in Genesis 15:3. Contextual evidence indicates that it conveyed the sense of "heir" here, so how does this in any way show that when Yahweh spoke in various places of giving the Israelites all the land their feet would tread upon in Canaan to possess, he didn't mean that he intended to give them all the land to possess?

Turkel(2):
I agree that in Gen. 15:3 yarash connoted the sense of "heir," but this is inapplicable to the land promise issue, since Yahweh is not a person who is dying and leaving the land to anyone,

Till(2):
The success or failure of the land promise is the issue in this debate, so if the Hebrew word yarash is "inapplicable" to that issue, why did Turkel bring it up? Why did he waste so much time saying over and over, "The Hebrew word used here was yarash"? I'm glad to see Turkel finally admitting that he wasted time bringing up over and over a matter that was "inapplicable" to the issue of this debate. I knew that he was doing this, so now maybe his readers will realize it too.

Turkel cuts and pastes so indiscriminately that he doesn't even notice at times that he is making comments that don't even relate to the issue under discussion. The present thread in this discussion pertains to his quotation of the following passage.

Gen. 15:3 And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.

So since the statement by Abraham was not made in reference to any land that Yahweh had promised to give, Turkel's remark that Yahweh wasn't dying and leaving land to anyone was completely irrelevant to this thread. Abraham was simply saying that he had no heir to inherit whatever property he owned at the time. Turkel introduced this quotation for no apparent reason except to point out that heir in the English translation was yarash in Hebrew, and he seems unable to explain to us any significance attached to the fact that yarash was the Hebrew word in this and other passages he has quoted.

Turkel(2):
and is not relevant to the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity, in which the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations which allowed them to continue to live in the land. We may add that by any token an "heir" would also never be a permanent, unconditional possessor of the land, since any human heir would eventually die and thereby the land would be "possessed" by someone else, or else some other condition (invasion, taxation) could strip the person of possession of the land. Yarash therefore still does not connote any unconditional, permanent sense of transference as our opponent requires for his case.

Till(2):
Well, once again Turkel has put his foot into his mouth. The promise to Abraham was that the land in question would be given to Abraham's descendants forever.

Genesis 17:8 "The whole land of Canaan, where you are now an alien, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be their God."

Genesis 48:3 Jacob said to Joseph, "God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and there he blessed me
4 and said to me, ‘I'm going to make you fruitful and will increase your numbers. I will make you a community of peoples, and I will give this land as an everlasting possession to your descendants after you.'"

Genesis 13:15 All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.

Certainly, no one lives forever, but the promise was that the land would be given to Abraham's descendants forever. I have already quoted passages that show Hebrew law was that when one died. his land would remain in his family. Zelophehad's daughters, for example, were required to marry within their own tribe so that the land that was given to them after the conquest would remain even within their tribe.

If invasion or conquest stripped the land from Abraham's descendants, that would merely be more proof that Yahweh's land promise failed, because the promise, as noted above, was that the land would be given to Abraham's descendants forever.

Turkel(1):

Gen. 24:60 And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them.

Till(1):
And this helps Turkel's case how? To me, it merely confirms what I have been arguing, i.e., Yahweh promised to give the Israelites [descendants of Rebekah] vast holdings of land to possess. So why didn't he give them all that he promised?

Turkel(2):
I did not cite Gen. 24:60 for the purpose of "helping" my case;

Till(2):
In a debate, both parties are supposed to present information that helps support the positions they are defending. I'm glad to see Turkel admitting that he has not been supporting his case.

Turkel(2):
I cited it for the purpose of demonstrating, as our opponent apparently agrees, that yarash is a word that can have different shades of meaning in context.

Till(2):
Yes, but if Turkel did not proceed to show us that in Genesis 24:60 yarash had some particular "shade of meaning" that was not made clear by the English translation of this verse, then he has done nothing but waste our time on irrelevant distraction.

Turkel(2):
However, Gen. 24:60 along with other land promises is germane in the context of the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity, in which the people were "rentors"[sic] under contract and had certain obligations which allowed them to continue to live in the land.

Till(2):
Turkel has cut and pasted this and similar comments more times than I could possibly estimate without wasting time to go back and count them, but it is nothing more than an assertion. When has he ever taken the time to explicate this assertion and show us that in some way it provides a reasonable explanation for why...

1. Yahweh said that he would give to Abraham's descendants land within specifically defined borders but never did not it?

2. The book of Joshua first said that all of the land that Yahweh had promised the Israelites had been given to them but later said that all of the land that Yahweh had promised the Israelites had not been given to them?

We are right back to the matter of P and ~P. How can P and ~P both be true statements? How does Turkel's constant cutting and pasting of his comment above in any way resolve this problem?

Turkel(2):
We have already explained, above and below, how this is relevant to the land promises, and as yet our opponent has not refuted any of our points.

Till(2):
No, "we" have not already explained, either above or below, how this ancient Near Eastern concept can explain the problems outlined above. As for whether I have refuted "any" of Turkel's points on this, I guess I will just have to follow his example and cut and paste again. Here is a thorough refutation of Turkel's assertion that an "Ancient Near Eastern" concept concerning land, people, and their deity would explain the various inconsistencies in the land-promise problem.

1. Even if we accept, his "Ancient Near Eastern concept," he must explain why the land promise did not succeed even in the "context" of that ancient understanding. The words "give" and "possess" had meaning, so in the different versions of the promise in Genesis where Yahweh said that he would "give" the land to Abraham's descendants as an "everlasting possession," the terms "give" and "everlasting possession" were intended to convey some kind of meaning. Turkel says that they were used in a "feudal-landlord" sense in which the Israelites were to be "rentors [sic]," so I have asked him to explain to us when all the land within the defined borders of the promise was ever given to the Israelites even in this "feudal-landlord" sense of "tenancy." For all of his talk about having explained this "fully below," Turkel has done no such thing.

2. Turkel claims that the "Ancient Near Eastern" concept of land, people, and deity meant that conditions were attached to the promise and that the behavior of Abraham's descendants was a condition. In reply to this, I have noted that (1) no conditions were stated or implied anywhere in any of the versions of the promise recorded in Genesis, (2) the restatement of the promise in Deuteronomy 9:3ff declared that [a] Yahweh was giving the land to the Israelites even though they had been rebellious and unrighteous from the day they had come out of Egypt, and that [b] Yahweh was going to give them the land despite their unrighteousness so that he could keep a promise made to Abraham.

3. At the time that Yahweh renewed this promise to the Israelites, they had not even kept the rite of circumcision that Turkel said was the "entry ritual" into the covenant.

4. The renewal of the promise to these Israelites, despite their unrighteousness and failure at that time to be in covenant relationship with Yahweh, would necessarily show that Yahweh did not consider the promise made to Abraham to have been conditional to the behavior of his descendants. It is completely illogical to argue that the behavior of the Israelites was not a condition at the time that Yahweh renewed this promise but then immediately upon crossing the Jordan River, their obedience did become a condition that justified withholding from them the land that he had promised to Abraham.

5. Despite Turkel's claim that the book of Deuteronomy was a "suzerainty treaty," which made the land promise conditional, very reputable scholars like Frank Moore Cross, as I have previously noted, have cited examples from ancient treaties that show the suzerain aspect of the covenant meant only that the behavior of rulers was a factor but that the land promise was unconditional as far as the people in general were concerned.

6. Signs of retrospective editing in the book of Deuteronomy will explain why some version of the promise attached conditions, but regardless of what those conditional versions of the promise may have said, they are incompatible with Deuteronomy 9:3ff, which clearly excluded the righteousness of the Israelite people as a condition for receiving the land.

7. Even if I should concede to Turkel that he is absolutely right and that the land promise was conditional to the behavior of Israelites--which is a concession that would not be supported by the evidence--that concession would not explain the second major problem identified in my article "Yahweh's Failed Land Promise." That problem is that Deuteronomy and/or the book of Joshua said that [a] no man of the Canaanite nations would be able to stand against the Israelites, [b] the Israelites would drive out and utterly destroy all of the Amorites, Hittites, Hivites, etc., [c] the Israelites possessed all of the land that Yahweh had promised them, and [d] not one of the promises that Yahweh made to Israel through Moses had failed, but later Joshua and subsequent books said that [a] the Israelites had not been able to drive out and utterly destroy some of the Canaanites and Jebusites, [b] the Israelites had not possessed all of the land that Yahweh had promised them, and [c] Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Jebusites, Perizzites, and Amorites remained in the land as late as the reign of Solomon. These are clear inconsistencies that Turkel has not explained "fully below" and will not, and never will be able to, explain fully below.

8. Number 7 is a clear case of the Bible's saying P in some places but ~P in other places, and it is not possible for P and ~P both to be true.

I apologize to readers for quoting this so often, but I want to emphasize the argument so thoroughly that if Turkel ever again says that I haven't answered his assertion about land, people, and their deity, we will know that he is being intentionally dishonest.

Turkel(1):
Lev. 20:24 But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the LORD your God, which have separated you from other people.

Till(1):
Well, why don't we just take a look at the context in which this statement appeared?

Leviticus 20:22 Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spue you not out.
23 And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.
24 But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am Yahweh your God, which have separated you from other people.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent has unerringly refuted his own case,

Till(2):
I suspect that Turkel meant to say that I had unwittingly refuted my own case, but as we will soon see, I did nothing unwittingly here.

Turkel(2):
as he has quoted a passage (20:22) that verifies our points concerning the context of the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity, in which the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations ("keep all my statutes...") which allowed them to continue to live in the land.

Till(2):
Since "our opponent" has clearly shown that the land promises as stated in the book of Genesis and renewed in Deuteronomy 9:3ff absolutely precluded any possibility of behavioral conditions being attached to the promise, I certainly have not refuted my own case. The details of my rebuttal arguments were just quoted above, so I won't cut and paste them here again. Until Turkel replies to these, he has failed to sustain his position that there are no inconsistencies in the Bible pertaining to Yahweh's land promise to the Israelites.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent does not refute us here, but merely verifies what we have been saying all along.

Till(2):
I'll leave it to readers to determine if "our opponent" has refuted "us" here. My detailed rebuttal arguments quoted above show that Turkel has failed to sustain his position. Certainly, Turkel is refuting nothing, because the repeated cutting and pasting of an unsupported assertion does not constitute refutation. Perhaps Turkel is unaware that argumentation by assertion is a logical fallacy. I suspect that this may well be the case, because many would-be apologists seem so accustomed to having what they preach to their choirs accepted without question that he may well think that what worked on his previously closed website will also work in an open-forum debate. I think he will learn differently as the debate progresses.

Till(1):
I really appreciate Turkel's taking the time to quote this text, because it is consistent with the texts that I quoted to show that Yahweh had promised the Israelites that he would drive out of Canaan seven nations mightier than they so that they could possess the land and dwell in it. So why didn't Yahweh keep this promise?

Turkel(2):
We can be little but amazed that our opponent has quoted a passage (20:22) that verifies our points concenring [sic] the context of the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity, in which the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations ("keep all my statutes...") which allowed them to continue to live in the land, and does not apparently even notice that he has shot himself in the foot for our benefit.

Till(2):
My foot is in excellent condition except for a slight case of gout at the moment. Yahweh's reference in Leviticus 20 to "casting out" before the Israelites the nations in Canaan so that they could "possess" the land was also in Deuteronomy 9:3ff.

Deuteronomy 9:3 Know then today that Yahweh your God is the one who crosses over before you as a devouring fire; he will defeat them and subdue them before you, so that you may dispossess and destroy them quickly, as Yahweh has promised you.

Keep in mind that this promise to defeat and subdue the nations in Canaan so that they would be dispossessed and quickly destroyed is in the context--one of Turkel's favorite words--of Yahweh's renewal of the land promise to the Israelites just before the crossing into Canaan, and they were at that time described as unrighteous and rebellious from the day they had come out of Egypt. Therefore, if "keep all [of Yahweh's] statutes" has been a condition to this promise, Yahweh would never have renewed it at this time to this particular group of Israelites. Let Turkel say all that he wants to that I have not refuted his argument, but I obviously have refuted it.

Let him explain why Yahweh would have made a promise conditional to keeping all of his statues to a people who at that time were not keeping his statutes. Let him explain how P and ~P could both be true statements.

Are there passages in the Old Testament that attached conditions to the land promise? You bet there are. But there are also unconditional versions of the promise, which allowed no room at all for any kinds of conditions, and it was not possible that the promise could have been both conditional and unconditional.

That is the problem that Turkel keeps dodging.

Turkel(1):

Judges 18:9 And they said, Arise, that we may go up against them: for we have seen the land, and, behold, it is very good: and are ye still? be not slothful to go, and to enter to possess the land.

The last cite is most relevant.

Till(2):
I keep hoping that Turkel will eventually realize that cite is a verb, and citation is the noun form of this word, but I guess that is hoping for a little too much. However, I should be excused for thinking that someone who knows all about Hebrew and Greek would know at least a few elementary facts about his native language.

Turkel(1):
Yarash represents the human activity of transfer of property or territory, including in war. But it is quite clear that this transfer did not involve legal ownership as we understand it, but possession.

Till(2):
I have shown that the land that Yahweh "gave" to the Israelites was "possessed" by individuals within the nation of Israel and that they had the right to buy and sell their property. I cited specific examples like the "parcel of land" bought by Boaz, which had previously been owned by Naomi's deceased husband, Elimelech, and Naboth, who owned a vineyard that king Ahab tried to buy. I referred to laws in the Deuteronomic code that prohibited tampering with markers that had been set to define the borders of privately owned property. That is all coming up again in more detail, so I won't quote it here again.

Turkel(1):
Evidence from ANE documents and the OT further clarify the nature of the relationship between a deity and its people as that of a feudal landlord and his tenants.

Till(2):
Well, if that is so, why doesn't Turkel wag out those ANE documents and quote to us where they sustain his position? Is there anything in those documents that would explain how P and ~P could both be true statements?

Turkel(1):
Under such an arrangement the land was owned by a deity and granted for the use of the people; the "landlord" had certain obligations, and the people had certain responsibilities:

Till(1):
And this explains away the problem how?

Turkel(2):
Our opponent's pretense at being ignorant is no more than a play to influence his skeptical readership into thinking there is no explanation.

Till(2):
No, pretense at being ignorant was made. I asked a simply question, and Turkel evaded it. I want him to explain to us how this "Ancient Near Eastern" concept that he keeps talking about would explain away the inconsistencies in the land promise passages. Out of consideration to the patience of readers, I won't requote my detailed rebuttal argument, but I will ask him to respond here to an abbreviated version of it.

1. Some texts in Joshua say that the Israelites possessed all the land that Yahweh had promised them.

2. Later texts in Joshua say that the Israelites did not possess all the land that Yahweh had promised them.

Even if we assume that this "Ancient Near Eastern" concept that Turkel keeps touting did indeed make all land promises of deities conditional to the good behavior of the ones being promised the land, exactly how would this ancient "concept" make both of the statements above true statements?

In other words, Turkel needs to explain to us how this ancient "concept" could make P and ~P both true statements.

Turkel(2):
As we noted clearly, and explain in more detail, the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity is such that the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations which allowed them to continue to live in the land.

Till(2):
And as I have noted, (1)Turkel has merely asserted that this "Ancient Near Eastern concept" was as deeply ingrained as he is claiming, and (2) a scholar in Ancient Near literature and cultures as eminent as Frank Moore Cross has cited evidence from ancient treaties of that region to show that "suzerainty treaties" ceded land unconditionally to vassal peoples. The behavior of rulers was conditional but not the behavior of the people in general.

Additional information on this would be in order at this point. I cited Bruce Monson earlier, who had quoted Cross's From Epic to Canon, but I now have open in front of me Cross's Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic. In a section beginning on page 249, he noted repeatedly the unconditional nature of Yahweh's land promise.

In the introduction of the Deuteronomist to the Book of Deuteronomy and to the entire Deuteronomistic history (Deuteronomy 1:6-3:29) the speech of Moses focuses attention on a new departure (Dt. 1:8,39; 3:18-22, 28]. Moses and his generation had violated the covenant and were appointed to death in the desert before Israel could enter "the good land" promised in Yahweh's oath to the fathers. The oath was unconditional, however, and Yahweh would give the land sworn to the fathers to the new generation of Israel led by Joshua. In speeches in Joshua 1:10-15 and 23:2-10, 14, the commission of Joshua was begun and ended fulfilling the oath to the fathers, establishing Israel in the land (emphasis added).

If the land promise sworn to the fathers was unconditional, how does Cross explain the passages that attached obedience conditions to the promise? He did so in the same way that biblical scholars in general look upon these passages.

The pattern of covenant violation followed by punishment (the curses of the covenant) and then by the emergence of new hope, a new departure initiated by Yahweh's call of a new leader, was repeated after Joshua's death. This pattern or movement became the very dialectic of history in the Deuteronomistic work. The gift of the land was qualified by Israel's apostasy according to Judges 2. Remnants of the nations were left in the land: Yahweh refused to drive them out. They were to be snares or stumbling blocks trying Israel's fidelity. Yet Yahweh (or his angel) states flatly in 2:1 "I have brought you into the land which I swore to your fathers and I said, "Never will I break my covenant with you..."(pp. 249-250, emphasis added).

After the reference to Joshua 23:2-10 (above), Cross had a footnote, which said, "Joshua 23:11-13, 14-16 is an expansion in the hand of Dtr2, the Exilic editor." In other words, Cross was recognizing that the inconsistency in versions of the land promise that attached no conditions and those that did stipulate conditions was due to the attempt of an exilic editor to give an explanation of the failures of Yahweh's promises not just in the land matter but also in the promise to preserve the throne of David forever. When the earliest "histories" of Israel were written, the writers firmly believed that the Israelites were the "chosen people" of Yahweh, the god of gods and lord of lords (much in the same way the people in our society today believe that we are one nation "under God"), and so they thought that the kingdom of Israel would exist forever, but when it didn't, editors of these earlier works resolved their cognitive dissonance by explaining that the promises of Yahweh had failed because of the unrighteousness of the people. Turkel is attempting to explain the failure of Yahweh's land promise by aligning himself with those who wrote retrospective explanations into the biblical text, but none of these explanations can satisfactorily explain how the land promise could have been both conditional and unconditional, and it cannot explain how P and ~P could both be true.

Later on in the same chapter, Cross noted that recognition that the land promise was unconditional was retained in passages that escaped the notice of editors who redacted explanations of the failure into biblical texts.

2 Samuel 7 echoes the themes we have been tracing. The unconditional promise of the land in Moses' speech (Deuteronomy 1:8, 39, and so on) and in Yahweh's address to Joshua (Joshua 1:6, and so on) the assertion of Yahweh to Joshua and Israel that he will never break his covenant with them (Judges 2:1), and the words in Samuel's address, "For the Lord will not forsake his people for his great name's sake..." (1 Samuel 12:22) find their natural culmination and climax in the oracle to David: "He shall build a house for me, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever... if he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men and with the stripes of the children of men: but my faithfulness shall not depart from him... and thy house and thy kingdom shall be sure forever before me; thy throne shall be established forever" (2 Samuel 7:13b-16, emphasis added).

Earlier, I quoted Cross's footnote in From Epic to Canon in which he noted that the land promise was unconditional in suzerainty treaties. If the kings were disobedient, they would be punished or removed, but the land still remained in the possession of the people. That idea was reflected in the passage that Cross quoted above from 2 Samuel 7. The full context here and in parallel passages shows that Solomon was to be David's heir through whom his kingdom would be established forever. If this son [Solomon] committed iniquity, Yahweh would "chasten him with the rod of men and with the stripes of the children of men," but Yahweh's faithfulness would not depart from him, and the house of David would be established forever. Of course, when promises like this failed editors redacted retrospective explanations into the appropriate texts, but sometimes, they failed to notice all of the texts that had contained unconditional promises.

Cross gives a much more extensive discussion of the unconditional nature of Yahweh's land promise than I could ever summarize with just a few quotations, so I recommend that readers who are interested in seeing just how out of touch Turkel is with responsible biblical scholarship in this matter take the time to read at least the relevant chapters in Cross's books From Epic to Canon and Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic. These are both available through amazon.com, so maybe Turkel will want to add them to the list of books available through his "bookshop."

Since these books are in obvious conflict with Turkel's view of ancient suzerainty treaties, he could give them one of his disparaging reviews, perhaps something like, "These books would have some practical bathroom use if they were printed on thinner paper, but you can still buy this book from Amazon.com and save 30%!" The important thing would be his commission, because I have noticed that he has been stuck on 81 for several weeks in his plea for suckers who will contribute $70 to $80 per year so that his "ministry" can become full-time.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent does not here refute this point,

Till(2):
I haven't just refuted it; I have killed it and buried it.

Turkel(2):
he merely struts pompously as though he has already refuted it, thereby manipulatively attempting to pre-empt the argument****

Till(1):.
For the sake of argument, let's just assume everything Turkel said. There are examples in the Bible that dispute what Turkel is saying, and I will get to them later, but for now, let's just assume that he is right.

Turkel(2):
This merely pre-emptive rallying intended to declare victory ahead of the game. It is not necessary to quote this in a reply****

Till(1):
The "ancient concept" was that Yahweh owned the land, and the people were "tenants" in a feudallike system.

Turkel(2):
This is indeed the point we are making.

Till(2):
No, it is not a point that Turkel has "made"; it is simply a point that he has asserted.

Till(1):
If a feudal lord told a family that they would be given permanent tenancy on property from sea A to river B and from mountain C to valley D, but later the feudal lord gave them tenancy on just a fraction of that land, the feudal lord would have reneged on his promise, wouldn't he? If not, why not?

Turkel(2):
The point which continues to escape our opponent, in spite of quoting verses that refute his very position, is that the tenancy was not, and never is, expressed as permanent or unconditional, but is expressed in terms of adherence to the contractual obligations laid out throughout the OT and especially in the contractual form of Deuteronomy.

Till(2):
Turkel's appeal to some Old Testament passages that attached conditions to the promise has been answered and answered and answered. First, I have noted that the land promise as stated in different places in Genesis never did attach any conditions to the promise. Second, the land promise as renewed to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 9:3ff precluded any behavioral conditions, since those Israelites were described in the context of the promise as thoroughly rebellious and disobedient. Third, retrospective editing of the promise is a perfectly logical explanation for the texts that attached conditions, and this is a view that is not just the rationalization of Farrell Till, whom Turkel sees as a "fundamentalist skeptic" but a view that has wide acceptance in responsible biblical scholarship (as noted in the quotations from the works of Frank Moore Cross).

Turkel(2):
The issue moreover, as we explain later, is that the Israelites violated these obligations even before they could physically move into the entirety of the land grant.

Till(2)
As I have noted more times than I can estimate without wasting time to go back and count, the Israelites to whom the promise was renewed in Deuteronomy 9:3ff were described in the context of the renewal as a people who had been rebellious and unrighteous from the day they had come out of Egypt. They were a people who had not even observed the rite of circumcision, which Turkel calls the "ritual entry" into the covenant, but despite the moral turpitude of the Israelites at that time, Yahweh said that he had to give the land to them in order to fulfill the promise he had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Now here is a question that Turkel has evaded throughout this debate. If the moral behavior of the Israelites at this time, just before they entered Canaan, was not a condition for receiving the land promised to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, why did it suddenly become a condition right after they had entered the land?

I ask this question, even though I am aware that Turkel avoids questions that are problematic to his position. Did everyone notice, for example, that he ignored the questions I asked above? I suppose I will just have to ask them again.

If a feudal lord told a family that they would be given permanent tenancy on property from sea A to river B and from mountain C to valley D, but later the feudal lord gave them tenancy on just a fraction of that land, the feudal lord would have reneged on his promise, wouldn't he? If not, why not?

He is the one who has introduced this so-called concept of feudal-landlord tenancy, so I am just taking his own analogy and asking him appropriate questions about it. As a participant in a formal debate, I hereby exercise my right to ask Turkel to answer these questions that he ignored the first time around.

Turkel(2):
By analogy, a rentor [sic] who steps into his apartment and immediately, at the front door, rips wallpaper off the wall and starts a fire, has already technically violated his lease (if it prohibits such acts, which may not be prohibited in certain collegiate rentals) and could readily be evicted by the landlord.

Till(2):
Notice the "if" in Turkel's analogy. What if the landlord signed an agreement with the "rentor [sic] that simply said, "I give John Doe and his descendants after him permanent tenancy forever to Apartment 102 at 430 East Elm Street, Canton, IL"? The owner of the apartment would be in a spot to remove him later, wouldn't he?

Does Turkel know what the fallacy of false analogy is?

Turkel(2):
It does not matter that he never got to the bedroom, or the bathroom, which the lease gave him implicit leave to occupy. Once the contract is violated, the "jig is up" and he is eligible for expulsion

Till(2):
But an unconditional lease like the one I described above would leave the owner of the apartment with no recourse. Turkel seems to take the fanciful yarns in the Old Testament rather seriously, so I wonder if he has ever stopped to think that the reason why Yahweh told the Israelites in Deuteronomy 9:3ff that he was giving them the land of Canaan, despite their abysmal unrighteousness was because the promise to Abraham had been made without the specifications of any conditions. As Frank Moore Cross noted, "{T)hanks to the fidelity of Abraham, the land is promised perpetually to his seed."

Till(1):
I think my point is clear enough that Turkel should understand it? All his talk about "ancient concepts" is merely a smoke screen to try to hide the obvious fact that he has no solution to the biblical inconsistencies on this matter.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent has little choice but to resort to this empty response, since he has utterly failed to respond to these points and demonstrate their error.

Till(2):
As open-minded readers of this debate will easily see, Turkel is the one who has utterly failed to respond to very detailed arguments and rebuttals that I have posted throughout this debate. His method has been to compose an unsupported denial the first time he encounters an argument and then to cut and paste it continually thereafter. His favorite one has been, "As we have explained above and below..." but I can't ever seem to find anything he has explained above and below. I have no problem finding where he has crassly asserted that he has explained thus and so above and below, but I haven't found any real explanations of anything. Plenty of assertions but no support for them--that is Turkel's stock in trade.

Till(1):
This is the guy who complained about "fluff," "set-up," and "irrelevant distractions" in my article. Go figure.

Turkel(2):
The issue was not the presence of such fluff, set up, or distractions, but our opponent's obsessive insistence that we quote EVERYTHING including fluff, set up, or distractions.

Till(2):
I started to cut this comment, but I wanted to remind everyone again that Turkel is misrepresenting me when he claims that I insisted that he quote everything I had said in articles he was replying to. Before this debate began, I had complained that he quoted selectively articles that he was "answering" but wasn't providing links to those articles so that his readers who wanted to could see for themselves what his opposition had said in sections of the articles that Turkel was not quoting. Had he put links to my articles in his replies to them, I would have made no issue over what he had not quoted. I would have simply replied to his articles and pointed out the materials that he had skipped over.

In Parts One through Three of my second-round replies in this debate, I pointed out Turkel's refusal to cooperate in negotiating a debating agreement. My proposed guidelines contained the following.

3. Each participant agrees to publish all exchanges in their entireties on their internet sites.

4. Each participant agrees to include all links that the participants refer to in their exchanges.

5. Each participant agrees to reply to all arguments and rebuttals made by the other.

6. If a participant overlooks an opponent's argument or rebuttal, he will reply to it after receiving notification that the argument/rebuttal was not answered.

7. Both participants agree to refrain from argumentation by asserting, question begging, or special pleading.

8. The participants agree to negotiate precisely worded propositions before a debate on an issue begins.

9. The affirmative debater agrees to define all key words in his proposition at the beginning of the debate so that the audience will know what the issue is in that part of the debates.

10. Both participants agree that their exchanges will be uncopyrighted so that anyone who wishes to publish them may do so as long as the published copies do not delete or add anything to the exchanges as they were presented by the participants.

11. The guideline immediately above will not exclude the right to correct grammatical or spelling mistakes after the exchanges have been posted.

12. Both participants agree to sign written copies of the guidelines and propositions after they have been agreed upon.

Obviously, I didn't propose these guidelines because I expected Turkel to quote everything that I would say in the debate. If that were my intention, then I would have proposed a guideline that said so. Number 5 was proposed as a guarantee that each of us would reply to all points made by the other, but replying to a point does not require quoting everything said in presenting that point.

This is just a straw man that Turkel has set up to knock around so that he could divert attention from his inability to answer my arguments. As I look back over this list with the benefit of hindsight from having seen Turkel's performance in a debate, I can understand why he wouldn't cooperate in negotiating an agreement on guidelines. He certainly didn't want an agreement on number 7, because argumentation by assertion and question begging has been his primary tactic in this debate.

Turkel(2):
As it remains, it is not necessary to quote such things****

Till(1):
Keep the passage that Turkel quoted above (Judges 18:9) in mind, because I will return to it when I reply to Turkel's claim that the sin "of just one of the people" was sufficient for Yahweh to withhold his promise.

Turkel(2):
What I actually said was, with reference to Achan and the loss at Ai, "The sin of even one of the people is enough to guarantee military non-success [sic]." This is not the same as saying that the sin of even one of the people is sufficient to withhold the promises as a whole. Technically it may be sufficient, but most landlords (and we say that Yahweh was no exception) do not take advantage of the first offense to evict a tenant, and the contractual document (Deuteronomy) does lay out a progression of offenses and punishments beyond this, with total eviction from the land as a final resort.

Till(2):
Well, if Yahweh required a "progression of offenses" in order to have a reason for withholding the land from the Israelites or denying them military success, he certainly had a reason to withhold it before the Israelites crossed into Canaan, because Deuteronomy 9:3ff, which I have now referred to umpteen times, stated that the Israelites had been rebellious and morally corrupt from the day they had come out of Egypt, yet, despite their national depravity, Yahweh said (1) that he was going to give the land to them anyway, and (2) that he had to give the land to them in order to fulfill the promise he had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

I'll repeat the question that Turkel has danced around all through this debate. If Yahweh would have reneged on his promise to Abraham by denying the promised land to the disobedient and rebellious Israelites before they crossed into Canaan, how could he have denied the land to them, on grounds of disobedience, after they had crossed into Canaan and still have kept his promise to Abraham? In other words, Turkel is arguing that if Yahweh had denied the land to the Israelites because of their disobedience before they entered Jordan, he would have broken his promise to Abraham, but somehow denying land to them for disobedience after they had entered Canaan did not constitute breaking his promise to Abraham.

I just want Turkel to explain to us the logic he has used to reach this conclusion.

Turkel(2):
At any rate, it seems that our opponent will be misapplying this quote if he uses it at all, since he has not grasped out [sic] intent in stating it.

Till(2):
Oh, I have understood Turkel's "intent" in quoting it [Judges 18:9], but when I return to it, I will show that he quoted it entirely out of context and that it does not in any way support his contention that disobedience of the Israelites would have accounted for Yahweh's decision to withhold some of the land from them. As I will explain, Judges 18:9 is in a context that shows that even though the Danites became heavily involved in idolatry, Yahweh still [presumably] enabled them to conquer the territory that the city of Laish was in, so in this case, the disobedience of not just one but many Israelites did not cause Yahweh to deny them military success.

Turkel(1):
Under such an arrangement the land was owned by a deity and granted for the use of the people; the "landlord" had certain obligations, and the people had certain responsibilities:

Till(1):
Very well, let's just accept this ancient "concept." As I noted above, all this would prove is that Yahweh owned the land and had granted its "use" to the Israelites.

Turkel(2):
This accurately represents our position.

Till(1):
So now let Turkel explain why he promised that every bit of ground the Israelites would tread on from the Red Sea to Lebanon and from the Euphrates River to the Great Sea would be given to the Israelites for their "use," but then later he reneged on the promise.

Turkel(2):
As we have explained above and below, this is "explained" in that the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity was such that the people were "rentors"****

Till(2):
"Above and below"! Turkel has always "explained" everything "above and below," but careful readers of this debate know that this is not so. Turkel has asserted "above and below" that this "Ancient Near Eastern context," which he never did support with any kind of evidence, explains everything, but I have shown that it didn't explain anything. As I said before, common sense should tell attentive readers that if Turkel, who has shown himself to be quite adept at cutting and pasting, had really "explained" this problem "above and below," he would simply cut the statement from above or below and insert it here instead of just cutting and pasting his claim that everything has been answered "above and below."

I snipped the rest of his statement because it was just a cutting and pasting of something he has parroted umpteen times in this debate.

Till(1):
And don't forget that the book of Joshua first said that all the land Yahweh had promised had been given to them and that "there failed not aught of any good thing which Yahweh had spoken to the house of Israel" and that "all came to pass" (Josh. 21:45), but then later, this same book said, "Ooops, the Israelites didn't get all the land after all, and there still remained much for them to possess" (13:1-2).

Turkel(2):
As we address Josh. 13:1-2 and 21:45 below, in our opponent's order, this is either lack of common sense or blantant [sic] dishonesty;

Till(2):
"Our opponent's order"? I have already brought this matter up several times, so if Turkel is concerned about "our opponent's order," this is the place to "address" it.

The dishonesty is in Turkel's constant cutting and pasting of claims that he has answered thus and so "above" or "below" when he knows that he has done no such thing. As I just said, if Turkel, whose stock in trade in cutting and pasting, really knew that he had given satisfactory answers to problems like this one, he would simply cut and paste them at places like this instead of cutting and pasting worn-out claims that he has answered this or that "above and below."

He is using a tactic of cutting and pasting irrelevant comments over and over to make the debate so long that some readers won't remember whether he has answered specific points "above and below." His dishonesty has become so flagrant that it amounts to outright lying.

Turkel(2):
our opponent is merely pep-rallying intended to pre-empt the argument****

Till(1):
I just deleted one of those comments that he has cut and pasted probably a hundred times already. If he can cut and paste such comments as these, he should not have any problem cutting and pasting all of those answers and rebuttals that he claims he has made "above and below." He doesn't cut and paste these, because he knows he hasn't made them.

Turkel(1):

2 Kings 18:33-35 Hath any of the gods of the nations delivered at all his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath, and of Arpad? where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah? have they delivered Samaria out of mine hand? Who are they among all the gods of the countries, that have delivered their country out of mine hand, that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem out of mine hand?

The comments of this Assyrian official reflect an expectation that at such time as a nation is attacked, it is expected that their god will come to their defense. Otherwise, as the territory of the land extends, so does the territory of the deity whose side wins, as indicated in this boast of the Assyrian king Sargon:

Till(1):
So ancient people, living in superstitious times, had such beliefs as this? They also believed a lot of other irrational things too.

Turkel(2):
That our opponent personally considers such beliefs "irrational" is beside the point, and his attempt to establish guilt by association ("other irrational things") is merely a gratutitous [sic] insult.

Till(2):
I wonder if Turkel denies that ancient people, living in biblical times, believed many irrational things. More than that, I wonder if he bothered to check the passage he quoted in its full context.

2 Kings 18:28 Then the Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in the language of Judah, "Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria!
29 Thus says the king: ‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you out of my hand.
30 Do not let Hezekiah make you rely on Yahweh by saying, Yahweh will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.'
31 Do not listen to Hezekiah; for thus says the king of Assyria: ‘Make your peace with me and come out to me; then every one of you will eat from your own vine and your own fig tree, and drink water from your own cistern,
32 until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive oil and honey, that you may live and not die. Do not listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you by saying, Yahweh will deliver us.
33 Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered its land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?
34 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?
35 Who among all the gods of the countries have delivered their countries out of my hand, that Yahweh should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?'"
36 But the people were silent and answered him not a word, for the king's command was, "Do not answer him."
37 Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the palace, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of the Rabshakeh.

Rather than teaching that gods owned certain territories and gave these lands to the people they chose to live therein, the Syrian official was actually saying that gods, including even Yahweh, were powerless to deliver their people from the great Assyrian king [Sennacherib]. Let's just suppose, however, that this Syrian official believed that gods controlled land and determined who would live on it, exactly how would that resolve the following problems?

1. Yahweh unconditionally promised all the land within defined boundaries to the descendants of Abraham, renewed that promise to a generation of morally depraved Israelites, but then did not give them feudallike "tenancy" over all of the land promised.

2. The book of Joshua first said that the Israelites possessed all the land that Yahweh had promised them but then said later that the Israelites did not possess all the land that Yahweh had promised them.

In other words, how can P and ~P both be true?

Turkel(2):
The comment as a whole is, will be taken as, and treated as evidence of, lack of capability to address the subject at hand (the internal consistency of the record, a point neither addressed nor refuted here), and of a need to provide a distraction from the central issue, for no other purpose than to conceal incapability on the primary subject by changing the discussion to another subject (whether such beliefs were rational) never addressed in the original article.

Till(2):
This is another cut-and-paste job, but I retained it to show that Turkel who can cut and paste all kinds of evasive and distractive comments never seems able to cut and paste points that he repeatedly claims to have proven "above and below."

Till(1):
How does this explain why the omni-everything Yahweh said that he would give to the Israelites to possess [use] all the land within the boundaries I have repeatedly noted, but it never happened? Why?

Turkel(2):
As we have explained above and below,

Till(2):
See what I mean? Turkel has constantly claimed that he has explained thus and so "above and below," but he never bothers to quote any proof from "above and below" that he has indeed "explained" it. He can cut and paste distractive comments like this and the one immediately below, but he never cuts and pastes his "explanations" from "above and below." Common sense should tell readers that if he really had shown us convincing arguments and answers "above and below," he would just quote them at places like this to reinforce his position.

Turkel(2):
this is "explained" in that the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity was such that the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations which allowed them to continue to live in the land, and which no amount of "ommi-everythingicity" would affect****

Till(2):
The rest of Turkel's comment was just the same old cut-and-pasted comments that we have seen probably a hundred times by now, so I snipped it out of consideration for the patience of our readers. I kept the part above to show that Turkel has evaded another question that I asked in all seriousness. I'm going to reinsert it here and ask Turkel to discharge his obligation as a presumably responsible debating opponent and answer it this time.

How does this explain why the omni-everything Yahweh said that he would give to the Israelites to possess [use] all the land within the boundaries I have repeatedly noted, but it never happened? Why?

The questions are perfectly legitimate. As I noted immediately below, Yahweh is presumably omniscient and omnipotent. If he is omnipotent, then he certainly could have given to the Israelites all of the land he promised them. If he was omniscient, then Turkel's claim that the land promise was conditional makes no sense, because if Yahweh was omniscient, he would have known at the time he made the promise that Abraham's descendants would be morally corrupt (as they were described in Deuteronomy 9:3ff). Why, then, would he have bothered to make a promise several times in Genesis that his omniscience would have enabled him to know would never be fulfilled.

I contend that this matter has direct relevance to what Turkel is claiming as a solution, so I am exercising my right as a party in a formal debate to ask him to reply to this.

Till(1):
Why would the omniscient Yahweh, who cannot lie, have told the people something that he knew wasn't going to happen?

Turkel(2):
In context, this is another distraction, and will be taken as, and treated as evidence of, lack of capability to address the subject at hand****

Till(2):
I assume that everyone saw Turkel's evasion of the question. When he can't answer, he evades by cutting and pasting another evasive comment.

Turkel(2):
Moreover we challenge our opponent to show a single verse where Yahweh said that the people would undoubtedly be successful in meeting their contractual obligations under the tenets of the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity.

Till(2):
Since challenges are being hurled, I challenge Turkel to prove that Yahweh's land promise was made within the spin of this "Ancient Near Eastern context" that he keeps touting. I have shown repeatedly that the land promise was unconditional, and I have quoted responsible biblical scholarship (whose "lifeblood" has been Ancient Near Eastern studies) that recognizes the promise was unconditional. I have already quoted too much the passage in Deuteronomy 9:3ff, which renewed the promised under circumstances that necessarily excluded behavioral conditions. Turkel has yet to reply to this, but maybe he did it "below."

Turkel(2):
The very fact that punishments for failure are laid out suggests that he will find no such passage.

Till(2):
I have repeatedly pointed out the retrospective nature of the passages that attached conditions to the promise, and I have supported that view with quotations from responsible biblical scholarship to show that this is not just a "Till-spin" that I am trying to put on these passages. The "punishments for failure" are, therefore, examples of excuse-making put into the text to "explain" why Yahweh's unconditional promise to Abraham didn't happen as originally stated. My contention is that Deuteronomy 9:3ff necessarily excludes behavioral conditions, so I am still waiting for Turkel to explain to us how the land promise could have been both conditional and unconditional.

In other words, how could P and ~P both be true.

This is a good place to drop a reminder of an issue that Turkel has not yet answered "above and below." If the promise was renewed to Israelites who had been rebellious and unrighteous from the day they had come out of Egypt, how could the promise have later become conditional to the behavior of the Israelites?

Till(1):
And why did he "inspire" the writer of Joshua to say that the Israelites had received all the land they had been promised and then later say that there remained much land for them to possess?

Turkel(2):
As we address these Joshua passages below, this is merely either lack of common sense or blatant dishonesty as stated above****

Till(2):
Yes, "below." Turkel is always going to answer something "below." It seems, however, that "below" never comes around. I cut the rest of his statement above because it was just another cut-and-pasted job.

Till(1):
All this flapdoodle about "ancient concepts" of deity-land-people ownership doesn't explain away these gross inconsistencies in a book that is supposed to be inerrant.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent has little choice but to resort to this empty response, since he has utterly failed to refute the points showing how the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity dissolves his allegations of inconsistency.

Till(2):
Once again I will assume for the sake of argument that this "Ancient Near Eastern context" was believed fully and exactly as Turkel has alleged. I say "alleged," because he has simply asserted it; he has not produced any real evidence that it was as deeply ingrained as he has claimed.

Very well, we are now assuming that this "Ancient Near Eastern context" existed just as Turkel has claimed. How does that explain textual inconsistencies between versions of the land promise as stated in Genesis and Deuteronomy 9:33ff, which attached no conditions to the promise, and those versions of the promise that did attach conditions? How could the giving of the promise in Deuteronomy 9:3ff to an Israelite nation that was presented as having been completely reprobate from the day they had come out of Egypt, leave any room for behavioral conditions.

In other words, I simply want Turkel to explain how the promise could have been both conditional and unconditional. It wouldn't matter if Turkel could prove that the people of the Ancient Near East believed that their gods came down to them for personal visits each morning to tell them that continuing to keep the land they lived on would be conditional on their behavior. That would not change the law of contradiction, which says that P and ~P cannot both be true statements. I want him to explain how it was possible for P [the Israelites possessed all the land Yahweh had promised them] and ~P [the Israelites had not possessed all the land Yahweh had promised them] to be both true.

Turkel(1):
Over [Ashur's] entire broad land and his numerous population I installed my nobles as officials, and thus extended the territory of Ashur, king of the gods.

Till(1):
Turkel doesn't have to convince me that people in biblical times had superstitious beliefs, but the fact that king Sargon of Assyria believed that Ashur had a territory over which he was "god" and the fact that Naaman believed that Yahweh was god of the land where the Israelites lived does absolutely nothing to explain the problem.

Turkel(2):
This is nothing but a gratutious [sic] insult against people in biblical times,

Till(2):
What is insulting about stating an obvious fact, i. e., people in prescientific times had superstitious beliefs? Even people today have superstitious beliefs.

I want Turkel to explain to us how the superstitious beliefs of ancient people could change the law of contradiction and make P and ~P both true. I grant for the sake of argument that Assyrians believed that Ashur had a territory that he ruled over and that when the Assyrians captured new territory, this increased Ashur's realm. Now with this concession, I want Turkel to explain to us how this superstitious belief of the times would make both statements below true.

1. The Israelites possessed all the land that Yahweh had promised them.

2. The Israelites did not possess all the land that Yahweh had promised them.

That's a very simple request that he should be able to explain if his position is as true as he seems to believe it is. If he refuses to answer it this time, I will assume that he has no answer to give.

Turkel(2):
intended to raise cheers from a gullible skeptical readership. It is not necessary to quote this in a reply**** As we noted clearly, and explain throughout this essay, the Ancient Near Eastern context of the relationship between a land, its people, and their deity is such that the people were "rentors" [sic] under contract and had certain obligations which allowed them to continue to live in the land.

Till(2):
It seems strange that if Turkel has indeed noted "clearly" and "explained" throughout "this essay" as much as he claims he has done, he would not just cut and paste those clear explanations over and over to drive home the point that he has thoroughly rebutted my arguments. Instead of doing that, however, he chooses to cut and paste repetitively those irrelevant distractions like the one that I cut above with **** and the one I am also cutting below.

I think it is time to call a spade a spade. Turkel is cutting and pasting all of these irrelevant distractions instead of requoting where he replied to my arguments "above and below" because he really knows that he has not answered my arguments. In other words, Turkel is lying and knows it.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent does not here refute this point, he merely struts pompously****

Till(1):
I'll try to draw Turkel a picture so that he can see the problem.

Turkel(2):
This is merely a snide comment. It is not necessary to quote this in a reply, and our opponent cannot****

Till(2):
See how skilled Turkel is at repeatedly cutting and pasting irrelevant distractions so that he can detract attention from his inability to support his position and refute mine? I want everyone to watch carefully to notice how Turkel evaded the picture that I drew below.

Till(1):
1. Yahweh, a presumably [there's that cuss word again] omniscient god, told the Israelites [presumably] that he would give them all the land to possess [use] that their feet would tread upon from the Red Sea to Lebanon and from the Euphrates River to the Great [Mediterranean] Sea.

2. This didn't happen.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent's pretense at being ignorant is no more than a play to influence his skeptical readership into thinking there is no viable explanation. As we noted clearly, and explain throughout this****

Till(2):
See what I mean? If Turkel really believed that he had explained "clearly" and "throughout" his "essay" how his "Ancient Near Eastern concept" explained how P and ~P could both be true, he would have gladly cut and pasted it above instead of recycling his same old evasive distractions. Turkel has been crushed on this issue. He knows it, and his constant claims that he has answered everything "clearly" throughout his postings is an outright lie. And he knows that too.

Till(1):
Since Turkel believes that Yahweh, unlike Chemosh, Ashur, and other gods, was the real thing, i.e., a genuine, rootin' tootin' god, why would the superstitious belief that gods had certain territories or lands that they ruled over explain why Yahweh's land promise to the Israelites didn't happen?

Till(2):
I'm sure everyone noticed that he did it again. He can cut and paste repeatedly a claim that he has explained everything "clearly" throughout "this essay," but for some reason, he seems unable to cut and paste at places like this any of those clear explanations. I can almost--almost but not quite--feel sorry for this guy. He wanted so badly to establish a reputation as a topnotch apologist, but in his very first debate in which he had to confront informed opposition, he got the stuffings kicked out of him.

Turkel(2):
The ability of Yahweh to root and toot has no bearing upon the freewill decision of His people to violate the obligations of their contract and therefore suffer the consequences clearly laid out for such violations in the OT and especially in the contractual document, Deuteronomy. Our opponent does not here refute this point, he merely struts pompously as though he has already refuted it, thereby manipulatively attempting to pre-empt the argument as though victory has already been won.

Till(2):
I'll demonstrate to Turkel what he should be doing instead of cutting and pasting evasive denials like his comments above. I'm not going to say that I have thoroughly refuted Turkel's position on the land-promise issue; I'm going to requote the detailed argument that I have stated several times in this debate so that it will be on record right here in this particular spot where he claims that I haven't refuted anything.

1. Even if we accept his "Ancient Near Eastern concept," he must explain why the land promise did not succeed even in the "context" of that ancient understanding. The words "give" and "possess" had meaning, so in the different versions of the promise in Genesis where Yahweh said that he would "give" the land to Abraham's descendants as an "everlasting possession," the terms "give" and "everlasting possession" were intended to convey some kind of meaning. Turkel says that they were used in a "feudal-landlord" sense in which the Israelites were to be "rentors [sic]," so I have asked him to explain to us when all the land within the defined borders of the promise was ever given to the Israelites even in this "feudal-landlord" sense of "tenancy." For all of his talk about having explained this "fully below," Turkel has done no such thing.

3. At the time that Yahweh renewed this promise to the Israelites, they had not even kept the rite of circumcision that Turkel said was the "entry ritual" into the covenant.

8. Number 7 is a clear case of the Bible's saying P in some places but ~P in other places, and it is not possible for P and ~P both to be true.

This eight-point argument has now been laid out in several different places in my second-round rebuttals, so if Turkel comes back only with more cut-and-pasted comments about how he has explained everything clearly "above and below" or "throughout this essay," we will know that he is still on his train to evasion-land.

Hey, Turk, preaching to the choir on a closed website is a lot more fun than facing informed opposition in an open forum, isn't it?

Till(1):
Furthermore, since the Israelites believed that Yahweh owned all the land in the whole world, and since Turkel believes that this was the correct view of deity-land-possession, why didn't Yahweh's promise to the Israelites pan out as he had promised?

Turkel(2):
Likewise, the ownership of all land by Yahweh has no bearing upon the freewill decision of His people to violate the obligations of their contract and therefore suffer the consequences clearly laid out for such violations in the OT and especially in the contractual document, Deuteronomy.

Till(2):
As the reposting of my eight-point rebuttal argument above clearly shows, the land promise was unconditional. It just isn't possible to reconcile Deuteronomy 9:3ff with any versions of the promise that attached behavioral conditions. Hence, the retrospective editing recognized by responsible biblical scholars, one of whom I have quoted, explains the inconsistency on this point in different texts. However, it isn't possible to explain how the promise could have been both conditional and unconditional, so there is a contradiction in the Bible until Turkel can explain how P and ~P can both be true.

Till(1):
That is problem number one. Here is the second problem.

Turkel(2):
This is merely transitional. We do not begrudge its use in a response, but do maintain that it is not necessary to quote****

Till(2):
Someone who has demonstrated his skill at cutting and pasting evasive comments like these should easily be able to cut and paste from "above or below" at least one of the many places where he has explained "clearly" and "thoroughly" how the land promise could have been both conditional and unconditional.

Till(1):
1. The book of Joshua claims that Yahweh gave the Israelites all the land he had promised to them and that nothing failed in all that he had promised.

2. The books of Joshua and Judges later say that this didn't happen, that Yahweh did not give all the land he had promised to the Israelites.

Turkel(2):
As we address these Joshua and Judges passages below****

Till(2)
Why didn't Turkel quote what he said "below" about this? He can cut and paste the same evasive comments over and over, so why doesn't he just quote his "clear" and "thorough" explanations from "below"? Doing that would drive home decisively to the readers of the debate that he has indeed "explained" all of this. Well, he doesn't cut and paste his "explanations" from "below," because he has given no sustainable explanations.

Till(1):
I suggest that Turkel keep in mind that, in his own words, the issue in this debate is "the internal consistency of the Biblical record" in the land-promise matter, so he needs to show consistency in the two problems outlined above rather than waste our time talking about ancient superstitious beliefs.

Turkel(2):
That our opponent is apparently oblivious to how the data given resolves his allegations of inconsistency in the land promise matter, and that he pompously pre-empts****

Till(2):
So Turkel cut and pasted another evasive comment. Why didn't he just cut and paste his explanation from "below"? If he actually had an explanation, he could have pounded me mercilessly by just putting it into all of the places where he has cut and pasted his evasive comments like those above. Well, he didn't do that because he knows that he has not explained anything "above or below."

In a word, Turkel is a liar, who hopes that inattentive readers won‘t notice his lie.

Turkel(1):
It was usually believed by the ancients that a god's power only extended as far as national borders, as here:

Till(1):
So how does this explain the two inconsistencies shown in my article and outlined above?

Turkel(2):
By itself it does not, and is not intended to, explain such a broad issue.

Till(2):
Then why has Turkel wasted so much time cutting and pasting his original comment about an "Ancient Near Eastern concept," which he presented as a "clear" and "thorough" explanation of the land-promise problem? I appreciate that he has finally decided to be honest and admit that all of his talk about an "Ancient Near Eastern concept" doesn't "by itself" explain the problem, but after making that admission, he is now obligated either to (1) explain the two inconsistencies that I outlined above, or (2) admit that he has no explanation. For his convenience, I will state the two inconsistencies again.

The first inconsistency:
1. Yahweh, a presumably [there's that cuss word again] omniscient god, told the Israelites [presumably] that he would give them all the land to possess [use] that their feet would tread upon from the Red Sea to Lebanon and from the Euphrates River to the Great [Mediterranean] Sea.

2. This didn't happen.

The second inconsistency:
1. The book of Joshua claims that Yahweh gave the Israelites all the land he had promised to them and that nothing failed in all that he had promised.

2. The books of Joshua and Judges later say that this didn't happen, that Yahweh did not give all the land he had promised to the Israelites.

Turkel(2):
It is an illustrative piece in our material describing the Ancient Near Eastern context of the contractual relationship between a land, its people, and their deity.

Till(2):
Yes, Turkel has said this probably a hundred times, but he has now admitted that this "Ancient Near Eastern concept" by itself doesn't explain the two sets of inconsistencies that I requoted above, so I will ask him to now discharge his responsibility as a participant in a formal debate and explain the inconsistencies.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent is wasting verbiage offering more material that is not necessary to quote this in a reply, and which our opponent cannot****

Till(2):
Instead of cutting and pasting the same old evasive drivel, why didn't Turkel use the space to give us a full and complete statement that would explain the two sets of inconsistencies above?

Turkel(1):

1 Kings 20:23 And the servants of the king of Syria said unto him, Their gods are gods of the hills; therefore they were stronger than we; but let us fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they.

Till(1):
But the omniscient, omnipotent Yahweh was, pardon the expression, presumably god of the hills, the plains, the valleys, the deserts, the rivers, the seas, etc. He was presumably god of everything in the whole world, so if he made the promises that I presented in my article and outlined above, why couldn't he make good on them?

Turkel(2):
The ability of Yahweh to know and do all that is logically possible, and His ownership of all the land, has no bearing upon the freewill decision of His people to violate the obligations of their contract and therefore suffer the consequences clearly laid out for such violations in the OT and especially in the contractual document, Deuteronomy.

Till(2):
Well, I have shown "above and below" that the land promise was unconditional, "thanks to the fidelity of Abraham," but Turkel is evading the issue. If Yahweh was indeed omniscient--and Turkel believes that he was--then why would he have bothered to make a land promise that contained conditions that he knew in advance would never be met? Turkel must explain that. He seems not to realize that establishing inerrancy in the Bible requires him to establish logical consistency, so I am challenging him to explain why an omniscient deity would have made a land promise that had conditions attached to it that he knew in advance would not be made.

Now I want Turkel's admirers to watch him evade this question again.

Turkel(2):
Our opponent does not here refute this point, he merely struts pompously****

Till(2):
Why didn't Turkel use this space to answer the question I asked? Had he done that, he would have made a much better impression than he has made by cutting and pasting over and over his evasive comments.

I will ask him again to explain to us why an omniscient deity would have made a land promise that had conditions attached to it that he knew would not be met.

Till(1):
The passage Turkel quoted above reminded me of another text that may explain why Yahweh couldn't come through with what he promised the Israelites: "And Yahweh was with Judah; and he drove out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron" (Judges 1:19).

Turkel(2):
This is merely a distraction, and will be taken as, and treated as evidence of, lack of capability to address the subject at hand, and of a need to provide a distraction****

Till(2):
So once again we see Turkel's flagrant evasion. I'll ask his admirers again if this is the guy some of you wrote to me to ask why I wouldn't reply to him. Well, I didn't reply to him because he was refusing to link his readers to my articles, which he quoted selectively. Now that he has come out into an open forum, I am more than happy to reply to him, and I think that his admirers aren't going to be too proud of what they are seeing from him.

Till(1):
Maybe Yahweh was just another god like Chemosh and Ashur, who was therefore no more able to make good on his promises than the other imaginary gods.

Turkel(2):
This is merely a snide comment, of no evidential worth or value in this context. It is not necessary to quote this in a reply****

Till(2):
So Turkel bobs and weaves and ducks and dodges again. I'll ask him to tell us if what I said above is at least a possibility and that Yahweh was just another imaginary god, like Chemosh and Ashur, who was therefore unable to make promises and keep them.

Is that a possibility, Turk?

I will be sending Parts Four through Seven to my assistant Rob Miles for posting on the website, and I will continue going through Turkel's cut-and-pasted evasions until I have replied to anything that remotely resembles an argument. These other replies will not be posted for a few weeks, because I will be replying to Turkel's "Olivet Discourse" for publication in the September/October issue of The Skeptical Review. Go to Part Eight.