Some of those commandments sound pretty familiar. Were could I have heard them before? Could it be the Code of Hammurabi, created circa 1760 BC. It’s got some pretty similar rules, 282 in all.
The bulk of the Torah was likely completed by the end of the Babylonian captivity (537 BC) with elements dating back to between the 10th and 6th centuries BC. But even if we use the Bible’s own account of the birth of Moses on 7 Adar 2368 (Feb – Mar 1391 BC), the code of Hammurabi still outdates the bible and its commandments written in stone by some 400 years.
Perhaps we should consider earlier sources of law. What about the code of Ur-Nammu (2100 – 2050 BC).
1. If a man commits a murder, that man must be killed.
There it is on the top of the list. God wouldn’t plagiarize, would he?
And the oldest example of legal code in recorded history, Urukagina, dates back to 2380 BC. In it, widows and orphans were exempted from paying taxes, the city was required to pay for funeral expenses, and the rich were banned from forcing the poor to sell against their wishes. It limited the power of the priesthood, took measures against usury and hunger, and and sought to establish higher levels of equality.
Based on the Bible’s own chronology, this was just before the time of the birth of Noah’s son Shem. This would have been before the flood that killed everyone except for Noah and his family. Yes, it is quite obvious why God would find the creator of Urukagina’s code of law so vile that he would wipe him from the face of the earth while leaving Noah to get pissed drunk on wine and run around naked (genesis 9:21) and upon learning that his son saw him in his naked drunken stupor, cursed his son and his son’s descendants to an eternity of slavery. Great guy. Good decision God.
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