From: Kate Distin (memes@distin.co.uk)
Date: Wed 15 Feb 2006 - 12:16:40 GMT
Scott Chase wrote:
>> From: Kate Distin <memes@distin.co.uk>
>> Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>> Subject: Re: Culture's effect on Genetics
>> Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2006 10:08:53 +0000
>>
>> Derek Gatherer wrote:
>>
>>> Okay, wearing my geneticist hat here.....
>>>
>>> For a common ancestor of all the Ys within both Jewish and
>>> Palestinian populations (which would be the "Y-chromosomal Abraham"
>>> by analogy with the "Y-chromosomal Adam"), the date is probably
>>> something like 8000-11000 BC (so the story in Genesis about Abraham
>>> cannot be true if one goes with the historians who guess that Abraham
>>> was ~2000 BC. If a historical figure, Abraham could have been the
>>> common ancestor of many current Jews and Palestinians but
>>> nevertheless only a minority in both populations as he is too recent)
>>>
>>
>> Responding with my RE teacher's hat on . . .
>>
>> I'm not intending to spark a debate about Biblical historicity, but
>> it's interesting in the light of what you say to note that Abraham is
>> first introduced (Genesis 11) against the background of a
>> geneaological history that gives the Hebrews a place in the wider
>> Semitic context ("the descendants of Shem"). Although this
>> genealogical picture is apparently painted in terms of individuals, in
>> fact the OT thinks of people as being so tightly bound up with their
>> tribe that it's not always easy to se whether names refer to a person
>> or his tribe (e.g. later references to Jacob/Israel).
>>
>> So although Abraham is revered as a patriarch, he of course did not
>> spring from nowhere, and indeed the Bible specifically draws our
>> attention to his ancestry. Talk of a Y-chromosomal Abraham may
>> therefore be misguided - when talking about his genetic fathering of
>> nations, the Bible places this in the context of his genetic ancestry.
>> It is when talking about his theological fathering of nations, if you
>> like, that the Bible emphasises his lack of memetic ancestry - that he
>> was the first monotheist. (And there's a rather delightful Qur'anic
>> story which makes the same point.)
>>
> In the US you can accept that George Washington was the "father of his
> country" or that we had multiple "founding fathers". The so-called
> fatherhood was obviously ideological and not genetic as most of us bear
> no direct genealogical relation to any of the founding fathers. Maybe
> the same holds true for Jewish and Arab patriarchs and their cultural
> descendants.
>
>
I think that's right, though the OT does also place some emphasis on the
genealogical relationships.
Kate
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