DB, all I can or will say about the Bible being folklore is that to the best of my knowledge it occupies a similar position in the literary history of its culture as, say, the Mahabharata or the Mabinogion or the Kalevala do in theirs. Those more expert than I could comment the Babylonian texts prefiguring the Biblical ones, or the implications of the diversity in the Dead Sea scrolls. An alternative approach is simply to consider the diversity of types of text constituting the OT. Rich and various it is, but most of it has nothing much to do with Divinity (Numbers, Deuteronomy, Judges, Kings, Chronicles....not much transcendence there).
I certainly overstated my case concerning Roman imperial propaganda (late nights ), however, Constantine did have a heavy hand in the selection of the texts that constitute the NT, and it’s no accident that a hierarchical, centralised church, with HQs in Rome & Constantinople, was imposed over, for instance the Copt or Irish monastic models, which had the fault of being non-authoritarian.
DB, all I can or will say about the Bible being folklore is that to the best of my knowledge it occupies a similar position in the literary history of its culture as, say, the Mahabharata or the Mabinogion or the Kalevala do in theirs. Those more expert than I could comment the Babylonian texts prefiguring the Biblical ones, or the implications of the diversity in the Dead Sea scrolls. An alternative approach is simply to consider the diversity of types of text constituting the OT. Rich and various it is, but most of it has nothing much to do with Divinity (Numbers, Deuteronomy, Judges, Kings, Chronicles....not much transcendence there).
I certainly overstated my case concerning Roman imperial propaganda (late nights ), however, Constantine did have a heavy hand in the selection of the texts that constitute the NT, and it’s no accident that a hierarchical, centralised church, with HQs in Rome & Constantinople, was imposed over, for instance the Copt or Irish monastic models, which had the fault of being non-authoritarian.