We’ve written before about a the translation of a 3,700-year-old clay tablet which was done by Irving Finkel, an archaeologist and Assyriologist, who is the Assistant Keeper of Ancient Mesopotamian script, and a curator at the British Museum. That was Hey, Hambo — Noah’s Ark Was Round!
The Babylonian text describes the ark as a round 220-ft diameter coracle with walls 20-ft high. Besides being the “wrong” shape, the tablet is a chronological disaster, because as Answers in Genesis (ol’ Hambo’s online ministry) says in this article: Timeline for the Flood, based on the Ussher chronology, the Flood began in the year 2,348 BC.
If the Babylonian tablet is 3,700 years old, it was written around 1,686 BC, a mere 662 years after the Flood, and around 700 years before Genesis was written. The tablet is far too old. Also, it doesn’t mention Noah. The ark-builder in the tablet was a Sumerian king named Atram-Hasis. That’s a strange detail to get wrong in an account written so soon after the Flood.
Besides being the wrong shape and the wrong date, and getting Noah’s name wrong, the ancient description of the Ark presents another problem for creationists. This article in the Guardian, Babylonian tablet shows how Noah’s ark could have been constructed, quotes Finkel, the translator of the tablet, as saying:
Noah’s ark was never built, still less crash landed on Mount Ararat, a British Museum expert has declared – despite holding in his hand 3,700-year-old instructions on exactly how to construct one. “I am 107% convinced the ark never existed,” Irving Finkel said.
The Guardian also says:
The tablet gives a version of the ark story far older than the biblical accounts, and Finkel believes the explanation of how “holy writ appears on this piece of Weetabix”, is that the writers of the Bible drew on ancient accounts encountered by Hebrew scholars during the Babylonian exile.
[…]
Finkel said that not only did the ark never exist, but ark hunters were looking in the wrong place – the map shows the ark in the direction of, but far beyond the mountain range later known as Ararat.
How have creationists been reacting to this news? So far, the outfits we follow have been silent, but we found one amazing article at the website of the Christian Broadcasting Network, founded by televangelist Pat Robertson. It’s titled Archaeologists: Ancient Writings Confirm Noah’s Ark. BWAHAHAHAHAHA! Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:
Archaeologists say writings on an ancient tablet confirm there was a global flood and an ark that carried animals.
They also describe the tablet as being 4,000 years old instead of 3,700. Hey, what’s 300 years? But they get one part right, when they say:
The tablet differs from scripture in its description of the ark. It tells of a giant round vessel, two-thirds the size of a soccer field. In the book of Genesis, God commands Noah to build a longer vessel, providing specific dimensions that are not round.
What do they make of the round description in the tablet? Here it comes:
Experts say other ancient civilizations adapted versions of Noah’s story to their own cultures.
So there you are. Creationists never have a problem with facts. Why should they? They’ve got The Truth™.
Copyright © 2014. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.
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The Sensuous Curmudgeon 
actually Noah’s ark has been found and it is in ,, get ready .. Noah’s ark national park in turkey ( I hope you have seen the Ron Wyatt videos , he has actually found the ark , the photos simply speak for themselves , plus the place that Moses crossed the red sea , along with monuments from king Solomon , plus the rock of horeb and the mount Sinai . ) . in fact this is legitimate and not a hoax .
actually since 1980 evolution has been in trouble with scientist desperately trying to find a new theory . now that it is evident that there is no way the universe could just happen , that it had to be designed and created with a precision that is as precise as the universe is big . we now have the latest face saving hoax , multiple universes , in a effort to explain the precision of the universe . no evidences just a hope .
now you can make fun of all this , in fact that is all you have . to make fun . this is why people like Richard Dawkins have just started to talk about being a atheist without highlighting evolution . he knows there is a major problem with trying to defend evolution .
there is only one reason to accept evolution . that is to give one an excuse to be able to reject God and become a atheist .
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Hambo writes about it today on the AIG website. As one would expect he decries it as an evolutionary attack on the word of god. This story must be particularly troublesome for Hambo when the last thing he needs at this time is a widely published report that says (1) the story of the ark is a myth and (2) the boat in the original myth is nothing like the one AIG wants to build in Kentucky.
It’s always other cultures adapting bible stories, not the other way around. Despite the fact that those cultures tend to be older, larger, more advanced…
I wonder what “experts” they are referring to. It was my understanding that most bible scholars in academia believe that Genesis is largely myths and tribal stories, and it is only the self-proclaimed experts like Ham, who lack the relevant education and research credentials, that claim Genesis to be literally true.
Plagiarism at its finest, long before any copyright laws!
Ruffusmd said:
” actually Noah’s ark has been found and it is in ,, get ready .. Noah’s ark national park in turkey”
Does Hambo know there is already an ark park? Is that where he got the idea from? AIG will probably have to pay royalties to Turkey if the ark of Appalachia ever gets built. Actually, if there is already an ark park in Turkey I do not see why the world needs another one in Kentucky. I am equally unlikely to visit either one of them.
Stephen Kennedy says: “Hambo writes about it today on the AIG website.”
Hey, right. I missed that when I checked Hambo’s website earlier. But he doesn’t say anything new. The bible gets it right, and pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Dr Ruffus – you will have to get in touch with all of those TE/EC/BioLogos folks who accept evolution and haven’t rejected god to become atheists.
I wonder if the next discovery will be a 4000 year old Mesopotamian clay tablet that represents an ancient junk bond to fund that circular ark?
Completely off topic . . . .years ago, I was working in Turkey, and for amusement on Saturday afternoons, I would engage a Turkish archeology professor to guide me through the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations in Ankara. His particular interest was translating Hittite and Assyrian cuneiform tablets into Turkish and English. One day I noticed a little clay tablet in a holder on his desk, and I asked him about it. As I recall he said that it was his favorite. It was a letter, basically, from a woman to her husband written about 1250 to 1300 BCE. It seems that the husband was on what could be called a business trip, about 25 to 30 kilometers from home. The wife was having to live with his mother and sisters while he was away. She was complaining to him about how intrusive and “gossipy” his mother was . . . . . . . .
“Some things,” the professor mused while holding the tablet in his hand,
“never change.”
“ark hunters were looking in the wrong place ”
Those who actually, you know, read the Bible have know this for a long time. Please read Gen. 8:4 closely, King James Translations. Note the plural – not the Mountain of Ararat but the Mountains of Ararat. Then read this:
http://rambambashi.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/noahs-ark/
Not that Ol’ Hambo cares. He knows better than anyone what the Bible says.
Man, that nickname sounds like a character in a Karl May novel (I suppose you Americans have to look that up; main characters are Old Shatterhand, Old Firehand and Old Surehand).
Mnb0,
I am familiar with Karl May novels because Hitler loved them. Indeed, he forced his generals to read them, believing they would learn brilliant, intuitive strategies from the Native American hero Winatou. Hitler knew May had never been in real battles nor to America– but Hitler believed that the intuition of the genius was worth more than evidence and reason. That explains a lot about his military decisions. Pure anti-rationalism and egoism all the way down.
Ron Wyatt, isn’t he the guy with the 12-inch …..? Yes, I bet those videos are highly “educational”.
The Wyatt Archeological Museum shares an abandoned gas station on I-65 with “David Rives Ministries.” It’s apparently where Li’l Davey produces his videos, or at least distributes them.
How ridiculous. If this is an older story, how did they borrow from scripture?
makagutu ponders—
Mysterious Ways™. And don’t you go confounding the issue with reason and logic, see? 😉
Seems to me Mr Lie’s explanations are getting more and more desperate and ever increasingly absurd. Can’t help feeling he may have something on his mind. The $9 million shortfall in his ridiculous Ark Project, maybe.
Noah’s Ark found by Ron Wyatt in eastern Turkey!
Really?
Uhm, sorry, no. (Just in case that first website in all its garish glory wasn’t enough of a giveaway.)
If everything written on cuneiform tablets is “history,” then we should also accept that Marduk defeated the monster Tiamat and created the cosmos by splitting her body in two…
@con-tester
Awesome website. Bullet point #8 is priceless.
Con-Tester links to: “Noah’s Ark found by Ron Wyatt in eastern Turkey!”
Yeah. I wrote about it at the time: Noah’s Ark Discovery: Competition Among Kooks.
Abject apologies, Curmy, for, er, raising an old wreck. My comment was a response to the first one by ruffusmd in this thread and my first instinct was to reach for Google. I should’ve known better than to presume that our ever-vigilant Curmudgeon would miss an opportunity to cast a few mordant broadsides at so momentous a discovery.
Paul S, yup, it’s a howler. Makes you wonder whether Ken Hambug drew inspiration from a Babylonian role model with a keen business sense for milking the gullible, one hailing from Hamopotamia maybe.