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According to the bible, are satyrs real, or a myth?
In 2 Chronicles 11:15 (NASB) Jeroboam was prostletizing around, and this is casually mentioned:
"He set up priests of his own for the high places, for the satyrs and for the calves which he had made."
Didja catch that? "for the SATYRS and for the calves which he had made."
Remember: This is OLD TESTAMENT. That means Ancient Hebrew, without spaces, punctuation, chapter or verse. No vowels. No verb tese (no future or past tense). And NO NUMBERS!!!
The next "verse" is "Those from all the tribes of Israel who set their hearts on seeking the Lord God of Israel [b]followed them to Jerusalem, to sacrifice to the Lord God of their fathers."
So, since the ORIGINAL didn't HAVE a way of distinguishing between letters and numbers, It COULD be the two verses are COMBINED as so:
"He set up priests of his own for the high places, for the satyrs and for the calves which he had."
"Make those from all the tribes of Israel who set their hearts on seeking the Lord God of Israel follow them to Jerusalem, to sacrifice to the Lord God of their fathers. "
In the first (perfectly legit translation) it SORT of kind of implies Jeroboam "made up" the satyrs he's preaching to. In the second, not so much.
Discuss.
3 Answers
- EnguerarrardLv 76 years ago
If your bible is not a direct translation from the Hebrew, then you are mistaken in your chain of thought. Satyrs were part of the Greek world, which became part of the Jewish world when Alexander the Great conquered the region. If the source was a Greek version of the OT (there are several), this would no be surprising. Also, the satyrs might be statues of satyrs. That too would have disturbed Jews a lot.
- username_hiddenLv 76 years ago
It doesn't say Jeroboam was preaching, it says he set up priests. The main job of a priest is not to preach, it is to offer sacrifices. And 'high places' generally refers to altars where sacrifices were offered to the pagan Gods. So what the quote says, in effect, is that Jeroboam appointed priests to offer sacrifices to the pagan gods who were represented by idols in the form of satyrs and calves. The phrase 'which he had made' indicates that these were idols - just as the Israelites made an idol of a golden calf when they were in the desert.
- 6 years ago
context is king
"the priests and Levites from all their districts throughout Israel sided with him (Rehoboam). 14 The Levites even abandoned their pasturelands and property and came to Judah and Jerusalem, because Jeroboam and his sons had rejected them as priests of the Lord 15 when he appointed his own priests for the high places and for the goat and calf idols he had made.
So according to the context, the priests stopped looking Jeroboam as a leader because he had set up idols. It is not as you imply that a idolotary is encouraged.
Satyrs were not real creatures, they were idols that were made by people
