Frank Greenall: Fiction, fact or bit of both?

"The t'ings dat yo' li'ble
To read in de Bible,
It ain't necessarily so."

IT'S 80 YEARS since George Gershwin penned those lyrics for Porgy and Bess, and most Christians now probably wouldn't argue the point too strongly. Even the 1611 King James-authorised English version is but a relatively recent descendant of Greek and Latin translations of biblical Hebrew and Aramaic documents, to name but a few. No surprise, if things got a bit fudged en route.

Even though the Bible didn't mention the dinosaurs, there's no doubting its value as an historical document, particularly if interpreted in wider contexts.

Take the story of the 10 plagues visited on the Egyptian pharaoh by the Hebrew God to persuade him to let the Hebrews depart Egypt - the boils, the pest infestations, the cattle dying, rivers of blood, etc. The plagues, as described, are pretty much the story of what is normal practice in the aftermath of violent major volcanic eruptions. The relatively recent 1980 eruption of Mount St Helen's in the US is a case in point.

This was a massive explosion with roughly the power of a 50-megatonne bomb. It devastated thousands of square kilometres with billions of tonnes of toxic volcanic debris and ash, wiping out local bird and animal life. Only the isolation spared a corresponding huge loss of human life. The acidic ash caused people living hundreds of kilometres away to suffer skin lesions and infections. Livestock were decimated through either inhaling or ingesting the same. Extensive waterways were similarly poisoned, rendering the water foetid and killing fish and marine life. Thousands of hectares of crops and pastoral land downwind from the explosion were also destroyed.

The sudden elimination of predators in turn allowed insects and creatures in embryonic form - and thus protected from the immediate fall-out - to emerge at a later stage unopposed. Soon there were swarming infestations of frogs, mosquitos, flies and all manner of other bugs. All in all, a catalogue of damage and destruction uncannily similar to that which plagued the pharaoh.

Coincidence? Maybe not. Recent archaeological and geological investigations have confirmed a massive volcanic eruption occurred in the Mediterranean at roughly the same time that the events of Exodus, round about 1360BC. The island of Thera (now Santorini) was blown apart in an explosion six times more powerful than Krakatoa's, which was 20 times Mount St Helen's!

The stupendous volume of debris ejected would have kept the skies darkened for weeks in another plague-like effect. And because the bedrock of Thera was rich in iron oxide, the rivers of Egypt would have run red from the fallout - rivers of "blood". Volcanic debris would have rained from the skies as "hail". Seabed excavations confirm wind swept the fallout straight towards Egypt.

Writers like Graham Phillips also speculate that the catastrophe would have rendered all aspects of Egypt's everyday life temporarily dysfunctional, perhaps creating the opportunity for the mass breakout by the Hebrews. Further, the continuing backwashes from the huge tsunamis may also have contributed to fortuitous "parting" seas, particularly in an estuarine area on Egypt's north coast known then as the Sea of Reeds, but later mistranslated as the Red Sea.

Similarly, the pillars of cloud and fire said to "guide" the Hebrews were witnessed in the aftermath of Krakatoa - massive plumes of thermonuclear debris that glowed at night for weeks afterwards.

The natural sequence of plague-like after-effects of volcanic explosions is different to that related in the Bible. But we all know how much a story can change in just one lap of the dinner table in a parlour game of Chinese whispers. Many years of yarning around the hearth or campfire can work wonders in turning a prosaic - albeit momentous - chain of events into tales of mounting suspense and epic nation-building triumphs, with God indubitably on your side.

-Frank Greenall has a master's degree in adult literacy and managed Far North Adult Literacy before moving to Wanganui.