Bible specifies good medical and hygienic practices (Talk.Origins)

Claim CH135:


 * The Bible describes medical and sanitary practices remarkable for the time. It says you should bury your excrement [Deut. 23:13]. It requires people to wash themselves after touching a dead body [Numbers 19:11-22]. It notes that the eighth day after birth is the safest time to perform circumcisions [Gen. 17:12;Lev. 12:2-3].

Source:
 * Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1985. Life--How Did It Get Here? Brooklyn, NY, p. 204-206.

CreationWiki response:

True, but accuracy on many points supports overall accuracy.

Actually Talk Origins has the reference is wrong. The correct one is Genesis 30:37-43. Aside from that Talk Origins is correct, that the passage is describing a breeding program based on sympathetic magic, but they have left out the fact that the Bible is simply describing what Jacob did and that it does not endorse it or indicate a real cause and effect relationship. On the contrary Genesis 31:10-13 shows that God was controlling the results not Jacob's actions.

Reference: Mr. Green Genes?

Actually, it is about both, in that it serves both purposes. The religious uncleanness is a stated reason but God established it in part for purposes of hygiene. Furthermore having a religious reason given does not change the fact that burying excrement would be good hygiene.

Here is another case of Talk Origins making a baseless claim even though it is from another source. There's no hint of this in the passage.

Talk Origins is correct that this is a purely ritual purification having nothing to do with hygiene. They show their bias however by calling it a superstitious taboo. It also needs to be noted that there is no evidence of contact between ancient Israel and Polynesian Islands. This was about religious purification with no evidence of superstition connected to it. Deuteronomy 23:9-14 is describing a war time situation. Any clean water that was available would be needed for drinking, and wandering around outside that camp looking for a place for burying feces downhill from drinking water would be dangerous. Simply burying the feces would be the most practical way of dealing with it.

True, except when it is said to have come personally from God.