Creation and the Greeks

If you listen to the professors who currently parade on campus, they will tell you the ancient Greeks didn't know anything about the creator God revealed to us in the Bible and especially in the book of Genesis. In a recent course from TTC, David Roochnik (in a series on Plato's Republic) assures us that Plato didn't know anything about the God of the bible. (He compares the concept of the 'good' with the the biblical idea of God.) This is the story that students are being given; and have been for at least a couple generations I guess. (In the last year or two I've heard this from Joseph Koterski and from Peter Kreeft.) I believe this is modern myth making, and is utterly false.

My main reason for believing this notion is false is that it flatly contradicts what the bible says. Genesis makes it clear that all mankind had a single parenting couple. It makes clear the whole world was repopulated after the Flood from a single family. If this is true it's nonsense to claim the Greeks didn't know of the creator Noah talked about. (It's common to speak of the Greeks as if they popped up from under a rock, but they clearly can be traced back to earlier groups in the middle east.) It not only contradicts the bible to believe the Greeks were ignorant of a creator God, it violates common sense and what we know of history.

Our secular (Humanist) professors like to pretend the Greeks didn't have knowledge of earlier civilizations because they want everyone to believe that the Greeks invented all things. (Over the years I'm sure I've heard one or another professor credit the Greeks with the invention of all things.) They do this because they want their students to believe that its Humanism (autonomous reason, working independently of god's revelation) that is responsible for everything good thing on earth. This story is a myth; and worse than this it's an intellectual scandal. The Greeks were well aware of the knowledge of earlier civilizations (the Egyptian, the Babylonian, etc.) and stole from them liberally. (You notice they weren't big on footnotes, the Greeks, and that they refused to give anyone credit for the ideas they stole.) The Greeks (of the Periclean age let's say) travelled widely... and had for centuries. It's ridiculous to pretend they didn't know of ancient Israel, of Abraham, of Job and of Noah. It's ridiculous to say they weren't aware of the Genesis account of creation. (Both in the form written down by Moses, and in earlier accounts.)

Just recently I came across the following ancient 'hymn' while reading 'In the minds of men' by Ian Taylor.
'Pettinato provides the translation to this remarkable hymn of praise written, it will be recalled, a thousand years before the biblical text and thus completely refuting the notion of oral tradition:
"Lord of heaven and earth
the earth was not, you created it
the light of the day was not, you created it,
the morning light you had not (yet) made exist."
(Pettinato 1981, 244)
- are we supposed to believe the Greeks were unaware of such hymns?

One day all this professorial Greek worship will come to an end, and the people who perpetuated the myth will be in disgrace. The idea the ancient Greeks didn't know the creator will be exposed for the deliberate campaign of deceit it is. The idea the Greeks invented all things will simply be laughed at.

Notes;
1. Arthur Custance makes a case for Monotheism being the view held by the most ancient peoples in; Doorway paper #34. (From monotheism to polytheism)
2. 'In the Minds of Men' - Ian Taylor/ch. 14. (Online here)
3. I remember reading once that 'Jewish' traders had established themselves in Greece, long before the time of Socrates, but I'm afraid I can't find the reference.
4. I believe the Greeks went (very early on in their existence as a people) from a belief in the true creator God, to a debauched polytheism, to a rejection of that polytheism to agnosticism and even materialism. (The so called Greek gods seem much more like characters out of a satiric play than anything else. It's hard to imagine anyone ever believed they had real existence.)
5. This is speculation on my part, but are we supposed to believe that the idea 'all is water' wasn't influenced by Genesis? Are we supposed to believe that the dialogues of Plato weren't 'influenced' by the book of Job? Isn't Plato's idea of the forms just a secularized version of the creation account?
6. One day someone will write a book refuting the 'groupie' adulation of the Greeks, and become world famous. (I hope it will be you.)