Just Genesis

David Plotz on Genesis One

2009-12-06T20:41:00.002-05:00

David Plotz, writing for Slate Magazine, blogs on the Bible. His comments on Genesis are often hilarious. Here's a sample:

You'd think God would know exactly what He's doing, but He doesn't. He's a tinkerer. He tries something out—what if I move all the water around so dry land can appear? He checks it out. He sees "that it was good." Then He moves on to the next experiment—how about plants? Let's try plants.

This haphazardness may be why Creation seems so out of order. If God made light on the first day, what was giving the light, since the sun doesn't appear until the fourth day? And God tackles the major geological and astronomical features during the first two days—light, sky, water, earth. But Day 3 is a curious interruption—plant creation—that is followed by a return to massive universe-shaping projects on Day 4 with the sun, moon, and stars. The plant venture is a tangent—like putting a refrigerator into a house before you've put the roof on.

Does the Lord love insects best? They're so nice He made them twice: On Day 5 He makes "the living creatures of every kind that creep." Three verses, and 24 hours later, He makes "all kinds of creeping things of the earth."

"Creeping" is all over these last few verses of Creation. God tells His newly minted man and woman that they rule over world and its creatures, including, as the King James puts it—"every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." What a superb phrase! It's perfect for insects, terrorists, and children.

Genesis One a Mistranslation?

2009-11-26T09:17:00.002-05:00

It’s a few days now since we ran the story of Old Testament scholar Professor Ellen van Wolde claiming that the start of the book of Genesis was based on a mistranslation and God didn’t “create” the world, but (simply!) “spatially separated” Heaven and Earth.

The comment thread to that story has, depressingly and predictably, broadly divided between Creationists saying something like “God still made it all” and secularists going “Told you so – it’s all a fairy story”.

It has to be said that the good Professor didn’t really aid her case by adding some really breathtaking silliness by way of commentary. Try this:

“There was already water. There were sea monsters. God did create some things, but not the Heaven and Earth. The usual idea of creating-out-of-nothing, creatio ex nihilo, is a big misunderstanding….The traditional view of God the Creator is untenable now.”

Phew, thanks Prof. I think that’s cleared up the mystery of creation once and for all.

Actually, I think her etymological point about the translation is fascinating. She just shouldn’t have gone off on one, as though she had a seat at top table in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

Read it all here.

Faith of the Fathers. Our Faith Too!

2009-11-25T07:53:00.006-05:00

There is considerable evidence for what I have termed "the Afro-Asiatic Dominion" in which Abraham and his ancestors were rulers. These rulers were regarded as semi-divine beings and they exercised great power over their subjects, and for the large part controlled the major water systems in their territories. Their priests were responsible for the diffusion of the Afro-Asiatic worldview and cosmology across a vast expanse from modern Nigeria to Nepal. I have documented this information for readers at Just Genesis over the past two years.

The connection of Abraham's people to Nigeria was not a difficult one to establish. Most readers imagine that they are reading about the children of Adam and Eve when they read the 'begats' of Genesis 4 and 5. However, analysis of this material reveals that the blood line was traced through Cain and Seth's wives, the daughters of an African chief name Nok (Enoch, Ha' Nok or nakh which means "the powerful" in Egyptian). The Nok civilization predates the Chaldeans by at least 4000 years.

The hard part of the research was finding evidence for the rule of Afro-Asiatic chiefs in the lands between Nok and Abraham's people in Canaan and Haran. That piece of the puzzle has fallen in place with the discoveries of the ancestral tombs at el-Kirru in Sudan. The archaeological, linguistic and anthropological evidence connects the Kushite rulers with Abraham's Horite people.

What is the significance of this research?

First, it helps us to understand that Abraham and his people were rulers, not commoners. They were a noble people whose rulers preserved their royal bloodline through a unique pattern of intermarriage. I have shown that this pattern continues unbroken from the time of Cain and Seth (Gen. 4 and 5) to Jesus Christ.

Second, it also helps us understand that the Horite belief that a Son of God would come into the world dates to many thousands of years ago. The Bible is the testimony of people of faith, but not just any faith. It is the record of a people who lived in expectation of the appearing of a Son of God who would destroy the cosmic serpent and restore paradise. Their pattern of intermarriage remained unchanged because they believed that the Son of God would be born of their bloodline.

We must read Genesis as the account of these people. In fact, we must read the entire Bible as a trustworthy witness to the faith of our Afro-Asiatic fathers.

God's African Ancestors

2009-11-18T16:10:00.016-05:00

Shown at right: Statue of Nehesi in Nubia/Kush. Kush was also called Ta-Nuhusi.

Alice C. Linsley

Religious belief is conditioned by the faith tradition which we receive from our parents, grandparents and, if we are to believe Jung’s theory of the collective consciousness, from our ancient ancestors. The Bible articulates this notion in this phrase: “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” And the expectation of the coming Christ was preserved through a long line of priests who were kin to Abraham, the "father of faith."

The ancestry of Jesus Christ our God is not a matter of private revelation. His coming was foretold from the beginning of time. Those to whom God declared that He should be born of their bloodline, lived in expectation of His coming for many millennia. His appearance on earth was announced by the unique conjunction of the king planet (Jupiter) and the king star (Regulus). Indeed all of the created order speaks of the God-Man Jesus Christ, so we should not be surprised when we find signs pointing to Christ in God’s handiwork. St. Paul recognized that all creation makes God’s nature known to us so that all are without excuse when they deny or ignore Him.

An anthropological study of the ancestors of Christ our God reveals that great attention has been paid to the matter of His coming. Most people have not attempted to deny or ignore Him. Almost universally, people have yearned for the benefits of His Incarnation and his shed blood.

It is fitting that attention should be paid to Christ's ancestors and to the evidence that His ancestors included Africans. It is interesting how consistently Africa is ignored when investigating the etiology of biblical practices such as circumcision and the linguistic connections between biblical words and the African languages.

Consider the names Nim and Lot, both Egyptian names, yet neither has been identified as such by biblical scholars. Rulers in Egypt with the name Lot include Iuwelot, Nimlot and Takelot. Egypt is the origin of the biblical names Nim-rod and Lot. Nimlot C was the High Priest of Amun at Thebes during the latter part of the reign of his father Osorkon II. He died before the end of his father's reign since his son Takelot F (king Takelot II) succeeded him as High Priest of Amun towards the end of Osorkon II's reign. This secession is established from the reliefs of Temple J at Karnak which depicts Takelot F as the priest-dedicant at a ceremony and mentions the ruling pharaoh as Osorkon II. Temple J has been dated to the final years of Osorkon II's reign in Tanis (which ended in 837 BC).

The Egyptian word nakh means "the powerful." Ha-Noch, the name of Reuben's first-born son is more a title than a proper name. It should be rendered something like "the Chief." Likewise, the Egyptian anoch can be rendered both Ha-Noch and Enoch. Nakh can also be rendered simply as Nok.

The biblical names Seth and Noah are equivalent to the Egyptian names Set and Nu and there are Egyptian stories in which the principal characters have these names.

Jesus Christ's ancestors were Afro-Asiatics. They spoke Afro-Asiatic languages which include Akkadian, Amharic, ancient Egyptian, Arabic, Aramaic, Assyrian, Babylonian, Berber, Chadic, Ethiopic, Hahm, Hausa, Hebrew, Kushitic, Meroitic, Omotic, Phoenician, and Ugaritic. Twelve of these language groups are spoken by populations in Africa. Christ our God spoke Aramaic, a language that shares many roots with the African languages Tigrina, Tigre, Amharic and the older Ge’ez.

Places associated with clans and rulers in Genesis are found only in Africa - Nok (Enoch), Kano (Cain), Ham, Bor' nu (Land of Noah), Terah, and the Jebu tribe (biblical Jebusites). Elephantine, at the border between Egypt and Sudan, was known to the ancient Egyptians as Yebu, the linguistic equivalent of Jebu. Some of these names appear also in Canaan: Terah, Jebu, Sheba, and Hor are among them. Jerusalem was a Jebusite city in the time of Abraham and Abraham paid tribute to that city’s ruler-priest, Melchizedek. Abraham’s Horite people apparently had kin-based alliances with the Jebusites. Both Horites and Jebusites were closely allied with the ancient Egyptians. Abdi-hepa ruled Jerusalem three centuries before its conquest by David. His name is Egyptian. (Hepa, Hap, or Hapi was a predynastic name for the Nile.) The first mention of Jerusalem, not surprisingly, is found in ancient Egyptian texts.

We also have the evidence of the four rivers mentioned as being at the heart of the Afro-Asiatic Dominion: the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Pishon and the Gihon. The last two are in Africa. Clearly there are two distinct traditions concerning the location of the garden, one African and the other Asiatic. The view that Eden was at the western border of Iran is based on the location of the Tigris and Euphrates. Yet we are explicitly told in Genesis 2:10-14 that the Gihon flowed through all the land of Ethiopia and the Pishon "skirts the whole land of Havilah". Havilah was a son of Kush (Gen. 10:7) and the "Kushites" lived in the upper Nile region and Sudan. So two rivers are in Mesopotamia and represent the Asiatic tradition while the other two rivers are in Africa and represent the African tradition. Both traditions are preserved in Genesis, but obviously the garden can't have been in both places. So where was it? If we accept that God drove the man out of the garden toward the east and the garden was west of Noah's homeland near Lake Chad, we must consider Nigeria as the likely location of the garden. So, we may speculate that some of Christ's ancestors came out of Nigeria.

Institutions and practices that characterize Abraham’s people are also distinctively African. These include the practice of circumcision (both male and female). To understand the cultural context of male and female circumcision we must recognize that Africans assign firm structure to males and softness and fluidity to females. It is important that women be less like men and men less like women (one reason that homosex is abhorred in traditional African societies.) In Africa, a family's honor is vested in the conduct of its women. Femininity is stressed and Pharaonic circumcision is seen as an enhancement of the woman’s femininity, potential fertility and purity. Likewise male circumcision was seen as an enhancement of maleness, potency and purity. The complement to the circumcised male is a circumcised female. The practice of female circumcision is not specifically mentioned in the Bible, but that may be because the female aspect is often hidden.

The African view is different from the binary exhibit of Hinduism in which both the lingam (male organ) and the yoni (female organ) are displayed. In the African tradition, phallic pillars (show right) are never displayed with the female organ. The female organ is always covered or hidden, pointing to the biblical distinction between revealed and hidden.

The institution of priest is distinctively African also. Sheba-qo’s son Hori-makhet, was high priest in Thebes. Hori is related to the Egyptian word harwa (priest) and is the linguistic equivalent of Horus and Horite. The term Horite can't be taken anachronistically when speaking of Abraham's ancestors, who were devotees of Horus, who they regarded as the “Son of God.” In African caste systems priests are always in the higher caste. Among the Mande of western Africa the highest caste are called the Horon, although few in this caste are priests. Most are warriors, farmers, animal breeders and fishermen.

As is evident today in traditional African religion, there are orders of priests, each assigned specific duties at the shrines. The Khar (Egyptian word for Horite) order of priests was responsible for providing fuel for the burnt offerings/sacrifices. Joseph's family lived in Nazareth which was the home of the eighteenth division of priests, that of Happizzez (1 Chronicles 24:15). The idea that only the Levites were priests simply isn't supported by the evidence of Scripture.

Rulers married the daughters of priests who served them. Joseph, Jacob's first-born son by Rachel, married Asenath, daughter of a priest of the Egyptian shrine at Heliopolis. Likewise, Moses married the daughter of a priest of Midian and his second wife was likely the daughter of a Kushite priest. Kush was known by many names, including Ta-Kash, Ta-Seti, Ta-Nuhusi and Ta-Kensat. In 747 B.C., a ruler named Kash united Lower Nubia as far as the Egyptian border at Aswan.

There were twenty-four priestly divisions after the construction of the Second Temple. Nineteen of these divisions are listed in Nehemiah 12:10-22. In the Nehemiah list we find these names of particular interest: Joachim, Joseph, and Mattenai. These are the names of priests who married the daughters of priests and from these lines came John the Baptist, Joseph, Mary and Jesus, the Incarnate Son of God.

Joachim is the name of Mary’s father, which is one reason that scholars believe that Mary was the virgin daughter of a priest. Hippolytus writing in the early third century, records that Mary’s mother was a daughter of a priest named Matthan. This means that Mary was of a priestly line. According to the custom of her noble African ancestors, Mary married into a priestly line when she became Joseph’s wife. Joseph was the grandson of the priest Mattenai (Matthew 1:16).

Genesis Through the Lens of Anthropology

2009-11-12T21:18:00.004-05:00

Alice C. Linsley

Biblical anthropology, like biblical archaeology, uses the Bible as a resource in advancing knowledge of the Ancient Near Eastern and Ancient African peoples and cultures. There is nothing extraordinary about this venture, except that it requires reading the Bible differently than would a preacher or a theologian.

Much of what I write in this field is not well received by preachers and theologians who generally conceive of Christianity as being established by Jesus (as Islam was established by Mohammed). They recognize that Jesus and his original followers were Jewish, but they are astonished and often angry when faced with anthropological evidence indicating that Jesus represents a very ancient religious tradition which held the key features of Christianity long before Jesus was born. As I have argued, Christianity is an organic religion, the origins of which are recognized before Abraham's time.

To give an example of how differently an anthropologist reads the Bible, consider the “begats” of Genesis 4 and 5. Most readers of the Bible skip over this list of first-born sons because they find the names difficult and the information boring. An anthropologist, on the other hand, will look here for clues as to the kinship pattern of these Afro-Asiatic rulers. This involves doing diagrams, which I execute following E.L. Schusky’s Manual for Kinship Analysis.

The Genesis genealogical information indicates that Abraham's ancestors came out of west central Africa. Verification of this comes from many related disciplines, but most recently from the archaeological studies of the ancient Sudanese rulers who became the black pharaohs of Egypt. These rulers' names have parallels in the Bible and their monuments and royal burial grounds are being studied rather extensively.Meroitic had an honorary suffix - qo - as in the names Sheba-qo and Shebit-qo. These are linguistically equivalent to the biblical name Sheba, an ancestor of Abraham and his cousin-wife Keturah. Sheba is one of the rulers listed in Genesis 10. He is a descendent of Ham and we know from the Genesis genealogical information that Ham's line intermarried with the descendents of Shem.

An anthropologist also pays attention to details such as sacred mountains and sacred trees and their locations. We note that the Oak of Moreh is called “the navel of the earth” in Judges 9:37. Moreh means oracle or prophet. Deborah is said to have ruled Israel from her palm half way “between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim.” This sheds light on the origins of the word Torah which means 'that which is thrown by the hand' of the Moreh. In Genesis 12:6, we read that upon his arrival in Canaan Abraham sought guidance from the oracle when he pitched his tent at the Oak of Moreh. The word "Torah", usually rendered guidance or instruction, is also associated with a prophet sitting under a tree.

An anthropologist is always seeking data. Without data there can be no hypotheses. Without hypotheses there can be no conclusions. Sometimes the data suggest a hypothesis which requires investigation in other disciplines such as linguistics. This often proves a fruitful avenue since the Afro-Asiatic languages share many common roots and these languages were spoken by people living from west central Africa to the Indus River Valley. Afro-Asiatic languages include Akkadian, Amharic, ancient Egyptian, Arabic, Aramaic, Assyrian, Babylonian, Berber, Chadic, Kushitic, Ethiopic, Hahm, Hausa, Hebrew, Omotic, Phoenician, and Ugaritic.

So an anthropologist will not be surprised to find that the word ‘Sakti’ = wine in Tantric use at the harvest moon celebration, is the linguistic equivalent of the Falasha word ‘Sarki’ = harvest moon festival. Sarki also means ruler among the people of Kano (Nigeria) who today are called the Kanuri (descendents of Cain). Sarki are also a people group who live in the Orissa Province of India. Sarki also live as ‘Haruwa’ in the Tarai region of Nepal. The word Haruwa is equivalent to the ancient Egyptian word ‘Harwa”, meaning priest.

Another word for priest is the Hebrew ‘Kohen’, equivalent to the Arabic ‘Khouri’ or ‘Kahin’ and the Persian ‘Kaahen’ or ‘Kaahenaat’ which is translated "timeless being". This word ‘Kahenat’ means priest in the Ethiopian Church. According to rabbinic tradition Moses had three brothers: Aaron, Hur and Korah. All three brothers were priests. And Moses married a Kushite bride, not unusual for Egyptian rulers of that time.

The Hebrew ‘yasuah’ = salvation, corresponds to the Sanskrit words ‘asvah’, ‘asuah’ or ‘yasuah’ = salvation. The Hebrew root ‘thr’ = to be pure, corresponds to the Hausa/Hahm ‘toro’ = clean, and to the Tamil ‘tiru’ = holy. All are related to the proto-Dravidian ‘tor’ = blood.

Maps are an extremely valuable tool for anthropologists, and for biblical anthropologists there are more available than one could imagine. These must be studied so that places associated with clans and rulers can be identified. Interestingly, most of the key names in Genesis do not turn up in Mesopotamia, but in Africa - Nok (Enoch), Kano (Cain), Ham, Bor'nu (Land of Noah), and the Jebu tribe (biblical Jebusites). Elephantine, at the border between Egypt and Sudan, was known to the ancient Egyptians as Yebu, the linguistic equivalent of Jebu according to THE DIPLOMATISTS HANDBOOK FOR AFRICA by Count Charles Kinsky.

With this additional information a biblical anthropologist can begin to construct a picture of the religious life and cosmology of Abraham’s people. There were orders of priests long before the Levitical priesthood. The khar (Egyptian word for Horite) order was responsible for providing the fuel used in burnt offerings. Priests were circumcised and clean shaven. There was great emphasis on their ritual purity which included bathing in cold water several times a day.

Rulers had multiple wives, both half-sisters and patrilineal cousins. These were regarded as the wives of the deity and received special honors. Most were the daughters of priests, as was the case with Joseph's wife Asenath.

Rulers were attended by their personal priests. So Moses was attended by a priest at his right and at his left while he oversaw the battle with the Amalekites. The priests were Aaron and Hur (named for Horus), Moses’ brothers.

This brief overview of what I do should explain what is meant by “Biblical Anthropology” and I hope it will encourage some younger readers to consider working in this field. It is truly wide open!

Kushite and Horite Rulers Linked

2009-11-07T05:30:00.015-05:00

Alice C. Linsley

The Genesis genealogical information indicates that Abraham's ancestors came out of west central Africa. Verification of this comes from many related disciples, but most recently from the archaeological studies of the ancient Sudanese rulers who became the black pharaohs of Egypt. These rulers' names have parallels in the Bible and their monuments and royal burial grounds are being studied rather extensively.

Meroitic had an honorary suffix - qo - as in the names Sheba-qo and Shebit-qo. These are linguistically equivalent to the biblical name Sheba, an ancestor of Abraham and his cousin-wife Keturah.

Sheba is one of the rulers listed in Genesis 10. He is a descendent of Ham and we know from the Genesis genealogical information that Ham's line intermarried with the descendents of Shem.

The Sheba-qo Stone, while containing many gaps, reveals a belief in Memphis as the sacred center [1] and the Creator God's residence. Sheba-qo’s double crown is shown on the stone and parts of his Horus name. So once again we have evidence linking the House of Sheba and Abraham’s Horite people.

Sheba-qo was buried in his ancestral cemetery at el-Kurru which is in Sudan. The prevalent theory is that his Pharaonic burial represents the introduction of Egyptian culture to the Sudan, but is may well be that cultural influences came from Sudan to Thebes and Memphis after Piye united the separate kingdoms.

Piye of Nubia (Piankhy) defeated the armies of Tefnakht of Sais (Twenty-fourth Dynasty), captured Memphis, and subdued the princes of Lower Egypt, restoring the status quo to that area. Piye's Twenty-fifth Dynasty has been the subject of speculation among Egyptologists who do not agree on the timeline of this Kushite succession.

All recognize that Piye's successors were Sheba-qo [2], Shebit-qo, and Tahar-qo and they also agree that each ruled from a different shrine city. Why would they rule from different cities? This would not have impressed upon their subjects that their father had forged a single kingdom. Wouldn't the establishment of a single capital city symbolize that unity better than three capitals?

The theory that each succeeded to the throne upon the death of the former ruler gives us this timeline:

716 BC: Piye dies; Sheba-qo becomes ruler of Kush and Egypt
710 BC: Sheba-qo moves his capital from Napata to Thebes
702 BC: Sheba-qo dies; Shebit-qo becomes ruler of Kush and Egypt
701 BC: Shebit-qo forms alliance with kingdoms of Israel against Assyrian threat
690 BC: Shebit-qo dies; Tahar-qo becomes ruler of Kush and Egypt; moves capital to Memphis
684 BC: Tahar-qo begins building temple to Amon-Re at Kawa
680 BC: Tahar-qo builds temple to Mut at Gebel Barkal in Nubia
671 BC: Assyrians defeat Tahar-qo and capture Memphis [3]
664 BC: Tahar-qo withdraws to Napata, builds the Nuri pyramid, the first in one 1000 years
664 BC: Tahar-qo dies; buried in largest known pyramid in Sudan
(From here.)

Based on my kinship research in Genesis, I'd suggest a different scenario, one proposed by Robert Morkot who has written: "It is most likely that there was more than one family group involved in the development of the Kushite state, and that the process was one of mixed military and diplomatic actions cemented by marriage alliances."[4] This assessment is consistent with my findings of 3 ruling priestly clans who intermarry.

Before his death, Piye divided his vast kingdom between his 3 first-born sons, as did Abraham (Gen. 25:6). We know that Piye had more than one wife because they are mentioned in his victory stela. This means that he likely had multiple first-born sons. Each was given his own territory when he came of age and the three had overlapping reigns. This explains the separate capitals. Sheba-qo ruled in Thebes, Shebit-qo ruled in Napata, and Tahar-qo (shown above) ruled in Memphis.

Is there evidence that Kushite rulers divided their territories between first-born sons before their deaths? Yes. The provision of territories for first-born sons predates the Twenty-Fourth Dynasty by about 2000 years. The following statement is found on the Inscription of Pepinakht-Heqaib [5] who lived during the reign of Pepi II (c. 2800 BC): "Never did I judge two brothers in such a way that a son was deprived of his paternal possession."

The Pepinakht-Heqaib inscription appears on the 2 jambs of the facade of his tomb on Elephantine Island [6] near Aswan (ancient Swenet/Syene). From the inscription we surmise that this man judged inheritance disputes between brothers and refused to deprive a rightful heir of his paternal possession. (See the Theme of Two Sons, here.)

NOTES

1. The Oak of Moreh is called “the navel of the earth” in Judges 9:37.

2. Sheba-qo revived the office of high priest, which he awarded to his son Hori-makhet who was high priest in Thebes. Hori is the linguistic equivalent of Horus and Horite. This makes it clear that the term Horite can't be taken anachronistically when speaking of Abraham's ancestors.

3. The Assyrians captured Memphis on 11 July 671. Tahar-qo escaped, but his one of his brothers and his son were taken captive.

4. Robert Morkot, The Black Pharaohs, The Rubicon Press, p. 156.

5. Pepinakht was ennobled (saH) and sanctified a living god (nTr anx) 300 years after his death. As a deified human he was regarded as a mediator between people and the gods.

6. Elephantine stands at the border between Egypt and Nubia/Sudan. It was known to the ancient Egyptians as Yebu which is the linguistic equivalent of Jebu according to THE DIPLOMATISTS HANDBOOK FOR AFRICA by Count Charles Kinsky. This links Elephantine with the Jebusites who controlled the major water systems in what is today Nigeria.

Cain's Murder of Abel

2009-11-05T13:21:00.015-05:00

Alice C. Linsley

Several mid-20th century commentaries on Genesis pose the murder of Abel as a sociological conflict between shepherds (represented by Abel) and farmers (represented by Cain). However, this approach ignores an important point. The name Kayin (Cain) means metal worker. Cain’s offering of the fruits of the earth does not mean that he was a farmer. His association with metal work is further indicated in Genesis 4:20-22 which tells us that Jabal was the ancestor of tent-dwelling herdsmen, Jubal the ancestor of pipers and flautists, and Tubal-Cain the ancestor of metalworkers.

Today the metalworking clans of west central Africa perform all these tasks. For example, the tent-dwelling Inadan [1] keep herds and are responsible for metal work, circumcision, and music at special events. Their chiefs maintain two wives in separate households on a north-south axis (as did Abraham and his forefathers). This suggests that the author’s identification of Jubal, Jabal and Tubal with trades is about the role of a group of clans within a larger society, not about the origin of technologies or a conflict between shepherds and farmers.

What does the murder of Abel have to do with these early clans? The story must be understood in the context of the relationship of the 3 clans. In Genesis 4:2, we are told that Cain is a tiller of the soil, but his name means metalworker. Seth’s trade is not mentioned but his name is that of the jealous son who kills his favored brother in ancient Egyptian mythology. Abel is a shepherd and according to the rabbis, his name (hevel) means vapor or breath. However, his name could also mean El (God) is father, which aligns with the deeper significance of the Cain and Abel story and with the Egyptian myth of Seth and Osiris.

Cain's murder of Abel has parallels to Set's killing of Osiris, the preferred son who the Lord of Creation chose to be Pharaoh. Seth was condemned by the Lord for the murder of his brother. Osiris rose from the dead, married and had a son, Horus, who is called the "son of God". The Horites were his devotees.

It is significant that in both stories there are 3 sons: Seth, Osiris, Horus, and Cain, Seth, Abel. Seth kills the chosen son who rises to life and Cain kills the chosen son, who is the son of the father (ab El) . Abel might also be rendered as ha Bel, meaning “the God”.

That there are 3 sons is important since in Genesis one of the 3 sons - usually the hidden or cut off son - represents the Son of God. Abel is a type or shadow of Jesus Christ [2], the one who offers blood sacrifice and whose blood cries to the Father for justice. We note that the Father's punishment of Cain is mixed with mercy just as Jesus prayed that the Father would show mercy to those who put Him on the Cross. Abel is killed by his own brother outside the camp just as Jesus was killed by his own brethren outside the city.

When people hear the names Cain and Abel, they rarely consider the other brother, Seth, yet Seth's descendents intermarried with Cain's descendents. Abel is the son who was cut off from the earth. Likewise, when people think of Abraham and Nahor, they rarely remember that there was a third brother, Haran, who was cut off from the earth. Typically where two sons [3] are named, there is a hidden or cut-off third son. Cain's punishment of being cut off from his land reflects his crime of cutting off Abel from the earth.

NOTES

1. The Inadan (blacksmith) are a sub-caste of the Taureg of the Sudan and Niger. The men and boys from the Inadan are the only persons permitted to work with fire and metals. The Inadan claim to be kin to King David. Read more here: National Geographic, Aug. 1979, p. 389.

2. For more on the theme of Christ in Genesis, go here.

3. To read more on the theme of 2 sons in Genesis, go here.

Claude Lévi-Strauss RIP

2009-11-04T06:51:00.005-05:00

One of the greatest anthropologist has died. His influence on my research has been profound. He and another Jew, the Arabic-speaking Jacques Derrida, also influenced by Lévi-Strauss, have left vast evidence both ethnographically and intellectually for the binary distinctions that frame Reality and enable us to avoid heresy. The reader will note that Edward Rothstein incorrectly states below that Jacques Derrida rejected the possibility of any "timeless universals". He apparently has not read Derrida's series of lectures given at Villanova University in which Derrida recognizes that there is something at the ontological center (more here).

November 4, 2009
Claude Lévi-Strauss, Anthropologist, Dies at 100

By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN

Claude Lévi-Strauss, the French anthropologist who transformed Western understanding of what was once called “primitive man” and who towered over the French intellectual scene in the 1960s and ’70s, has died at 100.

His son Laurent said Mr. Lévi-Strauss died of cardiac arrest Friday at his home in Paris. His death was announced Tuesday, the same day he was buried in the village of Lignerolles, in the Côte-d’Or region southeast of Paris, where he had a country home.

“He had expressed the wish to have a discreet and sober funeral, with his family, in his country house,” his son said. “He was attached to this place; he liked to take walks in the forest, and the cemetery where he is now buried is just on the edge of this forest.”

A powerful thinker, Mr. Lévi-Strauss was an avatar of “structuralism,” a school of thought in which universal “structures” were believed to underlie all human activity, giving shape to seemingly disparate cultures and creations. His work was a profound influence even on his critics, of whom there were many. There has been no comparable successor to him in France.

And his writing — a mixture of the pedantic and the poetic, full of daring juxtapositions, intricate argument and elaborate metaphors — resembles little that had come before in anthropology.

“People realize he is one of the great intellectual heroes of the 20th century,” Philippe Descola, the chairman of the anthropology department at the Collège de France, said last November in an interview with The New York Times on the centenary of Mr. Levi-Strauss’s birth. Mr. Lévi-Strauss was so revered that at least 25 countries celebrated his 100th birthday.

A descendant of a distinguished French-Jewish artistic family, Mr. Lévi-Strauss was a quintessential French intellectual, as comfortable in the public sphere as in the academy. He taught at universities in Paris, New York and São Paulo and also worked for the United Nations and the French government.

His legacy is imposing. “Mythologiques,” his four-volume work about the structure of native mythology in the Americas, attempts nothing less than an interpretation of the world of culture and custom, shaped by analysis of several hundred myths of little-known tribes and traditions.

The volumes — “The Raw and the Cooked,” “From Honey to Ashes,” “The Origin of Table Manners” and “The Naked Man,” published from 1964 to 1971 — challenge the reader with their complex interweaving of theme and detail.

In his analysis of myth and culture, Mr. Lévi-Strauss might contrast imagery of monkeys and jaguars; consider the differences in meaning of roasted and boiled food (cannibals, he suggested, tended to boil their friends and roast their enemies); and establish connections between weird mythological tales and ornate laws of marriage and kinship.

Many of his books include diagrams that look like maps of interstellar geometry, formulas that evoke mathematical techniques, and black-and-white photographs of scarified faces and exotic ritual that he made during his field work.

His interpretations of North and South American myths were pivotal in changing Western thinking about so-called primitive societies. He began challenging the conventional wisdom about them shortly after beginning his anthropological research in the 1930s — an experience that became the basis of an acclaimed 1955 book, “Tristes Tropiques,” a sort of anthropological meditation based on his travels in Brazil and elsewhere.

The accepted view held that primitive societies were intellectually unimaginative and temperamentally irrational, basing their approaches to life and religion on the satisfaction of urgent needs for food, clothing and shelter.

Mr. Lévi-Strauss rescued his subjects from this limited perspective. Beginning with the Caduveo and Bororo tribes in the Mato Grosso region of Brazil, where he did his first and primary fieldwork, he found among them a dogged quest not just to satisfy material needs but also to understand origins, a sophisticated logic that governed even the most bizarre myths, and an implicit sense of order and design, even among tribes who practiced ruthless warfare.

His work elevated the status of “the savage mind, ” a phrase that became the English title of one of his most forceful surveys, “La Pensée Sauvage” (1962).

“The thirst for objective knowledge,” he wrote, “is one of the most neglected aspects of the thought of people we call ‘primitive.’ ”The world of primitive tribes was fast disappearing, he wrote. From 1900 to 1950, more than 90 tribes and 15 languages had disappeared in Brazil alone. This was another of his recurring themes. He worried about the growth of a “mass civilization,” of a modern “monoculture.” He sometimes expressed exasperated self-disgust with the West and its “own filth, thrown in the face of mankind.”

In this seeming elevation of the savage mind and denigration of Western modernity, he was writing within the tradition of French Romanticism, inspired by the 18th-century philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, whom Mr. Lévi-Strauss revered. It was a view that helped build Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s public reputation in the era of countercultural romanticism in the 1960s and ’70s.

But such simplified romanticism was also a distortion of his ideas. For Mr. Lévi-Strauss, the savage was not intrinsically noble or in any way “closer to nature.” Mr. Lévi-Strauss was withering, for example, when describing the Caduveo, whom he portrayed as a tribe so in rebellion against nature — and thus doomed — that it even shunned procreation, choosing to “reproduce” by abducting children from enemy tribes.

His descriptions of American Indian tribes bear little relation to the sentimental and pastoral clichés that have become commonplace. Mr. Lévi-Strauss also made sharp distinctions between the primitive and the modern, focusing on the development of writing and historical awareness. It was an awareness of history, in his view, that allowed the development of science and the evolution and expansion of the West. But he worried about the fate of the West. It was, he wrote in The New York Review of Books, “allowing itself to forget or destroy its own heritage.”

With the fading of myth’s power in the modern West, he also suggested that music had taken on myth’s function. Music, he argued, had the ability to suggest, with primal narrative power, the conflicting forces and ideas that lie at the foundation of society.

But Mr. Lévi-Strauss rejected Rousseau’s idea that humankind’s problems derive from society’s distortions of nature. In Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s view, there is no alternative to such distortions. Each society must shape itself out of nature’s raw material, he believed, with law and reason as the essential tools.

This application of reason, he argued, created universals that could be found across all cultures and times. He became known as a structuralist because of his conviction that a structural unity underlies all of humanity’s mythmaking, and he showed how those universal motifs played out in societies, even in the ways a village was laid out.

For Mr. Lévi-Strauss, for example, every culture’s mythology was built around oppositions: hot and cold, raw and cooked, animal and human. And it is through these opposing “binary” concepts, he said, that humanity makes sense of the world.

This was quite different from what most anthropologists had been concerned with. Anthropology had traditionally sought to disclose differences among cultures rather than discovering universals. It had been preoccupied not with abstract ideas but with the particularities of rituals and customs, collecting and cataloguing them.

Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s “structural” approach, seeking universals about the human mind, cut against that notion of anthropology. He did not try to determine the various purposes served by a society’s practices and rituals. He was never interested in the kind of fieldwork that anthropologists of a later generation, like Clifford Geertz, took on, closely observing and analyzing a society as if from the inside. (He began “Tristes Tropiques” with the statement “I hate traveling and explorers.”)

To his mind, as he wrote in “The Raw and the Cooked,” translated from “Le Cru et le Cuit” (1964), he had taken “ethnographic research in the direction of psychology, logic, and philosophy.”

In radio talks for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 1977 (published as “Myth and Meaning: Cracking the Code of Culture”), Mr. Lévi-Strauss demonstrated how a structural examination of myth might proceed. He cited a report that in 17th-century Peru, when the weather became exceedingly cold, a priest would summon all those who had been born feet first, or who had a harelip, or who were twins. They were accused of being responsible for the weather and were ordered to repent, to correct the aberrations. But why these groups? Why harelips and twins?

Mr. Lévi-Strauss cited a series of North American myths that associate twins with opposing natural forces: threat and promise, danger and expectation. One myth, for example, includes a magical hare, a rabbit, whose nose is split in a fight, resulting, literally, in a harelip, suggesting an incipient twinness. With his injunctions, the Peruvian priest seemed aware of associations between cosmic disorder and the latent powers of twins.

Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s ideas shook his field. But his critics were plentiful. They attacked him for ignoring history and geography, using myths from one place and time to help illuminate myths from another, without demonstrating any direct connection or influence.

In an influential critical survey of his work in 1970, the Cambridge University anthropologist Edmund Leach wrote of Mr. Lévi-Strauss: “Even now, despite his immense prestige, the critics among his professional colleagues greatly outnumber the disciples.”

Mr. Leach himself doubted whether Mr. Lévi-Strauss, during his fieldwork in Brazil, could have conversed with “any of his native informants in their native language” or stayed long enough to confirm his first impressions. Some of Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s theoretical arguments, including his explanation of cannibals and their tastes, have been challenged by empirical research.

Mr. Lévi-Strauss conceded that his strength was in his interpretations of what he discovered and thought that his critics did not sufficiently credit the cumulative impact of those speculations. “Why not admit it?” he once said to an interviewer, Didier Eribon, in “Conversations with Lévi-Strauss” (1988). “I was fairly quick to discover that I was more a man for the study than for the field.”

Claude Lévi-Strauss was born on Nov. 28, 1908, in Belgium to Raymond Lévi-Strauss and the former Emma Levy. He grew up in France, near Versailles, where his grandfather was a rabbi and his father a portrait painter. His great-grandfather Isaac Strauss was a Strasbourg violinist mentioned by Berlioz in his memoirs. As a child, he loved to collect disparate objects and juxtapose them. “I had a passion for exotic curios,” he says in “Conversations.” “My small savings all went to the secondhand shops.” A large collection of Jewish antiquities from his family’s collection, he said, was displayed in the Musée de Cluny; others were looted after France fell to the Nazis in 1940.

From 1927 to 1932, Claude obtained degrees in law and philosophy at the University of Paris, then taught in a local high school, the Lycée Janson de Sailly, where his fellow teachers included Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. He later became a professor of sociology at the French-influenced University of São Paulo in Brazil.

Determined to become an anthropologist, he began making trips into the country’s interior, accompanied by his wife, Dina Dreyfus, whom he married in 1932. “I was envisaging a way of reconciling my professional education with my taste for adventure,” he said in “Conversations,” adding: “I felt I was reliving the adventures of the first 16th-century explorers.”

His marriage to Ms. Dreyfus ended in divorce, as did a subsequent marriage, in 1946, to Rose-Marie Ullmo, with whom he had a son, Laurent. In 1954 he married Monique Roman, and they, too, had a son, Matthieu. Besides Laurent, Mr. Lévi-Strauss is survived by his wife and Matthieu as well as Matthieu’s two sons.

Mr. Lévi-Strauss left teaching in 1937 and devoted himself to fieldwork, returning to France in 1939 for further study. But on the eve of war, he was drafted into the French Army to serve as a liaison with British troops. In “Tristes Tropiques,” he writes of his “disorderly retreat” from the Maginot Line after Hitler’s invasion of France, fleeing in cattle trucks, sleeping in “sheep folds.”

In 1941, Mr. Lévi-Strauss was invited to become a visiting professor at the New School for Social Research in New York, with help from the Rockefeller Foundation. He called it “the most fruitful period of my life,” spending time in the reading room of the New York Public Library and befriending the distinguished American anthropologist Franz Boas.

He also became part of a circle of artists and Surrealists, including Max Ernst, André Breton and Sartre’s future mistress, Dolorès Vanetti. Ms. Vanetti, who shared his “passion for objects,” Mr. Lévi-Strauss said in “Conversations,” regularly visited an antique shop on Third Avenue in Manhattan that sold artifacts from the Pacific Northwest, leaving Mr. Lévi-Strauss with the “impression that all the essentials of humanity’s artistic treasures could be found in New York."

After the war, Mr. Lévi-Strauss was so intent on pursuing his studies in New York that he was given the position of cultural attaché by the French government until 1947. On his return to France, he earned a doctorate in letters from the University of Paris in 1948 and was associate curator at the Musée de l’Homme in Paris in 1948 and 1949. His first major book, “The Elementary Structures of Kinship,” was published in 1949. (Several years later, the jury of the Prix Goncourt, France’s most famous literary award, said that it would have given the prize to “Tristes Tropiques,” his hybrid of memoir and anthropological travelogue, had it been fiction.)

After the Rockefeller Foundation gave the École Pratique des Hautes Études in Paris a grant to create a department of social and economic sciences, Mr. Lévi-Strauss became the director of studies at the school, remaining in the post from 1950 to 1974.

Other positions followed. From 1953 to 1960, he served as secretary general of the International Social Science Council at Unesco. In 1959, he was appointed professor at the Collège de France. He was elected to the French Academy in 1973. By 1960, Mr. Lévi-Strauss had founded L’Homme, a journal modeled on The American Anthropologist.

By the 1980s, structuralism as imagined by Mr. Lévi-Strauss had been displaced by French thinkers who became known as poststructuralists: writers like Michel Foucault, Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida. They rejected the idea of timeless universals and argued that history and experience were far more important in shaping human consciousness than universal laws.“French society, and especially Parisian, is gluttonous,” Mr. Lévi-Strauss responded.

“Every five years or so, it needs to stuff something new in its mouth. And so five years ago it was structuralism, and now it is something else. I practically don’t dare use the word ‘structuralist’ anymore, since it has been so badly deformed. I am certainly not the father of structuralism.”

But Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s version of structuralism may end up surviving post-structuralism, just as he survived most of its avatars. His monumental four-volume work, “Mythologiques,” may ensure his legacy, as a creator of mythologies if not their explicator.

The final volume ends by suggesting that the logic of mythology is so powerful that myths almost have a life independent from the peoples who tell them. In his view, they speak through the medium of humanity and become, in turn, the tools with which humanity comes to terms with the world’s greatest mystery: the possibility of not being, the burden of mortality.

Walton's 'Lost World of Genesis One'

2009-10-29T20:59:00.021-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

John H. Walton has written an excellent book titled The Lost World of Genesis One which I recommend. In this book Dr. Walton presents Genesis 1 as ancient cosmology and thereby sheds light on the origins debate. He argues that Genesis 1 is about function as understood by the ancient Semites, not about origins. He states, "The truest meaning of a text is found in what the author and hearers would have thought." (p. 43)

He later states, "Believing in the Bible does not require us to reject the findings of biological evolution, though neither does it give us reason to promote biological evolution. Biological evolution is not the enemy of the Bible and theology; it is superfluous to the Bible and theology." (p. 166)

Amen to that! From beginning to end, the Bible is about God with us, a reality which took human flesh in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. He is the new temple, as John explains: "He was speaking of the temple that was His body, and when Jesus rose from the dead, his disciples remembered that He had said this and they believed..." (John 2:21)

Drawing on his knowledge of Hebrew and the ancient Near East, Walton interprets the creation of the cosmos as the inauguration of God's Temple with 7 tiers. Genesis 1:1 tells us: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 'Heavens' is the accurate rendering of the Hebrew 'shamayim' which is a plural form, suggesting a multi-layered or tiered cosmos. When the Apostle Paul speaks of being mystically transported to the third heaven (2 Cor. 12:2), he is interpreting his experience in the context of this ancient worldview. Temples in the ancient Near East were constructed with 7 tiers and where we find the number 7 in Genesis we encounter the thumbprint of temple priests.

Walton insists that there is danger in forcing Genesis 1 into the concordist view of writers such as Hugh Ross. Concordists insist on reconciling Genesis 1 with modern cosmology. Walton makes it clear that this is both unnecessary and dangerous. He writes, "If we accept Genesis 1 as ancient cosmology, then we need to interpret it as ancient cosmology rather than translate it into modern cosmology. If we try to turn it into modern cosmology, we are making the text say something that it never said. It is not just a case of adding meaning (as more information has become available) it is a case of changing meaning. Since we view the text as authoritative, it is a dangerous thing to change the meaning of the text into something it never intended to say." (Read more here.)

I find Walton's research compelling and believe he is correct. He received his Ph.D from Hebrew Union College and is professor of Old Testament at Wheaton College. His background orients him toward the ancient Near East and he does an admirable job of highlighting the parallels between Genesis 1 and the creation narratives of the eastern Afro-Asiatics. In pointing out the parallels with ancient Egyptian cosmology Dr. Walton demonstrates the uniformity of cosmological thought from Africa to Babylon, further evidence for the Afro-Asiatic Dominion.

As an educator I appreciate the final chapter of Walton's book which calls for neutrality in public education on the subject of origins. Bible-believers should not insist that young-earth creationism or Intelligent Design be taught, but we should insist on what Walton calls "metaphysical naturalism" (p. 165). Restoring metaphysics to education would reintroduce the catalyst for the integration of learning, as Dorothy Sayers astutely recognized in her Lost Tools of Learning.

Finally, a word that spoke to my heart in a personal way. Walton wrote, "...we are presumptuous if we consider our interpretations of Scripture to have the same authority as Scripture itself." Lord, never allow me to forget this!

The Curse of Ham

2009-10-28T11:08:00.007-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father's nakedness and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father's nakedness. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father's nakedness. When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, he said, "Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers." He also said, "Blessed be the LORD, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend the territory of Japheth; may Japheth live in the tents of Shem, and may Canaan be his slave. (Gen. 9:20-27)

Noah’s cursing and blessing of his three sons parallels Jacob’s cursing and blessing of his twelve sons at the end of Genesis. The two accounts highlight the reality that fathers are often displeased by the actions of their sons. In both narratives there may also be an element of self-loathing.

There are other interesting similarities as well. Noah was angry because his son Ham had looked upon his nakedness. Jacob was angry because his son Reuben has slept with his concubine. In both cases we find the idea of exposing the father's nakedness. Noah’s curse falls on Canaan, Ham’s son, which is a deflection of guilt. Jacob’s blessing of Joseph’s sons falls on the youngest, a deflection of blessing. The excuse given for Jacob’s behavior is that he was blind. The excuse given for Noah’s behavior is that he was drunk. (The theme of drunken fathers in Genesis is taken up here.)

Another parallel exists between the curse of Canaan and the curse of Cain (Gen. 4:11). Cain’s curse involves his being expelled from his homeland. The curse of Canaan is clearly intended to justify Israel’s conquest of the land of Canaan by the driving out of the inhabitants know as the Canaanites. Although it is clear that some Israelites married Canaanites. Rahab’s marriage to Salmon, of the tribe of Judah, is but one example. More importantly, the Genesis genealogical information makes it clear that the descendents of Ham regularly intermarried with the descendents of Shem.

Since the rulers of the lines of Ham and Shem intermarried, the curse of Ham falls on the descendents of Shem as well. In this sense Noah’s curse falls upon both his Hamitic and Semitic descendents, which is what happens when a father acts out of self-loathing.

The fact that we can’t racially separate the Hamites from the Semites in Genesis underscores the stupidity of claiming the curse involves only people of black or dark-skin. There is no justification of racism in the book of Genesis.

Isaac's Three Sons

2009-10-26T19:59:00.009-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

When I was in seminary, my Old Testament professor told the class that he doubted Isaac’s existence because there is so little information about Isaac. He noted that the story of Isaac pretending that Rebecca was his sister parallels the story of Abraham asking Sarah to say that she is his sister. He concluded that Isaac is a literary construction reflecting the author’s love of doublets. Doublets are duplicate narratives of the same event, which source critics believe is one story told by two or three different authors living during different periods.

My professor also noted the limited genealogical information about Isaac (Yitzak). He is presented as an only son after his half-brother Ishmael was sent away. He has only one wife, unlike his ancestors, and she is barren until God hears Isaac's prayers and she conceives twins.

While I appreciate this professor’s observations, I disagree with his conclusion. Isaac’s historicity can be verified by his adherence to the kinship pattern of his ancestors. We don't find kinship patterns as complex as this surrounding fictional characters. Further, the kinship pattern of Abraham's people reveals a good deal of information about the principle figures of Genesis.

We note that after the binding of Isaac, Abraham and Isaac are found living in Beersheba and it was to Beersheba in the south (Gen. 24:62) that Abraham’s servant brought Rebecca to meet her betrothed. Beersheba was the settlement of Abraham’s wife Keturah. Had Isaac married a half-sister or a cousin other than Rebecca, he would have married someone from the line of Abraham by Keturah. The evidence points to him marrying a daughter of Yishbak. Yishbak was one of Abraham's sons by Keturah.

The evidence for Isaac’s other wife is rather hidden, as is the identity of Abraham’s mother. The final editors of Genesis wanted to preserve the claim of Isaac as the son of promise through whom Israel would claim the Land. It wouldn’t do to admit that Isaac had other children by an Arabian wife of the house of Sheba, or that Abraham’s mother was Canaanite. Yet the kinship pattern of Genesis provides the essential information to draw these conclusions and to justify them on the basis of the text alone.

It is likely that Isaac had other sons and daughters besides Jacob and Esau. It is possible to trace them through the cousin bride’s naming prerogative. Rebecca’s father was Bethuel (Gen. 22:23), a son of Na’Hor, Abraham’s brother. Why didn’t she name her first-born son Bethuel after her father? This is the pattern for those who were to rule. We are given this explanation: Jacob grasped his twin brother’s heel as he was born (Gen. 25:26) “so his name was called Jacob.” It is also possible that Rebecca didn’t name her first-born son after Bethuel because this son was not the one who would rule after Isaac’s death.

Rebecca is central to Isaac’s claim as the heir to Abraham’s territory and to the divine promises, yet she doesn’t name her first-born son after her father, as was the common practice for sons who were to be rulers. This suggests that Isaac had another first-born son by another wife.

How do we track Isaac’s first-born by his other wife? We must look for the hidden third son, which involves looking for linguistic similarity as in the case of Og, Magog and Gog. When we do this, we find these three sons of Abraham: Yitzak (Isaac) by Sarah; Yishmael (Ishmael) by Hagar, and Yishbak (Ishbak) by Keturah. [1]

Yishbak the elder would have had a grandson name Yishbak. This younger Yishbak is the first-born of Isaac by a daughter of Yishbak. She named their first-born son Yishbak after her father, according to the naming prerogative of the cousin bride.

Yishbak’s name means he will leave. He is likely one of the sons to whom Abraham gave gifts before sending them away to the east (Gen. 25:6). Yishbak’s descendants lived in the lands to the east of Canaan. Assyriologist Friedrich Delitzsch identified the name Ishbak with Iasbuk found on cuneiform inscriptions from a land whose king was allied with Sangara of Gargamis (Carchemish) against Assur-nazir-pal and Shalmaneser II (c. 859 B.C.). This Ishbak may have been a descendent of Abraham by Keturah and a descendent of Isaac by Keturah’s granddaughter.

It is fairly safe to conclude then that Isaac had at least three sons and their names were: Jacob, Esau and Yishbak. All three appear to have been rulers over their own territories.

NOTES

1. This pattern is like that of the Kushite rulers. The Kushite ruler Piye united Nubia and Egypt and established the 25th Dynasty. Before his death, Piye divided his kingdom between his 3 first-born sons, whose names are linguistically similar. Shabaqo ruled in Thebes, Shebitqo ruled in Napata, and Taharqo ruled in Memphis. Shabaqo revived the office of high priest, which he awarded to his son Hori-makhet who was high priest in Thebes.

Adam and Eve as Archetypes

2009-10-22T17:36:00.007-04:00

In this short entry, I want to explore the archetypes of Adam, Eve and their relationship. As many readers know, I'm of the opinion that Adam and Eve are archetypes, not historical persons, and I believe that the Genesis genealogical data supports this view.[1]

In the ancient world people didn't make sharp distinctions between mythological and historical. For example, the ancient Egyptians began their official history with a king named "Meni"[2] or Menes. Menes was credited with founding the First dynasty of Egypt, around 3100 BC. He may have been an historical figure or he may be a mythical founder (similar to Romulus and Remus for ancient Rome). We don't know, but that doesn't lessen the significance of his story or minimize the reality of founders of whole civilizations.

Whether historical or archetypal, Adam and Eve are the founders of the human race in biblical parlance. They are the first Father and first Mother, the first Husband-Wife relationship.

It is self-evident that the human race propagates through biological reproduction and this involves a father and a mother. Clearly, at some point in the past there was at least one original set of parents, but their names are not known as they lived many millions of years ago.

The Afro-Asiatics from whom we receive the Bible called the first parents Adam and Eve. These names intend to explain the function of the Father and the Mother. Adam is of the earth/dust yet he lives by the breath of God. He is the one from whom Eve receives her material substance since she is made from his body. Eve is the “mother of all the living” which indicates her function as the birth-giver. The meaning of these names is not prototypal, but archetypal. An archetype has symbolic value. It represents all the others in a group or class, in this case all humanity.

It is genius to use an archetype to represent humanity when there is no knowledge of the prototype of humanity. And the archetype stitches biblical theology together, for without the First Adam (humans in the condition of sin) we would not be able to understand the Second Adam (humans as they are in Christ).

The relationship of Adam and Eve serves as the archetype for the relationship of Christ and His Church, for just as Eve received life through Adam’s body, so the Church receives life through Christ’s Body.

The symbolism is so rich!

Genesis 2:24 says, “For this reason a man will leave his Father and his mother and cleave to his wife…”, so Christ left His Father’s house to become one with His Bride.

The archetypes of Adam, Eve and their relationship gain further dimension when they are explored in the Patriarchal narratives. To receive a kingdom, Abraham had to leave his father’s house. Before Isaac could receive the kingdom from his father, he had to marry.[3] This is why Abraham went to great pains to see that Isaac married before he died. Here is a wonderful mystery: before the Father delivers the Kingdom to the Son, the Son must marry his Bride, the Church.

NOTES

1. Analysis of the Gen. 4 and 5 kinship reveals that the founder of the lines of Cain and Seth is not Adam but Enoch or Nok, the father of their brides.

2. Meni is also the name of a mountain in Niger where Noah's ark may have landed.

3. As Abraham and the rulers of his people had two wives, it is likely that Isaac had a sister-wife in Beersheba as well as Rebekah, his cousin-wife. This was the pattern of the Horite ruler-priests.

Continue Praying for Fr. Nigel Mumford

2009-10-19T07:01:00.006-04:00

Your prayers are requested for Fr Nigel Mumford who has been hospitalized and is in critical condition. He is in ICU and is on oxygen.

The family has requested prayers specifically for the lungs. All are encouraged to pray the passage from Genesis 2:7 “The Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."

Fr. Nigel Mumford is a retired British officer who has a ministry to military personnel. The ministry is called Welcome Home Initiative, and helps returning military and their spouses deal with post-war trauma. He has been working to develop the ministry on a national and international scale. Fr. Mumford and Anglican Bishop Bill Love (Albany, NY) are scheduled to lead a Welcome Home retreat for military personnel and their spouses on Oct 26-28.

Fr. Nigel showed slight improvement on November 2. His oxygen pressure was mildly reduced with no side effects. He continues to be in critical condition and is sedated so please continue to pray for him and his family.

Follow developments at Lent and Beyond.

Was Abraham a Liar?

2009-10-17T17:42:00.007-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

When Abraham asked Sarah to tell Pharaoh that she was his sister, was he asking her to lie? When he told her to “say that you are my sister so that it might go well with me”, was he attempting to deceive? That is the common claim, but one which Scripture doesn’t support and one which we “children of Abraham” should not make.

The passages in question are Gen. 12:10-20; Gen. 20:1-13 and Gen. 26:1-14. E.A. Speiser writes, “All three passages give essentially the same story: a patriarch visits a foreign land in the company of his wife. Fearing that the woman’s beauty might become a source of danger to himself as the husband, the man resorts to the subterfuge of passing himself off as the woman’s brother.” (Anchor Bible Commentary on Genesis, p. 91. Italics mine.)

By this assessment of the wife-sister motif in Genesis, we must assume that Abraham is both a lair and a coward, a troubling picture of the Patriarch who is regarded as the Father of our Faith. While we see evidence that his trust in God grew over time, there is no evidence that Abraham was a liar. Sarah was his half sister.

He explains that Sarah “is really my sister, my father’s daughter though not my mother’s” (Gen. 20:12). This piece of information would surely have caused Pharaoh to ask more questions since kinship was a matter of great concern to rulers. This would have given Abraham the opportunity to explain his people's kinship pattern and since this pattern is unique to ruler-priests of the Horites, Pharaoh would have been forced to recognize Abraham as one to be protected as family. The Horites worshiped Horus (known also as the “Son of God”) and Egypt was the main center of Horus worship.

The Horites (Egyptian 'khar') were likely a tribe of priests (khar was a measurement of fuel used in burnt offerings) whose rulers were careful to marry chaste daughters of priests. Joseph, the first-born son of Jacob by Rachel, married Asenath, daughter of the "priest of On" (Gen. 41:45).

When Abraham explained his kinship pattern, the Pharaoh would have recognized it as that of the Horite ruler caste. The Pharaohs also married sisters, as is evident in Egyptian texts. The beauty of the sister bride is praised throughout Egyptian poetry and in the Song of Solomon. Abraham married his half-sister, as did his father Terah and his grandfather Nahor. This was a characteristic of their ruler-priest kinship pattern, as analysis of the Genesis genealogies reveals.

In Genesis 26, we find that Isaac employs his father's method to gain Abimelech’s attention in Gerar which was in the heart of Horite territory (see map). It is significant that only Isaac does this, since he was the son designated to rule after his father. Though Abraham had 7 or 8 other sons, none of them are reported to have tried this ruse. This suggests that these stories are not about deceit and cowardice, but about gaining the ruler’s recognition and favor. This would be necessary to become established in the land, which he did. Abraham's territory was between Sarah's settlement in Hebron and Keturah's settlement in Beersheba.

This is further substantiated by the fact that Abraham and Isaac were NOT visiting “foreign” lands as Speiser claims, but were in territory under Horite - Egyptian control. Kadesh and Shur (Gen. 20:1) were in Horite territory under the control of the Pharaohs. Abraham's mother's people controlled territory between Mt. Hor (northeast of Kadesh) and Mt. Harun (near Petra). Genesis 10:30 tells us that these were the clans whose dwelling place extended from Mesha “all the way to Sephar, the eastern mountain range.” They are called Horites in Genesis 14:6, 36:20 and in Deuteronomy 2:12.

Numbers 33:27-28 mentions 'Terah' as a place near Mount Harun in Jordan. Besides being the name of Abraham's father, Terah is also the name of an Arabian tribe (Terabin) that dwells chiefly between Gaza and Beersheba. So clearly Abraham was not in a foreign land. He was in territory ruled by his ancestors and he deserved to have his status recognized, which chiefly would have been done by verifying his kinship.

The Egyptians took pleasure in sex, but regarded adultery was an grave offense, especially for a ruler since such an unrighteous act would put his kingdom under divine judgment. This is why both Pharaoh and Abimelech were angry that Abraham should put them at risk, but in both instances the God of Abraham protected Sarah and the ruler long enough for Abraham to accomplish his objective of gaining the ruler’s favor.

The theological point of these stories is not that Abraham was a liar, but that He trusted God to help him make himself known to Pharaoh. Later, his descendents would seek the favor of a ruler of Egypt who was also one of their own.

Where Did Noah's Ark Land?

2009-10-16T17:47:00.007-04:00

A reader of Just Genesis has suggested that Noah's Ark landed on Ararat because that is apparently where Japhid (Japheth) dwelt.

He explains that the area is mainly populated by Armenian and Assyrian Turks who are the "new kids on the block", but the land is called "Hyastan" after Haig or Haicus who Armenians represent as the son of Togarmah (Gen. 10).

Hyastan means "Land of Hiacus". The Armenians, who constitute a small portion of the inhabitants of Armenia, call themselves Haiks, from this traditional ancestor.

I wouldn't be surprised that Japhid has a connection to the Lake Van area. The Afro-Asiatic rulers controlled major water systems. However, this is not substantial evidence that Noah's ark landed in Armenia.

Japhid appears to have been geographically removed from the other 2 sons whose lines intermarried. There is no evidence of intermarriage between his lines and theirs, so I suspect he did indeed reside a good distance from them. These Afro-Asiatic rulers controlled territories extending from west central Africa to the Indus River Valley. The Afro-Asiatic Dominion has been reasonably well demonstrated and supported by comparative religion and linguistics.

I still believe that Genesis indicates that the biblical Noah lived in the area of Mega Chad. This is the only place on the surface of the earth that claims to be his homeland - Bor' Nu - the land of Noah. Also, Armenia is probably not the correct rendering. It could just as easily be HarMeni - Mount Meni which is near Lake Chad. This coupled with the Genesis geneaologial data showing that Noah's ancestors lived in west central Africa seems conclusive. All the data fits this hypothesis. In fact, this hypothesis developed from a 28-year pursuit of the data. Noah's ark landed on Mount Meni in what is today the country of Niger.

Genesis and the Eucharist

2009-10-09T04:00:00.003-04:00

The Eucharist as life-giving sacrifice is prefigured in Genesis. The Cross is found in many of the Genesis accounts, as the Church Fathers have noted. Genesis 3 presents God as offering the first sacrifice as a covering for shame when HE clothes Adam and Eve with skins of a sacrificed animal. Genesis 22 points the Cross. Here the father receives back the son "on the 3rd day" and a ram is caught by its extended horns in the thicket - another image of Christ on the Cross. And as Patrick H. Reardon reminds us, "Since Melito of Sardis in the mid-second century, Isaac's carrying of the wood has always signified to Christians the willingness of God's own Son to take up the wood of the Cross and carry it to the place of sacrifice." (Creation and the Patriarchal Histories, p. 87.)

We also find Jesus' Passion in Joseph's story, who was betrayed by his brothers, cast into the pit and sold. He was unjustly accused, suffered and showed mercy to his oppressors. He was abased yet elevated to glory. He was believed dead yet found alive.

The pattern of Christ's passion is written across time and eternity so that "all are without excuse". From “before the foundation of the world,” the redeeming work of Christ has been known (1 Peter 1:18-20).

Ontologically the Eucharist is the single moment of sacrifice by which we repentent sinners are saved - and by which the world was made - a difficult concept to get our Western minds around since we tend to think of the Christ in chronological terms rather than metaphysically, as is more common in the East.

Yet when we look at Scripture and Holy Tradition we find the symbols of life - the Water and the Blood - consistently pointing to the Cross. And the Creed reminds us that all things were made through HIM, both visible and invisible. The Cross is that moment when "it is finished"; that is, His sacrifice and the creation and redemption of the world are conterminous. In the Eucharist, we repentent sinners are admitted to this moment by God's grace. And grace is granted to the priest to stand in that moment with Christ, not simply in Persona Cristi, but as one who himself is sacrificed (the oblation).

Is this not catholic teaching?

There is some theological speculation that the moment when Jesus offered himself to the Father as a sacrifice is at the Last Supper when He instituted the Sacrament. This idea is articulated here. See what you think.

Why Jesus Visited Tyre

2009-10-03T08:57:00.021-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

(Shown right: the ruins of Tyre)

"Son of Man, raise a lament over the king of Tyre and say to him: Thus says the Lord God: You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and flawless beauty. You were in Eden, in the Garden of God; every precious stone was your adornment... and gold beautifully wrought for you, mined for you, prepared the day you were created. I made you as a cherub with outstretched wings, and you resided on God's holy Mountain; you walked in the midst of the stones of fire. You were blameless in your ways, from the day you were created until wrongdoing was found in you. By your far-flung commerce you were filled with lawlessness and you sinned. So I have struck you down from the mountain of God, O shielding cherub, from the stones of fire." (Ezekiel 28:11-19)

This is one of the rare references to Eden outside Genesis and it deserves closer inspection.

To whom is God speaking in this passage? Here the 'Son of Man' is the prophet Ezekiel, through whom God declares judgement on the King of Tyre who is pictured as a quasi-mythical being, adorned with jewels and exalted. Ezekiel appears to be using the exile from paradise to describe the king's fall from glory. But is there more meaning here?

Tyre was the home of Hiram I, the father of the Tyrian king who helped Solomon build the temple. Tyre was originally situated on an island, about 600 yards off the coast and connected to the mainland by a causeway built by Hiram I.

The king of Tyre was allied by kinship with David and sent skilled artisans to help David build a palace in Jerusalem. Hiram is also known as "Huram" and "Horam", which are versions of the shorter names Hur or Hor. According to Midrashic tradition, Hur was Moses’ brother-in-law, the husband of Miriam. Hur’s grandson was one of the builders of the Tabernacle. I Chronicles 4:4 lists Hur as the "father of Bethlehem", that is the patriarch of the place known as the "city of David".

In other words, the king of Tyre and David were related. Their common ancestors were Horites, and as the Genesis geneologies indicate, the Horite lineage can be traced back to Eden.

The Horites believed that the Son of God would be born of their blood. They expected Him to come to visit them. This was fulfilled when Jesus Christ, the Son of God, visited Tyre (Matt. 15:21-28; Mark 7: 24). Here the Markan mystery is revealed, for we are told that in Tyre Jesus "could not pass unrecognized."

Oldest Human Fossils

2009-10-01T22:44:00.006-04:00

WASHINGTON – The story of humankind is reaching back another million years as scientists learn more about "Ardi," a hominid who lived 4.4 million years ago in what is now Ethiopia. The 110-pound, 4-foot female roamed forests a million years before the famous Lucy, long studied as the earliest skeleton of a human ancestor.

This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution, said anthropologist C. Owen Lovejoy of Kent State University.

Rather than humans evolving from an ancient chimp-like creature, the new find provides evidence that chimps and humans evolved from some long-ago common ancestor — but each evolved and changed separately along the way.

"This is not that common ancestor, but it's the closest we have ever been able to come," said Tim White, director of the Human Evolution Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley.

Read the full report here and note the assumptions that Lucy and Ardi are somehow less than human when the reserachers have concluded that these were human and not apes.

Important facts about Ardi and the Ardipithecus ramidus:

These 30+ skeletal finds represent the earliest known skeletons from the human family. The team found dozens of bones scattered over an area of 33 to 49 feet. The teeth to fit the range of human dentition and are not the dagger-like canines in male chimps and gorillas.

Paleoanthropologists are largely in agreement that the "Apes of the South" (Richard Leakey's term for Lucy's community) were humans who lived about 3.2 million years ago. Ethiopian Ardi pushes that back about one million years. Lucy was found only about 45 miles from where Ardi was found. At the time these populations lived in east Africa it was forested, as was much of Africa. The bones were found in a stretch of the Awash River, near the village of Aramis in Ethiopia.

Ardi walked upright and stood on 2 legs. She shared food with others in her community. These remains reveal human dentition, not that of apes. It has taken 17 years for scientists to reconstruct and analyze these Ardipithecus ramidus findings which included the bones of no less than 35 individuals.

Paleoanthropologist Tim White led the University of California at Berkeley research team.

Physical evidence indicates that humans appeared as humans and unheralded by sub-human ancestors more than 4 million years ago. Apes do not share food or hunt cooperatively.

Genesis Has Strengthened My Faith

2009-09-26T09:07:00.005-04:00

Recently I was asked what these 30+ years of research on Genesis have meant for my faith. That gave me pause, and I’ve been asking myself how the research has edified me as a Christian? I believe that I’m ready to answer this question.

First, I have been blessed to be so deep in God’s written Word. I meditate on it night and day. I often dream about what I'm studying. Sometimes the dreams are glorious and I am unable to describe them with words. Such dreams involve patterns and symbols of the ineffable. This must be how the rabbis and fathers of old came to understand what is not teachable by words.

Second, I have come to understand how the whole Bible rests upon the foundation of Genesis. This may seem obvious to most people who read the Bible, but for me the recognition involves tracing the threads that are interwoven from Genesis to Revelation and realizing that this unity is God’s work. He who creates all things has created a unique book. The author of our salvation has authored the greatest tome ever written.

There is also the discovery that this book testifies to Holy Tradition so that one must, by the witness of Scripture, conclude that Holy Tradition precedes the Holy Bible and is preserved for us in the pages of Scripture. This tells me that every generation has a witness to the Truth of God’s love, not only in creation as St. Paul attests, but also in the Tradition received through the passing generations of Abraham’s people. We who have been grafted into the Faith of Father Abraham are heirs of this Holy Tradition concerning the coming Christ. Were the Bible to be lost or taken from us, we would still have the Gospel. May God be praised!

Finally, I have come to the unshakeable persuasion that the Bible is truer than we can even conceive as empirically-minded moderns. Were we to allow it to speak for itself, not insisting on our interpretation, but accepting what it says, we would be led to see the truth and our view of reality would come into clear focus.

Some will regard what I’ve written as too intellectual and for that I make no apologies. That is my character and I trust that God has a place for intellectuals in the Kingdom. There is a notion within some circles that head knowledge blocks or interrupts the work of the heart. Orthodoxy is said to be “a religion of the heart, not of the head.” In humility, I ask why? Were not the Fathers men of intellect and good hearts? St. Paul was one of the greatest intellects of all history and yet he was also a man of great passion.

Doubtless some will use this emphasis on receiving Christ through the heart as an excuse to be lazy in their study of the Scriptures preserved supernaturally for our instruction and reproof. Beware! Faith comes by many avenues. Do not put limits on the work of the Spirit.

Marrying that Christ May Be Born

2009-09-22T09:00:00.002-04:00

Analysis of the kinship pattern of Abraham's people reveals a unique pattern of intermarriage between patrilineal cousins of priestly lines. It is possible to trace these lines because the cousin brides named their first-born sons after their fathers. This pattern is found as early as Cain and Seth who married the daughters of Enoch (Nok). Their first born sons were named after their wives' father (Gen. 4:17 and Gen 5:6). Likewise, Lamech's daughter married her patrilineal cousin, Methuselah, and named their first born son "Lamech" after her father. Her father is referred to as Lamech the Elder and her son is Lamech the Younger. All of these men were ruler-priests, as this pattern pertained only to ruler-priests.

This means that the sons of Aaron and the Levites are not the only priests in the Bible.

Jesus' priesthood is "in the order of Melchizedek" and that is said to be an eternal priesthood. Through Melchizedek, the priesthood of God is associated with the Jebusite settlement of Jerusalem. Abdi-hepa was a Jebusite king who ruled Jerusalem three centuries before its conquest by David. This distinguishes the priesthood of God from other priesthoods that do not recognize the ancient prophecies concerning Mount Zion and the House of David. Interestingly, according to 2 Samuel 24, David built a fire altar at the threshing floor of Araunah, the Jebusite. Here David is shown as a ruler-priest and shepherd, the very roles that characterize the ruler-priests whose patrilineal lines intermarried, bringing us to the house of Joachim, Mary's father, who was both priest and shepherd.

David's priestly lineage comes through both Judah and Tamar. He was descended from Tamar, the daughter of a priest who, according to Jewish tradition, was called Melchizedek-Shem. Tamar's punishment, as demanded by Judah, was that set in Lev. 21:9 for a priest's daughter found guilty of prostitution.

David was also of the priestly line of Ram (Ruth 4:19). Ram is a common name among the priestly lines. One of Shem's sons was named A'ram (Gen. 10:22) and the priestly lines of Aaron and Korah are traced through their father Am'ram.

There are 2 main priestly lines from Genesis through the Exodus and these lines intermarried. The lines are those of Cain and Seth, Ham and Shem, Sheba and Joktan, Levi and Judah, and Korah and his half-brother Aaron. Moses' father had 2 wives (see diagram). By Ishar, he had Korah whose name means 'shaved one' and designates a priest of Egypt. By Jochebed, he had Moses and Aaron. So we see 2 lines of priests from Genesis to Exodus.

In the time of David this was the case also. David was consecrated king by Samuel, the son of the priest Elkanah. Elkanah had 2 wives, Hannah and Peninnah (1 Samuel 1:2). We aren't told the identity of Peninnah's first born son, but we can assume that he would have been in line to serve as priest. Since Samuel was Elkanah's only son by Hannah, Samuel was a priest as well as a prophet. That is why he offered blood sacrifice and burnt offerings. But Elkanah's line (through 2 first born sons) was not the only line of priests during David's time. There was also the priest Eli, whose 2 sons acted as priests at Shiloh (1 Samuel 1:3) at the time Elkanah served as priest.

Keep in mind that kinship patterns are highly resistant to change. If the kinship pattern of Abraham's people survived Egyptian captivity and deportation to Babylon, it surely continued afterwards. In fact, it appears to have continued to the time of Jesus and then stopped, as if the pattern had fulfilled its purpose once Messiah was born.

Applied to Mary and Joseph, this kinship pattern indicates that they were cousins and both of priestly lines. These lines had been intermarrying from before Abraham's time and continued to intermarry up to the birth of Jesus Christ. Joseph's family lived in Nazareth which was the home of the eighteenth division of priests, that of Happizzez (1 Chronicles 24:15). The idea that only the Levites were priests simply isn't supported by the evidence of Scripture.

Abraham's people traced bloodline through the mother but social status and occupation was inherited through the father. So Joseph was a carpenter like his father. This continued to New Testament times as we see in the case of St. Paul who was a tent maker like his father.

Jesus was the Son of God, born to "the Woman" according to the ancient expectation (Gen. 3:15). Mary was the proper bride for Joseph since she was of a priestly line. He too was of a priestly line descending from Judah and Ram, David's ancestors. Joseph of Nazareth married the daughter of a priest as did Joseph in Egypt and Moses in Midian.

Why did Abraham's people preserve this unique pattern of intermarriage between priestly lines? The only explanation is that they really did believe that the expected Messiah would be born of their bloodline. This is what Jesus indicated when he said to the Jewish authorities, "Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad." (John 8:56)

Likewise, John the Forerunner's testimony concerning Jesus as "the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29) springs from direct knowledge of the tradition of his forebearers that the Son of God was coming into the world to save sinners.

For more on this pattern, read about the relationship of Jesus and his cousin John.

The Garden of Eden

2009-09-20T19:00:00.001-04:00

The final of the nine questions asked by a reader of Just Genesis is : "What about the garden of Eden, real place or myth?"

Answer: A place that existed in real time though not called "Eden" as this word originally meant garden or virgin forest and "garden of garden" is redundant. The Afro-Asiatic word for garden or virgin forest is "egan" which is the etiology of the Hebrew 'eden'.

According to Genesis, the garden would have been west of Noah's homeland which was Bor'Nu (Land of Noah) near Lake Chad. We assume this based on Genesis 3:24 which states that God drove the human out and caused him "to dwell eastward of the garden." This significant piece of information is not found in every translation of the Bible. However, it can be deduced from the angels being stationed on the east of the garden to guard the way to the tree of life (Gen. 3:24).

If we accept that the garden existed in real time and that it was west of Lake Chad, where might it be? One possibility is Eredo on the Atlantic coast of Nigeria (see photo above). This is west of where Noah's ark would have landed on Mount Meni in Niger. Mount Meni (har-meni) has been mistakenly rendered in English as Armenia. During the time of Noah's flood, the waters of Mega Chad would have reached Mount Meni. According to David M. Westley, PhD, Director of the African Studies Library at Boston University, "From the center of the Chad Basin to Mount Meni is about 230 miles."

In the time of the Guirian Wet Period when Mega Chad extended many hundreds of miles beyond its present basin, the waters would have extended up the side of Mt. Meni. I believe that is where Noah's ark landed. (For more on this, go here.)

Not, surprisingly there are 2 traditions concerning the location of the garden, one Afro and the other Asiatic. (The same can be said for the 2 creation stories and the 2 flood stories.) The view that Eden was at the western border of Iran is based on the location of the Tigris and Euphrates. The other rivers mentioned in Genesis 2:10-14 are the Pishon and Gihon. We are explicitly told that the Gihon flowed through all the land of Ethiopia. Many ignore this scriptural evidence.

Ethiopians identify the Gihon with the Abay River, which circles the former African kingdom of Gojjam. The Pishon is also in Africa because it "skirts the whole land of Havilah" (Gen, 2:11). Havilah is a son of Cush (Gen. 10:7) and the "Cushites" lived in the upper Nile region. So two rivers are in Mesopotamia and represent the eastern Afro-Asiatic tradition concerning the Garden while the other two rivers are in Africa and represent the western Afro-Asiatic tradition. Both traditions are preserved in Genesis, but obviously the garden can't have been in both places. So where was it? If we accept the biblical claim that God drove the man out of the garden toward the east and the garden was west of Noah's homeland, we must consider Nigeria.

The Church Fathers speak of the tree in the Garden as having existence in real time and in the geographical center of the garden. They also speak of the tree analogically. As Adam stretched out his hand and took of the fruit bringing the curse, so Christ stretched out his arms on the Tree and broke the curse. We find this sort of typology throughout the Bible. Another example is the ram caught by its horns in the thicket on Mount Moriah. This too is a type of Jesus on the Cross.

Received Tradition vs Special Revelation

2009-09-16T21:42:00.007-04:00

Alice C. Linsley

Religious belief is conditioned by the faith tradition which we receive from our parents, grandparents and even, if we are to believe Jung’s theory of the collective unconscious, from our ancient ancestors. If Jung is right, those who practice paganism or atheism must experience a constant inner struggle against the affirmations of God's love that their ancestors experienced. Perhaps this is why their lives are often tragic.

Likewise those whose ancestors were pagans are still inwardly pagan until their Baptism into Christ's death and resurrection miraculously breaks the great delusion, freeing them to embrace Holy Tradition. The Häme region of Finland, for example, is traditionally known for its paganism. It is reported that when the Catholic missionaries began baptizing people there, some would later repent of their baptism and wash it off in a lake where the shamans sacrificed animals to the lake spirits. The familial tradition is so strong that elements of paganism continue for generations even after the families convert to Christianity. A young Fin, Jaakko Olkinuora, reports: "In western Finland, the Catholic Church was very strong before the Reformation, as was Lutheranism afterwards. Our region, however, still has its native pagan place names and stories about spirits and demons of the lakes. When I was a child my mother had a book of Finnish stories collected from the old people. They were all pagan: demons of the lake, demons of the forest. My father has two Finnish names, Seppo and Tapio, both names of Finnish gods." (Road to Emmaus, Vol. IX, No. 4, p. 33)

Even among Americans who are notorious for being consumers of religion, familial tradition influences our choices. When asked about our church affiliation, especially if we are complacent about religion, we may say that we are Baptist, or Presbyterians, or Lutherans simply because our parents were. Or, we may say we are agnostics in reaction to religious parents whose devotion we reject. Either way, familial tradition exercises no small influence on our lives.

It seems that the tradition of our biological ancestors may predispose us to certain avenues and not to others. My family on both sides are English, Welsh and German. In seeking a religious milieu that I could embrace I've been most attracted to high-church Anglicanism, of a sort that my priest's wife, who was raised in a Serbian Orthodox family, would not find comfortable.

This suggests that we are not meant to worship God in the same way, though all are to worship the same God who has self-revealed in the person of Jesus Christ, the Son of God who came into the world to save sinners. This is the unique claim of Christianity, and to it is added the claim that this Holy Tradition is received through a long line of priests who were kin to Abraham, the "father of our faith."

Traditional societies which revere the wisdom of the ancestors don't seem to have the synthetic religions that we find in Western civilization: groups like the Mormons or Scientology which have fabricated histories and cobbled together seductive notions of reality. These groups seek to establish new familial traditions, claiming special revelation. They do not develop organically within the great religious traditions of the world. Instead, they seem intent on shoving aside those traditions.

If we go back far enough in time we find basically two religious traditions: one involving priests and the other involving shamans. While priests and shamans serve similar functions within their communities, they represent distinctly different, even opposite worldviews. Underlying shamanism is the belief that there are powerful spirits who cause imbalance and disharmony in the world. The shaman’s role is to determine which spirits are at work and to find ways to appease the spirits. This may or may not involve blood sacrifice.

Underlying the priesthood is belief in a single supreme Spirit to whom humans must give an accounting, especially for the shedding of blood. In this view, one Great Spirit (God) holds the world in balance and it is human actions that cause disharmony. The vast assortment of ancient laws governing priestly ceremonies, sacrifices, and cleansing rituals clarifies the role of the priest as one who offers sacrifice according to sacred law. The law represents received tradition preserved through the priestly lines.

The catholicism of East and West can be traced to Father Abraham and his people, the ancestors of Christ our God. The Genesis genealogies speak of the ruler-priests who preserved and passed along a tradition concerning the appearing of the Son of God. Their blood flowed through the veins of Joachim and Ana, the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God.

The origins of the faith of the Son of God came to Abraham, not as special revelation, but as a tradition received from his forefathers. The distinctive traits of this tradition align remarkable well with the key features of catholic faith and practice:

All-male ruler-priests
Sacrifice at altars
God of 3 / Triune God
Expectation of the appearing of the Son of God
As in heaven, so on earth
Belief in an eternal and undivided Kingdom

Article VII is one of the best of the Articles of Religion found in the Book of Common Prayer, especially this part: “Wherefore they are not to be heard, which feign that the old Fathers did look only for transitory promises.” Indeed.

To read more about the religious tradition of Abraham and his people, go here.

Original Sin or Ancestral Sin?

2009-09-13T10:00:00.005-04:00

Question number 8 of the most commonly asked Questions about Genesis is: "Did I understand you to say the Orthodox don't believe in inherited (original) sin? If so, how you they explain David saying he was conceived in sin, and sinful from birth?"

In response, I defer to one who is better qualified to answer the first part of this question. The Very Reverend Antony Hughes, M.Div., is the rector of St. Mary’s Orthodox Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He has served as the Orthodox Chaplain at Harvard University. Father Hughes has written an excellent explanation of the difference between original sin and ancestral sin. Here is an excerpt:

"As pervasive as the term original sin has become, it may come as a surprise to some that it was unknown in both the Eastern and Western Church until Augustine (c. 354-430). The concept may have arisen in the writings of Tertullian, but the expression seems to have appeared first in Augustine’s works. Prior to this the theologians of the early church used different terminology indicating a contrasting way of thinking about the fall, its effects and God’s response to it. The phrase the Greek Fathers used to describe the tragedy in the Garden was ancestral sin.

Ancestral sin has a specific meaning. The Greek word for sin in this case, amartema, refers to an individual act indicating that the Eastern Fathers assigned full responsibility for the sin in the Garden to Adam and Eve alone. The word amartia, the more familiar term for sin which literally means “missing the mark”, is used to refer to the condition common to all humanity (Romanides, 2002). The Eastern Church, unlike its Western counterpart, never speaks of guilt being passed from Adam and Eve to their progeny, as did Augustine. Instead, it is posited that each person bears the guilt of his or her own sin. The question becomes, “What then is the inheritance of humanity from Adam and Eve if it is not guilt?” The Orthodox Fathers answer as one: death. (I Corinthians 15:21) “Man is born with the parasitic power of death within him,” writes Fr. Romanides (2002, p. 161). Our nature, teaches Cyril of Alexandria, became “diseased… through the sin of one” (Migne, 1857-1866a). It is not guilt that is passed on, for the Orthodox fathers; it is a condition, a disease.

In Orthodox thought Adam and Eve were created with a vocation: to become one with God gradually increasing in their capacity to share in His divine life — deification (Romanides, 2002, p. 76-77). “They needed to mature, to grow to awareness by willing detachment and faith, a loving trust in a personal God” (Clement, 1993, p. 84). Theophilus of Antioch (2nd Century) posits that Adam and Eve were created neither immortal nor mortal. They were created with the potential to become either through obedience or disobedience (Romanides, 2002)."

Read more here.

In answer to the second part of the question: why David said he was conceived in sin and sinful from birth - he is speaking of ancestral sin. This is significant since it was likely during King David's reign that the geneological information in Genesis and Exodus was complied.

Why so much interest in his ancestors? Because David believed the prophecy concerning the coming of the Son of God from his line of ancestors (Gen. 3:15) - He who would crush the head of the cosmic serpent. So the Orthodox proclaim that the Son of God, born of the line of David, reversed the curse that fell upon His and our ancestors.

This is the heart of our catholic Faith: Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has come into the world to save sinners such as me. The Eternal Son became flesh and in His death He destroyed death and the works of the devil.

"For God so loved the world that He sent His only Begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Fof God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world thorugh Him might be saved."

Three bear witness on earth to the appearing of the Son of God: the Spirit, the water and the blood (I John 5:8). In real time these are Anna the Prophetess (Spirit), John the Forerunner (water), and Simeon the Priest (blood)

“He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar because he has not believed the testimony God has given of His Son. This is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son of God has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.” (I John 5, 10, 11)

Justin Martyr: “There is not a single race…among whom prayers and thanksgivings are not offered in the name of Jesus…”

Irenaeus: “Such is the common faith and tradition…In whom have all the nations believed, but in the Christ…”

The testimony of Scripture: “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.” (I John 5:13)

Architecture Links Horites and Petra

2009-09-11T23:50:00.009-04:00

I have shown that Abraham's people were Horites and that their territories were vast. Na'hor the Elder's territory extended virtually the length on the Euphrates. Other Horites controlled a territory from Mt. Hor northeast of Kadesh-barnea to Mt. Harun at Petra. So it should not surprise us that the temple of Horus in Egypt (above right) resembles the architecture at Petra (above left).

It can be argued that this architecture shows the influence of Egyptian culture on a non-Egyptian people, but that doesn't explain why Petra was built in that style. It is more likely that temple construction was overseen by Horite ruler-priests who followed the tradition associated with Horus who was called the "Son of God."

“Horite” refers not to ethnicity, but to the deity Horus whose symbols were the falcon’s head, the all-seeing eye, the Sun, and Jupiter. Minutius Felix, an early Christian apologist, discerned even in the gross darkness of paganism a ray of truth concerning Jesus, the Son of God. He wrote, “Those who make Jupiter the sovereign deity, err only in name; they are one with us as to the unity of the power.”

The region of Bethlehem is associated with the Horites in 1 Chronicles 4:4. This indicates a connection between Abraham's people and David, the son of Jesse. On December 24 A.D. 3, the king planet Jupiter completed a triple coronation of and aligned with the king star Regelus in the constellation of Leo (symbol of Judah) to produce the brightest heavenly light ever seen. The ancients who expected the Son of God to be born recognized the sign and followed the Bethlehem Star to Jesus who is called the Christ. This event is confirmed by sophisticated astronomical software. Read more here: www.bethlehemstar.com

Visitors Use the INDEX!

2009-09-10T22:35:00.003-04:00

Since I started this blog 3 years ago, visitors from the United States have comprised about 75% of the readership. Today I looked at the breakdown of readers and I discovered something interesting. 50% of the readers this week are from only 3 countries: Australia, the Philippines and India.

I also found that about 10% of the visitors are using the INDEX to search for information by topic. One topic that draws a diverse readership is Serpent Symbolism. Moses and Abraham are also of great interest.