Bishop Ussher Goofed

Alice C. Linsley


Young Earth Creationists use Archbishop James Ussher’s chronology to date the age of the earth. They believe that the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11 are chronological, enabling them to arrive at an approximate date of creation of the whole universe. They calculate the earth's age at 6000 years on the basis of ages assigned to these rulers. Ussher failed to recognize that the so-called "genealogies" are King Lists. These are not the first humans on earth, but rulers of the Afro-Asiatic Dominion.

The Genesis 4 and 5 lists represent a time of kingdoms, laws, warriors, weapons, settlements, shrine cities and numerous technologies associated with the Neolithic Period. This places these earliest rulers of Genesis between 10,200 and 3000 B.C., millions of years after the appearance of archaic humans.

Ussher's scheme is not accurate because these lists are not generational, but regnal, and the reigns of some kings coincided. Tubal-Cain (Gen. 4) and Methuselah (Gen. 5) ruled at the same time. Tubal-Cain's sister married Methuselah. (See diagram below.)

Each of Ussher's errors reflects ignorance of the marriage and ascendancy structure of Abraham's ancestors as that is revealed in Genesis 4, 5 and 11. This same pattern characterizes Moses' family and Samuel's family. It is the distinctive pattern of the ancient Habiru (Hebrew), a caste of ruler-priests.

Let us examine the problems with Ussher's scheme error by error.

Error #1: Ussher did not recognize that the Genesis genealogies are regnal not generational. They cannot be used to count generations because they are king lists and some kings ruled simultaneously, others ruled for short periods, and still others ruled for longer than a generation (40 years).

Error #2  Ussher did not recognize that some of the genealogical lists are telescopic. Telescopic lists leave out some names. Such lists give the names of only the most famous rulers. This means that we cannot use the genealogies to date the earth.

Error #3: Ussher did not understand that the rulers listed had two wives so there were two first-born sons. Ussher did not take this complication into consideration, which is another reason his chronology can't be used to determine the age of the earth.

Error #4: There are various the king lists, depending on the group of people. The Horite rulers are listed in Genesis 36. Some lists provide the names of the first born sons of the half-sister brides. Other lines are traced through the cousin bride who named her first born son after her father. This is the case with Methuselah's wife who named their first born son "Lamech" after her father.

The lines of Cain and Seth intermarried. Each ruler-priest had 2 wives. One was a cousin bride and the cousin bride named her first born son after her father. Thus the similarity of names occurring in both lines. Kenan is a variant of Kain, and Irad is a variant of Jared.

In the case of Lamech's daughter, Naamah, the pattern is quite clear. She married her cousin Methuselah and named her first-born son Lamech after her father. This pattern of marriage can be traced from Genesis 4 and 5 to the lines of Joseph and Mary in the New Testament, demonstrating that  Jesus is a direct descendant of the people to whom God made the first promise of the Bible that a woman of their ruler-priest lines would bring forth the "Seed" of God (Gen. 3:15).

Jesus' mother's name was Miriam daughter of Joachim Son of Pntjr (Panther) Priests of Nathan of Beth Lehem. From predynastic times, ntjr designated the ruler among the Kushites. The name Panther or p-ntjr meant "God is King." It is certain that Mary was of the ruler-priest caste because even those who hated her admit this. Sanhedrin 106a says: “She who was the descendant of princes and governors played the harlot with carpenters.”

There is Biblical support for this view of Enosh/Nok as familial "head" in Psalm 8:4 which reads, “What is man [enosh] that you are mindful of him, the son of man [ben adam] that you care for him?” The parallelism of the Hebrew makes it clear that the historical Enosh is regarded as progenitor just as the archetypal Adam is regarded as progenitor. Enoch and Enosh are linguistically equivalent. This indicates that the first born sons of Cain and Seth were named after the same ruler.

Cain and his brother Seth married the daughters of Enoch/Nok, a great Proto-Saharan chief. These brides named their first born sons after their father. This suggests that they were cousin wives rather than half-sister wives. Cain’s son was Enoch and Seth’s son was Enosh. Another variant is “Hanoch,” the name of Jacob's firstborn son's firstborn son.

Using kinship analysis it is possible to determine the name that should appear at the head of the Genesis 4 and 5 family tree. That name is not Adam, but is Enoch or Nok. Both names mean "one who is to rule." Enoch is a royal title. Likewise, Lamech is a variant of la-melech which appears on several thousand Egyptian seals. It means "of the King" or "for the King."

Error #5: Usher insisted on reading Genesis as chronological records, rather than as stories involving people who often lived at the same time.  For example, Abraham was a contemporary of Job. Judah likely had two wives, one in Horite Territory and the other n Egypt. Genesis 46, Judah went into Egypt with his brothers and presumably settled in the land of Goshen with his children. Yet in Genesis 38, we read that Judah had sons by a woman and lived in the region of Adulla, Mareshah and Chezib in the territory of the Horites. Judah, like his father. had two wives. Shua was his wife in the region Chezib and he had another wife in Egypt.

Error #6:  Ussher didn't know about the cousin bride's naming prerogative which meant that the bride's father and her first-born son had the same name. The biblical record often speaks of two different people who had the same name. This is true of Lamech the Elder and Lamech the Younger, of Joktan the Elder and Joktan the Younger, and of Sheba the Elder and Sheba the Younger.

Here we see that there are two named Esau. Esau the Elder married Adah.  Esau the Younger married Oholibamah.

Seir is identified as a Horite in Genesis 36. The names Esau, Uz, Lotan and Timna are likewise Horite names. The name "Adah" can be traced back to Lamech the Elder. One of his wives was named Adah (Gen. 4:23).

Ussher lived before the development of molecular genealogy which has shed much light on human origins, and especially on the dispersion of the ancient Nilotes and Kushites. He also lived before the development of kinship analysis which makes verification of the Genesis King Lists possible. It can no longer be claimed that these rulers did not live in history. Their marriage and ascendancy pattern is authentic and can be traced from Genesis 4 to the New Testament records of Mary and Joseph's families. It is not possible that this aspect of Biblical history could have been written back into the texts since the 66 books of the Bible represent the contributions of numerous scribes and authors over about 1200 years.


Related reading:  DNA Resaerch Confirms Kushite Migrations; A Scientific Timeline of Genesis; Calculating the dates of the Patriarchs; The Genesis King Lists; Horite Territory; Two Named Esau; Abraham and Job, Horite Rulers; The Cousin Bride's Naming Prerogative

Abraham and Moses Prefigure Christ

Alice C. Linsley

Christianity develops out of a tradition that was well developed in Abraham's time: the Nilotic expectation of the coming of the Son of God. As God's son, he would rule the universe and his kingdom would never end. The advent of the Son of God would mean deliverance from death and the restoration of Paradise.

Abraham and Moses prefigure the Son of God in many ways. Both were said to be the LORD's friends. For these men salvation was personal and embodied. Their relationship with God was so unlike most people’s that their faith is remembered throughout the Old and New Testaments.

For Jewish Christians living in the first decades, Father Abraham’s faith represented both imputed righteousness and the necessity of faithful works. It depends on who you read. “Abram put his faith in Yahweh and this was credited to him as righteousness.” (Gen. 15:6) For Paul this text proves that righteousness depends on faith, but James cites this text when he argues that faith without works is dead. James writes: “Was not Abraham our father justified by his deed, because he offered his son Isaac on the altar? So you can see that his faith was working together with his deeds; his faith became perfect by what he did. In this way the scripture was fulfilled: Abraham put his faith in God, and this was considered as making him upright; and he received the name ‘friend of God’.” (James 2: 21-23)

For both Paul and James it is clear that to be a son of Abraham meant to have faith like the Father. On the other hand, to be a disciple of Moses required keeping all the Law. For James there seems not to be a conflict here, but Paul sets these up as a dichotomy. For Paul the wife, Sarah, represents imputed righteousness or grace while the bondservant, Hagar, represents the Law. (Gal. 4: 21-31) Paul writes, “There is an allegory here: these women stand for the two covenants.” The Apostle strikes a contrast in order to teach the superiority of the covenant of grace which he understood to be fulfilled in the Person of Jesus Christ. But did all early Jewish Christians think of these figures this way? Isn’t it likely that they also saw similarities between Abraham and Moses that spoke to them of the Person of Jesus Christ?

Abraham and Moses had contact with the rulers of Egypt. They have much in common when it comes to Egypt. Moses married a Kushite wife and Egypt was united for the first time by Kushite rulers.  The Pharaoh desired Sara because she was very beautiful in his eyes.  That likely means that she had a Nilotic skin tone.

Consider these other similarities between Abraham and Moses:

• Both came into Pharaoh’s presence by water: Abraham because of lack of it in Canaan, and Moses as a baby floating in a basket.

• Neither Abraham nor Moses had offspring in Egypt. In terms of progeny, Egypt was not a fertile place for them (as compared to Joseph).

• In Egypt both men’s natural relationships became distorted. Abraham was estranged temporarily from his wife (also his half-sister). Moses was not raised as his parents’ son, but as a prince in Pharaoh’s household.

• Both leaders left Egypt with greater authority and wealth.

• Both were princes yet foreigners among the people.

• Both were blessed and counseled by noblemen priests: Abraham by Melchizedek, and Moses by Jethro (his future father-in-law).

• Both met their wife at wells: Abraham married Keturah in Beersheba (well of Sheba) and Moses met Zipporah, his future wife, at a Midianite well.

Now we remember that Jesus fled to Egypt with his parents and came out of Egypt.
As we consider Abraham and Moses prefigure Christ, we find a pattern. Here are some threads of the pattern:

• The Prophet Hosea tells us that God called His Son out of Egypt. Since both Abraham and Moses were led out of Egypt, this cannot apply to Israel. Were it so, the prophecy would speak of “sons.” Clearly this prophecy speaks of the Son, Jesus Christ.

• Jesus’ is revealed at his Baptism in the Jordan. Instead of the waters parting, the heavens part.

• Jesus had no progeny. (Sorry Dan Brown.)

• On earth, Jesus’ natural relationship with the Father is distorted in that moment when He cries: “Why hast Thou forsaken me?”

• Jesus victorious rose from the grave, Almighty God.

• Jesus was a Prince whose royal lineage was not recognized by his own people. John reminds us that He came into the world but the world did not recognize or “receive” him.

• Jesus was blessed by noblemen sages (priests and prophets?) at His revealing by the Bethlehem star.

• Jesus met his archetypical “bride” in the woman at Jacob’s well. She was the first female evangelist, and according to tradition, Photini and all her children were martyred. Photini means “Illumined One” and she represents the Church, the Bride of Christ.

The revelation of Jesus Christ is seen in the pattern of both Abraham and Moses, and since the pattern is the same, how can we speak of these figures as opposites? The Person of Jesus Christ is foreshadowed throughout the Bible. Nothing in the Scriptures is extraneous to the Person of Jesus Christ. Salvation is an embodied reality and has types which prefigure the fulfillment of the Edenic Promise (Gen. 3:15).

No one was saved under the Law. “Salvation belongs to the Lord” (as it says in Jonah). The Bible points to Jesus as the Heir of God's Kingdom. Paul makes the point that the Law is not extraneous to Jesus Christ, but acts as a schoolmaster to prepare us for Christ and His eternal kingdom.

In posing a dichotomy between Grace and Law, Paul tells us that he is using an allegory, and allegories are to instruct. Paul instructs his readers about the superiority of the Gospel of Jesus Christ by showing that Abraham and Moses prefigure the One who would be their greater, the Son of God who was anticipated by their Horite people.


Related reading: Who Were the Horites?; Archaic Rulers, Ascendancy and the Foreshadowing of Christ; Esau in Yoruba Tradition; The Substance of Abraham's Faith

The Risen Son Claims You!

Alice C. Linsley


On Good Friday the Deceiving Worm struck Christ's “heel” and Christ crushed the Worm's head. The disobedience of the First Eve is reversed by the Second Eve, the Blessed Theotokos. The evil one can never claim that God has used the advantage of divinity against him since he is defeated by a humble woman whose will cooperated with God’s will to bring forth the Incarnate One.

Having raised His Only Begotten to life from death, God honors the Son in a great wedding feast. He claims his bride. She belongs to Him for He has bought her by His shed blood. It is a bride price of immeasurable value.

Among Abraham’s people, the firstborn son of the cousin-bride belonged to the bride’s father’s household while the bride belonged to her husband’s household. Cultural anthropologist, Claude Levi-Strauss, noted this arrangement (1949) and observed that mother and child do not belong to the same clan in a patrilineal society. This pattern of the cousin-wife belonging to her husband's household, and her firstborn son belonging to her father's household, is the background behind important claims of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is the only begotten of the Father by the Virgin Mary. Mary was a cousin to Joseph, so technically Jesus belonged to the household of Mary's shepherd-priest father Joachim. Mary, the virgin bride of Zion, is the fulfillment of the promises made in Genesis and throughout the Old Testament. She is the foremost saint, and through her comes the Son who is of the same essence as the Eternal Father and belonging to the priestly lines that are traced from Eden.

St. Paul tells us that the Resurrection is the ultimate proof that Jesus belongs to the Father. He also tells us that through the Holy Spirit we receive the spirit of “sonship.” In other words, the Only Begotten claims us as his inheritance and seals the claim by the gift of the Holy Spirit.

What is the significance of belonging to the first born of the Father? Again, we gain insight by exploring the cultural pattern of Abraham’s people. The firstborn son received all the maternal grandfather 's or father’s possessions, territories, title and authority. Paul tells us that the saints are “joint heirs” with Christ. That means we who are redeemed share all equally with Christ our Lord and King.

Jesus means “God Saves” because in His Resurrection He tramples down death and breaks the chains that bind sinners. He claims those who He redeems, spoiling the devil.

According to the genealogical pattern, Jesus belongs to his mother’s clan. This is how the promise of Genesis 3:14 and 15 comes to be fulfilled. “And the Lord God said to the serpent: Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle, and beasts of the earth: upon thy breast shalt thou go, and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.”

The journey that began when Abraham left his father’s house in obedience to the Lord, has led Abraham’s spiritual children to the Eternal Father’s house where we share in the inheritance of the Only Begotten. We can hardly comprehend this great mercy whereby Christ our God condescends to save us sinners, but we rejoice that the Only Begotten of the Father claims us and permits us to share in His victory over death!

Related reading: The Deceiving Worm; Good Friday: Do Not Flee; The Horite Marriage and Ascendancy Pattern; The Virgin Mary's Ancestry

Lamech's Story and Horite Kinship

Alice C. Linsley


Lamech, a descendant of Cain and Seth, was a ruler and a priest.  His name is a variant of the Egyptian la-melech, which has been found on hundreds of seals.  La-melech means "of the King." The la-melech seal typically had the image of a scarab or a sun disc, the emblem of the Creator. The sun disc was used as a royal seal by the Kings of Judah who were direct descendants of Cain and Seth.

Analysis of the Genesis 4 and 5 marriage and ascendancy pattern reveals that Lamech was likely a Horite ruler-priest. The Horite priesthood has roots in the Proto-Saharan culture that centered around Nekhen, the oldest known shrine city of Horus, whose totem was the falcon.


Lamech Segment: Genesis 4 and 5

The pattern of having two wives is evident with Terah, Abraham, Jacob, and Moses. The rulers named in Genesis 4, 5, 10, 11 and  22:20-24 married two wives and traced their lineage through both the father's line and the mother's line. Analysis of the Genesis King Lists reveals that the first born son of the half-sister wife ascended to the throne of his biological father, So Isaac ruled Abraham's territory after Abraham died.

The first born son of the patrilineal cousin wife ascended to the throne of his maternal grandfather.  So Joktan, Abraham's first born son by Keturah ascended to the throne of this maternal grandfather, after whom he was named. This is evident in the case of Lamech's daughter who married her cousin and named their first born son Lamech, after her father.

We are able to trace the line of the cousin brides by looking at the recurrance of the names of chiefs. Cousin brides named their firstborn sons after their fathers. Lamech's daughter Naamah (Gen. 4) married her patrilineal cousin (or uncle) Methuselah (Gen. 5) and named their firstborn son Lamech after her father. The first born son of the cousin wife belonged to the bride's father’s house while the bride belonged to her husband’s house. Levi-Strauss (1949) observed that in a patrilineal system, mother and child do not belong to the same clan.

Patrilineal cousins are cousins who are descended from a common male ancestor or patriarch. As the lines of Cain (Gen. 4) and Seth (Gen. 5) intermarried and the lines of Ham and Shem intermarried, all of the rulers listed in Genesis descend from a common Edenic ancestor.



Lamech's Hubris

Lamech maintained his wives in separate households on an east-west axis. His son by Zillah was Tubal-Cain. Tubal-Cain maintained wives in Nok (the oldest site of metal working in Africa) and Kano, to the north. Abraham's father, Terah, maintained wives in Ur and Haran, to the north. Abraham maintained Keturah in Beersheba and Sarah in Hebron, to the north. The location of the wives is significant because their positions marked the southern and northern boundaries of the chief’s territory.

Likewise, the Great Chief marked HIS territory by the sun’s rising in the east and setting in the west. In other words, God was regarded as sovereign over all the earth. Vestiges of this cosmology are evident in the Psalms where Yahweh is said to ride his chariot, the sun. The sun or helios was viewed also among Greeks as a symbol for Jesus Christ, the 'Sun' of God who said, "I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darknesss, but will have the light of life" (John 8:12). (For an extensive discussion of sun symbolism, see David Fideler's Jesus Christ, Sun of God Wheaton: Quest Books, 1993Z)

Lamech’s situation symbolizes his spiritual hubris, for by setting his wives on an east-west axis, he pretends equality with God. As the Hebrew scholar Theodor Gaster noted, the names Adah and Zillah corelate to the Akkadian words for dawn and dust. This rounds out the picture of Lamech as a braggart, for besides regarding his murder of a man as being without impunity, he regarded himself as God's equal.

Analysis of the Lamech story reveals that this Kushite chief had two wives, Adah and Zillah. Likewise, Abraham and Jacob had two wives. In Africa, from whence came Abraham's Kushite ancestors, a chief is expected to have more than one wife.

Related reading: The Marriage and Ascendancy Structure of Abraham's People; The Kushite Royal Marriage Pattern Drove Kushite Expansion; The Seventh Seal and Silence in Heaven