Review of Walton's "Lost World"

Alice C. Linsley

John H. Walton has written an excellent book titled The Lost World of Genesis One which I recommend. It enables the reader to place the first creation account in its proper historical-cultural context.

Though the book in not about science, it addresses some scientific concerns. Dr. Walton believes that Genesis 1 refers to 24 hour days and that the earth could be billions of years old. He believes that Adam and Eve were historic individuals and that aspects of evolution could account of their origin.

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!


Related reading:  YEC Dogma is NOT Biblical; A Scientific Timeline of Genesis

The Curse of Ham

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

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 a single story told by two different authors.

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 three sons of Abraham: Yitzak (Isaac) by Sarah; Yishmael (Ishmael) by Hagar, and Yishbak (Ishbak) by Keturah. We note the parallel names Yish and Yitz, which recall the 3-son confederations of the ancient Kushite rulers. [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 or Yisbak was likely a descendant of Abraham and Isaac.
It is fairly safe to conclude that Isaac had at least three sons and their names were: Jacob, Esau and Yishbak, the last being named by the cousin bride after her father, according to the cousin bride's naming prerogative. All three appear to have been rulers over their own territories.

Related reading: Moses' Two Wives


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. Sheba-qo ruled in Thebes, Shebit-qo ruled in Napata, and Ta-har-qo ruled in Memphis. Shebaqo revived the office of high priest, which he awarded to his son Hori-makhet who was high priest in Thebes.

Adam and Eve as Archetypal Ancestors

Alice C. Linsley


In this short entry we explore the nature of the biblical figures Adam, Eve and their relationship. I'm of the opinion that Adam and Eve are archetypal ancestors, not historical persons, and that archetypes in the ancient world were regarded as real in the Platonic sense. Plato, who studied in Egypt, likely borrowed the concept of Forms or Archetypes from the ancient Egyptians.

Whether taken as historical or archetypal, Adam and Eve represent the first created humans in the Bible.  Since the oldest human fossils are about 3.4 million years old, we would have to place Adam and Eve back at least that far, if they are historical.

Archbishop James Ussher believed Adam and Eve were historical and he attempted to calculate the age of the Earth using the generations listed in Genesis. Ussher didn't recognize that these lists are not generational. They are regnal, that is to say, they can't 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).


Most of the rulers had two wives so there were two first-born sons. Ussher didn't take this complication into consideration, which is another reason his chronology can't be used to determine the age of the Earth.


In fact, the first verifaibly hisotrical persons in Genesis are the kings listed in the Genesis 4 and 5 king lists. Analysis of the Gen. 4 and 5 kinship reveals that the founder of the lines descending from Cain and Seth is not Adam, but Enoch or Nok.


Sorting the Historical from the Legendary and the Mythological

Sometimes it isn't easy to sort the historical from legend or from myth.  King Menes probably lived, but he is veiled in legend and myth to the degree that some believe that he was not historical.
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" 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.

The name Meni or Meri has associations with Noah. Mount Meri is likely the mountain where Noah's ark landed in the area of modern Kenya/Tanzania.

Whether historical or archetypal ancestor, 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! The kinship pattern of Abraham's Horite people speaks of many mysteries revealed in Jesus Christ.

The relationship of Adam and Eve gains further dimension when they are explored in light of the Patriarchal narratives. To receive his own kingdom, Abraham had to leave his father’s house. Likewise, 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.

Before Isaac could receive the kingdom from his father, he had to marry. Likewise, Christ will marry His bride before He receives the eternal Kingdom from His Father. As Abraham and the rulers of his people had two wives, it is likely that Isaac married a sister-wife as well as Rebekah, his patrilineal cousin. This was the pattern of the Horite ruler-priests. This is why Abraham went to great pains to see that Isaac married his second wife 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. Christ has said that until that great day, He shall not drink of the fruit of the vine.


Related reading:  The Genesis King Lists; Adam and Eve: Historical or Archetypes?; The Genesis Creation Stories; The First Historica Persons in Genesis

Was Abraham a Liar?

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?

Alice C. Linsley


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/Japheth has a connection to the Lake Van area. The descendants of Japheth are found in Europe, Turkey, Pakistan, Mongolia and the Upper Nile. This explains the linguistic similarity between some Afro-Asiatic names and some Turkish, Pashtun and Mongolian names, including Jochi, Beri, Malik and Khan. Khan was originally a title meaning king. Today it is a common surname in Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Mongolia. It is equivalent to the Afro-Asiatic Kain or Kayan. Some of the Pashtun tribes adopted Malik as the ruler's title instead of Khan. Malik is equivalent to the Afro-Asiatic Melek, meaning king or ruler.

Genghis Khan married a woman of the Olkut’Hun, or Ogur Hun meaning the Hun clan/community. The word ogur means clan/community and appears to be equivalent to the Pashto orkut, meaning community. So ogur, orkut and olkut are cognates and likely related to the Kandahar dialect, which has Tir-hari as a principal dialect. Tir is a form of the name Tiras, mentioned in Genesis 10 and hari is a form of the word for Horite. So Genghis Khan married into a community which had connections to Abraham's Horite people, probably through the ruler Nimrod.

In the Hungarian origin stories, Nimrod had two sons: Magor and Hunor. Magor is the equivalent of the Afro-Asiatic name Magog and the Hungarian word Magyar. Magyar is the name for the Hungarian people. Some Magyar still live in the Upper Nile area where they are called the Magyar-ab, the Magyar tribe.

Japheth appears to have been geographically separated from Noah's other 2 sons whose lines intermarried. There is no evidence of intermarriage between Japheth's lines and theirs, so his people did reside a good distance from them. However, all the Afro-Asiatic rulers were apparently related.  And they were able to exchange goods, moving cargo along the major river systems that extended from west central Africa to the Indus River Valley and beyond. Their Afro-Asiatic Dominion has been reasonably well demonstrated and supported by comparative religion and linguistics.

The Afro-Arabian and Afro-Asiatic rulers controlled major water systems at a time when Africa, the Levant and Mesopotamia were much wetter. We know that the descendants of Japheth moved into the region of what is today Hungary. However, this hardly proves that Noah's ark landed in Armenia.

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' No, meaning the land of Noah. During Noah's time Lake Chad was 600 feet deep and five times the size of Lake Superior.

Also, neither "Ararat" nor "Armenia" represent correct renderings of the old Arabic words. The Arabic word ararat is means vehemence and Armenia is probably har Meni, meaning the mountain of Meni/Menes. Mount Meni is another name for Mount Meru. All the data suggests that Noah's ark landed on Mount Meni, Meri or Meru in what is today Kenya or Tanzania.

Related reading:  Finding Noah's Ark; Noah's Ark; Mount Mary and the Origins of Life; Dark Sky and Howling Wind; Noah's Sons and Their Descendants; Africa in the Days of Noah

Genesis and the Eucharist

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

Alice C. Linsley


"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." (Ezekiel 28:11-18)

The ruins of Tyre

This is one of the rare references to Eden outside Genesis and it deserves closer inspection. Here the 'Son of Man' is the prophet Ezekiel through whom God declares judgement on the King of Tyre who is pictured as adorned with jewels and exalted. Ezekiel uses the exile from paradise to describe the king's fall from glory. But is there more here?  Yes, there is a Messianic message.

Ezekiel is told to prophecy against the King of Tyre because he was no longer “perfect.”  The ruler who was once full of wisdom in the Garden has fallen into sin and is being judged. Here we have a glimpse of God's economy by which guidance is always delivered in the proper order. The Father first sends the Son to those whose ancestors were in Eden and the people of Tyre recognized Him. Likewise, the angels first appear to the shepherd kings of Bethlehem, David’s people, to declare the coming of the Son, and the shepherds went straight away to worship Him.

Another example involves Jesus at Capernaum on the northwestern edge of the Sea of Galilee (formerly Lake of Chinnereth). The Sea of Galilee was between the territory of the Aramaeans (descendants of Nimrod) and that of the Afro-Arabian descendants of Joktan, Peleg’s brother. In Peleg’s time, the Aramaean and the Afro-Arabian descendants of Kush became separate kingdoms. Joktan’s holding extended from Jok-neam in the hill country southwest of the Sea of Galilee to Jok-deam, in the hill country just south of Hebron. Peleg’s holding extended north from the Sea of Galilee to Damascus. By the time we meet Abraham in Genesis 12, the Aramaeans controlled the water systems of Mesopotamia. Terah’s holding extended the length of the Euphrates, from Haran in the north to Ur in the south.

The Sea of Galilee sat between the two kingdoms and was controlled by the rulers on both sides. The two ruling houses intermarried. At Capernaum Jesus comes as Immanuel to both the Aramaeans and the Afro-Arabians. Both are his people since His ancestry is traced by both lines. So Jesus is first known at Capernaum. Mark and Matthew agree on this point, though they present their material differently.

In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus' true identity is recognized in the ancient island city of Tyre, not on a mountain as in Matthew's Gospel. For Mark, the Messiah’s appearing means the beginning of the restoration of Paradise. Perhaps the evangelist was thinking of this passage from Ezekiel 28. That would explain why Mark makes so much of Jesus’ visit to Tyre.

Tyre was the home of Hiram I, the father of the Tyrian king who helped to build Solomon’s temple. Hiram I was kin to David and sent skilled artisans to help David build a palace in Jerusalem, “the city of the Great King” (Matt. 5:35). Hiram is also known as "Huram" and "Horam", which are versions of the names Hur, Hor and Harun (Aaron), as in Jabal Harun, the Mountain of Aaron. According to Midrash, Hur was Moses’ brother-in-law, Miriam’s husband. Hur’s grandson was one of the builders of the Tabernacle. I Chronicles 4:4 lists Hur as the "father of Bethlehem", a settlement in the heartland of Horite territory.

In other words, the common ancestors of Hiram I and David were Horites, a caste of ruler-priests who anticipated the fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 because their Horite lineage went back to Eden. The Horites believed that the promised Seed of the Woman would be born of their blood and they expected Him to visit them. In Mark 7:24, this expectation was fulfilled when the Son of God visited Tyre, where we are told Jesus “could not pass unrecognized.”


Related reading:  Horite Territory; Who Were the Horites?; The Holy One Hidden and Revealed; The Nazareth-Egypt Connection

Oldest Human Fossils

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" (Johanson'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.