Speiser and Deuteronomy 21:16

Alice C. Linsley


While doing research I compare and contrast versions of the Bible and sometimes find that my knowledge of the Horite marriage and ascendancy pattern is critical to a detecting a good translation.  Consider the case of Deuteronomy 21:16, which was accurately translated by E.A. Speiser (The Anchor Bible) in this way:

"He shall not be able to give the birthright to the younger son of the beloved wife, in disregard of the older son of the un-loved wife." (Speiser, Genesis, p. 118)

Analysis of the kinship pattern of the Horite ruler-priests shows that each ruler had 2 wives.  He married the first wife at a young age.  She was his half-sister, as was Sarah to Abraham.  This is the wife of his youth who was closer to his age than the second wife.  Through a long acquaintance, the first wife would be most likely to lose her husband's attentions. Her firstborn son received the birthright of his biological father and ruled in his place.  This means that Isaac (Yitzak) ruled as Abraham's heir.

The second wife was married when the man approached the age of ascent to his father's throne. She was a patrilineal cousin or niece, as was Keturah to Abraham.  She was a younger wife, whose firstborn son would rule after her father. This means that Joktan, Abraham's firstborn son by Keturah, ruled in the place of Keturah's father who was also called Joktan. The Bible cautions the ruler not to neglect his first wife and not to permit her firstborn son's birthright to pass to the cousin bride's ruling line.

Now we see why Speiser's translation is a good one.  He distinguishes between 2 wives and 2 firstborn sons.  Deuteronomy 21:16 forbids breaking the kinship pattern by giving to the firstborn of the cousin bride what rightfully belonged to the firstborn son of the sister wife.

Note how the following translations suggest that there is only one birthright and only one first-born son.

New International Version:  when he wills his property to his sons, he must not give the rights of the firstborn to the son of the wife he loves in preference to his actual firstborn, the son of the wife he does not love.

New Living Translation: When the man divides his inheritance, he may not give the larger inheritance to his younger son, the son of the wife he loves, as if he were the firstborn son.

English Standard Version:  then on the day when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the unloved, who is the firstborn,

New American Standard Bible:  then it shall be in the day he wills what he has to his sons, he cannot make the son of the loved the firstborn before the son of the unloved, who is the firstborn.

GOD'S WORD® Translation:  When the day comes for the father to give his sons their inheritance, he can't treat the son of the wife he loves as if that son were the firstborn. This would show a total disregard for the real firstborn (the son of the wife he doesn't love).

King James Bible:  Then it shall be, when he maketh his sons to inherit [that] which he hath, [that] he may not make the son of the beloved firstborn before the son of the hated, [which is indeed] the firstborn:

American King James Version:  Then it shall be, when he makes his sons to inherit that which he has, that he may not make the son of the beloved firstborn before the son of the hated, which is indeed the firstborn:

American Standard Version:  then it shall be, in the day that he causeth his sons to inherit that which he hath, that he may not make the son of the beloved the first-born before the son of the hated, who is the first-born:
Douay-Rheims Bible:  And he meaneth to divide his substance among his sons: he may not make the son of the beloved the firstborn, and prefer him before the son of the hated.

Darby Bible Translation:  then it shall be, in the day that he maketh his sons to inherit what he hath, that he may not make the son of the beloved firstborn before the son of the hated, who is the firstborn;

English Revised Version:  then it shall be, in the day that he causeth his sons to inherit that which he hath, that he may not make the son of the beloved the firstborn before the son of the hated, which is the firstborn:

World English Bible:  then it shall be, in the day that he causes his sons to inherit that which he has, that he may not make the son of the beloved the firstborn before the son of the hated, who is the firstborn:

Young's Literal Translation:  then it hath been, in the day of his causing his sons to inherit that which he hath, he is not able to declare first-born the son of the loved one, in the face of the son of the hated one -- the first-born.
 
So we see that Speiser's translation is the best because he appears to understand the kinship pattern of the ruler-priests.  E.A. Speiser understood it better than he lets on in his commentary on Genesis.  He is the scholar who speaks of "Lamech the Elder" and "Lamech the Younger", indicating that he knew that Genesis 4 and Genesis 5 are different but related king lists, NOT different accounts of the same king list.


Related reading:  Pepinakht-Heqaib: Upholding the Rights of Two Sons

 

Moses' Wives and Brothers

Analysis of the marriage and ascendancy structure of Moses' family reveals the distinctive pattern of the Horite ruler-priest caste. Moses had two wives. His Kushite wife was his half-sister, as was Sarah to Abraham. The pattern of Moses' family is identical to that of the rulers listed in Genesis 4, 5 and 11 and to that of Abraham's father Terah and Samuel's father Elkanah." It appears that all of these great men of the Bible were Horites.



Alice C. Linsley


Moses’ father was Amram. He had two wives, following the pattern of his forefathers who were Horite priest-scribes. By Jochebed he had Moses, Aaron and presumably Miriam. Exodus 6:20 indicates that Jochebed was probably his sister. They had the same father, but different mothers. Her name is also spelled Jacquebeth and refers to the African homeland, probably ancient Kush. The Horites were ethnically Kushite.

Amram's relationship to Jochebed parallels Abraham's relationship to Sarah. Both were first wives, married at a young age. The ruler's second wife was usually a patrilineal cousin or niece. Such was the case with Amram's second wife Ishar and Abraham's second wife, Keturah. This pattern is characteristic of the marriage and ascendancy pattern of Horite ruler-priests.

Ishar was a descendant of Seir the Horite (Gen. 36). She would have been Amram's patrilineal cousin of niece (as was Keturah to Abraham). Ishar was the mother of Korah the Younger (Numbers 26:59), who she named after her father Korah the Elder. Korah the Younger is the one who opposed Moses' authority.

According to Numbers 26, Korah's claim to be the ruler-priest was supported by the Hanochites (descendants of Ha'nock, the first born son of Jacob's firstborn son Reuben). As the first born son of the cousin/niece bride Korah was to rule the territory of his maternal grandfather.

Korah's descendants are praised in 1 Chronicles 26. Here the Chronicler classifies them with the gatekeepers of Obed-Edom. Obed was the name of David's grandfather and Edom is the traditional homeland of the Horites. Petra, the capital of Edom, reflects Horite architecture.

The Pattern of Two Wives

Following the custom of his Horite forefathers, Moses had two wives. The first wife would have been a half-sister, the wife of Moses' youth. It is likely that he married her while in Egypt. She is said to be Kushite (Numbers 12) and for some reason Moses' siblings didn't approve of the marriage, although the marriage was probably arranged by Amram. The Horites originated in ancient Kush so Moses' marriage to a Kushite isn't surprising.

Zipporah, Moses' cousin bride, is mentioned in Exodus 2:15-16 and in Exodus 18:1-6. Moses met her while she at a well where she was drawing water for her father’s flocks. Priests were also shepherds who maintained shrines near wells, springs or other bodies of water. Zipporah was the daughter of "the priest of Midian". In other words, her father was a descendant of Abraham by Keturah who bore him a son named Midian.

Moses’ Kushite wife is not named, but she was likely a woman of high rank as the Kushites were part of, if not the majority of, the ruling classes in Egypt. We are told nothing about where Moses met her but she is likely his half-sister, if he married acording to the pattern of his Horite people. That would make her the sister of Korah. The first wife was the half-sister (as was Sarah to Abraham) and the second wife was the patrilineal cousin (as was Keturah to Abraham). Moses likely had children in Egypt by his first wife before he fled to Jethro and married Zipporah.

The criticism of Moses' marriage to the first wife is related in this passage: “When they were in Hazeroth, Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman he had married: “He married a Kushite woman!” They said, “Has the Lord God spoken only through Moses? Has God not spoken through us as well?” (Numbers 11:35-12:2)

We don’t know why Aaron and Miriam criticized Moses for marrying the Kushite woman, but it is was not racially motivated since all these people were descendants of Noah by Kush (Ham's son) and Aram (Shem's son) since the two lines intermarried. Likely, Moses’ siblings were angry that he asserted authority over Aaron, his older brother, by marrying Korah's sister and then marrying a Midiante wife. His marriage to Korah's sister strengthened the alliance with the Kushites and his marriage to Zipporah strengthened the alliance to the Midianites. This led to the formation of a powerful alliance of peoples related by blood and marriage and strengthened Moses' position as ruler.

In order for Moses to rule, he had to have two wives. This pattern of rulers having two wives is first found in Genesis 4 which mentions Lamech and his two wives. It continues through the generations with Nahor, Terah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and as we have seen with Moses. [3] This also explains Abraham's urgency to fetch a cousin wife for Isaac so that Isaac could rule after Abraham's death. This suggests that we should look in the biblical text for clues as to who Isaac's first wife would have been. We know that she would have been a half-sister, since Rebecca was the cousin bride. Likely, Isaac's first wife was a daughter of Yishbak, another son of Abraham by Keturah.

Here we find the 3-son pattern with Yishmael, Yishbak and Yitzak.  It is like other 3-son tribal units that we have seen: Uz, Buz and Huz; Og, Magog and Gog. The pattern corresponds to the 3-son Kushite rulers Sheba-qo, Shebit-qo and Ta-Har-qo. Here we find the Meroitic honorary suffix qo. The first two names are linguistically equivalent to the biblical name Sheba, an ancestor of Abraham and his cousin-wife Keturah. Ta-Har-qo is a Horus name.


The Youngest Son Rules

Isaac was the younger of the 3 first-born sons and he was chosen to rule over Abraham's territory after Abraham's death. The theme of the youngest son as ruler runs throughout the Bible. However, he never rules without objection from his siblings who express jealousy such as Miriam and Aaron. Cain’s jealousy of his younger brother overturns his natural affection to the point that he commits fratercide. Likewise, the jealousy of Joseph’s older brothers overturned their affection and they sold him into slavery. Neither was David, the youngest of the 12 sons of Jesse, treated well by his brothers. They left him to tend the flock while they returned home to feast with the Prophet Samuel. We have an allusion to this in the opening of the Song of Songs, which says that beloved’s skin is as dark "as the tents of Kedar" because he was made to work in the sun by his older brothers.

Zipporah and the Flint Knife

There is a strange story about Zipporah circumcising Moses’ son using a flint knife. As far as we know women didn’t circumcise males. This would have been a violation of the gender role distinctions practiced among Abraham's people. Women circumcised females and men circumcised males. This has led some to wonder if perhaps Moses was uncircumcised and Zipporah circumcised him in an urgent situation, but the Egyptians practiced male circumcision and Moses would not have been permitted to appear before Pharaoh had he been uncircumcised.[4]  Besides, the text specifically says that Zipporah circumcised her son.

“On the way, at a place where they spent the night, the LORD met him and tried to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint and cut off her son's foreskin, and touched Moses' feet with it, and said, “Truly you are a bridegroom of blood to me!” So he let him alone. It was then she said, “A bridegroom of blood by circumcision.” (Exodus 4:24-26)

Here we see Zipporah acting as a priest in applying the blood of the son to save her (uncircumcised = ritually impure) husband. This is the only written record of a woman involved with male circumcision and Zipporah clearly was not happy to be put in that situation. In her cultural context performing an act reserved for men would have diminished her femininity. She sacrificed an aspect of her womanhood in performing this act to save her husband.


Related reading:  The Horite Ancestry of Jesus Christ; The Ethnicity of Abraham and David; The Genesis Record of Horite Rule; Who Were the Horites?; Lamech Segment Analysis; Abraham's Nephews and Nieces; The Eyes of Horus Speak of Jesus; Abraham and Job: Horite Rulers; God's African Ancestors; Moses and Abraham: Different Origins of Israel?



NOTES

1. The name “Korah” means shaved head. This was the custom for priests in Egypt preparing for their terms of service in the temples. See Biblical Archaeology Review, July/August 2007, p.37.

2. Many of the rulers in Genesis and Exodus met their wives at wells. That is because they married the daughters of priests who tended shrines where there were either natural springs or wells.

3. All of these royal priests married two wives and maintained them in separate households on a north-south axis. These settlements marked the north and southern boundaries of the ruler’s territory along the water system he controlled. The pattern of ruler-priests having 2 wives continues throughout the Bible. Elkanah is a later example, with his two wives Hannah and Penninah.

4. Circumcision was a sign of purity among the Egyptians and none who were uncircumcised were permitted to appear before Pharaoh. Circumcision applied to females also. Read about Pharaonic circumcision here.

The Double Crown of Horus

Alice C. Linsley

"Then take silver and gold, and make crowns [ataroth], and set them on the head of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest..." Zechariah 6:11

Joshua or Yeshua is Jesus in English. He wore a double crown such as that worn by the rulers of the Nile. The double crown represents the Upper and Lower Nile regions which were united under the Kushite Pharaohs, Jesus' ancestors.

The Kushites were descendants of Kush, the son of Ham, the son of Noah. One of Kush's sons was Nimrod, the great Kushite kingdom-builder. Abraham was a descendant of Nimrod. The lines of Ham and Shem intermarried according to the Horite marriage and ascendancy pattern.

The king list on the Palermo stone begins with the names of Lower Nile pharaohs (Kushites) and shows them wearing the Red Crown. The Cairo fragment shows these rulers wearing the double crown, which the Greeks called the "Pschent." The invention of the Pschent is attributed to Menes, but a rock inscription shows his Horus wearing it. This indicates that the double crown was a symbol of Horus who was often called "Horus of the Two Crowns". He was also called "son of God" because his mother Hat-Hor conceived when she was overshadowed by Re, the Creator.

This is the origin of Messianic expectation.  It wasn't invented by the Jews.

The totem of the Upper Nile was the Griffin Vulture (called neshser in Hebrew and rendered "eagle", as in Job 39). The totem of the Lower Nile was the Cobra and the crown was originally made of reeds which represent the masculine principle of erectness.  The sema sign (shown right) represents the Osiris phallus divided into rhizomes for planting. The cultivation of reeds transformed the ancient Egyptian landscape from one wetlands to grasslands.

Gold and the color yellow were associated with the Sun, and white was associated with the Moon.  It is likely that silver and silver-gold alloys (electrum) which is found in nature, represented the Moon. The Sun and Moon were paired as binary opposites and they represented the Masculine and Feminine. Before appearing in public, royal Egyptian women were painted white. The sister wife is described as having been "made white" while her beloved has skin as dark "as the tents of Kedar" because he was made to work in in the Sun by his older brothers (like David). Gen 25:13 tells us that Kedar was a son of Ishmael and his Egyptian wife. The tents of Kedar were black.

In most ancient depictions of Saharan men, they are painted with red ochre. Red can also represents the Sun. Red symbolized the fiery radiance of the sun and amulets representing the Eye of Re were made of red stones. (From here.)

The Sun and the Moon are spoken of in Genesis 1 as two powers: the Sun is the greater power which rules the day and the Moon is the lesser power which rules the night. When the two appeared in the sky just before dawn or dusk it meant to the ancients that God was watching. The "two lights" (or two powers) were interpreted as the eyes of Re or of his son, Horus. Horus' left eye, the Moon, was weaker because it had been damaged in mortal combat with his brother Set. So Jesus Christ, who is one with the Father, was mortally wounded by his brethren, but rose before dawn and rules over all.

"Har-Ur" refers to Horus in maturity, or the Elder Horus. In his infancy he was depicted in ancient Egypt as either a calf or a lamb and in his maturity as a bull or a ram.  Horus is the only mythological figure in ancient Egypt who was understood to be a man and only as a man does he wear the two crowns.

Red (desher) was the color of life and of victory. During celebrations, ancient Egyptians would paint their bodies with red ochre and would wear amulets made of cornelian, a deep red stone. The normal skin tone of Egyptian men was depicted as red, without any negative connotation. Egyptian artisans created paint by using naturally oxidized iron and hematite.

The color white (hedj and shesep) suggested omnipotence and purity. Due to its lack of color white was also the color of simple and sacred things. The name of the holy city of Memphis meant "White Walls." White sandals were worn at holy ceremonies. The material most commonly used for ritual objects such as small ceremonial bowls and even the embalming table for the Apis Bulls in Memphis was white alabaster. White was also the heraldic color of Upper Egypt. The "Nefer", the crown of Upper Egypt was white, even though originally is was probably made of green reeds.

The pure white color used in Egyptian art was created from chalk and gypsum.  The white crown appears like a linen turban and suggests purity. The red crown suggests the blood that purifies. The double crown association with Horus speaks of both purity and blood sacrifice. Among the ancient Afro-Asiatics these were linked as is evident from linguistic studies.

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 (Sudroid) "tor" = blood. This relates to the injunction that the ancient Egyptian/Kushite priest (harwa) be pure (w'b) before entering the temple. These priests shaved their heads. Korah, Moses' half-brother, was such a priest. His name means "shaved head" and according to Numbers 16:17-18, he carried the censor to offer incense to the deity. This indicates that "kor" and "tor" are linguistically related, suggesting a connection between tora/Torah and kora/Korah.


Related reading:  Jesus Christ of the Two Crowns; Who Were the Kushites?; Linguistic Evidence for the Afro-Asiatic Dominion; Jesus From Lamb to Ram

Life is in the Blood

Alice C. Linsley

One of the fascinating discoveries of cultural anthropologists involves the extremely ancient and universal practice of burying people (especially rulers) in red ochre dust, a symbol of blood. Red ochre or hematite (from the Greek word for blood, haema ) is found naturally around the globe. When hematite powder is mixed with water is looks just like blood.

The oldest site of red ochre mining is in the Lebombo Mountains of southern Africa. Here H.B.S. Cooke’s team discovered the oldest known human burial, between 70,000 and 80,000 years old. The grave is that of a small boy, buried with a seashell pendant and covered in red ochre. This is also the location of the oldest known mining operations in which thousands of mining tools have been found in excavated tunnels. Here hematite was mined 80,000 years ago.

These same archaeologists report the finding of the 35,000 year old Lebombo bone at Border Cave in Natal. The Lebombo bone, carved from a baboon femur, is the oldest mathematical tool found to date and appears to be a moon phase counter. It counts up to 6 phases, which suggests that it represents a binary calendar of 2 sets of 6 moon phases. One set is likely associated with the Feminine Principle and the seasons in which plants and animals reproduce. The other set is likely associated with the Masculine Principle and the seasons in which plants and animals are harvested and hunted. The Lebombo bone was the invention of the people who mined red ochre and used it to bury their people in the hope of life after death.

The use of red ochre in burial was widespread in prehistoric times. A man buried 45,000 years ago at La Chapelle-aux-Saints in southern France, was packed in red ochre. “The Red Lady" of Paviland in Wales was buried in red ochre about 29,000 years ago. The “lady” was actually a man whose skeletal remains and burial artifacts are encrusted with the red ore.

P.L. Kirk reports that prehistoric Australian aboriginal burials reveal pink staining of the soil around the skeleton, indicating that red ochre had been sprinkled over the body. The remains of an adult male found at Lake Mungo in southeastern Australia were copiously sprinkled with red ochre.

The ‘Fox Lady’ of Doini Vestonice, Czechoslovakia, who was buried 23,000 years ago, was also covered in red ochre. There is also the 20,000 year old burial site in Bavaria of a thirty-year-old man entirely surrounded by a pile of mammoth tusks and nearly submerged in red ochre. Natives peoples of the Americas also used red ochre to bury their dead.

Blood Speaks

In the ancient world, blood was suspected of having supernatural powers.  The blood of sacrificed animals could pay for certain human crimes, but for other crimes only the blood of the offending party would suffice.  The blood of humans was more powerful than the blood of animals because it was perceived to come from the Creator directly through the mother. For example, the Ashanti of Ghana believe that an individual's blood is derived from the earth and passed through that individual's mother.  In this scheme, human blood has the power to speak to its Source or Origin, blood speaking to blood. This notion is reflected in the story of Cain and Abel.

When Cain kills his brother and God asks him about it, Cain replies with a question that poses a theme of the entire Bible. Cain asks, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” The answer is not obvious, though it is natural that brothers should care for one another. However, there is much more to this story. The blood of the murdered brother cries to God from the ground where it spilled (Gen. 4:10). The blood of the murdered has a voice! There is life in the blood of the innocent one. Abel is the archetype of the Son of God who was killed by his own brethren.

There is still more to the story. Cain was the first-born son. He killed his younger brother, the very person he should have tried to protect. In this, Cain’s jealousy of his younger brother overturns his natural affection. Likewise, the jealousy of Joseph’s older brothers overturned their affection and they sold him into slavery. Neither was David, the youngest of the 12 sons of Jesse, treated well by his brothers. They left him to tend the flock while they returned home to feast with the Prophet Samuel. We have an allusion to this in the Song of Songs (1:5,6), which says that beloved’s skin is as dark "as the tents of Kedar" because he was made to work in the sun by his older brothers.

Moses had two older brothers: Aaron and Korah. Aaron caused trouble for Moses when he permitted the creation of the bronze calf, an idol which represented fertility and prosperity (unlike the lamb, which represented purity and sacrifice). Korah, Moses’ other brother, challenged Moses’ authority in the wilderness and died when the earth opened and devoured him (Numbers 26:10).

The theme of the beloved younger brother being abused by his older brothers runs through the entire Bible and speaks of the only begotten Son of God. His Blood gives life to the world and His blood makes it possible for our hearts to speak to Him. This sheds light on these words of Jesus:

"Truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.  Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will rasie him up at the last day. For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him." (John 6:53-56)

Mount Mary and the Origins of Life

Alice C. Linsley

The mountain image for The Virign Mary and the Nativity of Christ follows verses such as Habakkuk 3.3 "God came from Mount Paran", and the portrayal of Mary as "Holy mountain" rests on ancient cosmology.


In observation of the Heavens it is evident that the Sun always rises in the east and appears to journey across the sky to the west. The only time when there are no shadows is high noon, so in terms of the solar day, this is the temporal sacred center. The spatial sacred center is between Heaven and Earth, on the mountain top. Abraham, Moses and other biblical figures climbed to the tops of mountains to encounter the Creator.  Jesus, who "came down from Heaven", was revealed on Calvary and on the Mount of Transfiguration.

The sacred center is temporal and spatial, halfway between East and West as measured by the Sun's movement to high noon, and halfway between Heaven and Earth. This is the place of encounter between God and Man, the place of both judgment and redemption. 

The mountain image as a celestial pattern is very old. It is the safest place to be when the chaotic waters rise. Te-hom (Hebrew: תְּהוֹם‎), the chaotic deep,  is the opposite of te-hut, divine wisdom and order. (The oldest known moral code is the Law of Tehut which dates to about 5,000 B.C.) According to the ancient Afro-Asiatics, when God spoke the creation into being He also fixed boundaries which those who honor God are not trespass. Trespassing divinely established boundaries invites chaos (tehom) to return like a great flood to the world. So tehom and tehut are binary opposites, but tehut is the greater of the two because it preserves order and life.

The victory of tehut (order) over tehom (chaos) relates to the annual inundation of the Nile and helps us to understand the Egyptian concept of creation. One of the oldest creation myths envisioned the first place in the world as a mound emerging from the waters of a universal ocean. Here the first life form was seen as a lily, growing on the peak of the primeval mound. The ancient Egyptians called the mound Tatjenen, meaning "the emerging land".

In Hindu and Buddhist mythology the mound that emerged from the primordial seas at the beginning of time is called Mount Meru. It emerges from the center of the Cosmic Ocean, and the Sun and seven visible planets circle the mountain. Mount Meru in Hinduism is a mythological mountain. However, there are two mountains called Meru in Africa, one in Kenya and the other in Tanzania. Meru, spelled Meri in Egyptian, is Mary in English. Meri is sometimes spelled Meni, with the n taking the place of the r, as in the Southeastern Asian languages (like Siamese), which call Mary "Mania."

The Virgin Mary, whose womb swelled with the Son of God, is sometimes portrayed in icons as the mountain of God. The Prophet Daniel saw a mountain, from which a stone was cut by the hand of God (Dan. 2:34, 45). This is the stone which the builders rejected and which has become a stumbling block, even Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

The Virgin Mother of God is also called the "Mother of Life" as in the following Toparion (Tone 1):

In giving birth you preserved your virginity,
In falling asleep you did not forsake the world, O Theotokos.
You were translated to life, O Mother of Life,
And by your prayers, you deliver our souls from death.

This conception of Earth emerging from a universal ocean likely originated in the Upper Nile region where stone pillars and mounds of earth were erected. In the Lower Nile region small pyramids were carved from a single block of stone. These were known as a bnbn (benben), from the root, bn, meaning to "swell forth". The image of the sun resting at, or swelling forth from the peak of the pyramid or mountain is represented in the sign of tnt and in the Agadez crosses made by the Inadan metalworkers of west central Africa. The Egyptian word for the rising sun is wbn, which comes from the same root as benben.

One can't help but think of Noah's flood and how his ark landed in Ar-menia, which could mean "mount Meni". Godfrey Higgins, in his 1874 monograph Anacalypsis: An Inquiry into the Origins of Languages, Nations and Religions, noted that "Armenia" could mean "mount of Meru… that is, Ar or Er-Meni-ia, the country of mount Meru or Meni." This leaves open the possibility that Noah's ark landed on Mount Meni in central Africa, about 230 miles from the present limits of Lake Chad, and the most likely site of Noah's flood.

Higgins noted the conflation of the names Meni and Meru. Here is another indication that the legend of Noah was carried to the eastern extension of the ancient Afro-Asiatic Dominion by the ruler-priests of Abraham's people.

The sacred center is the place where the Sun rests at the peak of the day (noon). This is why the Sun is shown at the top center of many cross-like images such as the Agadez Cross, the sign of TNT, and the Egyptian Ankh.  For the individual the inner shrine is the sacred center. This notion of the inner shrine as the sacred center where God may dwell is evident in Hierakonpolis as early as 3200 B.C., when personal piety involved facing the rising sun and inviting the Deity to dwell within. The Pharaoh was called “son of Re,” whose emblem was the Sun. Egyptian king lists never mention the king's earthly father. Each Pharaoh was called the "son of Re" because kingship was a manifestation of the solar deity’s overshadowing of noble women.  So Mary is the one by whom both Jesus' kingship and His sonship are traced back to the Father.


Related reading:  Sacred Mountains; Peaks and Valleys;

2,400 B.C. Tomb of Purification Priest

Egyptian archaeologists discovered a 4400-year-old tomb, south of the cemetery of the pyramid builders at Giza, Egypt.

In a statement, Egyptian Minister of Culture Farouk Hosny, said the ancient Egyptian tomb was unearthed during routine excavations supervised by the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) near the pyramid builder's necropolis.

The recently discovered tomb belongs to a priest named Rudj-Ka (or Rwd-Ka), and is dated to the 5th Dynasty - between 2465 and 2323 BC.

Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the SCA, said that Rudj-Ka had several titles and would have been an important member of the ancient Egyptian court.

Read it all here.

Blood is shed in many ways: in hunting and in war, in the woman’s monthly cycle and in childbirth. Archaic peoples distinguished between these types of blood. Some bleeding results in death. Other types of bleeding result in life. Here the binary distinction between life and death is very evident. We also find a gender distinction between bloods or what has been called the “blood work” of males and females.

The blood work of males pertains to war, hunting, execution and animal sacrifice. The blood work of women pertains to conception and reproduction. The two bloods were to be kept separate so as not to blur the distinction between death and life. Women were not present where animals were sacrificed and men were not present where women gave birth.

Blood shed that leads to the death of another human was to be covered by payment in blood. If the slaying was accidental, an animal could be sacrificed in the place of the killer and the victim’s family compensated in some way (usually by payment of grain, oil or livestock). If the person killed intentionally, he was either banned from the clan/village/tribe or his life was forfeit.

Blood was handled carefully because it was viewed as having the power to bring blessings or curses on those who handled it or were responsible for the shedding of blood. There were priests whose job it was to flay the carcasses of sacrificed animals. They were called “sarki.” (Sarki still exist and can be found from west central Africa to Nepal.) There were castes of priests whose single responsibility was to sacrifice animals, a very bloody business. There were other priests whose work was to purify those who had become contaminated through contact with blood or a corpse. Rudj-Ka was a purification priest.


Related reading:  Who Were the Horites?

The Ancient Afro-Asiatic World

The following paper was written by one of my World Religions students and I thought it was an interesting overview of my research on the ancient Afro-Asiatics.  Mr. Lewis has kindly given me permission to publish it and I hope that others will find it interesting also.

As background, see A Scientific Timeline of Genesis.



Jeffrey L. Lewis

The Afro-Asiatic Dominion, a term coined by Alice C. Linsley, is used to describe the correspondence of religious concepts and practices diffused across a vast area which extends from west central Africa to the Indus River Valley as well as religious practices among the Sarki who live as ‘Haruwa’ in the Tarai region of Nepal.

The Afro-Asiatic Dominion concept in the Hebrew Scriptures is suggested by the correspondence of western (Afro) and eastern (Asiatic) traditions (Linsley, July, 2009). Many similarities exist between these 2 traditions. Among them are the 2 creation stories, the 2 flood stories, and a consistent binary framework of both traditions. The Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament), through the book of Genesis (in the beginning), is a Biblical explanation of how the world came into existence; however Linsley provides another view of the book of Genesis through an anthropological interpretation. Through research conducted over 32 years of study, she has identified a specific kinship pattern that shows Afro-Asiatic beliefs and practices widely spread through a lineage of ruler-priest who intermarried throughout the areas of Africa, Mesopotamia, and India to exercise control over the water systems at a time when these areas were wetter.

Linsley’s research unveils geological, biological, and linguistically equivalent evidence relevant to the spread of the Afro-Asiatic religion and its worldview. Through comparisons of the languages of Saharan Africa, Semitic languages, Sanskirt and Dravidian, evidence suggests a vast extension of Afro-Asiatic Dominion practices across the Atlantic coast of modern Nigeria to the Indus River as much as 20,000 and 10,000 years ago. Cultural diffusion [1] may explain why people across such a vast area share similar words and linguistic affinities between languages. In relation to the genealogy of the sons of Noah, who replenished the earth after the flood, Genesis 11:1 states that the ‘whole earth had one language and one speech’. According to scripture in Genesis chapter 11, the people attempted to unify and honor themselves rather than God by building a monument unto them. As a result the Lord confused their language and scattered them across the earth (vs. 7-8), and the unfinished monument became known as the Tower of Babel [2]. These descendants of Noah are "Afro-Asiatics", according to Linsley, and at one time spoke the same words, thus explaining common root systems supporting linguistic similarities.

In addition to geologic, biologic, and linguistic evidence of the Afro-Asiatic Dominion, Linsley has identified eight key features of the ancient religion’s worldview. This essay will discuss those key features shared in common with Christianity today. The eight key features of Afro-Asiatic religion include: Triune God; the Sun as an emblem of the Deity; concept of the Son of God; fixed order of creation; hereditary priesthood; blood sacrifice at altars; a common number symbolism; and prophets.

One religious feature shared between the Afro-Asiatic Dominion and the Christian Doctrine is the Triune God. Triune God is the concept that God exists in 3 persons; God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This is one of the most important doctrine beliefs within the Christian faith. Referred to as the Trinity, the concept of God existing in three persons can be founded in the Hebrew Scriptures. The Trinity teaches that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are three persons in one Godhead and that each has the same attributes and power as the other. The first recorded indication to the Trinity actually comes from Genesis 1:26, when God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness…” This statement in itself can be used to support the doctrine of a Triune God. Another example may be seen in Genesis 18:1-2, where God appears to Abraham as three men standing by him as he sat under the shade of the terebinth tree, yet when Abraham speaks, he speaks only, “my Lord” (vs. 3).

When looking for commonality for the sharing of the Sun as Deity in the Christian faith, Luke 1: 76-79 may be considered. In these verses, Zacharias prophesies about the ministry of John the Baptist, who would be the forerunner or the one preparing the way for the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Within these verses, verse 78 likens Christ’s coming to the sunrise. In the Holman Christian Standard Bible it reads: "Because of our God’s merciful compassion, the Dawn from on high will visit us." For Christians this was an accurate prediction of Jesus’ coming. Christ would be Sun in an otherwise dark world, bringing light and peace to a dying world.

The concept of Jesus Christ as The Son of God incarnated is also a key feature of Christian Doctrine. In Hebrew Scripture New Testament writings, John 3:16 is a foundational scripture for the plan of salvation to the Christian believer. John 3:16 states, “For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” This feature shared among one of the eight in the Afro-Asiatic Dominion religious life is indeed keen in modern day Christianity.

The next feature, Fixed Order of Creation, begins with the first statement in the first book in the Hebrew Scriptures. Genesis 1:1 reads, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” God began creation alone, and the creation is His kingdom, and He alone is the ruler. Psalm 104:19 states, “The Lord has established His throne in heaven and His kingdom rules over all”. According to Hebrew Scriptures, God used an orderly fashion when creating the earth and creatures over six days and resting on the seventh. After His divine order of creation, He saw that all created ‘was good’. He also instructed each kind of creature to reproduce according to its own kind, representing order in multiplication. Violations of the order of creation represent rebellion against the Creator as was the case when Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden. Other scriptures define the Fixed Order of Creation, such as Jeremiah 33:25, which speaks of God separating the day and night and fixing laws that govern heaven and earth and Jeremiah 31: 35-36 which details the ordinances of order and the consequences if those ordinances are not kept. (Linsley, May, 2009).

In the Afro-Asiatic tradition there is evidence of intermarriage of the priestly lines as far back as Kain and Seth, (sons of Adam and Eve) and Ham and Shem (sons of Noah and his wife). This is also noted through Aaron and his half-brother Korah, who was also a priest. This type of intermarriage was necessary to preserve the priestly bloodline leading to the birth of Jesus Christ, the Priest Messiah. Preserving this lineage of ruler-priest bloodline also influenced the spread of the Afro-Asiatic religion.

Blood Sacrifices at Altars and Common Number Symbolism will be discussed together as some aspects of each coincide at times. Blood sacrifices were preformed by priest in the Afro-Asiatic religion and throughout the Old Testament Hebrew Scriptures as a priestly duty for the atonement of sin. The number seven symbolizes completion to Christians based upon the fact that God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh day from all His work having been complete. Seven has thus been significant in reference to perfection and or completion in these religions and some practices. According to priestly laws, the sacrificial blood of the animal sacrificed was to be sprinkled seven places on the altar. Christians believe that Jesus Christ was the ultimate sacrifice for the atonement of their sin as He died on the cross, therefore sacrificing of animals are no longer necessary for their sin. Jesus Christ bled from seven areas of His body and His blood offers believers ‘Eternal Life’ (John 6:54).

The final feature of the Afro-Asiatic Dominion identified by Linsley that shares commonality with the Christian faith are the belief of prophecy and prophets. A prophecy is a divinely inspired prediction, instruction, or exhortation spoken by a prophet who is one chosen to speak for God or a deity. Prophecy and prophets are often spoken of in Hebrew Biblical writings used as the foundation of Christianity. In the Afro-Asiatic civilizations prophets live near bodies of water or sacred springs and there we find prophecy to be attested at the shrines along the Nile, at Hama on the Orontes, and at Mari on the Euphrates (Linsley, July 2009).

For Christians the greatest prophecies were those that predicted the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. In the book of Isaiah chapter 6, we see Isaiah as he is called to be a prophet. He saw a great vision of the King of kings, whom we later learn in John 12:39-41 is the Lord Jesus Christ, ‘high and lifted up’ (Isaiah 6:1b). Many other prophecies point to the Messiah throughout chapters 7-12 of Isaiah. One of much significance is Isaiah 7:14 which reads, “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.”[3] Although some dispute this being a prophecy of the Messiah because of the Hebrew word ‘almah’, which could mean ‘virgin’ or ‘young woman’, the New Testament teaches that Christ was virgin-born and both Matthew 1:23 and Luke 1:27 use the Hebrew word ‘parthenos’ which can only mean virgin.

While this essay discusses several commonalities of the eight key features of the Afro-Asiatic Dominion with Christianity, there are surely are many more. Afro-Asiatic religious culture diffusion has resulted in the spread of this religion from west central Africa to the Indus river Valley and beyond. Both Afro-Asiatic Dominion and Christianity religions share these eight key features all of which are based on Biblical truths. All these truths point to a God with whom we can have eternal life through His Son, Jesus Christ.


NOTES

[1] Cultural diffusion is the process by which different cultures initiate regular contact through migration, commerce, and alliances. It involves the spreading of knowledge, skills, and technology between cultures.

[2] Tower of Babel represents a symbol of divine judgment against self-pride and self-rule. It is a monument that began as an attempt to build a tower to heaven with the intention to glorify man-kind’s superiority as opposed to man’s dependence upon the one and only true God.

[3] The use of the name Immanuel, which means “God-With-Us”, tells us of the virgin-born human form of God in the birth of Jesus Christ the Messiah.


References

1) Linsley, A.C. (2009, July 22). One Worldview, Many Priests. Retrieved September 30,2010.

2) Linsley, A.C. (2009, March 14). The Afro-Asiatic Dominion. Retrieved September 28, 2010.

3) Linsley, A.C. (2009, July 7). Afro-Asiatic Religious Life. Retrieved October 4, 2010.

4) Linsley, A.C. (2009, May 9). Genesis and Genetics. Retrieved October 5, 2010.


Related reading:  African Religion Predates Hinduism; The Christ in Nilotic Mythology; Who Were the Horites?

Intelligent Design Meets Resistance in Glasgow

They are among Scotland’s most eminent scientists, they believe the world was created in six days and women were made from Adam’s rib ...and they’re coming to a school near you.

A new creationist group that preaches the “scientific” theory of intelligent design has set up in Glasgow with the stated aim of promoting its beliefs to schools and colleges.

The Centre for Intelligent Design, headed by a Northern Irish professor of genetics, a vice-president of the Royal College of Physicians and a former school inspector, has already prepared the ground for a clash with authorities.

The group’s director, Dr Alastair Noble, told the Sunday Herald it was “inevitable” the debate would make its way into schools – even though the Scottish Government says teachers should not regard intelligent design as science.

“We are definitely not targeting schools, but that doesn’t mean to say we may not produce resources that go to schools,” Dr Noble said, adding that he had already been asked to speak in Scottish schools, and agreed to do so.

Read it all here.

Shepherd Priests

Alice C. Linsley

The ruler-priests among Abraham's people had two wives who lived in separate settlements with separate flocks. Together these constituted the extent of the ruler's kingdom. There were practical reasons for this practice. In the event of attack, the ruler's line was more likely to survive if divided into two camps. This very fear of being "cut off from the earth" motivated Jacob to divide his household into two groups when returning to Canaan (Gen. 32). Horus two land holdings, which is indicated by one of his titles:  Har-pa-Neb-Taui, which means Horus of the Two Lands.

Jesus, the Good Shepherd, speaks of having other sheep in another fold (John 10:16). The two folds are often cast as dispensations: one consisting of those who lived in expectation of the Son of God (Abraham's people) and the other being the witnesses of His resurrection (the Church). Together these comprise the Kingdom of God.

The rulers of Egypt kept flocks and acknowledged that Jacob's people were especially skilled shepherds. This is why Pharaoh asked Joseph to put the best shepherd of Jacob's clan in charge of the royal flocks (Gen. 47:6).  Amram, Moses' father, married according to the pattern of Horite ruler-priests. He too was a shepherd with water sources to provide for his flocks. His daughter, Miriam, grew up around her father's water shrine and she married a Horite ruler, Hur.

The association of sheep with the Son of God is found throughout the Bible and takes the Horite shepherd-priests as its pattern. A common image of God is as the Shepherd of Israel (Ps 80:1) and the priests of Israel are referred to as “shepherds.” The priests took the best sheep to offer as sacrifices. Jesus comes from a long line of shepherd-priests, on both Joseph's and Mary's sides.  According to Tradition, Mary’s father, Joachim, was a priest and the Protoevangelium of James says that he had flocks.  The pattern is clear that priests, who maintained shrines at major water systems or at wells, kept sheep. Moses tended the flocks of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian. It was at Jethro's well that Moses first met his future wife, Zipporah. Abraham's servant found Rebecca at a well and Jacob first encountered Rachel at a well.

The ruler-priests among Abraham's people were shepherds. The signs of their authority were the shepherd's crook and the flail. These were also the emblems of Pharonic authority and they have been found in pre-dynastic wall paintings at Hierakonpolis, the site of the most ancient temple and city in Egypt (circa 4200 B.C.). Priests placed invocations to Horus at the fort-summit as the first rays of the Sun came over the eastern horizon. Of particular interest is the tomb painting of two men who carry crooked staffs with objects that look like flails, suggesting that they might be ruler-priests. They are painted with red ochre.

In God's economy, which always gets the order of things right, it was the shepherds of Bethlehem, a Horite settlement, who were the first to receive the news of the birth of the Son of God!

The Eyes of Horus Speak of Jesus

Ron, a regular reader of Just Genesis has made an important and well-informed observation which I would like to explore further. He wrote in a comment here:

[My] theory…. depends entirely on whether or not gold and silver are, in Egyptian mythology (or, more generally, in the Afroasiatic worldview) associated with the sun and the moon. I don't know if they are.

But if they are, then perhaps the two metals in the Zech. 6:11 crown symbolize the eyes of Horus.

Or perhaps they symbolize sun worship at the western end of the Afroasiatic dominion and moon worship at the eastern end, mentioned in one of your earlier posts ("Was Abraham a Pagan?"), which may suggest rule over the whole Afroasiatic dominion, from east to west. At that time, wouldn't that be the entire known world?

We begin by addressing Ron’s last observation about the western and eastern extensions of the vast Afro-Asiatic Dominion. Ron recognizes that there are 2 creations stories and 2 flood stories and that they come from different areas of the Dominion, yet they share a common worldview. On the western end, the Sun was regarded as superior to the Moon and the emblem of the Creator.  On the eastern end, devotion to the Mood-god Sin was so great that the Moon was regarded as the Sun's equal.  The western Afro-Asiatics would have viewed this as heretical (pagan) because it moved the more ancient binary worldview, in which one of the opposites is always greater in some way, to a dualistic worldview in which the opposites are equal in every way. 

In the story of Jesus’ birth we find another expression of the western and eastern expectations of God's work. The announcement came to the shepherds from an angelic host at night. The heavens lit up with their glory as they proclaimed that a Son was born in the city of David. To the Magi, who were eastern Afro-Asiatics, the announcement came by the conjunction of the king planet Jupiter with the king star Regelus, in the constellation of Leo. Why God would communicate with the western and eastern Afro-Asiatics differently? Why not send angels to both groups. Wouldn’t that have worked as well?

God honors both traditions in choosing to proclaim the birth of His Son within the contexts of the two groups. The shepherds would have known about the promise of the coming Son because all the old Horite priests were also shepherds. The Magi knew to read the heavens because they were the descendents of those rulers from Judah who expected the Son’s coming to be attended by evidence in the heavens. This knowledge came to them from their Horite priest ancestors.  In both cases, events in the heavens communicate with those who are paying attention.  In ancient times, the people who payed attention to events in the heavens were priests.

Psalm 19:1 says that the "heavens declare the glory of God." The greatest celestial witness is one which God set to go off in the heavens like an alarm clock on December 24 A.D. 3. That's when Jupiter completed a triple coronation of and aligned with Regelus in the constellation of Leo 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 the Son of God. This event is confirmed by sophisticated astronomical software. (For more on this, go to http://www.bethlehemstar.com/)

Ron asks about the metals silver and gold in Zechariah’s crown. The metals are silver and gold. It is certainly possible that these represent the eyes of Horus, who was called "Horus of the Two Eyes". However, Horus is often portrayed as blind in one eye. That eye was damaged while Horus engaged in mortal combat with this brother Set. The other eye is often shown as red, as in the image of Hathor crowned with the red eye of Horus.

In ancient Egyptian symbolism, the right eye is the Eye of Ra, and symbolizes the sun. The left is the Eye of Thoth, and symbolizes the moon. Together they are the Two Eyes of Horus, but one is weaker than the other. This is consistent with the binary worldview of Abraham's Kushite ancestors. If the metals represent the eyes of Horus, the silver would have been the symbol of the Moon and the gold the symbol of the Sun.  Now the question remains, which would have been the red eye?  To answer that, we should consider Hathor, an image of divine judgment, which is what the red eye appears to symbolize.  In Egyptian mythology, Apopis was a water serpent and a symbol of chaos (te'hom). He is slain by Hathor, Ra's cat. This makes sense when we consider that the Sun and Moon appear red when the atmosphere is least pure, that is to say, when the "waters above" are made chaotic. This too would have been observed by the ancient Afro-Asiatic priests.

This takes us back to the story of Jesus' birth. The shepherds would have known the story of the angels coming to Abraham and their announcement of the birth of a son.  The angelic beings appeared in the "heat of the day". This contrasts with God's visitation in the garden in "the cool of the day", in which He intended to commune with the Man and the Woman.  The latter visit was a hot encounter with God because the angels were on their way to Sodom, a city that stood under divine judgment.  The chiastic structure of the Sodom narrative places the destruction of Sodom between the promise of a son for Abraham and the birth of two sons to Lot.  The element of the promised Son's birth can be found even in the story of Sodom's destruction.

The Horite Conception of Priesthood

Alice C. Linsley


Most people think of Christianity as an off-shoot of Judaism. However, the core of Christianity can be traced back to Abraham and his Kushite ancestors, long before there were Jews and Judaism. In this sense, Christianity isn't original. What it lacks in originality, it makes up for in antiquity and herein rests its authority.

Abraham and his people were Horites, a caste of ruler-priests who were devotees of the mythical Horus who was called the "Son of God" and "Horus of the Two Crowns". The sacrificing priesthood may not have begun with the Horites in the Nile region, but this group's conception of the priesthood shaped the Jewish and later the Christian conception of the priesthood.

Horite priests were asked to pray for people because they were recognized as especially holy people.  Abraham was asked to pray for Abimelech's household and Job was asked by God to pray for his friends. So the Horite priest's work involved intercessory prayer, fasting and sometimes blood sacrifice. Righteous Job offered sacrifice on behalf of his whole family.

The men named in Genesis are Horite ruler-priests. The Horites were a caste. One trait of castes is strict endogamy. The Horites exclusively intermarried. These are the rulers who are listed in the Genesis genealogies.

The marriages were arranged between the sons and daughters of 2 main priestly lines.

Each ruler had 2 wives at the time of his ascent: one was a half-sister (as was Sarah to Abraham) and the other was a patrilineal cousin wife (as was Keturah to Abraham). There are numerous examples of exactly this pattern in Genesis and Exodus.

The priestly lines are traced from brother patriarchs: Cain and Seth; Ham and Shem; Peleg and Joktan, and Nahor and Abraham.

It is by the cousin bride that the ruler-priest lines are identified. The cousin wife names her firstborn son after her father. So Namaah’s firstborn son Lamech is named after her father Lamech the Elder. This pattern continues throughout the Bible to Joseph and his cousin bride, Mary, the mother of Jesus, the Son of God.


The Priesthood and Purity

Horite priests define the priesthood.  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. The Horite priest was to be purified before entering the temple. His purification involved fasting and an intense period of prayer. The purification ritual involved bathing and shaving the head. Korah, Moses' half-brother, was a priest. His name means "shaved head" and according to Numbers 16:17-18, he carried the censor to offer incense before God.

Horite priests served in the temple, probably on a rotating schedule. It is from the Horite priesthood that the priesthood of Israel developed.  Moses' two brothers, Korah and Aaron, were both Horite priests before there was a nation known as Israel.


Devotees of the "Son of God"

Many have noted the uncanny correspondence between the myth of Horus and the story of Jesus. Both were born the only begotten Son of God under miraculous and humble circumstances.  Both were slain by their own kin.  Both rose to life again.  Both inherit the Father's kingdom, uniting 2 peoples, which is symbolized by the wearing of two crowns.  This is references in the book of Job, who was himself a Horite.  The trial of Job, in which Satan acts as the accuser, parallels Zechariah 3:2-6 where Satan accuses the High Priest Joshua (Yeshua). In Yeshua's trial God acquits Yeshua and commands that he be clothed in clean garments and crowned with 2 crowns (ataroth). This points to Jesus who as the Son of God would wear 2 crowns, one representing those who have died in faith and the other representing the Church.

The correspondence between the Horus Myth and the story of Jesus can be explained in two ways. Either Christians borrowed the Horus myth or Christianity emerges in an organic way from the belief system of Abraham and his Horite people. If we decide that Christians borrowed the Horus myth, we must explain why they should have selected this one in particular. There are other great world myths that could have served as the pattern for the story of Jesus. I know of no other religions that prefigure Jesus Christ, the Son of God, other than the faith of Israel as it emerges out of the faith of Abraham's Horite people. 

This is the meaning of John 8, where when the Jews called Abraham their father, Jesus said to them, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day.” 

“Then the Jews said to Him, ‘You are not fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was I AM.”

Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that He will receive an eternal kingdom from the Father. The citizens of this eternal kingdom must themselves be eternal beings and that is why Jesus alone offers eternal life to all who believe that He is the Son of God, the fulfillment of the Edenic Promise of Genesis 3:15. He is able to do this because He alone has conquered death and can deliver sinners from the curse of death. This is the core of Christian belief. Surrounding this core are attendant beliefs which logically follow. One is that to receive eternal life, we must acknowledge our need for mercy, forgiveness and salvation. Another is that God does this for us out of His boundless love. John wrote, "This is the revelation of God's love for us, that God sent his only Son into the world that we might have life through him." (1 John 4:9)

God told Abraham to leave Haran and go to a place where He would establish him as the father of many peoples. God had plans for Abraham and there was nothing for him in Haran, since his older brother Nahor ruled in Terah's place when Terah died. This does not indicate that Abraham abandoned the religion or marriage pattern of his Horite people. In fact, the Bible makes it clear that Abraham continued to believe that the Seed of the Woman would be born of the bloodlines of the ruler-priests because he married his half-sister (Sarah) and his patrilieal cousin (Keturah), following the pattern of his Horite ruler-priest ancestors.

The story of Horus and the story of Jesus correspond in great detail, though Horus never existed in the material sense. He was the prefigurement of the One who would wear 2 crowns and unite 2 peoples. The Horites worshiped the Creator who emblem was the Sun when many other peoples were worshipping false gods. They anticipated the coming of the Son of God to earth and believed that He would be born of their royal-priest bloodlines. That is why the lines of priests intermarrried exclusively and why unchaste daughters of priests were burned alive (Lev. 21:9).  Sexual impurity was not tolerated. 

Joseph, Jacob's first-born son by Rachel, married Asenath, the chaste daughter of a priest of Heliopolis (city of the Sun). Heliopolis, which was called Lunu by the Egyptians, was a shrine city of Horus. Lunu means place of pillars because the temples of Heliopolis were constructed with many pillars.

We have no evidence that Horite priests performed the Canaanite practices condemned by the prophets, who were their descendants. These priests were very concerned about purity, expecially when preparing for their time of service in the temple.  In the ancient world the Horite priests were known for their purity and devotion to the High God. Plutarch wrote that the “priests of the Sun at Heliopolis never carry wine into their temples, for they regard it as indecent for those who are devoted to the service of any god to indulge in the drinking of wine whilst they are under the immediate inspection of their Lord and King. The priests of the other deities are not so scrupulous in this respect, for they use it, though sparingly.”


Related reading:  Who Were the Horites?; The Christ in Nilotic Mythology; God as Male Priest; The Genesis King Lists

Lower Solar Irradiance, Higher Atmospheric Temps?

The Solar System is so complex! Just when climatologists think they have it figured out, they discover how little they understand. Here's an example:


The thermal structure and composition of the atmosphere is determined fundamentally by the incoming solar irradiance. Radiation at ultraviolet wavelengths dissociates atmospheric molecules, initiating chains of chemical reactions—specifically those producing stratospheric ozone—and providing the major source of heating for the middle atmosphere, while radiation at visible and near-infrared wavelengths mainly reaches and warms the lower atmosphere and the Earth’s surface¹. Thus the spectral composition of solar radiation is crucial in determining atmospheric structure, as well as surface temperature, and it follows that the response of the atmosphere to variations in solar irradiance depends on the spectrum². Daily measurements of the solar spectrum between 0.2 µm and 2.4 µm, made by the Spectral Irradiance Monitor (SIM) instrument on the Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (SORCE) satellite³ since April 2004, have revealed⁴ that over this declining phase of the solar cycle there was a four to six times larger decline in ultraviolet than would have been predicted on the basis of our previous understanding. This reduction was partially compensated in the total solar output by an increase in radiation at visible wavelengths. Here we show that these spectral changes appear to have led to a significant decline from 2004 to 2007 in stratospheric ozone below an altitude of 45 km, with an increase above this altitude. Our results, simulated with a radiative-photochemical model, are consistent with contemporaneous measurements of ozone from the Aura-MLS satellite, although the short time period makes precise attribution to solar effects difficult. We also show, using the SIM data, that solar radiative forcing of surface climate is out of phase with solar activity. Currently there is insufficient observational evidence to validate the spectral variations observed by SIM, or to fully characterize other solar cycles, but our findings raise the possibility that the effects of solar variability on temperature throughout the atmosphere may be contrary to current expectations.

Correspondence to: Joanna D. Haigh¹ Email: j.haigh@imperial.ac.uk

Appears in Nature 467, 696-699 (7 October 2010)

Published here on 6 Oct. 2010

Christian Faith Emerges From Faith of Abraham

There isn't much that is original in true Christianity. It isn't a religion for people who seek innovation or who prefer a belief system that is open to modification and personal preferences. People who seek innovation in religion will either try to change Christianity or will stay away. Unlike synthetic religions which cobble together beliefs and ideas, Christianity is an organic religion that emerges out of a belief that God made a promise in Eden and that He has been busy fulfilling it in the God-Man Jesus Christ.

Most people think of Christianity as an off-shoot of Judaism. However, the core of Christianity can be traced back to Abraham and his Kushite ancestors, long before there were Jews and Judaism. In this sense, Christianity isn't original. What it lacks in originality, it makes up for in antiquity and herein rests its authority.

Read it all here.

For more on this topic, go here.

Abraham and Job: Horite Rulers

Alice C. Linsley

Job was an historical person, as the genealogical information in the Bible makes clear. He was the great grandson of Nahor, Abraham's brother. His maternal grandfather was Nahor's son, Uz the Elder.  According to I Chronicles 1:42, the elder Uz's daughter married Dishan, the Horite. She named their first-born son Uz after her father, according to the cousin bride's naming prerogative.

Uz the Younger was Seir's grandson. Here is Seir's Horite family:

Job was of the clan of Uz. He was a Horite. The Horites were a caste of rulers who controlled the trade routes. Originally, they controlled the major waters systems at a time when the Sahara, Arabia and Mesopotamia were wetter. They were devotees of Horus, who was born miraculously of Hathor-Meri by the overshadowing of the Sun (the Creator's emblem). 

The Horites served as shrine and temple attendants and many were priests who interceded for others and offered sacrifice. Job offered sacrifice daily for the sins of his own family. At the end of the book, God tells Job to pray for his kinsmen Eliphaz, Zophar and Bildad. This is reminiscent of Abraham praying for Abimelech and his whole household (Gen. 20:17,18).

Job's people were associated with the Dedanites and the Temanites. Clearly the author of the book of Job was writing well after Job's time because he ridicules Job and his kin as people from the desolate wilderness who live in the clefts of the valleys and in the caves.  He portrays them as "donkeys braying among the bushes" (Job 30:3-7). This is not how Job himself would have regarded his kin.  We can be fairly certain that the author of Job was not someone who lived in that part of Canaan that was Horite territory.

There is a very old tradition that the God of the Hebrews (haBiru) "came from Teman. This is reflected in Habakkuk 3:3 which states, "God came from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Paran." This is one reason that Frank Moore Cross believes that the God of Israel is the God of the Horites.

Job and his kin dwelt in the hill country of Canaan and built shrines in caves such as at Petra. It is not surprising that Petra reflects Horite beliefs. 

Horite ruler-priests shaved their heads (Jeremiah 25:23), as was the custom of Horite priests. Esau the Younger had a son named Korah which means shaved one.[1] This suggests that this was a confederation of Horite priestly families. Genesis 36 confirms this, listing Uz's grandson Dedan as a Horite ruler. Here we also find reference to Huz or Husham of the land of Tema (Gen. 36:34).

The people of Uz belonged to a 3-clan Horite confederation.[2] Their kin and allies were the Dedanites and the Temanites. The clan of Teman descended from the elder Esau's son Teman (Gen. 36:11).  The Temanites were known for their wisdom. Job's friend Eliphaz was a Temanite. Jeremiah 49:7 speaks of the wisdom of Teman and verse 8 links the Temanites with the Dedanites. The largest collection of texts in the oldest Arabic script come from Tema and Dedan in the Hijaz. Tema is known by Arabs as Taima and lies about 70 miles north-east of Dedan. Tema, Dedan and Dumah were caravan stops along the trade route from Sheba to Babylon.

According to Genesis 10:7, Dedan the Elder was descended from Kush, the son of Ham. According to Genesis 25:3, Dedan the Younger was a descendant of Abraham and his cousin wife, Keturah. Dedan's father was Abraham's first-born son Joktan. Isaiah 21:13 speaks of the "caravans of Dedanites" in Arabia, and Ezekiel 27:20 speaks of Dedan as supplying Tyre with precious things. Dedan is associated with Uz in the hill country of Edom, Job's homeland.  This is Uz the Elder, son of Nahor, whose grandson (by his daughter) was Uz, the son of Dishan, shown in diagram above.

NOTES

1. Moses had a half-brother named Korah. (See Moses' family diagram below.) Shaving the body was the custom for Horite priests in Egypt. See Biblical Archaeology Review, July/August 2007, p.37. According to Numbers 26, Korah's claim to be the ruler was supported by the Hanochites (descendents of Nok through Jacob's first-born son Reuben). The diagram below shows the typical marriage pattern of Horite rulers. Amram had two wives. One was a half-sister (Jochebed) and the other was either a patrilineal cousin or niece (Ishar).

2. The Horite confederation is not identified as Uz, Huz and Buz, but rather as Dedan, Tema and Buz.


Related reading:  The Horite Ancestry of Jesus Christ; Petra Reflects Horite Beliefs; Etymology of the Word Horite; Who Were the Horites?; The Afro-Arabian Dedanites; Job's Friends and Their Contribution to the Message of Job

Abraham's People Had "Easter" Eggs

Alice C. Linsley

The first painted eggs were ostrich eggs. From the beginning these represented the hope of eternal life. This is evident from archaeological finds throughout Africa. Painted or incised ostrich eggs have been found in El-Badari and ancient Kush (Nubia). In the Oriental Museum there are examples of ostrich eggs which have been decorated over their entire surfaces. At Naqada, a decorated ostrich egg replaced the owner's missing head. This egg is now in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.

Ostrich eggs, which are as hard as earthenware when dry, were used in prehistoric times throughout the Nile valley as perfume containers, bowls for oblutions, and as canteens. Ostrich feathers were worn in the hair of warriors and rulers of ancient Egypt, and the Egyptian goddess Ma'at is shown with an ostrich feather in her hair. Using this feather, she weighed the hearts of the dead to determine who would enter eternal life and who would experience the second death (Rev. 2:11, 20:14).

Painted ostrich eggs have been found in tombs at Hierakonpolis (Nekhen) and in many graves of children in ancient Nubia (Kush). The oldest find of decorated ostrich eggshells includes 270 engraved shell fragments, excavated in the area of Diepkloof Rock Shelter in South Africa. These are between 65,000 and 55,000 years old.

The ostrich represents the Winter Solstice.  This explains why the ostrich is placed between the Bull (symbol of the Autumnal Equinox) and the Griffin Vulture (symbol of the Spring Equinox) in Elihu's discourse on the transcendence of the Creator in the book of Job. The Winter Solstice marks the end of the old year and the birth of a new year.

Abraham's Horite people observed the Spring Equinox (March 21-22), the Summer Solstice (June 21-22), the Autumnal Equinox (Sept. 21-22), the Winter Solstice (Dec. 21-22). From the Winter Solstice, the hours of daylight lengthen and the Sun is shown to be Sol Invictus ("the undefeated Sun"). This is symbolized by the ostrich which hides its head for a time by lying flat against the ground, and after the Winter Solstice, it begins laying its eggs. The wild ostrich, which originates in Africa, produces 90% of its eggs between January and March.
Ostrich eggs were traded by Abraham's Kushite ancestors, some of whom were rulers in Kerma, between the third and fourth cataracts on the Upper Nile. These Kushite rulers, such as Nimrod (son of Kush), one of Abraham's most famous ancestors, established trade routes that connected the interior of Africa to Egypt and the islands of the eastern Mediterranean Sea and beyond. They traded exotic hardwoods, animals and their skins, ivory, ostrich eggs and ostrich feathers. "Through the wealth built up by this exchange of goods, the Nubians of Kerma became exceedingly rich....." (The Nubians by R.S.Bianchi)  Those who built cities in southern India were called "Sudra", which means Sudanese.


Related reading:  The Ostrich in Biblical Symbolism; Abraham and Job: Horite Rulers; The Christ in Nilotic Mythology