Alice C. Linsley
Noah lived in the region of Lake Chad (Borno/Benue - "Land of Noah") approximately 5500-4500 B.C, when the Sahara experienced a wet period. Humans had already dispersed globally by 12,000 B.C.
Noah lived in the region of Lake Chad (Borno/Benue - "Land of Noah") approximately 5500-4500 B.C, when the Sahara experienced a wet period. Humans had already dispersed globally by 12,000 B.C.
Some of those dispersed populations were from earlier migrations out of Africa. There have been multiple migrations out of Africa, probably as early as 500,000 years ago.
Abraham was a descendant of the Kushite kingdom builder Nimrod who established his territory in the Tigris-Euphrates valley. This explains why in the Bible we first meet Abraham in Mesopotamia.
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| 8000-year dugout found in the Sahara |
The oldest known zoological collection was discovered during excavations at Nekhen on the Nile in 2009. This royal menagerie that dates to 3500 B.C. and included hippos, hartebeest, elephants, baboons and wildcats. The story of the Proto-Saharan ruler Noah preserving a collection of animals is based on historical reality.
Nekhen is the oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship (4200 B.C.). Noah probably knew of this place.
What was happening before Noah?
The evidence of archaic human industry, religion, ritual burial, and domesticity in Africa, Arabia and China creates a more accurate picture of the earlier populations.
On the Arabian Peninsula, the Qafzeh population was using tools 125,000 years ago at Jebel Faya and burying their dead in red ochre.
Humans were making reed mattresses 77,000 years ago in South Africa. That is where the oldest mattress— made from compacted grasses and leafy plants— was found at the Sibudu Cave site in KwaZulu-Natal. In this same region a stone carving of a python has been found that dates to 70,000 years.
There is the evidence of mining 80,000 to 100,000 years ago. These major mining operations in southern Africa included quarries and tunnels. It is estimated that a million kilos of red ocher ore were excavated from several mines. At one mine half a million stone-digging tools were found. The red ocher was ground to power and was used globally to bury rulers. Anthropologists agree that the red ocher symbolized blood. Apparently, it was connected to the people’s hope that the ruler might rise from the dead and lead his faithful people to immortality.
The Pengtoushan culture thrived along the Yangtze River between BC. 7500–6100, and the Yangshao culture flourished along the central Yellow River between BC. 5000 and 3000. Yangshao nobles wore silk garments.
Cemetaries were established which reveal ritual burial. Paul Sereno unearthed 10,000-year skeletons at Gobero in Niger. These were buried on the edge of a paleolake on the northwestern rim of the Chad Basin. The Gobero site is the earliest known cemetery in the Sahara and the skeletons found there indicated that some were at least 6 feet tall.
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| Gobero skeleton (G3B8) measures 6 feet 6 inches Photo (c) Mike Hettwer, courtesy Project Exploration |
At the time of the Gobero populations (9700-4400 years ago), humans were dispersed globally, and during the time of Noah these populations were not destroyed.
There is no evidence pf a worldwide flood that led to extinction of humans and animals. Human settlements in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and the Near East were along major water systems and prone to flooding. Flood stories often appear in ancient texts. A late source (Deuteronomist Historian) used the Noah story to promote his theology of God's wrath upon sinful humanity.
Noah's flood was a large regional flood. The term "eretz" which appears in the Genesis flood stories can mean earth, land, or territory. The Lake Chad region was Noah's territory and is the only place on earth claimed to be Noah's homeland by the local populations. The local Kanuri people refer to Lake Chad as "Buhar Nuhu", meaning Sea of Noah.
Noah's three sons were Hebrew clan chiefs whose descendants intermarried (caste endogamy). Those descendants dispersed widely and carried their beliefs wherever they lived. However, they did not repopulate the earth after a catastrophic worldwide flood.
Related reading: The Extent of Noah's Flood; Noah's Descendants; The Animals on Noah's Ark; Abraham's Faith Lives in Christianity; Understanding the Science of Biblical Anthropology; Discovering the Historical Noah
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16 comments:
Ms Linsley
The question is when did the flood of Noah happen?
I want to make a few points.
It is clear that you do biblical and scientific research. Which puzzle me why you are using the biblical timeline in the article to date Noah flood. (Example time of Noah living).
According to scientific research the human population did drop to about 2000 people, thousands of years ago. It is not known what happen to cause this drop. However, it was from these survivng African people that the whole world was populated
No disrespect to your grandmother but during her time people did not have all the scientific information that we have available to us today.
Ms Linsley, you are saying all the people were not destroyed during Noah's Flood punch holes in the flood story.
So I ask you what was the purpose of Noah Flood if everyone was not destroyed? According to the bible it was to destroy all Humans and start over. You cant have it both ways.
PS The people that built the pyramids were of Africans orginial. So you can add that to what the other people were doing. In fact it was when the Hyksos and other came into Egypt (Pyramids had already been built when they arrived) The people in the land of Ham begin to take on lighter skin.
To make myself clear. My main point is the bible has compressed the history of the world which is over 4 billions years old into a time period of est 5000 yrs which led me to believe.
1. Noah flood happen way over 200,000 years ago.
2 Noah lived around 2500 BC and the flood was just his imagination.
3. Noah flood story is not literally.
Dee,
The book of Genesis is not about human origins or the whole of world history. It is about the origins of Messianic expectation among Abraham's Nilotic ancestors and Genesis is told from their perspectives.
The flood which Noah experienced took place between about 2500 and 2000 BC. In Noah's time, the Proto-Saharans experienced a prolonged wet period due to monsoons circulating from the Indian Ocean. This has been confirmed by the research of Karl W. Butzer. He now teaches at the University of Texas, Austin. He is a world recognized expert on ancient Nilotic civilizations.
Noah lived in the region of Bor-Nu (Land of Noah) near Lake Chad. This is the only place on Earth that claims to be Noah's homeland. Satellite photographs reveal that Lake Mega-Chad was once a huge body of water, five times the surface area of Lake Superior and with a depth ranging from 200 to 600 feet. This part of Africa was much wetter during the Holocene due to climate cycles and the African rifts that created great watersheds or troughs. It experienced another briefer wet period during the time that Noah lived there.
During this wet period, the major water systems from the Benue Trough to the Tigris-Euphrates overflowed, creating a vast watery world. This was the world that Noah knew, so from his perspective the whole world was flooded.
Then, as today, catastrophic events were regarded as "acts of God" and divine judgment.
"No disrespect to your grandmother but during her time people did not have all the scientific information that we have available to us today."
I'm sure she would not take this as disrespectful. :)
Today we have the linguistic, anthropological, DNA, archaeological and climate studies to confirm the biblical account. This blog is all about that!
Ms Linsley
Thank you for your reply to my comments.
Your explanation of the flood story makes a lot of sense. However, it is a long way from the flood story written in the bible.
Given, that it is written in the bible that "from one blood comes many nations" and today DNA has proven this to be true. It may be that the Noah flood story was a way to allegory show what some Scientists are saying about at one point the human populations was near extinction, but a few strong people held on for the survivial of the human race. (Just a thought).
One again thank you and I enjoy reading your blog.
Dee,
I would be interested to see the DNA studies that show that all the peoples of the earth come from "one blood." Please cite your sources.
Different peoples come from Noah and his Kushites descendants. This has been verified by DNA studies that prove the Kushite expansion mentioned in Gen. 10. However, we don't know how all the peoples are related. As far as I know, no DNA studies have linked all the archaic populations as "one blood." Some are still debating whether of not the Lucy and her community were even human.
Among modern humans the Ainu have been identified at the center of Cavalli-Sforza's genetic distance chart. They originated in the Nile and migrated as far as Japan. See:
http://jandyongenesis.blogspot.com/2012/03/first-people-at-genetic-center.html
http://jandyongenesis.blogspot.com/2012/05/nile-japan-ainu-connection.html
http://jandyongenesis.blogspot.com/2012/01/kindling-of-ancient-memory.html
Right off hand SPENCER WELLS. Wells is a geneticist and anthropologist, an Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society, and Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of '56 Professor at Cornell University. He leads The Genographic Project.
Mr Wells is just one of many that have been doing this research.
Spencer Wells Documentary "A Journey of Man.
Also his paperback A journey of man A genetic odyssey
"Around 60,000 years ago, a man—genetically identical to us—lived in Africa. Every person alive today is descended from him. How did this real-life Adam wind up as the father of us all? What happened to the descendants of other men who lived at the same time? And why, if modern humans share a single prehistoric ancestor, do we come in so many sizes, shapes, and races?"
Spencer Wells from Amazon book site
Also information google "Mitchondrial Eve" that goes back even farther than 60,000years
According to some scientists all female alive today are descentants from one African woman.
There are many others but Spencer Wells is a good source to start.
This is not new this information has been out for years and written about.
Dee,
The MT-DNA of modern humans is much older than 60,000 years. The Y-chromosome is not as old because it can become extinct, which is what apparently happened. From a biblical perspective this would be expected if by Adam's sin came death to his line.
A maternal ancestor to all living humans called "Mitochondrial Eve" lived about 200,000 years ago, at roughly the same time anatomically modern humans are believed to have emerged.
This conclusion is based on analyses of mitochondrial DNA. Found in the energy-producing centers of cells, mitochondrial DNA is passed down the maternal line, and can be traced back to one woman.
However, this doesn't mean she was the first modern woman, rather it indicates that only her descendants survive to the present day.
"There is always some other female that predated mitochondrial Eve, whose DNA didn't make it up to modernity," said Marek Kimmel, a professor of statistics at Rice University. "So the age of the mitochondrial Eve is always less than the age of the true, first female modern human."
Thanks again Ms Linsley for your reply.
I have been on the internet over a year trying to read and gather information for a better understanding of the bible and a study of human origin.
I came across your site after doing a google search. (Cant remember exactly what I typed in).
You have an excellent site full of good information.
Thank you, Dee. I've been researching Genesis for over 30 years and I hope to share some of what I have learned through this blog.
Have you checked out the INDEX?
I see that this is an older thread but I am hoping you will still respond to comments and questions.
It seems to me that you accept evolution as you write of pre-modern humans. Where do you insert God into the creation of mankind? If you believe in a soul at what point was it inserted into hominids in your opinion?
I would have a million questions for someone who like you who is a serious, knowledgeable scholar and still believes in what seems to me a fairy tale.
Thanks in advance. John
John,
I do not accept all aspects of Darwinian evolution. When I speak of "archaic humans" I am not suggesting that these were less than human or part of a branch of human evolution. There has been no change in essense of humanity, only flux or change in form. This can be explained by adaptation. God created all species with the potential to adapt to changing environments in order to survive. Archaic humans had the same essence as humans today. That would include having been created by God and having a soul/spirit.
Thanks for the response and clarification Alice.
Have a good one.
Hi, whether you are a scholar or a true child of God, the facts are in the Bible which is a book of facts and prophesies. In Genesis 8:15 Then God said to Noah, "Come out of the ark you and your wife and your sons and their wives. In Genesis 9:1 God blessed Noah and his sons saying to them to be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. Gods words are powerful and true. Said the same in Genesis 9:7(repeating what he said in 9:1. From 9:18-19 Noah's 3 sons populated the earth quickly with theirs wives of course. Maybe incest, but not our time as it is today. They populated the nations. Sons of sons of sons and so on. Genesis 10:1-32. Genesis 10:32 These are the clans of Noah's sons, according to their lines of descent within their nations. From these the nations spread out over the entire earth after the flood. All Biblical, so very possible and true. God Bless You
Hi Alice,
I hope I can still comment on this old thread.
My question is in regards to your post:
"Noah lived in the region of Bor-Nu (Land of Noah) near Lake Chad. This is the only place on Earth that claims to be Noah's homeland."
You mention that is place is in Africa.
My question is: How could Noah's flood have taken place in Africa if the Bible states that the ark landed on Mount Ararat (Turkey)?
Borno is in the region of Lake Chad. This is also the homeland of Kain, Seth, Enoch, Lamech, Methuselah, etc. Abraham's ancestors were Nilo-Saharans, and are sometimes called "Kushites" because they were descendants of Noah by his grandson Kush (Cush) - Genesis 10.
Ararat is a mountain chain in Turkey. Because of the Gilgamesh Epic translators assumed that Noah's ship came to rest in that region. The word in Genesis is Har-arat, and is an Arabic word. Har-arat means Mount of Vehemence, a reference to the intensity of divine judgment. This fits the story. God was vehement about the corruption on earth.
We discuss these matters in greater depth at the international Facebook forum The Bible and Anthropology.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/970693143031228
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