They Believed in a Messiah 6000 Years Ago

 

Hathor Overshadowed

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

The Horites and the Sethites were the two principal ritual groups (moieties) of the Hebrew ruler-priest caste. They maintained separate temples and shrine along the Nile River before the time of Abraham (c.2000 BC). They often were in competition though both groups served the same God and the same king. 

The oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship is at Hierakonpolis (Nekhen) on the Nile (c.4000 BC). Other Horite shrines (mounds) are mentioned in the Pyramid Texts.

Long before Judaism emerged, the Hebrew ruler-priests were devotees of Horus, the son of God. The word "Horite" identifies them as such. The term is related to the Ancient Egyptian HR (Horus in Greek), which referred to the Highest One. Related Egyptian words include her, meaning over or above; horiwo - head, and hir - praise. Jews often refer to their parents or forebearers as their horim.

HR also refers to the Hidden One. The presence of a hidden son is a theme found in the canonical Scriptures. Hidden sons invite us to come closer. The Markan mystery is about the hidden Son. Jesus command his followers to keep silence about his identity as Messiah. 

This theme is expressed in the Seder. The three matzahs are enveloped, and the middle one is broken and hidden from the others. It is found after a search and returned to its natural group. The three matzahs are called the Unity, but we might as appropriately refer to the unity as Three in One, or a Trinity.

Hidden sons point to Jesus Christ, the Son hidden in the Father's bosom from before the ages. He inherits the Kingdom that is not of this world. Genesis is the story of His ruler-priest ancestors and their dispersal through the ancient world.

The Hebrew priest caste was devoted to the service of the High God and his son Horus (HR). Horus is the pattern whereby the people would recognize Messiah. He was conceived by the divine overshadowing of his mother Hathor (cf. Luke 1:35). He died, rose on the third day, and ascended to the Father. He was said to be equal to the Father.

The Egyptian Coffin Texts and Pyramid Texts provide a great deal of information about Horus, the divine son. In the funerary rite the priest addresses the deceased king, saying: "Horus is a soul and he recognizes his Father in you..." (Pyramid Texts, Utterance 423)

A Horite song found at the royal complex at Ugarit, speaks of Horus descending to the place of the dead "to announce good tidings." The text reads: Hr ešeni timerri duri - "below in the dark netherworld" and has the Hittite phrase Šanizzin ḫalukan ḫalzi - "to announce good tidings". (See Note 2 on page 2012.)

Horus is described as rising on the third day (The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, Utterance 667).

The Edenic Promise of Genesis 3:15 speaks of how the Woman would bring forth a son who would crush the serpent's head and restore paradise. This early Hebrew expectation was expressed about 1000 years before Psalm 91 in the Pyramid Texts. "Horus has shattered (crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot" (Utterance 388).

HR was regarded as the fixer of cosmic boundaries, the stars, the cardinal points, and Lord over the winds and the waters. Horus shrines were located on major water systems and Horus ruled the waters. This is why the Horus name appears in the Semitic word for river: na-hr (Hebrew and Arabic), and ne-har (Aramaic).

Many words that pertain to boundaries and measurements are derived from Horus: hour, horoscope, horologion, horotely, and horizon. The association of Horus with the horizon is evident in the Ancient Egyptian Har-ma-khet, meaning "Horus of the Horizon." 

The symbol or emblem of the father and the son was the sun. Divine appointment was expressed by overshadowing. When the Virgin Mary asked how she was to become the mother of the Messiah, the angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:35)

Solar symbolism pervades the early Hebrew texts. The Hebrew had many names for the High God depending on where they lived. The Hebrew living among the Elamites called the High God "Na-Pir" which refers to the God of the piru. The term piru refers to a temple, shrine, palace or house. The Elamite deity Napir is often depicted as having bull horns with the sun resting in the horns.

The Scriptures present the whole of what we need to know about the Messianic Faith that we call "Christianity" and that Faith has deep roots in antiquity. 

Related reading: Competition Between the Horites and the Sethites; Why So Many Names For God?; The Substance of Abraham's Faith; Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; BIBLICAL ANTHROPOLOGY: Horite and Sethite Mounds; Why Nekhen is Anthropologically Significant; BIBLICAL ANTHROPOLOGY: The Hebrew were a Caste

Jesus Christ in the Hebrew Scriptures

 

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

Someone observed that the name "Jesus" is mentioned only in the New Testament. In this person's mind that raises doubt about His historicity and the authenticity of the Gospel. 

There are allusions to the Lamb's Blood that saves the Israelites from death, or to the scarlet cord by which Rahab's household is spared from the slaughter in Jericho. The Apostle Paul described the Rock in the wilderness as Christ. Melchizedek is posed as a type of Christ, both High Priest and High King. The New Testament writers certainly found Jesus in the Hebrew and Greek texts of the Old Testament.



Beyond these allusions and typologies, a critical reading of the Old Testament presents an accurate picture of the Gospel as a tradition received from the early Hebrew, Abraham's ancestors.


About one-quarter of Genesis is the story of God’s dealings with Abraham and his ancestors (chapters 1-12). Some of Jesus' ancestors are named in the King Lists of Genesis 4, 5, 10, 11, 25 and 36. Jesus' eventual victory over sin and death is described in Genesis 3:5. Because this is so, we recognize that the promise concerning the incarnate Seed/Son of God (Gen. 3:15) does not originate with the Jews. It is the much older belief of the Horite and Sethite Hebrew who believed that the Son of God would be miraculously conceived, and that in his repose he would proclaim glad tidings to those in Hades. A Horite Hebrew song found at the royal complex at Ugarit speaks of HR descending to the place of the dead "to announce good tidings." The text reads: Hr ešeni timerri duri - "below in the dark netherworld" and has the Hittite phrase Šanizzin ḫalukan ḫalzi - "to announce good tidings".

The Seed of God was expected to crush the serpent's head. This early Hebrew expectation was expressed in the Pyramid Texts, dating to 2200 B.C. "Horus has shattered (tbb, crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot (tbw)" (Utterance 388).

The early Hebrew believed that the Son of God would rise on the third day. A reference to the third day resurrection is found in the Pyramid Texts: "Oh Horus, this hour of the morning, of this third day is come, when thou surely passeth on to heaven, together with the stars, the imperishable stars." (Utterance 667) Jesus' third-day resurrection fulfilled that Hebrew expectation in every detail.

The Messianic reference in Psalm 110:1 - The Lord says to my Lord: "Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet." - is expressed 1000 years earlier in the Coffin Texts (Passage 148). "I am Horus, the great Falcon upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name. My flight has reached the horizon. I have passed by the gods of Nut. I have gone further than the gods of old. Even the most ancient bird could not equal my very first flight. I have removed my place beyond the powers of Set, the foe of my father Osiris. No other god could do what I have done. I have brought the ways of eternity to the twilight of the morning. I am unique in my flight. My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet in my name of 'Red Cloak'." (Myth and Symbol in Ancient Egypt by R.T. Rundle Clark, p. 216)

Jesus subdues the Father's enemies so that God's children might live and prosper. This is expressed in the Messianic Psalm 2:12: "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him."










The name "Jesus" (Yeshua in Hebrew) is derived from the ancient Egyptian name Yesu (shown above) which is associated with royal authority. The feather represents the letter Y and stands for one who judges, measures, or weights. The next symbol represents horns. The idea of God's presence "between the horns" predates Judaism. Then there is the sedge plant which represents a king, and finally the falcon, the totem of HR (Horus), the patron of kings. HR in ancient Egyptian means "Most High One". (Source: Bill Manley, Egyptian Hieroglyphs, 2012, Thames and Hudson Ltd., London)



In the Egyptian Book of the Dead, Horus is called the "advocate of his father" (cf. 1 John 2:1).

The expectation of the coming of the incarnate Son of God was preserved by Abraham's ancestors to whom the promise was first made in Eden, a well-watered region that extended from the sources of the Nile to the Tigris-Euphrates (Gen. 2). Christianity alone preserves that oldest known religious belief.

The oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship is at Nekhen on the Nile (4500 B.C.). The Hebrew ruler-priests served at many of the ancient Nilotic Sun Cities. They gave the world the earliest known resurrection texts.




Related reading: The Oldest Known Religion; Belief in the High God; Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; Early Resurrection Texts, Horite and Sethite Mounds, The Hebrew Were a Caste; Is It Possible to Speak of the Proto-Gospel?

Is it Possible to Speak of the Proto-Gospel?

Dr. Alice C. Linsley


Just Genesis presents an "anthropological sleuthing of pre-Abrahamic origins." I have identified the marriage and ascendency pattern of Abraham's Hebrew caste and have demonstrated that this pattern drove the early Hebrew into distant lands where they established territories as early as 4000 BC. The dispersal of the early Hebrew kingdom builders was driven by the practice of sending away sons.

The early Hebrew believed in God Father and God Son and anticipated the incarnation of the Son by divine overshadowing of a virgin of their ruler-priest caste (Luke 1). This expectation is expressed in the first Messianic promise of Scripture - Genesis 3:15 - given to Abraham's ancestors. Some of those ancestors are named in the King Lists of Genesis 4, 5, 10 and 11.

I want to thank the faithful readers of Just Genesis. You have been an excellent sounding board as I have pursued the research on Abraham and the Horim/Horite Hebrew ancestors. I appreciate that you recognize the unique nature of this blog. Just Genesis is unique in these aspects:

• takes an anthropological approach to the study of Genesis
• acknowledges the great age of the earth and of human existence
• rejects aspects of Darwinian theory that lack material evidence
• asserts that Genesis interprets itself on questions of origins
• shows that the first verifiably historical persons in Genesis are kings listed in Genesis 4 and 5
• examines the material in its original cultural context, that of ancient Nilotic peoples
• argues that Genesis isn't about human origins as much as it is about the origin of Messianic expectation among Abraham's ancestors

All the articles at Just Genesis are listed by topic alphabetically in the INDEX. Articles on Biblical Anthropology can be found at my other blog by that name.

About one-quarter of Genesis is the story of God’s dealings with Abraham and his ancestors (chapters 1-12). The other chapters deal with Abraham's descendants before the establishment of Israel. Because this is so, we recognize that the promise concerning the coming of the Seed of God by the Woman (Gen. 3:15) does not originate with the Jews. It is much older. We may speak of it as the "Proto-Gospel" because the Horite and Sethite Hebrew believed that the Son of God would be miraculously conceived, and that in his repose he would proclaim glad tidings to those in Hades. A Horite Hebrew song found at the royal complex at Ugarit speaks of Horus (HR) who descends to the place of the dead "to announce good tidings." 

The Seed of God was expected to crush the serpent's head. This early Hebrew expectation was expressed in the Pyramid Texts, dating to 2400 BC. "Horus has shattered (tbb, crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot (tbw)" (Utterance 388).

They believed that the Son of God would rise on the third day. A reference to the third day resurrection is found in the Pyramid Texts: "Oh Horus, this hour of the morning, of this third day is come, when thou surely passeth on to heaven, together with the stars, the imperishable stars." (Utterance 667) Jesus' third-day resurrection fulfilled that Horite Hebrew expectation in every detail.

The Messianic reference in Psalm 110:1 - The Lord says to my Lord: "Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet." - is expressed 1000 years earlier in the Coffin Texts (Passage 148). "I am Horus, the great Falcon upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name. My flight has reached the horizon. I have passed by the gods of Nut. I have gone further than the gods of old. Even the most ancient bird could not equal my very first flight. I have removed my place beyond the powers of Set, the foe of my father Osiris. No other god could do what I have done. I have brought the ways of eternity to the twilight of the morning. I am unique in my flight. My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet in my name of 'Red Cloak'." (Myth and Symbol in Ancient Egypt by R.T. Rundle Clark, p. 216)

Jesus subdues the Father's enemies so that God's children might live and prosper. This is expressed in Psalm 2:12: "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him."

In the Egyptian Book of the Dead, Horus is called the "advocate of his father" (cf. 1 John 2:1).

The expectation of the coming of the Son of God was preserved by Abraham's ancestors to whom the promise was first made in Eden, a well-watered region that extended from the sources of the Nile to the Tigris-Euphrates Valley.

The oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship is at Nekhen on the Nile. The Hebrew ruler-priests served at many of the ancient Sun Cities. They gave the world the earliest known resurrection texts.

Waiting for the Eternal King 

The Genesis King Lists help us to understand the Bible's purpose and what we might call the "proto-Gospel" or the pattern upon which the prophets reflected and whereby Jesus Messiah would be identified as the fulfillment of Genesis 3:15. 

From beginning to end, the Bible is about the royal ancestry of Jesus Christ. It is possible to trace His ancestry because of the cousin bride's naming prerogative, whereby the cousin bride named her first-born son after her father. This is why there are two named Enoch, two named Lamech, two named Nahor, two named Esau, etc. Lamech the Elder (Gen. 4) bragged to his two wives, and his daughter Naamah gave birth to Lamech the Younger (Gen. 5). Naamah named her first-born son after her father. This is one of many examples in the Old Testament of the cousin bride's naming prerogative.

The cousin-bride's naming prerogative is found from Genesis 4 to Numbers and beyond, so it is not coincidental. Rather it is a feature of the unique marriage pattern of the early Hebrew. Many scholars (Noth, Albright, Speiser, etc.) concluded that Genesis 4 and Genesis 5 represent different oral or textual traditions of the same ruling line. This is NOT what the Bible claims, however, and I take the Bible's claims very seriously. Genesis claims that the rulers listed in Genesis 4 are the descendants of Cain and those listed in Genesis 5 are the descendants of Seth. The correspondence of names (Enoch/Enosh, Kain/Kenan, Irad/Jared, Lamech/Lamech, etc.) between the two lists has to do with the cousin-bride's naming prerogative, something that I discovered about 20 years ago using kinship analysis, a tool of anthropology. 

The kinship pattern of these early Hebrew rulers reflects characteristics typical of ancient castes. One of those characteristics is caste endogamy. The high-ranking rulers practiced bride exchange to strengthen the caste bonds.

All of the men listed in Genesis chapters 4 and 5 are rulers with two wives. One wife was a half-sister (as was Sarah to Abraham) and the other was either a patrilineal niece or a cousin (as was Keturah to Abraham). The cousin bride named her first-born son after her father because this son would serve as a high official in the territory of his maternal grandfather. Lamech's daughter, Naamah, married her patrilineal cousin, Methuselah, and named their first-born son Lamech. This son of Methuselah would serve in Lamech the Elder's territory as he belonged to the household of Lamech. 

Jesus Messiah is a direct descendant of the early Hebrew ruler-priests. As they regarded the Sun as the symbol of the Creator, divine appointment was expressed by overshadowing. Hathor, the mother of Horus, is consistently shown in ancient iconography as divinely overshadowed. The Greek word Horus is derived from the ancient Egyptian HR, meaning Most High One.

When the Virgin Mary asked how she was to become the mother of the Messiah, the angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:35)

Related reading: Hebrew Rulers with Two Wives; The Marriage and Ascendancy Pattern of Abraham's People; The Story Behind Osirus; The Substance of Abraham's Faith; The Hebrew Were a Caste

The Horite Hebrew of Eden

 

Biblical Eden had forests, grasslands, marshes, rivers and lakes to sustain early humans, large herds, fish, and birds. The region was well watered by extensive inter-connected water systems including the Nile, Lake Victoria, the Tigris and the Euphrates.

Alice C. Linsley

Recently, I was asked how the history of the biblical Horites connects to Eden. The Horites were a group of priests who believed in God Father and God Son. The Nilotic Horites referred to the son of God as Horus. Thus, their name Horite, which can be written also as Horim. Jews refer to their parents and ancestors as their "horim." The Ancient Pyramid Texts make it clear that the Horite and the Sethite Hebrew worshiped the same God and served the same king.

There are texts in the Bible that come from the Horite and Sethite Hebrew. Genesis 3:15 and Psalm 91 refer to the trampling of the serpent. Psalm 91:12-13 - "They will bear you up in their hands, that you do not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread upon the lion and cobra, the young lion and the serpent you will trample down."

In Srimad Bhagavatam 10:16 we find a parallel to Genesis 3:15 where we are told that the serpent's head will be crushed under the feet of the Woman's Son. The Hindu text reads: "The Ancient Man danced on the serpent, who still spewed poison from his eyes and hissed loudly in his anger, and he trampled down with his feet whatever head the serpent raised, subduing him calmly..." (Cited in Andrew Wilson, Ed. World Scriptures, p. 449.)

The same is expressed in the earlier Horite Hebrew texts from 4200 years ago. Utterance 388 of the Pyramid Texts speak of how the Son of God, Horus "has shattered (crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot."

The root of the word Horus is HR. It means "Most High One" in ancient Egyptian. The faith of the Horite Hebrew is older than that of the Jews. Genesis 36:31 says that the Horite kings who ruled Edom and Seir reigned before there was any king in Israel.

How does this relate to Eden? 

The oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship is Nekhen, located in Eden. Nekhen was a flourishing shrine city 5800 years ago. Genesis describes Eden as a vast well-watered region that extended from the Gihon and Pishon rivers at the source of the Nile in Uganda and Ethiopia to the Tigris and Euphrates in Mesopotamia. 

The phrase "east of Eden" in the Hebrew is quimat-Eden, an ancient Nilotic reference to a place of bulrushes. Quimat is derived from the root qma, an ancient Egyptian word that refers to bulrushes. 

The term "Eden" derives from the Akkadian term edinu, which refers to a fertile plain. Akkadian is the oldest known Semitic language.

It is evident that belief in God Father and God Son has deep roots among Abraham's Nilotic ancestors. He was a descendant of Nimrod, a son of Kush (Gen. 10). Kush/Cush refers to a region and population of the Nile Valley. 

The Nilotic Hebrew looked for a Righteous Ruler who would overcome death and lead His people to immortality. They produced the oldest known resurrection texts.

Related reading: Horite Mounds; The Substance of Abraham's Faith, Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; Eden Was a Well-Watered Region; Early Resurrection Texts

The Calling of Abraham

Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He saith not, and to seeds, as of many; but as of one, and to thy Seed, which is Christ… And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise. (Galatians 3:16, 29)

Alice C. Linsley


We first meet Abraham in Ur, which is where his older brother Haran died. When Abraham's father died, Abraham was living in Haran. Abraham's call to leave Haran is consistent with the Horite Hebrew marriage and ascendancy pattern.

As was the marriage custom of the Horite Hebrew rulers, Terah had two wives. Abraham makes this clear when he explains that he and Sarah have the same father, but different mothers (Gen. 20:12).

Terah's two wives resided in separate settlements. One lived in Ur and the other in Haran to the north. Terah's territory extended along the Euphrates from Haran in southern Turkey to Ur in southern Iraq. At that time, there was a large system of lakes at the midpoint between Haran and Ur. It appears that Terah controlled much of the water commerce between Ur and Haran.

Terah's first born son by his half-sister wife was Nahor, and Nahor was Terah's proper heir. (Na-Hor means "Horus is exalted.") When Terah died, Nahor ruled over Terah's territory, and Abraham was sent away to establish his own kingdom. This is consistent with the Horite Hebrew custom of sending away sons who are not the first born. Other sent-away sons include Abraham's sons Yishmael/Ishmael (son of Hagar) and Yishbak (son of Keturah). Yishbak means “sent away." (The initial Y in these names is a solar symbol that indicates a ruler under divine appointment.)

Before he died, Abraham "made grants" to his other sons and sent them away from his heir Yitzak/Isaac (Gen. 25:6). We may assume that Terah made a grant to Abraham and sent him away from Nahor before he died. This began Abraham's journey south where he eventually became established in Edom, and where his descendants ruled for many generations.

The practice of sending away sons to establish their own kingdoms drove the Horite Hebrew expansion out of Africa into Mesopotamia and beyond. Nimrod, the son of Kush (Gen. 10), was a sent-away son who became a great kingdom builder in Mesopotamia. Abraham is one of his descendants.

This feature is important in understanding Jesus' true identity as Messiah. He left the glory he enjoyed with His Father as a sent-away son. He set aside His immortal nature that He might stoop to save (kenosis). He became mortal that He might redeem a people for Himself and establish an eternal kingdom.

As with all sent-away sons, God promises to deliver a kingdom by divine power. This pattern speaks of the Son of God who is heir to the eternal kingdom. Abraham's call is to possess the Kingdom. Psalm 2 declares this concerning the Kingdom: He said to Me, "Thou art My Son, today I have begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Thine inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as Thy possession."

The sending forth of Abraham constitutes a divine call and appointment. It means that a kingdom will be gained, not according to worldly means, but as God directs. Sent-away sons receive divine protection, guidance, territory, authority, and heirs. This pattern is found with Cain, Abraham, Moses, Yacob, Yoseph, Samuel and David.

In II Samuel 8:18, David’s sons are called priests. They are of the Davidic House which is assocaited with the Horite Hebrew settlement of Bethlehem, Jesus' birthplace. The Prophet Micah proclaimed that Messiah would be from Bethlehem (Micah 5:2).

In Genesis 3:15, the Messiah is called the "Seed" of the Woman. In Abraham's time, she was shown overshadowed in images like this:

In Christian iconography, the "Woman" is shown overshadowed by a dove. The dove replaced the solar cradle of the Horite Hebrew, but the message is clear. When Mary asked how she would conceive, seeing that she was a virgin, the Angel Gabriel replied: "The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:35)

When Abraham went to Canaan he did not abandon the tradition of his ancestors. He continued the marriage and ascendancy pattern of his Horite Hebrew people, taking a cousin wife from among his Horite Hebrew kin. Horite rulers practiced endogamy because they believed that the Seed of God would be born of their ruler-priest bloodlines. That is why the lines of priests intermarrried and why unchaste daughters of priests were burned alive (Lev. 21:9). Sexual impurity was not tolerated.

Horite priests were known for their purity and devotion to the High God whose emblem was the Sun. Plutarch wrote that the “priests of the Sun at Heliopolis [biblical On] 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.”

From Abraham's seed comes the Seed of God

Abraham left his father’s territory as a response to God’s call whereby God would deliver to Abraham a kingdom. To gain that kingdom, he needed a proper heir. This was not Eliezer, but the firstborn son of Sarah who was barren. Yitzak (Isaac) was the son whose miraculous coming into the world was to bring Abraham a kingdom. This speaks of the Son of God.

"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." (Isaiah 9:6)

Jesus is the fulfillment of the expectation of Abraham's Horite people. He is a direct descendant of the Horite Hebrew ruler-priests. About Him it was written "My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet...” (Coffin Texts, Utterance 148). Note the similarity to the Messianic reference in Psalm 110:1: The Lord says to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.”

The substance of Abraham's faith centers in the belief of his people that the Creator made a promise to their ancestors in Eden that a woman of their bloodlines would conceive the Divine Seed who would overthrow the curse and restore paradise and perfect communion with the Creator. From this faith Christianity emerges organically. Christians affirm that the Creator has been busy fulfilling that promise in Jesus Christ, the Divine Seed/Son. The core belief of Christianity in God Father and God Son can be traced to Abraham and his ancestors. It predates all the great world religions. Christianity is not original, but what it lacks in originality it makes up for in great antiquity, and herein rests its authority.

Related reading: Abraham's Complaint; The Ra-Horus-Hathor Narrative; The Horite High Places; Abraham's Territory Between Hebron and Beersheba; Horite Hebrew Rulers With Two Wives

Horned Altars and Horned Sacred Vessels

Horned altar found during excavations at Gath

Alice C. Linsley

The Hebrew ruler-priest clans of Genesis 4, 5, 10, 11, 25 and 36 intermarried. Abraham and his ruler-priest ancestors were a caste of priests who traced descent by both the maternal and paternal bloodlines. Their endogamous marriage practice means that these words should be taken literally: "For me you shall be a kingdom of priests, a holy nation." (Ex. 19:6). This is a historical reality that has been neglected by Bible scholars. The priesthood of old is the basis for the Church's priesthood and should not be generalized to all believers, as was done by the Reformer Martin Luther.

The Horite Hebrew dispersed widely in the service of the "mighty men of old" and the artifacts of their religion are found wherever they resided. These artifacts include ritual flint knives, metal and clay objects of ceremonial importance, and stone altars.

They practiced animal sacrifice on stone altars. In the Harappan culture the altars were temporary and often in the shape of a falcon, the totem of Horus. Horus was the son of Ra. Among the Akkadians he was called Enki and his father was called Ani. The Shulba Sutras state that "he who desires heaven is to construct a fire-altar in the form of a falcon."

At the Harappan water shrines of Kalibangan and Lothal, numerous fire altars have been discovered. The Dravidian word Har-appa means "Horus is father." The falcon was a symbol of divine kingship in hieroglyphs as early a 3000 BC. Here is further evidence of the spread of Horite Hebrew religion from the Nile Valley into India where the cow continues to be regarded as a sacred animal.

The horns of the cow were a sacred symbol for the Horite Hebrew. The horns represented the power of God. Both Joab and Adonijah found themselves on the losing side of a political struggle and fled to the LORD for protection, taking hold of the horns. It was an appeal for divine aid and mercy.

Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors venerated their long-horn cows. The Y of the horns was regarded as a cradle for the Sun, and the Sun was the emblem of the creator and his son.

Hathor, the mother of Horus, is shown wearing a crown of cow horns in which the Sun rests. The Y indicated that the person was divinely overshadowed and this indicted that the person was appointed for service.

The Canaanite Y symbol designated a deified "son" of God, which is why it appears in the names of many Biblical rulers: Yaqtan (Joktan); Yishmael (Ishmael); Yishbak; Yitzak (Isaac); Yacob (Jacob); Yosef (Joseph); Yetro (Jethro); Yeshai (Jesse) and Yeshua (Joshua/Jesus). 

The Y-shaped headdress of the Somali nomads is called barki and refers to divine blessing upon the wearer. The word corresponds to the Hebrew word birka which is the blessing upon food, oil or wine or upon a person.

Many of the world's oldest coins show animals with horns. Alexander the Great had coins minted that showed him with the ram's horns on his head (show above). These speak of the divine appointment of the rulers for whom the coins and royal seals were made.

The ancient Nilotic Annu/Ainu were priests associated with the shrine at Heliopolis (Biblical On), one of the most prestigious of the ancient world. It was known a iunu, place of pillars, because the temples and shrines had many pillars.  The priests were called "Tera-neter," and Tera/Terah is the title held by Abraham's father.

Heliopolis is the Greek name and it means "City of the Sun." The Habiru served as priests at On. Joseph married a daughter of the priest of Heliopolis. It was an exceptionally prestigious shrine city in the ancient world. The pyramids at Giza, Abusir and Saqqara were aligned to the obelisk of On.

The ancient Sun temples were called O'piru. O'piru is a variant of Hapiru and Habiru, and all these reference an archaic priestly caste in ancient texts. The word Habiru is rendered "Hebrew" in English Bibles. 

In the ancient world, a temple was considered the mansion (hâît) or the house (pirû) of the deity. The shrines and temples had an east-facing entrance and the priests faced the rising Sun whenthey offered their prayers and oblations. The Sun was the emblem of the Creator among Abraham's ancestors, and it appears that the Habiru had dispersed widely by 14,000 B.C.

Tera is the Japanese word for priest and the evidence of artifacts, genetics and linguistics suggests a connection between the Annu of the Nile and the Ainu of Northern Japan and Okinawa. It is evident that these ancient peoples were sea-faring. The Ainu word for water is aka, which corresponds to asta, the Old Nubian word for water.

Study of the Ainu Micmac hieroglyphics in Vermont and the Eastern seaboard of Canada strike a blow to isolationist theories and reveals "ancient contact across great oceans."

The genetic mapping of Cavalli-Sforza indicates a pattern of expansion from the Sea of Japan towards eastern Asia. This came long after the expansion from Africa (100,000 and 70,000 years before the present).

The grandson of an Ainu elder living in Eastern Canada reports that not all the native people of North America came via the land bridge from Siberia. His Miqmaq people came via Scandinavia, a fact that has been confirmed by DNA studies (Haplogroup X2b5). This explains the common clothing style and decorative motifs and the close resemblance of the signs in the Ainu and Habiru/Hebrew scripts (shown above).

Jomon sacred horned vessel
3000–2000 BC 
Sailko/Wikimedia Commons

Nyland (2001) found that many place names and common objects in Hebrew are closely related to the proto-Saharan words. These would have been used by Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors. In ancient Egyptian tera-ntr refers to a ruler-priest and among the Ainu tera means priest. Abraham's father was "Terah" and his ancestors were from the Upper Nile Valley.

Recent DNA studies reveal that the Ainu of Hokkaido and the Ryukyuans of Okinawa have a closer genetic affinity than either group has to the Japanese. It is likely that these populations which have practiced clan endogamy retain cultural and physical characteristics of the earlier Jomon who had dispersed throughout the various islands of Japan.

As the point of origin for the ancestors of the Jomon was the Nile Valley we would expect to find some common features in the artefacts of the descendants of the Nilotic Ainu and the Japanese Ainu.

The Jomon horned vessels of Japan are of special interest because they resemble the horned altars of Abraham's Horite ruler-priest caste. The vessel shown (right) would have had a ritual use.

The tree of life motif is found on the Jomon vessel (above) in Japan and the Iron Age horned altar (below) found in Israel. Other common motifs include serpents, solar boats, circles, and diagonal hatch marks. The diagonal marks are found on the world's oldest known human artifacts.

Jomon pottery has been found throughout the islands of the Japanese archipelago. Some pieces date as early as 14,000 BC. The Jomon and Ainu are probably related to the Nilotic Anu who moved out of Africa, beginning about 20,000 years ago.

The Asia-Africa connection is found in Y-DNA Haplogroup DE. DE is unique because it is distributed in several geographically distinct clusters. Immediate subclade, haplogroup D, is normally found only in eastern Asia, and the other immediate subclade, haplogroup E, is common in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.

Related reading: The Nile-Japan Ainu Connection; Terah Means Priest; Solving the Ainu Mystery; Ram Symbolism of the Ancient World; The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y; A Kindling of Ancient Memory; The Kushite-Kushan Connection; Chinese Have African Ancestry; Dr. Clyde Winters, The Relationship Between Mande and Japanese

Messiah's Sign in Creation

Alice C. Linsley

Stat Crux Dum Volvitur Orbis. The Cross remains constant while the world turns. Those are the words of Pope John Paul II (Crossing the Threshold of Hope, p. 60) in a chapter addressing suffering. Often our suffering draws our focus from the Cross to ourselves and we forget that the Cross redeems all suffering ultimately.

It seems to me that the cross shape is Messiah's sign in creation because it is found everywhere. The intersecting lines between the cardinal points form a cross. The cross-shaped laminin (shown right) holds the body together (cell adhesion). The beta and alpha chains of laminin "influence pre-synaptic and post-synaptic development, thus providing a way to coordinate maturation of the sending and receiving sides of the synapse." Referring to Jesus Messiah, Paul wrote, “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:17)

Rabbi Yitzhak Kaduri

Before he died at age 108,  Rabbi Yitzhak Kaduri left a signed note indicating Messiah's identity: Yeshua - Jesus. A few months before, Kaduri had surprised his followers when he told them that he met the Messiah in dreams and visions. Kaduri gave a message in his synagogue on Yom Kippur, teaching how to recognize the Messiah. Kaduri's manuscripts, written in his own hand, have cross-symbols painted all over the pages.

Many attempt to explain the crosses by arguing that the great Rabbi Kaduri was not a Christian. We have no reason to believe he was. Instead, it appears that he was a Jew who accepted Jesus as Messiah. Only God knows. This we may safely assume: Rabbi Kaduri was wise and prayerful, and he knew the tradition of his Hebrew ancestors. Perhaps this led him to Jesus, the Son of God, at the sacred center of our cross-shaped reality.

His ancestors were Horite Hebrew. For them the sun and the cross spoke of the Creator who had a son. The son is called Horus (Enki in Akkadian). Horus was the archetype of Jesus, the son of God. Both the sun and the cross are found on stone reliefs at the Temple of Horus in Edfu (shown below). The relief also shows the sun resting over the banks of the Nile (directly below the bird). A variation of this image is the Hebrew horned altar, an apophatic solar image. The sun resting over a place or person represents divine appointment and blessing. The Canaanite Y is another example.

Photo: Maureen Palmer

Horus was called "lord of the sky" in hieroglyphs at the beginning of dynastic Egypt (c. 3000 BC). His priest devotees were called Horites (Gen. 36) and one of the terriotries they controlled was ancient Edom, known as a seat of wisdom.

This Egyptian temple of Horus closely resembles the pillared architecture of Petra. The ancient temples of the Sun cities had many pillars, typically at least 25. Entrance pillars were often named for righteous ancestors. The entrance pillars of Solomon's temple were named from his maternal and paternal great great grandfathers.

Vertical pillars and horizontal entrance beams/stones form a cross, and as the entrances to the ancient temples faced east, the sunlight came into the sacred space through the cross.

The Horite Hebrew regarded the sun as the symbol or emblem of the Creator. They are called Ha'biru in ancient Akkadian. The word is related to the Arabic yakburu, meaning “he is getting big” and to the intensive active prefix: yukabbiru, meaning "he is enlarging." This is a reference to the morning ritual of Horite Hebrew priests who greeted the rising sun with prayers and watched as it expanded across the horizon. This is the origin of the morning ritual whereby the sun is blessed daily in every devout Hindu home (Agnihotra) and the Jewish Sun Blessing ritual (Birkat Hachama) that is performed every 28 years.

Aspects of the solar symbolism are found in the Bible and in historical texts. Psalm 92:2 describes the Lord as “a sun and a shield.” The Victory Tablet of Amenhotep III describes Horus as “The Good God, Golden [Horus], Shining in the chariot, like the rising of the sun; great in strength, strong in might…” (Tablet of Victory of Amenhotep III, J.H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt, Part Two, p. 854). At the oldest known Horite Hebrew fortress at Nekhen on the Nile, the priests greeted the rising sun and placed prayers in the crevices of the rock.

Consider how the boundary markers of Abraham's territory suggest intersecting lines that form a cross. First, the placement of his wives in separate households on a north-south axis. These settlements marked the northern and southern boundaries of the his territory. Sarah resided in Hebron and Keturah in Beersheba. For Abraham, the east-west boundaries were marked by water sources: Engedi to the east, and wells in Gerar to the west.

Our experience of earth and the heavens suggests a geometrical quality of lines, angles and boundaries. The boundaries fixed by the Creator can be observed in genetics (horotely), climate cycles, and in time and space. Abraham's people respected the boundaries since they perceived of them as having been established by the Creator. Their religious and social practices reflect concern to distinguish the values of entities in the binary sets of Heaven-Earth; God-Man, Pure-Defiled, and Life-Death, and to serve the greater value.

Consider how the residences of the prophets reveal the vertical and horizontal lines that form a cross. Abraham visited the prophet (moreh) at a great oak half way between the cities of Ai and Bethel (east-west axis). Deborah judged from her nut palm tree halfway between the cities of Bethel and Ramah (north-south axis).

In our cross-shaped reality, there is always a sacred center. In the ancient world the sacred center of a territory was usually the shrine city, an elevated fortification near a water source. For the ancient Nilotes the sacred center was depicted in this image of the lions and the sun. 

We also may speak of a metaphysical sacred center. After his many years of deconstruction, Jacques Derrida concluded that there is a center and that there is a "presence" at the center. He claimed that throughout the history of philosophy this metaphysical presence is called by different names, including God. Materialists are baffled and perhaps frightened by this metaphysical presence since it must be of greater power and authority than they. There is existential angst about the possibility that expressions of authority depend on God's existence (Romans 13:1). A Facebook friend recently wrote that there are many ways to kill people, but the most certain way is to persuade them that there is no God, no Truth, and no morality. 

Pope John Paul II said that "the Cross remains constant while the world turns." Were we to investigate with seeking hearts, we would see Messiah's sign everywhere.

Related reading: Reality is Cross Shaped; The Sun and the Moon in Genesis; The Swelling of Sun and River Speak of God; The Rabbi Who Found Messiah

The Social Structure of the Biblical Hebrew (Part 4)

All rights reserved. If you borrow, please cite this page. This information represents 35 years of research.

Sultan Jamal ul-Kiram (seated at center), with his chiefs. 

They are holding knob sticks or rods as the sign of their rank.

Also shown US Army officer and some visiting Muslims.

Photo taken in Mindanao c. 1899-1901

Alice C. Linsley

In seeking to understand the social structure of the biblical Hebrew, we must investigate numerous features such as descent, inheritance, right of rule, residence, form of government, and ultimate authority for decisions. 

Feminists claim that the biblical Hebrew had a patriarchal social structure, but they are unable to prove this. In feminist and gender studies, patriarchy refers to the universal oppression of females in male-dominated societies. This is an ideological definition, and one which lacks empirical evidence.

In The Social Structure of the Biblical Hebrew (Part 1), we saw that for the feminist claim to be true, the social structure of the biblical Hebrew would be characterized by these 6 conditions:

1. descent is traced through the paternal line only (Part 2)

2. inheritance rights come through the father's lineage only (Part 3)

3. right to rule is vested with males only (Part 4)

4. patrilocal residence; that is the bride lives with the groom's clan/family (Part 5)

5. governed by a council of all males (Part 6)

6. ultimate authority rests with a male figure such as a patriarch, a chief or a king.

In Part 2 (Descent), we investigated whether the Hebrew social structure traces descent through the paternal line only and discovered that this is not the case.

In Part 3 (Inheritance), we investigated the claim that only men were permitted to inherit among the biblical Hebrew. We found that the inheritance laws among the biblical Hebrew are more complex because the ruler had two first born sons. Provision was made for both sons to receive an inheritance. Additionally, grants were made to the sent-away sons of concubines. Daughters could petition to receive inheritance. By levirate marriage a widow was able to preserve her deceased husband's holdings for his son. In an extremely archaic practice, inheritance rights were attached to whoever had possession of the clan ancestor figurines. These were stolen by Rachel who knew that her husband Jacob (Israel) had no inheritance.

Having found that the feminist claim of patriarchy does not apply to the Hebrew patterns of descent and inheritance, we move to the question of the right to rule among the biblical Hebrew to see if it fits the pattern of absolute patriarchy.

Overview

Among the biblical Hebrew the first born son of the principal wife ruled over his father's territory upon the death of the father. These were regional kings, not high kings whose territories we would consider empires. Abraham is an example. These rulers carried rods as a sign of their rank. Below is the image of a ruler-priest (tera-neter) holding a rod (Petrie 1939). This ruler-priest served the Creator, the High God, who was called Anu in Akkadian (the equivalent of El Elyon in Hebrew).

Annu refers top "those of royal blood"
according to Gwendolyn Leick
(Dictionary of Ancient Near Eastern Mythology, 1998, p. 7)

The first born son of the second wife, a patrilineal cousin, served as a vizier in the court of his maternal grandfather's territory. Abraham's first born son, Joktan, is an example.

Other sons and the sons of concubines received grants which enabled them to become chiefs in areas where they did not pose a threat to the first born sons. Ishmael is an example.

Some of these sent-away sons ruled over kingdoms that they gained by conquest, negotiation, and marriage. This was the case with Nimrod, a Kushite kingdom builder (Gen. 10:8).

Some sent-away sons are noted for being city builders. The Hebrew phrase וַיְהִי בֹּנֶה עִיר may be translated as [Cain] "he existed as a builder of a city" or "he existed, building a city." He named his city Enoch, after his father-in-law and the first born son of his cousin wife (Gen. 4:17). Nimrod, the son of Kush (Gen. 10:8) built the cities of Erech and Accad (Gen. 10:10).

The most protected and most desired lands were areas where copper and gold were collected. If these were acquired, the son's right to rule was established by virtue of wealth and power to control much desired commodities. It is significant that the oldest chacolithic sites are places where the Horite Hebrew rulers were established: Predynastic Lower Nile and the shrine city of Jericho (9000 BC). The next oldest sites are in Mesopotamia: Harran, Eridu, Lagash, Mari, Nippur and Ur (5000-4000 BC). Abraham's father, Tera, controlled a territory between Harran and Ur.

Among the Horite Hebrew one woman was especially honored: Hathor. Her image and name appear at many ancient shrines and temples. She is the foreshadowing of the Virgin Mary, the Theotokos, who is venerated by Christians.

Hebrew women ruled their households and exercised considerable influence in their social circles as the wives of ruler-priests. Some women ruled in Israel as judges and queens.

Now we will look more closely at each of these situations.

Right to rule of the first born son of the first wife

Analysis of the marriage and ascendancy pattern of the biblical Hebrew refers that the Hebrew ruler-priests maintained two wives in separate households. The principal wife was the bride of the man's youth and his half-sister. Sarah is an example. The first born son of the half-sister wife was the ruler's proper heir. Sarah's inability to have a son posed a serious problem for Abraham. When Isaac was born, Abraham rejoiced to have a proper heir. Isaac ruled after Abraham's death and his territory extended on a north-south axis between Hebron and Beersheba and on an east-west axis between Engedi and Gerar. Isaac was a ruler of prestige and great wealth.

Keep in mind that "These are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom, before any king reigned over the children of Israel.” (Genesis 36:31) Their smiths were among the most elite metal workers of the ancient world. Edom was rich in copper and the patroness of their mines and smelting operations was Hathor. She is the overshadowed one (Luke 1:35) who brings forth the son of God, Horus, from whom the Horite Hebrew or Horim are named. A temple dedicated to Hathor was discovered at the southwestern edge of Mt. Timna by Professor Beno Rothenberg of Hebrew University.

There is little doubt that Hathor was venerated among the Horite Hebrew. The Chalcolithic works at Timna in the foothills along the western fringe of the southern Arabah Valley include smelting works, slag, and flints found to be identical to those discovered near Beersheba where Abraham spent much of his time. The metal workers of Timnah and Beersheba were kin, and the patroness of their mining and smelting operations was the mother of Horus. Rothenberg concluded that the peoples living in the area were "partners not only in the work but in the worship of Hathor." (Timna, p. 183)

Right to serve as a chief (vizier) in the territory of the maternal grandfather

The first born son of the second wife became a high ranking official in the territory of his maternal grandfather. He was named after that ruler. This explains why there are two named Esau, Enoch, Lamech, Nahor, Joktan, etc. This is the "cousin bride's naming prerogative" and it is a distinctive feature of the social pattern of the biblical Hebrew.

An example is Joktan. He had a right to rule as an official in his maternal grandfather's territory. He was Abraham's first born son by his cousin wife, Keturah. 

Right to rule by conquest, negotiation, and marriage

Royal sons who were not first born received grants and were sent away to gain territories of their own. Abraham is an example. He was the youngest son of Terah. When Terah died, Abraham's older brother Nahor ascended to the throne.

Abraham left Haran in search of a territory of his own and, following God's leading, he gained a territory in Edom between Hebron and Beersheba. This involved marriage to Keturah, a descendant of Sheba, and aligning with some regional chiefs who were kinsmen: Mamre, Eschol and Aner (Gen. 14:13). They are called "Amorites" in Genesis 14:13.

The word is Am-urru refers to people of the high places. Urusalem (Jerusalem) means high place of peace. Ur-shu is the ancient Egyptian word for a sentry posted at a high place. These "high place" allies joined their forces with Abraham's army of 318 trained warriors (Gen. 14:14). This confederation of about 1300 warriors raided the contingent of Elamites who had taken Abraham's nephew captive. Abraham relinquished his share of the booty to his allies (Gen. 14:24) and received the cleansing rite after combat from Melchizedek, the high priest of Jerusalem.

Genesis 6 speaks of Hebron, where Sarah resided, as a holding of Anak. Anak's father was Arba and Hebron was called Kiriah-Arba (Gen. 23:2). This is likely related to the Akkadian kiprat arba, meaning four regions/four peoples. In addition to Anakim, this same region was populated and controlled by Hittites, Horites, and Jebusites. The clan of Het lived in Kiriath-Arba (Gen. 23:3,7) and the sons of Het are designated as Hittites in Genesis 23:2-11. The Hittites recognized Abraham the Horite ruler of Edom as a great prince among them (Gen. 23:6). Indeed, Genesis 13:2 describes Abraham as very wealthy.

Most of the heroes of the Bible were sent-away sons to whom God delivered a kingdom. These speak of the Son who was sent by the Father to transfer us from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." (Col. 1:12-14)

Just as Abraham established his kingdom through marriage to Keturah, so Jesus Christ will come as the Divine bridegroom (Mat. 9:15, 25:6), and this time of fasting will become the time of feasting at the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev. 19:6-9).

The Rule of Women

Examination of the biblical data reveals that Hebrew women ruled their households and exercised considerable influence in their social circles as the wives and daughter of high ranking priests.

The responsibilities of the Hebrew ruler's wife are described in Proverbs 31. This woman is the wife of a city elder (like Ruth) and a respected figure in her own right. She is the mistress of her house and a decision maker. She buys and sells merchandise, and “makes herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.”

Feminists insist that the Hebrew woman's condition under Patriarchy is one of subjugation. Instead, we find strong, dignified, multi-talented, caring women who make a mark for themselves in the world. They invest wisely, oversee servants, and manage real estate. Some are so important that they are named in the Genesis king lists: Naamah, Anah and Oholibamah, are examples. Anah is called a "chief" in Genesis 36.

Some women are consulted by priests and kings as in the case of Huldah. Deborah judged in Israel from her tamar between Bethel and Ramah. No telling how often wives saved their husband’s estates from destruction, as did Abigail. The Wise Woman of Abel Beth-Macaah is praised for saving her entire city.

Women also ruled as queens. The August 2008 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR) reports on a Judean queen named Salome Alexandra who ruled alone from BC 76-67. Archaeologists have discovered her palace in Jericho. Salome was one of two women to rule Judea alone. She is the only woman mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls. She is responsible for some of the religious reforms that shaped second-Temple Judaism, and her reign is viewed as a golden age in the Talmud. Queen Salome Alexandra was so admired that generations of mothers named their daughters "Salome" in her honor.

Related reading: Dark Sky and Howling Wind; The Serpent of Moses's Staff; Geologic Studies Confirm Biblical Data; Who Was Melchizedek?; The High Places; Denying Marriage: A cunning royal strategy

The Social Structure of the Biblical Hebrew (Part 3)

All rights reserved. If you borrow, please cite this page. This information represents 35 years of research.


Alice C. Linsley

Patriarchy is often held up as an explanation for why no women served as priests among the biblical Hebrew. Why should this matter? It matters because it isn't true. It matters because this is the basis of Dr. William Witt's argument for the ordination of women. He served as a consultant to the ACNA task force that studied the question of women's ordination for five years. Dr. Witt's argument is that women were not priests because of patriarchy and Anglicans should correct that injustice by permitting women to be ordained.

Anglicans who push for women's ordination on the basis of this argument should check the facts. Anthropologically, the social structure of the biblical Hebrew is much more complex than generally presented in feminist literature and gender studies. Examination of the biblical data reveals that the Hebrew social structure is not characterized by these 6 conditions of absolute patriarchy:

1. descent is traced through the paternal line only (Part 2)
2. inheritance rights come through the father's lineage only (Part 3)
3. right to rule is vested with males only (Part 4)
4. patrilocal residence; that is the bride lives with the groom's clan/family (Part 5)
5. governed by a council of all males (Part 6)
6. ultimate authority rests with a male figure such as a patriarch, chief or king.

Anthropologists never have found an absolute patriarchy or an absolute matriarchy. In an absolute matriarchy, the six conditions would be vested with the ruling females (matriarchs).

Today we investigate whether the Hebrew social structure reflects the second condition: patrilineal right of inheritance.

In an absolute patriarchy only men inherit property and the right to rule territories. It is often said that the rights of inheritance of the biblical Hebrew follow primogeniture, but that is not accurate. The inheritance laws among the biblical Hebrew are more complex because the ruler had two first born sons. Provision was made for both sons to receive an inheritance. Additionally, grants were made to the sent-away sons of concubines. Daughters could petition to receive inheritance. By levirate marriage a widow was able to preserve her deceased husband's holdings for his son. In an extremely archaic practice, inheritance rights were attached to whoever had possession of the clan ancestor figurines. Let's now look at each of these situations.

The right of primogeniture for the principal wife's first born son

The rights of primogeniture applied only to the first-born son of the first wife (the half-sister). This son assumed the rule of his father's territory and control of all property. Because of the Hebrew had a double unilineal descent pattern, his wives and their servants were responsible for flocks, herds, tents, and other moveable property. The story of Jacob is interesting in that he was a servant of Laban and as such, he shared responsibility for his wives' flocks and herds (Gen 30). 

If the sister wife does not produce a son to be the patriarch's heir, the man could appoint the first born son of a concubine to be his heir. Sarah being infertile, Abraham appointed Eliezer, the son the concubine Masek.

To better understand the right to rule among the biblical Hebrew, we should should separate the right to rule from the question of inheritance. However, the two are related in the case of the first born son of the first bride, the half-sister wife. Her son ruled in the place of his father and inherited his father's territory. Abraham's proper heir was Isaac, the son of Sarah, Abraham's half-sister.

It is curious that Isaac's first wife is not mentioned in Genesis. The first born son of this wife would have been Isaac's proper heir. Esau is the first born of Isaac's cousin bride and as such, he was not Isaac's proper heir. He was a chief in Edom, but it does not appear that he ruled all of Edom in Isaac's place.

If Isaac followed the pattern of his Horite Hebrew ancestors, he had a wife before he married Rebekah. She would have been his half-sister. Abraham's urgency to fetch Isaac a cousin wife was so that Isaac would have the two wives necessary for Isaac to rule Abraham's territory upon his death.

The Messianic expectation concerning The Bridegroom coming for his bride and taking His eternal throne is foreshadowed in the marriage and ascendancy pattern of the Horite Hebrew ruler-priests.

Sent-away sons

Inheritance grants were given to the sons of concubines. Abraham gave grants to the sons of his concubines and sent them away from the territory of his proper heir, Isaac (Gen. 25:6). The heroes of the Bible are men who left their homes and relied on God for provision of their own territories: Cain, Nimrod, Abraham, Moses, David... the Son of God, Jesus Messiah.

The practice of sending away sons drove the expansion of the Horite Hebrew into new territories. Before dying, the sent-way chiefs arranged for the transfer of property to their sons. The right of rule was bestowed on the first born son the principal wife. The principal wife was usually the first wife, the bride of the man's youth, and also a half-sister, as was Sarah to Abraham.

Women could inherit property

Zelophehad's five daughters were Mahlah, Noa, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah. According to Numbers 27 they inherited property after petitioning Moses to render a judgement on this dispute. The dispute is connected to Moses's half-brother Korah who challenged Moses's authority, and pertains to a land holding of Manasseh. In the Book of Chronicles, Zelophehad (Tzelofhad) is listed as a son of Manasseh whose land holdings were in Egypt.

Zelophehad's daughters argued that the name of their deceased father would be lost among his people were they not to inherit. However, Zelophehad's name would be perpetuated through one of his daughters. Were she to marry a patrilineal cousin, she would name her first born son Zelophehad, after her father, according to the cousin-bride's naming prerogative. Sons did not perpetuate the father's name among the biblical Hebrew.

Moses granted the five daughters' petition to inherit their father's holding, and we read this law: "If a man dies without a son, then the inheritance shall pass to his daughter." (Num 27:8)

This account comes from the Deuteronomist, a source dating to the later Neo-Babylonian period (c.700-300 BC). The purpose is to explain the assignment of tribal holdings in the Promised Land. However, as this story comes before the entrance of the Israelites into the Promised Land, where was Zelophehad's holding? The clan of Manasseh had deep roots in Egypt. It is possible that Zelophehad's holding was in Egypt, but this does not serve the Deuteronomist's narrative. He would have us believe that all the Hebrew people left Egypt, never to return there.

According to Shammai Feldman's "Biblical motives and sources" in "Journal of Near Eastern Studies" 22 (1962), this narrative is a fiction created to illustrate laws of inheritance. To express this another way: "This section of the chapter is a good example of a law embedded in a narrative, or a narrative created for the sake of a law." (The Schocken Bible, p. 796)

Many scholars regard the account of Zelophehad's daughters as an example of accretions added to an earlier source. This would explain the contextual incongruities. Though scholars note problems with the story of Zelophehad's daughters, it is almost certain that the daughters of Hebrew rulers had the right to petition to inherit property. Ancient documents from Mesopotamia, Syria, and the Nile Valley attest to the fact that women could inherit property, even when there was a proper male heir (Hebrew Study Bible, p. 338).

Numbers 27 clarifies that daughters could inherit land. If a land owner died without a male heir his land was to go to a ranking daughter (Numbers 27:8). If he died without a son or daughter, the land was to go to his brothers.


Levirate marriage and inheritance rights

Levirate marriage is extremely ancient practice in which the widow of the deceased brother marries one of his brothers. Levirate marriage is practiced by societies with a strong clan and caste structures in which exogamous marriage is forbidden. The practice is found among the cattle-herding Nuer and Dinka of the Nile. It also is found among the Igbo of southeastern Nigeria, and in the Punjab-Haryana region of Pakistan, and among peoples of Central Asia such as the Saka and Kushan. It appears that the rulers of these regions were served by Horite Hebrew ruler-priests.

In the Punjab-Haryana region, if the levir (dewar) refused to redeem his brother's widow, she would spit in his presence and remove one of his sandals. Subsequently, the people of the town would refer to him as "the one without a shoe".

This sheds light on the redemption of Ruth and the transfer of her husband's inheritance at the city gate of Bethlehem.

Now in earlier times in Israel, for the redemption and transfer of property to become final, one party took off his sandal and gave it to the other. This was the method of legalizing transactions in Israel. (Ruth 4:7)

In Genesis 23:10, we read that Abraham settled the purchase of a burial cave at the city gate; (literally, in the presence of "all who came in at the gate of his city.")

Rights of inheritance through levirate marriage could be declined. This sometimes happened if acceptance of the widow as a wife endangered the inheritance or ruler status of the levir's own heir. This appears to be the case with the man who was first in line to redeem Ruth. Judah also refused to fulfill the levirate law when he denied Tamar and later recognized that, "She is more righteous than I, since I wouldn't give her to my son Shelah." (Gen. 38:26)

Teraphim

Hurrian/Horite law placed importance on the possession of the teraphim (Heb. תְּרָפִים). This is usually rendered "household gods" in Bibles, but these were ancestor figurines usually kept at the family hearth. One was exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum in 1986. This was a rare showing of a figurine from the Chalcolithic Period, showing holes around the circumference of the head.

During the Chalcolithic Period, the Horite Hebrew were involved in the mining of copper and the fabrication of copper artifacts in Israel, Southern Europe, Spain, and England. Hathor was the patroness of metal workers. Her name means the "tabernacle of Horus," the son of the God. A temple dedicated to Hathor was discovered at the southwestern edge of Mt. Timnah by Professor Beno Rothenberg of Hebrew University. Timnah is the site of some of world's oldest copper mines. The mines were worked almost continuously until the Roman Period.

The teraphim that Rachel hid in her camel bags were figurines of Terah and his principal wife. Hundreds of these figurines have been found in Israel. Many have been found in David's Zion. There were holes around the top of the heads of the figurines. The hair of Terah and the hair of his wife were woven through these holes. Possession of these ancestor figurines represented a claim to inheritance.

When Jacob proposed a plan to escape from servitude to Laban, his two wives were quick to support him, saying: "Are we still likely to inherit anything form our father's estate? Does he not think of us as outsiders now?" (Gen. 31:14) Laban sons had became jealous of Jacob, saying, "Jacob has taken everything that belonged to our father; it is at our father's expense that he has acquired all this wealth." (Gen. 31:1) Clearly, Jacob's wealth was that of his wives, their servants and their flocks and herds. Other than his initial grant as a sent-away son, Jacob had no inheritance coming from Isaac. Nor from Laban. That is why Rachel stole the ancestor figurines.

In Part 4, we explore the right to rule among the biblical Hebrew, and discover that the pattern does not fit that of an absolute patriarchy.

Related reading: The Social Structure of the Biblical Hebrew (Part 1); The Social Structure of the Biblical Hebrew (Part 2); Abraham's Sons; Evidence of Castes in the Book of Ruth; Why Zipporah Circumcised Her Son; Denying Marriage: A cunning royal strategy