Another Look at Genesis 3:13-15

 

Mary and the Christ Child with Angels and Saints George and Theodore, c. 600 AD 

(St. Catherine's Monastery)

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

The most primitive model of the Mother of the Son of God is found among the early Hebrew at Nekhen on the Nile (4000-3000 BC). Nekhen predates the building of the Great Pyramids at Giza and the step pyramid of King Djoser (Third Dynasty). The oldest known tomb, with murals on its plaster walls, is located at Nekhen and dates to c. 3500–3200 BC.

Nekhen is the oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship. That is where the Narmer Palette was found. It dates to c. 3100 BC. At the top of the Palette are two images of Hathor wearing the bovine horns. Among the early Hebrew, Hathor was venerated as the mother of Horus, the son of the High God. In Ancient Egyptian the Son of the High God was called HR, meaning Most High One. 

Nekhen predates the building of the Great Pyramids at Giza and the step pyramid of King Djoser (Third Dynasty). The oldest known tomb, with murals on its plaster walls, is located at Nekhen and dates to c. 3500–3200 BC.

The people of Nekhen were cattle herders. The bull's horns were often show cradling the solar orb, a symbol of the presence of the High God. Hathor was shown with the Sun resting in the horns. This represented her conception of the Son of God by divine overshadowing, as was fulfilled in the Virgin Mary's conception of Jesus. In answer to Mary's question, the Angel Gabriel explained, "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."

Hathor overshadowed and wearing the blue of the divine ones.

This belief of the early Hebrew (4200-2000 BC) is found in the canonical Scripture in Genesis 3:13-15, the first Messianic prophesy of the Bible. That prophesy concerns the Woman, her Child, and the Serpent. This passage is called the "proto-Evangelium" or the proto-Gospel. It speaks of the eventual victory of the Woman and her divine Son over all God's adversaries.

The passage appears slightly different in the various translations. The Greek speaks of how He will bruise the serpent's head. The Latin speaks of how She (ipsa) will bruise the serpent's head. The Hebrew speaks of how the Woman's offspring shall strike the Serpent's head and the Serpent's offspring shall strike at their heel. In the Hebrew the Woman and her Son are both targets of the Serpent's attacks (cf. Rev. 12).

The early Messianic expectation was expressed in the 4200-year-old Pyramid Texts: "Horus has shattered (tbb, crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot" (Utterance 388). 

Psalm 110:1 expresses God victory through His Son. "The Lord says to my Lord: 'Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.'" This was expressed 1000 years earlier in Passage 148 of the Coffin Texts: "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'." 

The Horite and Sethite Hebrew believed that the Son of God would be miraculously conceived by divine overshadowing. They also believed 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." (cf. The Apostles' Creed)

The basic pattern of the Messiah's saving work is found in the early texts of the Nilotic Hebrew. 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) 

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

Related reading: The Earliest Known Site of Horite Hebrew Worship; The Golden Calf in Anthropological Context; Why Nekhen is Anthropologically Significant; Solar Imagery of the Proto-Gospel; The Substance of Abraham's Faith; Revelation 12: The Woman, the Child, and the Dragon; The Story Behind Osiris; Hebrew Names and Titles

Blame Eve for the Heat

Alice C. Linsley

Recently, Ralph, a member of the international Facebook forum The Bible and Anthropology asked this question: "Who's sin caused the Fall, Eve's or Adam's?" Here are the responses:

Del - Adam's, I should think; as covenant head, he would have been fit to intercede sacerdotally for Eve had he himself not participated in the sin. 

Alice - That is a good response to Ralph's question and accurate if we accept the biblical assertion that Adam is the first named ruler-priest of the ruler-priest lineages that descend to the Messiah, Jesus. The genealogical lists in Matthew and Luke are intended to show that connection. Also that point is made in Paul's parallelism of Adam and Jesus. "For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive." The priestly office is clearly identified with men.

Kristine - In Romans, Paul refers to “one man” (who sinned) like 13 times but never to one woman, even though she ate first.

Alice - St. Cyril of Alexandria teaches that humanity became “diseased… through the sin of one," and if we attend to the Genesis text closely, that is the sin of Eve, the crown of creation (think pyramid), whose action of submitting to the will of a creature who slithers along the ground (bottom of pyramid) inverted the hierarchical order in creation, so that all of the creation is subjected to decay. Therefore, as by that first woman and first man death entered, so by the New Eve (the Theotokos) and the New Adam (Jesus Messiah), death is overcome. "Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and on those in the tombs bestowing life!"

The Eastern Church never speaks of sin being passed from Adam and Eve to their descendants. Instead, each person bears the guilt and shame of his or her own sin. What then is the inheritance of humanity from Adam and Eve if it is not guilt? It is a condition or a disease that results in death, which St. Paul also points to in I Corinthians 15:21 where he parallels Adam and Christ. "For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive."

Del - I think the difference between the East and the West in this case has to do with the East thinking the Western theologians are using the word "guilt" in penal/juridical sense. While, in fairness, some theologians certainly *do* use the term in that way, that doesn't seem to be the traditional doctrine, which uses the term "debitum" as shorthand for the disorder a man experiences who lacks the justice that comes along with the grace of divine sonship. Since a person is made for interpersonal communion with other persons (and, preeminently, interpersonal communion with God), if he lacks the grace of divine sonship, he can't fully be himself. He is spiritually disfigured, and this creates a disorder in the union of the soul with the body, which in turn negatively impacts both. We can speak of this in terms of "guilt", because it is something corrected by justice (i.e., by "arightness"). It isn't really the same thing as personal guilt, though, nor do I think the Western fathers or later medievals mean to imply an identity between the two.

Alice - True, Del. Another difference is that the Eastern Fathers were sensitive to archetypes and were great observers of patterns in Scripture. One of those patterns is male-female couplets. Note, for example, that after Eve's sin, the cool encounters with God become hot encounters. Gen 3:8 speaks of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. In Gen. 3:15, God tells the Woman that she will bring forth the Seed that will crush the serpent's head. Note the promise of the Son. The next visitation is to Abraham in heat of the day: "The LORD appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day." (Gen. 18:1) Again a son is promised. The male-female couplets in Genesis usually point us to Messianic expectation.

Related reading: St. John Chrysostom on Eve's Sin; Adam Was a Red Man; Binary Sets in the Ancient World; The Sun and the Moon as Male-Female Couplet; Rebecca Ran to Her Mother's House; Binary is a Bad Word These Days

Hagar's Conversion

Painting of Hagar in the wilderness by Giovanni Lanfranco. It hangs in the Musée du Louvre.


Alice C. Linsley

Hagar was the Egyptian handmaiden to Sarah, Abraham’s sister wife. She was also one of Abraham’s concubines. Though she is presented as a downtrodden slave, it is likely that Hagar was highly cultured and moved comfortably in the circle of nobles.

As the Horite Hebrew clans practiced endogamy, it is likely that Hagar was the daughter of a Horite Hebrew priest, and as such, she would have been a skilled attendant to Sarah, and even as a concubine, she would have been a woman of high social status.

Sarah’s resentment toward Hagar appears to have had a long history. Some of the resentment may have been cultural. Sarah was from the region of Aram in Mesopotamia while Hagar is identified as an Egyptian. Sarah's resentment toward Hagar became blind jealousy after Isaac was weaned, when Ishmael was about 15 years old.

Genesis portrays Hagar as having a complex personality. In later life she is a strong and independent woman, contracting marriage for her son and apparently producing other offspring known as the Hagarites. They are mentioned in Psalm 83:6. The core of this psalm is believed to pre-date David. The Hagarites are distinct from the Ishmaelites in the Psalm 83 listing of allies, so it is apparent that Hagar (like Anah and Oholibamah) was regarded as a clan chief.

This picture of Hagar as a mature clan chief differs from the picture presented in Genesis 16:5 where we are told that Hagar acted tactlessly toward her childless mistress. Sarah blamed Abraham for this and Abraham said to Sarah: “Your slave-girl is at your disposal. Treat her as you think fit” (Genesis 16:6). Sarah then abused Hagar who fled to a spring where Abraham had lived for a time (Genesis 20:1). The Angel of the Lord found her at the spring and prophesied concerning her son that his name should be Ishmael meaning God Hearkens, for God heard the cry of Hagar's affliction.

This story portrays Hagar as a tactless, abused runaway, but note how she has a personal encounter with the Lord at the water shrine! She knows that she has encountered the all-Seeing God because she declares that she has gone on seeing, even as she is seen (Genesis 16:14). The Angel of the Lord speaks in the first-person, and in verse 13 Hagar identifies the visitor as God. To me, this sounds like a conversion story.

Given the times in which Hagar lived, she would have run to a place where she felt she could provide for her son. She traveled to a shrine half way between Kadesh and Bered (Genesis 16:14). In Genesis, when a water system is identified as being along a road between two towns, it is a shrine to which a priest is attached. It is likely that Hagar had family there. Since this was Horite Hebrew territory, an Egyptian priest (Harwa) at a water shrine would have been a Horite priest.

Horite territory extended north-south at least between Mount Hor (above Kadesh-barnea) and Mt. Harun or Hor south of Oboth. According to Genesis 14: 6, Horite territory extended as far south as the wilderness of Paran (see map).


A temple dedicated to Hathor, the mother of Horus was discovered at the southwestern edge of Mt. Timna by Professor Beno Rothenberg of Hebrew University. This is the site of some of the world's oldest copper mines.

Horite priests were devotees of Horus, who was called “Son of God.” From ancient Egyptian texts we gather that Horus is equal to the Father in nature and glory. The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts and Pyramid Texts provide a great deal of information about Horus, the divine son of Ra. This is expressed in the Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts. In the priest's prayer to the King, he says, "Horus is a soul and he recognizes his Father in you..." (Utterance 423).

In these texts Horus is described as the one who unites the peoples (the Upper and Lower Nile). This is symbolized by the double crown. The rulers of the two regions wore different crowns, but Horus was called "Horus of the Two Crowns" because he wore both. This is what stands behind the account of Yeshua/Joshua, the priest, receiving the "crowns" in Zechariah 6:11: "Take the silver and gold, and make crowns, and set it upon the head of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest..."

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)

Consider how Horus describes himself in the Coffin Texts (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’.

This text is about 1000 years older than the words of Psalm 110:1, a clear messianic reference: The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at My right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet."

Horus was expected to trample down the serpent. This expectation is expressed int he Pyramid Texts:
"Horus has shattered (tbb, crushed) the mouth of the serpent with the sole of his foot (tbw)" Utterance 388 (681).

This reference dates to about 800 years before Psalm 91: ""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."

Horus gives himself as mystic food of immortality. In The Pyramid Texts, dating from the beginning of the 4th Dynasty, we read: "O Hunger, do not come for me; go to the Abyss, depart to the flood! I am satisfied, I am not hungry because of this kmhw-bread of Horus which I have eaten." (Utterance 338) The Egyptian word km means to bring to an end, to complete, or fulfill, and hw refers to the heavenly temple or mansion of the firmament above.

It appears that the "kmhw-bread of Horus" is what the Church Fathers call "the bread of immortality." Concerning himself, Jesus said that "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day" (John 6:53-54).

These are key elements of the Messianic Faith by which Messiah is identified.

Jesus Messiah is sometimes called “the Angel of the Lord.” Perhaps he met Hagar’s when she fled to the Horite shrine. Might Hagar's conversion be due to a personal encounter with the pre-incarnate Christ? 

This is how some Church Fathers see Hagar's visitation. He who is of one essence with the Father, “for in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9) came into the world to save sinners like Hagar... like me.


Related reading: The Ra, Horus, Hathor Narrative; Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; Hagar's Journeys

The Religion of the Saka

The stiff front piece on the head covering 
is like those worn by Ainu chiefs.

Saka Yuetzhi warrior












Alice C. Linsley

There has been some fascinating speculation about the Israelite origin of the Saka Scythians. Indeed, there are indications of a connection between the Saka and the biblical rulers known as Horites. The Horites dispersed very widely in the ancient world, taking their religious practices with them.

The Saka ruled in India, Syria, Anatolia, Serbia, Bactria and Southern China. These rulers were kingdom builders, like Nimrod. They also appear to have been devotees of Horus, the "son" of the Creator. The eye of Horus is called vidjet. In Serbian vidjet means to see. There are many linguistic connections between words in Serbian, Nilo-Saharan languages and Sanskrit.

The Saka rulers appear to have the same marriage and ascendancy pattern as the Horite rulers listed in Genesis 4, 5 and 10. These rulers had two wives, as did their descendants Abraham, Jacob, Amram, Moses and Elkanah. Horite ruler-priests were found among the Saka.

According to Hindu sacred texts, the Saka ruled the ancient world for 7000 years. They were ethnically Kushites. Genesis calls these rulers of the archaic world "the mighty men of old"(cf Nehemiah 3:16). Some of these rulers dispersed far from their ancestral homes and established kingdoms in Syria, Southern Europe, Northern India and the Tarim Valley of China. In all the regions to which their ancestors dispersed we find a common toponym: Tamana. Proto-Saharans formerly lived in these areas. Tamana means "great place." The ancient Tamana sites were rock and river shrines established by Proto-Saharan peoples.

The Saka are grouped into Eastern Scythians and Western Scythians. The Western Scythians were followed by the Sarmatians, then the Alans and finally the Ossetes, but they share a common patrimony. They are related to the Yuezhi of Bactria and China. Both the Saka and the Yuezhi are ethnically Kushite.

The Yuezhi from around 176 BC to 30 AD

The Kushan-Yuezhi called themselves Visha or the Vijaya. This is usually rendered "tribes" although the word refers to their two ruling royal houses, as in vijana, the splitting of wisdom. The honorific title Pharaoh originates in the term pr-aa, which means "great house." In Vedic tradition, pra-jna means "wisdom of the great house." The words have multiple, related meanings (polysemic). In Vedic tradition the a-laya-vijña-na is the seed of the receptacle-world, but literally it means the receptacle of the seed, as in va-gina, symbolized originally by the pictograph V.

Karmic seeds - bija - are laid down in Alaya-vi-jña-na to produce karmic fruition. Alaya (aalaya) refers to a house, dwelling, or a receptacle. Bi is a variant of vi.

vi or bi - separation, division into two parts (social moiety)
jna - wisdom / to know
pra- intensifier

The divine Seed was regarded as giving life on earth and also immortality. Consider how the Bible refers to Christ our God as the Seed. Genesis 3:15 foreshadows the Christ's birth to the Woman who shall bring forth the Seed that will crush the serpent's head. Jesus refers to Himself as the Divine Seed in John's Gospel.

The Solar Arc and Animal Symbolism

The Ra-Horus-Hathor narrative involves the sun as the emblem of the Father and Son. This is represented in images of Ra's solar boat upon which Horus is often shown as a falcon perched on the mast. "

Horus of the Two Crowns" Horus is the only mythological figure in ancient Egypt who was understood to be a man, and as a man he wears the two crowns. This is alluded to in the account of the priest Yeshua/Joshua who receives the c owns in Zechariah 6:11: "Take the silver and gold, and make crowns, and set it upon the head of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest..."

The expectation of a Righteous Ruler-Priest who would overcome death and save his people has a very early expression in the Re-Horus-Hathor narrative. Horus was regarded to be co-equal and co-eternal with his father Ra. He was spoken of as the fixer of cosmic boundaries. Horus was invoked to send favorable winds. The four winds often appeared as birds at the four quarters of the heavens announcing the accession of Horus' deified ruler on earth. On the walls of Amenemhat III's burial chamber at Hawara Horus is depicted at the cardinal points and associated with the resurrection of the ruler. The four forms of Horus: the man, the jackal, the falcon, and the baboon top the canopic jars holding the ruler's organs.

Depending on the cultural context the animal symbolism changes. In the story of the binding of Isaac, the lamb is exchanged for a ram, signifying resurrection of the appointed ruler for which Horus stood as the archetype. "Horus of the two horizons" was the sacred calf on the western horizon who rises as a bull in mature strength on the eastern horizon. In another version, Horus was a lamb who rises as a ram. The ram was the symbol of the Giving God. All stories about a dying deity who returns from the grave are essentially the same myth with variations. This myth has a wide global dispersion, indicating that it is very old. Joseph Campbell called it the "monomyth" of the hero's journey.

The expectation of a divine ruler who would overcome a sacrificial death was expressed in the religion of Ammon as a ram. Believing that he might be the living god, Alexander the Great made a pilgrimage to the Ammon shrine at Siwa in the Libyan Desert to consult the oracle there. He became known as Dhul-Qarnayn, the two-horned one because coins minted during his rule show him with ram's horns.

Among the Nilotic peoples, the sun is shown between two lions. The Nilotic Luo speak of piny horu (soft h), a reference to the dawning of a new day. Horu refers to Horus of the two horizons, the son of Re. Horus was said to have fixed the rising and setting of the sun. The temporal sacred center was high noon when the sun rested exactly over the Nile. This is depicted by the Egyptian Akar, an image of twin lions carrying a sun disk on their backs.


Akar relates to the solar arc, the sun's big stride over the earth, a sign of the Creator's sovereignty over all. The two lions are called ruti (or rute/ rude) which in Luo means twins or things coming in pairs.

Long before Abraham's time, the Giving God was associated with the Sun. He was sometimes portrayed as riding the sun as a chariot, or as sailing in a solar boat. He was sometimes portrayed as a bull calf with the sun cradled between his horns.

This Giving God was also associated with the constellation of Leo. The bull was often shown in ancient European images between two lions, just as the Sun was shown between two lions among the ancient Nilotes. The Giving God was called Horus among the Saharo-Nilotes and the Kushite Saka called him Hromi Daba, the "Giving God."

Hromi Daba was also known by the names Crom Dubh and Grom Div. His association with the Sun is seen on the Triglav Stone (below) from Istria which shows the Giving God haloed by the Sun. This Giving God was also understood to be a Trinity. Triglav refers to trinity or triune.

Among the Saka the Siberian deer was a symbol of the Giving God. Deer antlers are found in many Saka burial sites. This creature was associated with gold and the Sun, the emblem of the Creator.

British archaeologists are aware that long before Stonehenge was erected, ancient inhabitants of the British Isles used such head dresses in religious ceremonies dating back to 9,500 BC. At Starr Carr, 21 such red deer skulls with antlers were discovered. All had holes that would have been used to tie them to the head with a leather thong for ceremonial use. (For more on this go here.)

The Red Deer of Europe, western Asia and North Africa is a distinct species from the red elk of eastern Asia and North America. These red stag and hinds roamed from North Africa to Ireland. The red color symbolized revitalizing blood and may have had the same significance for the ancient inhabitants of the British Isles and their kinsmen living in Serbia. That would explain the presence of red-deer antlers at Stonehenge and in the graves of the Saka of Northern India, Bactria, Thrace, and the Steppes of central Eurasia.

Here is a description of Christ as the "true sun" in Gildas' De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae:

Meanwhile, to the island stiff with frost and cold, and in a far distant corner of the earth, remote from the visible sun, He, the true sun, even Christ, first yields His rays, I mean His precepts. He spread, not only from the temporal firmament, but from the highest arc of heaven beyond all times, his bright gleam to the whole world in the latest days, as we know, of Tiberius Caesar. At that time the religion of Christ was propagated without any hindrance, because the emperor, contrary to the will of the senate, threatened with death informers against the soldiers of that same religion.

Related reading: The Kushite-Kushan Connection; Haplogroup R1b; Was Constantine a Saka Ruler?; The Solar Imagery of the Proto-Gospel; The Red Heifer; Some Marks of Prehistoric Religion; Aramaic Documents of Sogdiana and Bactria

Jesus Fulfills the Edenic Promise

Alice C. Linsley

Messianic expectation predates Abraham and appears to have originated among the priest caste that served in the temples and shrines of archaic Eden which stretched from ancient Nubia to Syria. Some of these priests were called Horim or Horites, and they were known in the ancient world for their purity of life.

The Horite priests were an extremely ancient caste going back to biblical Eden. It was to their ancestors that the Creator made the promise that a woman of their ruler-priests lines would conceive the Seed of the Creator (Gen. 3:15) by divine overshadowing. This is called the "Edenic Promise." The Angel Gabriel told the Blessed Virgin Mary that she would conceive by the overshadowing of the Spirit. She is the Woman of Genesis 3:15. Her son is the Divine Seed.

Samuel's father was Elkanah, a Horite priest with two wives, so was Amram, Moses' father. Moses also had two wives, as did Abraham, Jacob, etc. It is the pattern of Horite rulers whose ancestors are listed in Genesis 4, 5 and 10. Some of these rulers dispersed far from their ancestral homes and established kingdoms in Syria, Southern Europe, Northern India and even the Tarim Valley of China. Horite priests were found among the "Saka." According to Hindu sacred texts, the Saka ruled the ancient world for 7000 years. They were ethnically Kushites. Genesis calls these rulers of the archaic world "the mighty men of old."(cf Nehemiah 3:16)

These mighty rulers controlled the water commerce and the high elevations which is where they built their fortified palaces. The boundaries of their territories were often marked by the the residential settlements of their two wives, and usually on a north-south axis. Nimrod's territory extended along the Tigris River between Calah and Ashur. Likewise, Cain's territory extended between Kano and Nok, Terah's between Ur and Haran, and Abraham's between Hebron (where Sarah resided) and Beersheba (where Keturah resided).

Wherever these rulers established territories they spread their Horite religion, including the hope of a Righteous Ruler who would overcome death and lead his people to immortality. A few even claimed to be that ruler in order to strengthen their power. Sargon is an example. Sar and gon are African words, and both refer to a ruler. The replication of the meaning king indicates that Sargon would have meant "King of Kings" or "Most High King." He claimed that his mother miraculously conceived him while she was praying in the temple at Azu-piranu, the House of God. Sargon was born in an O-pirû, House of the Sun. The Sun was the emblem of the Creator and gold (oros) was associated with the sun.

In the ancient world, a temple was considered the mansion (hâît) or the house (pirû/biru) of the deity. Those men who served in the temple were called Ha'biru, which in English is Hebrew. They served the Creator and the Creator's divinely appointed ruler. They preserved the ancient religious laws concerning ritual purity and sacrifices. Because they regarded the sun as the Creator's banner or standard, much of their religion is based on the solar arc. Horus rose in the east as a lamb and set in the West as a ram. Now we see the significance of the ram caught in the thicket. The Creator's qualities were often expressed in terms of the sun's properties: warmth, light, and constancy.

Among the desert Nilotes the dung beetle (scarab) also spoke to them of the Creator. This beetle rolls balls of dung along the ground and deposits them in its burrows. The female lays her eggs in the dung ball and when the larvae hatch, they feed off the dung until they emerge from the earth. The orb of the lowly beetle replicated on earth the solar orb of the Creator. Both were seen to sink below the earth and were believed to give life to those buried in the earth.

When it came to resurrection of the body, the heart would be weighed in the afterlife. The body of the pure heart would rise from the dead, as the sun rises in the morning. This is the significance of the dung beetle scarab, placed over the mummy's heart. The emphasis on having a pure heart is found throughout the Scriptures, especially in the Psalms.

Create in me a pure heart, O God. (Ps. 51:10)

Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. (Ps. 51:6)

I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. (Ps. 119:11)

The ancient rulers of the Nile Valley observed that the beetle buried the dung ball and that the beetle's young fed off the dung underground. This was symbolic of the food placed in the graves of rulers in hope that they would come forth from the grave and lead their people to immortality. The scarab beetle was given the name Khoprer, which is derived from kheper, meaning to become.

The expectation that a Righteous Ruler would come who would overcome death and save his people, has a very early expression in the Re-Horus-Hathor narrative. HR (Horus) was regarded to be co-equal and co-eternal with his father Ra. He was spoken of as the fixer of cosmic boundaries. Horus was invoked to send favorable winds. The four winds often appeared as birds at the four quarters of the heavens announcing the accession of Horus' deified ruler on earth. On the walls of Amenemhat III's burial chamber at Hawara Horus is depicted at the cardinal points and associated with the resurrection of the ruler. The four forms of Horus: the man, the jackal, the falcon, and the baboon top the canopic jars holding the ruler's organs.

Jesus showed Himself to be the eternal Son of the Father when he calmed the wind and the waves on the Sea of Galilee. This understanding of the Cosmic Ruler is reflected in many words of ancient origin. Horos refers to the boundaries of an area, or a landmark, or a term. From horos come the English words hour, horizon, horologion, horotely, and horoscope. The association of Horus with the horizon is seen in the word Har-ma-khet, meaning "Horus of the Horizon." Today the word horoscope connotes astrology, but the word originally referred to an "observer of the hours."

In the time of Abraham's ancestors, the priests of Horus (called "Horites" in the Bible) were dedicated to observation of the planets and constellations. They observed that the planets and the constellations have an orderly clock-like movement. They conceived of this order as fixed and established by the generative force which makes existence possible (logos, nous, ruach, etc.) The Horite priests were the earliest known astronomers and it is likely that horo pertains to the celestial archetypes surrounding Horus, the son of Ra, born to Hathor. Hathor's animal totem was a cow. She is shown at the Dendura Temple holding her newborn in a manger. He was often shown as a calf with the solar orb between his horns as a sign of divine appointment.

The Horites were devotees of Ra (R) and his co-equal son HR (Hor, Horus) an Hathor (HTR) who they believed was conceived miraculously by the overshadowing of the Sun. This is about celestial archetypes, not about a historical person. The idea that God might appear in human flesh did not yet exist, only the celestial archetype which was acknowledged in funeral practices and in popular feasts and fasts.

One such festival involved a 5-day ceremony in which Horus was said to have died by his brother's hand. The people fasted as a sign of grief for his death. On the third day the priests led processions to the fields where grain was sowed in the fields. Jesus described his death as a seed of grain falling into he ground and dying (John 12:20-26). St. Augustine noted that the Egyptians took great care in the burial of their dead and never practiced cremation, as in the religions that seek to escape physical existence. Abraham's ancestors believed in the resurrection of the body and their ceremonies and celestial archetypes express their yearning for a deified king who would rise from the grave and deliver his people from death.

At some point the Horim came to believe that the ancient hope would take the form of a Divine Man. This happened well before Simeon's time. 

There was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; and this man was righteous and devout, looking for the consolation of Israel; and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ. (Luke 2:25-26)

The "consolation" extends back to Eden. The Horites believed that the promised Seed of the Woman would be born of their ruler-priest lines and they expected Him to visit them. In Mark 7:24, this expectation was fulfilled when the Son of God visited Tyre. Mark explains that there Jesus “could not pass unrecognized.” Though Jesus was rejected in Jerusalem,he was recognized in Tyre. Tyre is associated with the Edenic Promise. 

Son of Man, raise a lament over the king of Tyre and say to him: Thus says the Lord God: You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and flawless beauty. You were in Eden, in the Garden of God; every precious stone was your adornment... and gold beautifully wrought for you, mined for you, prepared the day you were created. (Ezekiel 28:11-18)

The New Testament speaks about Jesus as both ruler and priest. He is the firstborn from the grave and by his mighty resurrection He delivers to the Father a "peculiar people." He leads us in the ascent to the Father where we receive heavenly recognition because we belong to Him.

Heavenly recognition for the Horites was never an individual prospect. Heavenly recognition came to the people through the righteousness of their ruler-priest. Horite rulers took this seriously, some more than others. The best were heavenly minded and the worst were so earthy minded that they shed much blood enlarging their territories. All failed to be the One long-expected as evidenced by their failure to rise from the grave. The true Righteous Ruler-Priest did rise from the dead. Therefore, Jesus, the Son of God, has the power to deliver captives from the grave and to lead them to the throne of heaven (Ps. 68:18; Ps. 7:7; Eph. 4:8).

Related reading:  Genesis in Anthropological Perspective; Theories of Change and Constancy; The Re-Horus-Hathor Narrative; Ignoring Anthropologically Significant Data; The Dung Beetle and Heavenly Lights; Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; Miners Venerated Hathor

History Channel Scores a C

Alice C. Linsley


Dramatic and conventional in its portrayal... that's how I characterize the History Channel's presentation of Genesis and Exodus. Did it present Abraham's Horite people faithfully? Not at all. This was a rehash of old interpretations that fail to tell the whole story. In other words, a missed opportunity.

The program clearly stirred interest because after it aired this blog had over 300 reads in less than 30 minutes. The higher traffic continued the following day. People arrived from different search engines with questions like "Who was Abraham's firstborn son?" and "What color was Abraham?"

If you watched the program, try to imagine these changes:

Cain establishes a city and so does his brother Seth. These are great rulers over fertile lands in what is today the Sudan and central Nile Valley.

Noah's ark has a wooden frame and is covered with bundles of reeds. No Siberian tigers on the ark. The ark floated in the area of Lake Chad and came to rest on a mountain in East Africa.

Abraham, the youngest of Terah's three sons does not look like a European Jew, but instead has a reddish brown to black skin tone because he is of Kushite ancestry. Lot, Abraham's nephew, would have a similar look.

Lot's choice to move to the plain was motivated by greener pastures for his flocks, but it was regarded as a bad decision because it broke with the pattern of his Horite ancestors who inhabited the higher terrain. This was not a conflict between rural and urban dwellers, as presented in the dialogue.  Horites also lived in the shrine cities which were on hills or mounds (tells).

Abraham and Sarah are much richer than portrayed. He is recognized as a "prince" among the Canaanites (Gen. 23:6). They are of the ruling class.  Hagar and Masek, though concubines, are royal handmaids.

JOE ALBLAS / © LIGHTWORKERS MEDIA / HEARST PRODUCTIONS INC.

Abraham is played by Gary Oliver and Sarah by Josephine Butler

Abraham is not a nomad. He does not move seasonally with his entire tribe. His two wives reside in semi-permanent settlements on a north-south axis. Sarah resides in Hebron and Keturah in Beersheba to the south. These settlements mark the northern and southern boundaries of Abraham's territory. The wives, children, and herds rarely move location. Abraham and his personal band of warriors are the ones who move within the territory.

Before Sarah loses hope and gives Hagar to Abraham, he has already married his second wife, Keturah. She gives birth to Abraham's first born son Joktan (Yaqtan). Joktan is the "father" of the Dedanite traders and scribes.

God's promise that Abraham will have descendants more numerous than the stars finds fulfillment through his 9 sons, some of whom are Egyptians (through his concubine Hagar), Arabians (through his cousin wife Keturah), Arameans (through his concubine Masek) and Jews (through his half-sister wife Sarah).

Here is a list of the sons born to Abraham by his two wives and his two concubines:

Sarah, daughter of Terah (Gen. 20:12)
Isaac (Yitzak)

Hagar the Egyptian
Ishmael (Yismael), who was Egyptian since race/ethnicity was traced through the mother, as is true even today among Semitic peoples.

Keturah, daughter of Joktan the Afro-Arabian (Gen. 25)
Yishbak
Joktan (Yaqtan) – probably Keturah’s first born son
Midian
Zimran
Medan
Shuah

Masek, the Aramean
Eliezar of Damascus


The Sign of the Cross

One detail that the producers did get right is the T-shaped mark on Sarah's forehead. These are called Tilakam, Tikuli, Tilak, Tikli, and Tilaka among Kannada, Tamil and Telugu peoples and were worn by married Dravidian and Afro-Arabian women in Abraham's time. However, because of Sarah's high status her mark would not have been a smudge, but a well executed scar raised on the forehead by applying ashes to the original wound. (Dravidian is related to the languages of Chad, Sudan, Egypt and Somalia. Read more here.)

The T was a sacred symbol of the oversight of the Creator. The Tau and the cross are already evident among Abraham's Horite people who expected a woman of their blood lines to conceive by the overshadowing of the Creator whose emblem was the Sun. She would bring forth the "Seed" of God in fulfillment of the Edenic Promise (Gen. 3:15). This is the origin of Messianic expectation.

Another mark on the married woman's forehead was a solar tattoo. The oldest evidence of this is found on the mummy of Amunet, devotee of Hathor (2160-1994 BC). Hathor was the virgin mother of Horus. As Abraham and Sarah were Horites, it is likely that Sarah's mark was like that of Amunet. This mark on Sarah, their Horite beliefs, and the miraculous events surrounding Isaac's birth, suggest that Abraham may have believed Isaac to be the promised Seed. Here again we glimpse the solar imagery of the Proto-Gospel.


Related reading:  History Channel's Bible: Episode 2; Episode 3: The Messiah Appears; The Ethnicity of Abraham and David; What Language Did Abraham Speak?; Reality is Cross Shaped; The Pattern of Two Wives; Kushites Wives; Abraham's Sons; Was Keturah Abraham's Wife?; The Afro-Arabian Dedanites; The Conversion of Hagar; Lot's Story; Sarah's Story

Genesis as Ecological Ethics

Alice C. Linsley


A friend recently asked my opinion of a course on Genesis being offered at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary by Professor Jerome Creach.  It is a lecture series on "Genesis and the Moral Imagination" and the recommended text is Terence Fretheim's God and World in the OT: A Relational Theology of Creation, Abindgon, 2005.

Before I offer my opinion, I should preface it with a note to those who don't know me very well. 

I am an old curmudgeon and care less what people say, especially when they make unsubstantiable claims such as "women make better priests" or "Abraham was the first Jew."  I either leave them to their nonsense or I ask them to substantiate their claims. I'm not interested in arguing with them. 

Leon Kass wrote a rather comprehensive book from the Jewish perspective on Genesis and ethics. If that is the angle one wishes to take, I recommend his book, The Beginnings of Wisdom. Kass sees the overarching theme of Genesis as God's effort to create a human society that will practice justice and mercy.  It is no surprise that Christ is not found anywhere in the book and Messianic expectation is of little concern.

Professor Creach, on the other hand, is a Christian (Prebyterian).  Surely in his class students will find Christ at the heart of Genesis.  One would hope!  However, his take is not distinctly Christian, as far as I can tell.  Here is the course description:

"This study of the book of Genesis will explore some of the Bible's most popular stories..."

I take this to mean that the class will not look at the latest anthropolgical research confirming the historicity of Genesis. The focus will be on narrative and meaning.  If one wishes to take this approach, Robert Alter's Genesis and his The Art of Biblical Narrative are unsurpassed.

The course will focus on "moral and ethical concerns" such as "care for the natural world and the maintenance of justice." In other words, Creach will play it safe with the politically correct reading of Genesis which entirely misses the point of the book as a narrative about the origins of Messianic expectation among Abraham's ancestors.

Personally, I wouldn't be the least interested in this course. It would annoy me, but as I said, I'm an old curmudgeon.


Related reading:  Jesus Christ's Resurrection in Genesis; Jesus Christ, The Son of God; Jesus Christ in Genesis; The Kingdom of God in Genesis; Tracing Christ's Kushite Ancestors; The Christ in Nilotic Mythology; Genesis and the True Meaning of Christmas