Noah's Ark Landed In Kurdistan



David Rohl writes:

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what would be the real clincher to prove, beyond doubt, that Noah's Flood was a genuine historical event? Of course, the discovery of Noah's Ark, what else? You may think that this is a bit of a joke, but people have been searching for Noah's Ark for decades and have been coming up with all kinds of extraordinary claims, some of which have made headline news or had TV documentaries lavished upon them. Virtually all these 'discoveries' have been focused on or around Mount Ararat in north-eastern Turkey. The problem here is that Mount Ararat was not the original traditional landing site of the Ark. It was only in the 13th century AD, when Vincent de Beauvais, Friar William of Rubruck, Odoric and Marco Polo came this way, that Mount Ararat superseded a much older and widely recognised location for the Place of Descent.
The first thing to note is that the Biblical text itself does not identify Mount Ararat as Noah's mountain. What Genesis 8:4 actually says is that 'the Ark came to rest on the mountains (plural) of Ararat' – in other words somewhere in the mountainous terrain of the land of Ararat. Biblical Ararat is recognised as being identical with the region that the 1st millennium BC Assyrians called Urartu – a land which covered much of the central section of the Zagros range. According to Genesis, therefore, the Ark must be searched for in modern Kurdistan, not hundreds of miles to the north on the volcanic peak we know today as Ararat in Armenia. Ararat is a late Christian name for the mountain; its local name is Agri Dagh. What is more, Jewish Talmudic writings of the 6th century AD consistently interpret the Biblical Ararat to mean Kurdistan and not Armenia [Targums of Genesis 8:4, Isaiah 37-38 and Jeremiah].

Dorés landing of the Ark.

So, where does everybody else, other than post-13th-century Christianity, locate the Place of Descent?
The Koran (8th century AD) calls Noah's landing site Gebel Judi ('Mountain of the Heights') and the 10th-century Muslim writer, Ibn Haukal, observes that 'Judi is a mountain near Nisibis. It is said that the ark of Noah (peace be upon him) rested on the summit of this mountain'. Nisibis is modern Nesibin or Nusaybin, one hundred miles north-west of Mosul on the southern edge of the Zagros foothills.
The early Nestorian Christians (followers of Nestorius, 4th-century patriarch of Constantinople) knew this to be the true landing place of the Ark. The pilgrim saint, Jacob of Nisibis (also 4th century) – note the link with the town claimed to be near Gebel Judi by Ibn Haukal – was the first Christian to look for the mountain of the Ark. His search concentrated in the 'district of Gartouk' which scholars recognise as a late spelling of classical Carduchi which, in turn, derives from Kardu – the ancient name of Kurdistan.
But we can narrow down our search even further. Hippolytus (AD 155-236) informs us that the landing site of the Ark was located in 'those mountains called Ararat which are situated in the country of the Adiabeni'. The Greek and Latin sources place Adiabene in the mountains to the north of Mosul where the Hadhabeni tribe still live today. One hundred miles due north of Mosul, just across the Iraqi border into Turkey and ninety miles to the east of Nesibin, the 7,000-feet peak of Judi Dagh ('Judi Mountain') rises from the Mesopotamian plain. This surely has to be the landing site of Noah's Ark referred to in all the early, Jewish, Christian and Islamic sources.
Judi Dagh is a place of real mystery and fascination for someone like me. Around this holy mountain there are devil-worshipping cults, giant rock-cut reliefs of Assyrian kings, and, near the summit itself, the ruins of a Nestorian monastery called the 'Cloister of the Ark'. Needless to say, I am keen to mount an expedition to investigate but, unfortunately, that isn't possible at the moment. Not only is Judi Dagh on the northern edge of the Kurdish autonomous zone of Iraq (currently a no-go area for British and American nationals) but it is also smack in the middle of the area being fought over by three different Kurdish military factions. Add to this the ongoing 'cleansing' operations by the Turkish army in eastern Anatolia and you have a recipe for potential disaster for any archaeological mission. For the moment, then, we will have to satisfy ourselves with what we know from the writings of earlier travellers to the region.
In the 1920s the Reverend William A. Wigram and his son Edgar spent some time exploring the region around Mosul. In their book, The Cradle of Mankind, they record ascending the ridge beneath the summit of Judi Dagh on the 14th of September to witness a gathering of Muslims (both Sunnis and Shias), Sabaeans, Jews and the Satan-worshipping Yezidis for a great annual religious festival. The English explorers watch each group of pilgrims deliver a sheep for sacrifice as 'the smoke of a hundred offerings goes up once more on the ancient altar' where the Kurds believe Noah made sacrifice to God for his deliverance from the Flood.
The Babylonian chronographer, Berossus (3rd century BC), tells us that in his day Kurdish mountain-folk 'scraping off pieces of bitumen from the ship (i.e. the Ark), bring them back and wear them as talismans'. The practice of local women wearing bitumen talismans was still observed as recently as the beginning of this century according to European travellers' reports. Bitumen is the oil-based 'pitch' with which the Ark was sealed against the seepage of the flood-waters [Genesis 6:14]. The mystery here is that the nearest source of bitumen lies hundreds of miles south of Judi Dagh in the swamps of the Iraqi lowlands. So by what mechanism did quantities of the black tar reach a mountain ridge on Judi Dagh? - unless, that is, it was a genuine survival from the wreck of Noah's floating refuge.
Finally, we have the ancient Jewish legends surrounding the powerful Assyrian ruler, Sennacherib (705-681 BC), who, during his military campaigns against the Kurds, 'found a plank, which he worshipped as an idol, because it was part of the Ark that had saved Noah from the Deluge'. If this tale has some historical truth to it, then knowing the approximate find spot of Sennacherib's sacred relic would be very useful. It is interesting, therefore, to note that giant figures of King Sennacherib were discovered in 1904, carved into the cliffs at the foot of one particular Kurdish mountain. Yes, you've guessed it – Judi Dagh. Aren't you just itching to get out there?

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Taken from: http://davidrohlontour.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/mountain-of-ark.html

Close Convergence of Abram (Abraham) and Menes



Egyptian God Thoth

Taken from:
http://www.emmetsweeney.net/article-directory/item/70-abraham-and-egypt.html

 

by

 

Emmet Sweeney

Abraham and Egypt

According to biblical tradition, the Hebrews were a tribe of Mesopotamian nomads who, under the leadership of Abraham, or Abram, made their way to the “promised land” of Canaan. Their wanderings did not stop there, however, for we are told that during a time of famine Abraham led his followers into Egypt.

The Scriptures tell us very little of Abraham’s sojourn in the land of the Nile, save that after an initial welcome he and his followers were asked to leave by the pharaoh. The first century historian Josephus has rather more to say and provides a curious story, evidently derived from Jewish oral tradition. According to this, Abraham was the inventor of numerous arts and sciences, and it is hinted that he taught the Egyptians the rudiments of civilized life. Pharaoh, according to Josephus, gave Abraham,

… leave to enter into conversation with the most learned of the Egyptians; from which conversation his virtue and reputation became more conspicuous that they had been before.

For whereas the Egyptians were formerly addicted to different customs, and despised one another’s sacred and accustomed rites, and were very angry with one another on that account; Abram conferred with each of them, and confuting the reasonings they made use of, every one for their own practices, he demonstrated that such reasonings were vain and void of truth; whereupon he was admired by them in these great conferences as a very wise man, and one of great sagacity. He communicated to them arithmetic, and delivered to them the science of astronomy; for, before Abram came into Egypt they were unaccustomed with these parts of learning. (Jewish Antiquities, Bk. 1)

Until now, these claims of Josephus (and similar ones in Talmudic literature) have been dismissed as little more than the patriotic boasts of a Jew on behalf of the founder of his race. His claim that Abraham had taught the arts of civilization to the Egyptians – always regarded as one of the oldest of civilized nations – has always seemed absurd.

Thus matters have long rested. But with the advent of modern archaeology in the nineteenth century strange facts began to emerge which called Josephus’ words to mind. Flinders Petrie, for example, who did extensive work on the origins of dynastic Egyptian culture, was astonished to find that the very earliest stage of pharaohnic civilization was heavily influenced by Mesopotamia. (Petrie, The Making of Egypt, London, 1939) The evidence seemed conclusive, becoming more voluminous with each dig; and indeed the pronounced Mesopotamian inspiration behind the first Egyptian civilization has now become part of received wisdom.

In the 1971 edition of the Cambridge Ancient History, I. E. S. Edwards devoted considerable space to the question:

“Foremost among the indications of early contacts between Egypt and Mesopotamia must be counted the occurrence in both countries of a small group of remarkably similar designs, mostly embodying animals.” (Edwards p. 41) The artistic parallels are detailed and striking: “Both on the Narmer palette and on the seals, the necks of the monsters are interlaced – a well-attested motif in Mesopotamian art, to which the interlaced serpents found on three protodynastic knife-handles may be an additional artistic parallel.” (Edwards, “The Early Dynastic Period in Egypt,” in The Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. 1 part 2 (3rd ed) p. 41)

Some Egyptian work of this period looks as if it was actually produced in Mesopotamia. A famous ivory knife-handle, for example, found at Gebel el-Araq, “portrays in finely carved relief a bearded man clothed in Sumerian costume and holding apart two fierce lions.” In Edwards’ words, “… so closely does the composition of this scene resemble the so-called Gilgamesh motif, frequently represented on Mesopotamian scenes, that the source of its inspiration can hardly be questioned.”

Even the earliest Egyptian architecture, found in the Early Dynastic mastaba tombs, has an apparently Mesopotamian antecedent: “ … excavation in Mesopotamia has revealed the more primitive wooden constructions from which this style of architecture was no doubt derived, and … the earliest Mesopotamian examples in brick are considerably older than the first mastabas of the Naqada form found in Egypt, where thy appear quite suddenly at the beginning the First Dynasty.” (Edwards, loc cit. p. 43)

In terms of writing, the Sumerian and Egyptian hieroglyphic scripts showed “certain affinities”. Nonetheless, the differences between the two are “too significant to be disregarded,” and “it is probably correct to assess the Sumerian contribution to the Egyptian science of writing as mainly suggestive and limited to imparting a knowledge of the underlying principles.”

Scholars are at a loss in trying to identify these Mesopotamian culture-bearers. Commercials intercourse is regarded as “unlikely” because “the movement seems to have been in one direction only – from East to West.” The bearers of the Mesopotamian influences were “Sumerians who migrated to Egypt and settled in the Nile valley.” (Edwards, loc cit. p. 44) This was no great invasion but the movement, over a short period of time, of small groups. “There are good grounds for believing that the numbers of immigrants was not such as to constitute an invasion and that the flow could not have continued after the beginning of the First Dynasty.” (Edwards, loc cit. p. 45)

The reader could be excused for believing that in the above sentence Edwards was actually trying to describe, in modern terms, the migration of the Abraham tribe into Egypt. But of course no such thought could enter a contemporary scholar’s mind, since biblical chronology places Abraham, roughly, around 2000 BC, whereas Menes, the first pharaoh, is dated to slightly before 3000 BC – over 1000 years earlier! Thus any possible connection between the migration of Abraham to Egypt (which Talmudic sources placed during the reign of the first pharaoh) and the very real connections between Mesopotamia and Egypt which archaeology found at the start of the First Dynasty, was ruled out even before it was considered. Yet, strangely enough, there exists a whole corpus of other evidence linking Abraham to the First Dynasty; indeed to the first pharaoh: For the character and personality of Abraham bears close comparison with that of Menes, the semi-legendary founder of the First Dynasty.

First and foremost, Menes – like Abraham – was regarded as the founder of civilized life. A whole series of arts, sciences and skills were associated with his name. Later Egyptians insisted that it was with Menes that the people of the Nile Valley became a cultured and literate nation,

Both characters were also regarded as religious innovators. Thus in Genesis 17:9 Abraham initiates the custom of circumcision, a ritual that was to stay with the Hebrews throughout their history and was to become a central religious duty. In Moses’ time, the instrument used to perform the operation was a flint knife – suggestive of the custom’s remote antiquity. (Exodus 4:12) But circumcision was also one of the most ancient customs of Egypt, apparently introduced near the beginning of the dynastic period. Circumcision seems to have constituted a type of propitiatory sacrifice, and we know from Diodorus Siculus that Menes “taught the people to worship gods and offer sacrifices” (Diodorus i, 45, 1). The names Menes, which Herodotus renders as Min, reminds us of the phallic god Min, who was one of the most important deities in early dynastic times. It would appear that Menes is but an euhemerization of this god (no pharaoh named Menes has been found in the contemporary monuments), and if this is the case then the custom of circumcision most assuredly dates from the start of the First Dynasty and the connection with Abraham before even stronger.

As well as initiating circumcision, Abraham appears to have been credited, like Menes, with initiating the custom of flesh sacrifice. We recall at this point Abraham’s abortive sacrifice of Isaac. In the biblical account the patriarch does not sacrifice his son but instead offers a ram caught in a nearby thicket. For this reason, some commentators have argued that Abraham is hereby abolishing human sacrifice. This however was not the opinion of the great Eduard Meyer, who held that the legend originated in the sacrifice of children to a god named pachad yitzchak or “Fear of Isaac.” (Meyer and Luther, Die Israeliten und ihre Nachbarstämme (1906)). Human sacrifice, it should be stressed, was one of the most characteristic features of religious practice during the early dynastic epochs of both Egypt and Mesopotamia.

In summary then Abraham and Menes share at least three outstanding features:

1. Both were credited with initiating civilized life and being cultural innovators.
2. Both were believed to have introduced now forms of religious worship including, almost certainly, flesh sacrifice.
3. Both were associated with circumcision and were linked to a phallic cult.

A further consideration adds yet more weight to the argument. Abraham, as well as Menes, was clearly related, in terms of general character, to the god Thoth/Hermes. Amongst the Egyptians, Thoth was regarded as the patron of learning and it was believed he bequeathed civilization to mankind. It was said that he invented language, writing and medicine. The Greeks regarded Thoth (whom they associated with their own Hermes) as one of the oldest of the gods. He had a frivolous and impetuous nature and, it was suggested, could be destructive. It was said he assisted the Three Fates in the invention of writing, astronomy, the musical scale, the arts of boxing and gymnastics, weights and measures and the cultivation of the olive tree (Diodorus, v, 75). He was also a religious innovator and was credited with initiating the custom of flesh sacrifice, when he cut two stolen cattle into twelve equal portions as an offering to the twelve gods (Apollodorus, iii, 10, 2).

Thoth was a deity of great importance during the First Dynasty and at least two pharaohs seem to have been named in his honour. He was also, like Menes and Abraham, linked to the cult of phallus-worship. Hermes/Thoth was called “caduceus” and his symbol was a staff intertwined with coiled serpents. He was worshipped throughout the Hellenic and Roman worlds round a sacred stone phallus, or “herme”. All of these symbols are of great importance during the Early Dynastic period (the intertwined serpents are found repeatedly in artwork from both Egypt and Mesopotamia during this epoch), and are clearly linked to the personality of Abraham, whose phallicism is expressed not only in his name (“father of a multitude”) and his initiating of circumcision, but also in the story of the apparently ritual homosexuality of Sodom.

A wealth of evidence therefore links the story of Abraham to the very beginnings of literate civilization in the Nile valley. The literary evidence is supported by archaeology and elucidated by it. Therefore the millennium which, in conventional chronology, separates Abraham from Menes is an illusion and the history of Egypt needs to be brought forward by a thousand years to tie in with that of Israel. In fact, making the Abraham and Menes epochs contemporary also demands that Imhotep be identified with Joseph; and using the same chronological measuring-rod we would expect the Exodus to have occurred at the end of the Third Dynasty, which would make the last pharaoh of that line, Huni, also known as Ka-nefer-ra, identical to the pharaoh of the Oppression. The first pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, Sneferu, would also have been a contemporary of the Exodus. Without, at this stage, going into the details of the Exodus and its place in history, we should note that one legend tells of a magician parting the waters of a sacred lake during the time of Sneferu, whilst the Hellenistic writer Artapanus of Alexandria told a strange tale about the Exodus, in which the pharaoh who oppressed the Israelites was named Khenephres.

Answering U.S. Creationists

A colleague from Missouri wrote:

Hi, Damien -

Not all your readers find very persuasive your case against a global Flood.

[See http://bookofdaniel.blog.com/2013/02/26/what-exactly-is-creation-science/]

Here are a few thoughts from two American Catholic creationists.

Blessings,
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Here's my take:

RS: The Greek of Acts 2:5 means, of the nations that had Jews living in them, all of them were gathered in Jerusalem. It is not including any region of Earth that did not contain Jews. So this context is not the same as Genesis 6-9.

Mackey will need to prove that the expression “all the earth” cannot apply to the whole earth. He will not be able to do so since the Bible uses such expressions in both local and global ways.

More significant is 2 Peter 3:5, which compares the earth completely covered by water at the creation in Genesis 1:1-2 with the flood of Noah’s day that will once again cover the Earth completely with water. The Greek di means “between,” and thus tells us that the Earth was surrounded by water (i.e., water covered the entire spherical circumference). Since creation is global, so is the flood.

It then compares the judgment by fire of the whole earth with the judgment of the whole earth in Noah’s day. Since the fire is global, so is the flood

There is no suggestion that an of these three events: (1) creation water over the earth, (2) judgment fire on the earth at the last day, (3) Noah’s flood, are merely local events.

Genesis 7:19-20 says that the water rose 15 cubits higher than the highest mountain, which is about 300 feet. Whatever the height of the highest mountain, the laws of physics say that water seeks the lowest point and assumes the shape of its container. Water could never reach a height of 300 feet over a mountain locally, since the water would always seek a lower point somewhere on the earth, no matter how far it extended. The only way Genesis 7:19-20 could be accomplished is by a worldwide deluge, not to mention that the same fossils that are found in the Mesopotamian region are found in the Americas, Australia and the Far East.

The proposition that the Garden of Eden was sitting on sedimentary rocks has no evidence to support it. Genesis doesn’t hint to such a circumstance. The only mention of rare earths or elements is Gen 2:12 (gold, bdellium, onyx stone), but these are speaking of what is there as of the writing of Genesis by Moses, not necessarily what was there in the time of the Garden of Eden. Even if they were existing during the time of Eden, gold is a naturally occurring element, not a sediment. Bdellium is the product of tree. The only possibility of something built by layers is the onyx, but that is a quick crystallization process, not a sedimentary process.

The other instance is the use of bronze and iron at the time of Gen 4:22, but these are either naturally occurring elements or forged mixtures of elements, not sediments.

As for the four rivers, flood waters would not necessarily erase the elongated earthen cavity that holds river water. In fact, the exceeding pressure from water that is a mile or two high (as in our oceans) preserves rather than destroys. Once the mile or two of water is removed, the cavity that held the river remains. The only way the cavity would not be present after a flood is if the flood waters were in great turbulence and literally broke up the cavity, but that requires proof of some great turbulence, not assumption.

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And

In a message dated 2/23/2013 8:45:49 P.M. Eastern Standard Time .... :

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I don't know how Damien can argue that he is able to interpret Genesis better than ALL of the Fathers of the Church, especially since the geological evidence fits perfectly well with a global Flood and a post-Flood Ice Age. It seems extremely arrogant to think that the Fathers were incapable of interpreting the Scriptures that refer to the Flood correctly and that we needed the speculations of anti-Catholic scientists like Darwin and Lyell to interpret them aright!
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Damien Mackey’s Response

Depth and common sense are needed when approaching a particularly difficult scriptural segment such as early Genesis. By depth, I mean reading beneath the surface of a modern translation. And the application of common sense will ensure that one does not arrive at a conclusion that is unrealistic, unscientific, or even, laughable.

I want to exemplify this by using an example of the geography of the Book of Tobit - which appears quite nonsensical when read ‘at face value’ - and then to apply this type of example- when properly explained - to early Genesis.

Was the Archangel Raphael leading the young Tobias ‘right up the garden path’?

On the surface of things, the angel Raphael got his geography badly wrong when attempting to lead young Tobias, son of Tobit, to the land of“Media”, to “Rages” and “Ecbatana” therein. And this despite the angel’s assurance to the ageing Tobit (5:10): “Yes, I can go with him, for I know all the routes. I have often traveled to Media and crossed all its plains and mountains; so I know every road well.”

However, departing from Nineveh, which is well west of Median Ecbatana (see at far right in Map I below), the travellers arrive in the evening at the Tigris River, which is even west of Nineveh. In other words, they are going in quite the wrong direction – exactly opposite to the way that they ought to be heading!

Map I: Median Ecbatana, Nineveh and Har[r]an



This absurd situation has prompted Fr. MacKenzie, in The Jerome Biblical Commentary (article“Tobit”, footnote comment on 5a), to remark that: “Raphael knows the journey of life far better than the route to Media!”

Whilst, according to The Jerusalem Bible, “the geography is inexact”.

The fact that the Douay-Rheims version of Tobit adds “Charan”(Harran/Haran, see map) as a ‘midway’ point in the journey (11:1) serves only to reinforce the view that the travellers are going right away from their intended (as customarily estimated) destination in the east.

Three possible ways of approaching this difficulty

I should like to suggest - with approaches to early Genesis well in mind - three ways that commentators (e.g. the likes of Fr. MacKenzie) might react to the geography of Tobit:

1. The liberal approach, such as Fr. MacKenzie’s, and The Jerusalem Bible’s, and - as appeared in the March MATRIX - Bro. Guy Consolmagno (S.J.)’s estimation of early Genesis; or

2. The artificial approach towards‘saving’ the Scriptures as used by conservatives, such as the ‘Creationists’with early Genesis, to make the inerrant Scriptures fit their preconceived interpretations: “All of these things are read into the Bible from a centuries-past interpretation of it” (Professor Carol Hill); or

3. The biblical key, allowing the scriptures to open themselves up to us.

Since the Holy Spirit is of course the true inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, then ‘the key to their interpretation will be laid upon the shoulder’ (Isaiah 22:22) only of those who approach the Sacred texts in a spirit of prayer and with a disciple’s ear, and who do not bring to the study a heavy mass of preconceived ideas.

1. The liberal approach

This is basically clueless, and does not respect the work of the Holy Spirit to the extent of looking to defend the Sacred Scriptures. Unable to understand the Bible, lacking any key to unlock its hidden secrets, proponents of this method take the easy way out by labelling much of it “inaccurate”, and by relegating it to “a pious fiction”, and, in the case of Adam and Eve, describing it as “unscientific”, “a marvellous allegory”, and so on.

Bro. Consolmagno posits “three different creation stories in the Bible, so which is true?”

And Fr. MacKenzie does not make any effort to ‘redeem’ the geography of the Book of Tobit, but simply leaves us with who he thinks is a directionally-confused angel.

So much for the liberals!

2. The artificial approach

In astronomical terms, this is somewhat like trying to ‘save the appearances’ (or phenomena) by adding epicycle upon epicycle, until the whole unwieldy model ‘fits’.

Thus e.g. a Creation Scientist, employing a shallow a priori approach to the perfect Scriptures, will endeavor, though quite unwittingly, to force the Sacred texts to fit the hopeful model. The perfect Scriptures are reduced to the absurd, the unscientific (no genuine scientist would want to countenance them), with common sense thrown right out the window.

With regard to early Genesis, they end up with some ridiculous situations like God’s retiring in the evenings and re-starting His creative work on the next day. “Have you not heard”, exclaims Isaiah (40:28), “the Lord will not grow tired or weary”. Then there is Light from the start despite its luminary source not being created, supposedly, until the Fourth Day. And there are the miracles upon miracles (‘epicycles upon epicycles’) needed to get Noah’s Ark built and furnished, with all animals on board, and afloat, and surviving a global Flood, without everyone on board drowning in – forget the Flood – manure (possibly including dinosaurs). Or, as Professor Carol Hill put it (in previous MATRIX): “The “leaps of logic” build one on top of another until finally, as the result of this cataclysmic event, almost all of the geomorphic and tectonic features present on the planet Earth (e.g., canyons, caves, mountains, continents) are attributed by flood geologists to the Noachian Flood”.

I have already discussed the Creationists’ tendency to turn universal biblical language into global modern terms, “whole earth”, “under the entire heavens”, etc. The limited world that the people of the Bible knew, the ‘whole world’ to them, was not the global world of today. And that comment also applies to the early Church Fathers. For example, the entire world assembled at Pentecost incorporated just a tiny percentage of today’s global village.

Consider the differences in meaning of Pope Francis’s saying that they had gone to “the end of the earth” to get him, and for “evangelisation to the ends of the earth”, and of Jesus’s words about the Queen of the South coming from “the ends of the earth” to visit king Solomon. She (be she Hatshepsut - ruler of Egypt and Ethiopia - or an Arabian queen) came from a place which, on a global map, is a tiny step to Jerusalem and is not even in the southern hemisphere.

Now, how might this artificialapproach manifest itself with the geography of Tobit?

Well, a friend has proposed to me a hypothetical archaeologist, believing in biblical inerrancy, with Bible in hand, scouring the world (presumably near Nineveh) and finding the set:Nineveh, Tigris, Media, Ecbatana, Rages, Haran, but not the classical and well-known locations – e.g. ‘a stream called “Tigris” that is not the Tigris River’. Epicycle upon epicycle. And, whilst antiquity did know of a Median and a Syrian “Ecbatana”, I would still say ‘good luck’ to that hypothetical archaeologist in his search for his biblical combination (or key).

1. The biblical key

Nice if we can get it.

However, I think that there is an attainable solution at least to the tricky geography of the Book of Tobit that is right in accord with the textual details and that does fit the story like a finely tuned key, without the need for added baggage - just as will be the case with early Genesis when properly understood. Having the key in hand neither requires one to ridicule and dismiss the text as nonsense, as do the liberals, nor to add epicycle upon epicycle to make it fit, as do the conservatives.

Here, then, is my effort to account for which way the angel was really leading young Tobias (and let us not forget his dog as well).

‘Saving’ the Geography of Tobit

When Raphael and Tobias are properly understood to have been travelling from Ninevehwestwards, not the usually presumed eastwards, then their arrival at the Tigris River in the evening, and later at “Charan” in the midway, and finally at “Ecbatana”, makes perfect sense. “Media” then becomes, with a slight tweak (and that is all that is needed with this scenario), Midian. And indeed there are, as we shall read in the section below, extant versions of the Book of Tobit that supply the appropriate place names here (“Midian” and “Bathania”).

Median Ecbatana and Rhages (var. Rhaga, Rau) do not fit the Book of Tobit scenario eitherdirectionally or topographically, as the former is in the mountains, whereas Tobit’s Ecbatana was in the plain, whilst Rages, in the mountains in Tobit, is in the plain in Media.

It is simply all the wrong way around!

The Book of Tobit’s city of Rages must be the city of Damascus, which fits exactly insofar as it is in the mountain of Bashan, exactly 2 miles from where tradition places Job (our Tobias). Here is my recent account of this stunning geographical fit that completely defies a surface reading of the current text:

Reading common sense into the Geography of the Book of Tobit

http://bookofjob-amaic.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/reading-common-sense-into-geography-of.html

… whereas the journey from Tobit's Ecbatana toRages normally took “two full days”, the almost 200-mile journey from the Median Ecbatana to Rhages would have taken significantly longer. In fact it took the army of Alexander the Great 11 days at full gallop to march from the one to the other ^13]. Rightly then does Jan Simons observe (according to a Median context) that the journey referred to in the Book of Tobit "would be a forced 'journey of two days' even for an express messenger"^14].

…. So we find that the real Raphael [not Fr. MacKenzie’s inept version of him] was escorting the young Tobias, not eastwards, but westwards from Nineveh, to the Tigris crossing, then to Haran, and on to Bashan (where the angel then leaves on an early flight for Damascus).

I … discussed all this in Volume 2 [of my thesis, A Revised History of the Era of King Hezekiah of Judah and its Background], Ch. 2, pp. 38-40, where I had specifically claimed that “Rages”, a city in the mountains, must be the city of Damascus that dominated the province of Batanaea” (p. 39).

Damascus, almost 700 m above sea level, is actually situated on a plateau.

Secondly, I gave there very specific geographical details in order to identify this “Rages” in relation to “Ecbatana” (Tobit 5:6), which I had in turn identified (following the Heb. Londinii, or HL, fragment version of Tobit) with “Bathania”, or Bashan (possibly Herodotus’Syrian Ecbatana as opposed to the better known Median Ecbatana). According to Tobit, “Rages is situated in the mountains, two days’ walk from Ecbatana which is in the plain”. Now Damascus is precisely two days’ walk from Bashan in the Hauran plain, as according to Jâkût el-Hamawi who says of Batanaea’s most central town of Nawâ …: “Between Nawa and Damascus is two days’ journey” (as quoted on p. 39). …. Whilst Bible scholars today tend to dismiss the whole geography of the Book of Tobit as nonsensical, a simple adjustment based on a genuine version (Heb. Londinii), makes perfect - even very precise (“two days walk”) - sense of it.

The testimony of Jâkût el-Hamawi here was an absolute clincher for me, not only when trying to make sense of the geography of the Book of Tobit, but also for having Tobias, with the angel, heading to the very region in Naphtali from where Tobit himself had hailed (Naphtalian Bashan) … [and again] from the point of view of having the geography of Tobit converge with that of Job (my Tobias) …with the pair of travellers heading to the very geographical region, Bashan, where ancient legends of Job place his home of Uz and his final resting place.

Syro-Arabic Traditions

Again, this Damascene region is the very one in which the Syro-Arabic traditions place the home of Job.

The Jâkût el-Hamawi and Moslem tradition generally mention the east Hauran fertile tract of country north-west of Têmâ and Bûzân, el-Bethenîje (i.e. Batanaea), as the district in which Job dwelt. According to Abufelda ^25]: "The whole of Bethenije, a part of the province of Damascus, belonged to Job as his possession".

Map 2: Damascus, Hauran (Batanaea)

The Syrian tradition also locates Job's abode in Batanaea, where lies an ancient "Monastery of Job" (Dair Êjûb), built in honour of the holy man.

All the larger works on Palestine and Syria agree that "Uz" is not to be sought in Edom proper. In these works we also find it recorded that Batanaea is there called Job's fatherland. In Batanaea itself the traveller hears this constantly. If any one speaks of the fruitfulness of the whole district; or of the fields around a village, he is always answered: '

Is it not the land of Job (bilâd Êjûb)?';

'Does it not belong to the villages of Job (diâ Êjûb)?'.

It seems that Batanaea (Hauran) and the land of Job are synonymous.

Job's Tomb and other Relics

Regarding Job's tomb, we read from Ibn er-Râbi that ^26]:"To the prophets buried in the region of Damascus belongs also Job, and his tomb is near Nawa, in the district of Hauran".

Delitzsch^27] notes, in favour of Batanaea, that the "heap of ashes" (Job 2:8) upon which Job sat in his misery is variously translated as "dunghill", and that only in a Batanaean context is there no contradiction, since the two were "synonymous notions". There the dung, being useless for agricultural purposes, is burnt from time to time in an appointed place before the town; while in any other part of Syria it is as valuable as among any farmer. This distinctive fact, he concludes, is yet another indication that Job's "land of Uz" cannot refer to the land of Edom.

[End of quotes]

The key easily fits the lock and does not need to be forced.

Concluding Remarks

The problem with reading one’s own meaning into the Scriptures – for instance, reading a global scenario into a non-global world – instead of reading the real meaning out of the Scriptures, is that one ends up erasing all proper meaning from the Scriptures. By imposing upon the Scriptures a burden, be it scientific, historical, or prophetical, which they are not able to bear, one ends up with an, inaccurate at best, and nonsensical at worst, scenario.

The Church has warned against this type of artificial imposition.

Such a method also has serious ramifications for biblical prophecy, since a warping of the intended meaning of the texts (coupled with a faulty chronology) - e.g. an artificial extrapolation of ancient events into a third millennium world - will mean that it is impossible for inspired prophecies to be understood as having arrived at their proper terminus or fulfilment. This is a further source of glee for atheists, who can then point to scriptural personages (including Jesus Christ himself) as being “false prophets”.

Finally, speaking of atheists, I do not properly comprehend how my approach to the Scriptures can be said to support Lyell and Darwin in any way, shape or form. I should have thought that my anti-evolutionary views and my urging for significantly shortened Geological, Stone, and Archaeological, Ages (see e.g. AMAIC sites, next page) would have quite the opposite effect. But I firmly believe that evolution must be exposed using real scientific data and not by means of a pseudo-scientific view of early Genesis.

And, written to a US Creationist later on 10th April:

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Greetings from Sydney in this most blessed season of Easter!

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Those AMAIC newsletters on Creation Science were intended to pack a punch, especially with Catholiccreationists. As I say, I was one, too – so I can well appreciate that those strong comments by the AMAIC could be a bitter pill. However, I wanted to try to prod people into thinking differently. Ultimately it is up to the reader to decide pro or con.

We know the archaeology down to bedrock (say, Adam and Eve). Progressively above that we can discern, layer upon layer, in very ancient places such as Jericho and southern Mesopotamia, the antediluvian phases of increasing (as one goes upwards) agricultural, architectural and metallurgical sophistication.

And then comes the Flood.

Australian anti-evolutionist, Wallace Johnson (RIP), a global Floodist, appreciating this historical sequence, tried to reconcile real archaeology with a Morris and Whitcomb type of total Flood. But the choice has to be one or the other.

After the Flood, we have the return to southern Mesopotamia (biblical “Shinar”) and soon the strong Uruk I civilisation, of Cush and Nimrod (= Enmerkar, and probably Gilgamesh), leading into the Mesopotamian Babel stories.

It all follows the biblical sequence.

Next occurs the era of Abram (Abraham), the Late Chalcolithic (Early Bronze I in some places), with the disappearance at the time of the Ghassul IV culture from Trans Jordan (when the 4 Mesopotamian kings wiped it out and then came into Palestine and captured Lot).

And so on.

Bob’s model, of the Paradise rivers overlaid by the global Flood, with its ‘oceans’ of deposited sediment – yet (the rivers) somehow managing to keep their ancient form and re-emerge – is, to me, quite staggering.

The archaeologically-known antediluvian peoples (e.g. the Ubaid culture) were a highly skilled and clever people. But there is no way that nay one of them was capable of building a wooden Titanic, to ride out a global Flood. Their reed vessels were nothing like that type. Their cities were tiny by comparion with ours.

As one book suggests (my emphasis): "This book reconstructs the original legend and focuses on what would be physically possible, technologically practical, and consistent with archaeological facts and facts about flooding in the Euphrates River valley".

Just as the Shroud of Turin challenges many diverse scientific disciplines, yet still mystifies; so (in a contrary sor to fway) does the concept of a global Flood wreak havic with a disciplined, multi-faccetted science. Whilst the Shroud demands new scientific parametrs, genuine science demands that global Floodists reconsider their biblical parameters.

In Jesus and Mary

Damien Mackey.

The Flood and Subsequent Civilization



by Dr. David Livingston

Terra Is Truly Firma An article in US News & World Report told a marvelous story about "Terra," the super-computer program at Los Alamos, New Mexico, which was designed "to prove that the story of Noah and the flood of Genesis 7:18 . . . happened exactly as the Bible tells it." It seems that John Baumgardner, who designed it, is the world's pre-eminent expert in the design of computer models for geophysical convection, the process by which the earth develops volcanoes, earthquakes, and the movement of the continental plates. He is also a fundamentalist Christian "who believes, in accordance with the Bible, that the earth was created by God less than 10,000 years ago." Terra is an attempt to reconcile the most literal reading of Scripture with the most advanced science in existence. Some time went by after his conversion, before evolutionist Baumgardner gave much thought to the creation of the universe by God. But as his walk with the Lord deepened, he became convinced that "indeed there had been a major catastrophe in the Earth's past that accounts for a large fraction of the geological features we observe at the earth's surface today." And this catastrophe was the Flood of Noah's day. The enormous significance of this is seen, for instance, in that the 100 mile-an-hour runoff of the water covering the earth back into the oceans could easily create the Grand Canyon "in about a week!" Most physicists "believe" the earth is 4.5 billion years old. And the results of Terra, run with that assumption, works out OK. On the other hand, run the program assuming the earth is less than 10,000 years old, and that there was a catastrophic universal Flood, and all the geology works out OK that way also! But, as Baumgardner points out, scientists wrongly take for granted that geology happens consistently, without catastrophes. "If you look at the geological record," he insists, "there are fingerprints of catastrophe everywhere one looks." Details of the Terra program and how it works, as well as more of Baumgardner's evidences for a young earth, make the article well-worth looking up. (US News & World Report, 6/16/97:55-58.) Where Did the 40 Days and Nights of Rain Come From? The answer, or part of it, may be found in a recent theory proved correct. Louis Frank of Iowa University published an article in 1986 postulating that small icy comets continually pelt the earth. Other scientists scoffed at the idea. A leading atmospheric expert argued that no atmospheric expert supported such a thing. Another commented, "If he's correct we'd have to burn half the contents of the libraries in the physical sciences." Well, he IS correct! A report in US News and World Report noted stunning evidence from three cameras on NASA's Polar satellite actually have captured images of comets as big as a house(!) plunging into the atmosphere. Between five and 30 comets hit the upper atmosphere every minute! "The ice becomes water vapor that later comes down as rain." That could be a lot of rain! (US News & World Report, 6/23/97.) Tale of Two Cultures: Ancient Chinese Dynasty Linked to New World's Earliest Civilization Abroad for the first time in his life, Han Ping Chen, a scholar of ancient Chinese, landed at Dulles International Airport near Washington, D.C., the night of September 18, 1996. The next morning, he paced in front of the National Gallery of Art, waiting for the museum to open so he could visit an Olmec exhibit -- works from Mesoamerica's spectacular "mother culture" that emerged suddenly with no apparent antecedents, 3,200 years ago. After a glance at a 10 ton basalt sculpture of a head, Chen faced the object that prompted his trip: an Olmec sculpture found in La Venta, 10 miles south of the southernmost cove of the Gulf of Mexico. What the Chinese scholar saw was 15 male figures made of serpentine or jade, each about 6 inches tall. Facing them were a taller sandstone figure and six upright, polished, jade blades called celts. The celts bore incised markings, some of them faded. Proceeding from right to left, Chen scrutinized the markings silently, grimacing when he was unable to make out more than a few squiggles on the second and third celts. But the lower half of the fourth blade made him jump. "I can read this easily," he shouted. "Clearly, these are Chinese characters." For years, scholars have waged a passionate debate over whether Asian refugees or adventurers might somehow have made their way to the New World long before Columbus, stimulating brilliant achievements in cosmogony, art, astronomy and architecture in a succession of cultures from the Olmec to the Mayan and Aztec. On one side are the "diffusionists," who have compiled a long list of links between Asian and Mesoamerican cultures, including similar rules for the Aztec board game of patolli and the Asian pachisi (also known as Parcheesi), a theological focus in ancient China and Mesoamerica on tiger-jaguar and dragonlike creatures, and a custom, common both to China's Shang dynasty and the Olmecs, of putting a jade bead in the mouth of a deceased person. "Nativists," on the other hand, dismiss such theories as ridiculous and argue for the autonomous development of pre-Columbian civilizations. They bristle at the suggestion that indigenous people did not evolve on their own. Striking Resemblances For diffusionists, Olmec art offers a tempting arena for speculation. Carbon-dating places the Olmec era between 1000 and 1200 BC, coinciding with the Shang dynasty's fall in China. American archaeologists unearthed the group sculpture in 1955. Looking at the sculpture displayed in the National Gallery, as well as other Olmec pieces, some Mexican and American scholars have been struck by the resemblances to Chinese artifacts. In fact, archaeologists initially labeled the first Olmec figures found at the turn of the century as Chinese. Migrations from Asia over the land bridge 10,000 - 15,000 years ago could account for the Chinese features, such as slanted eyes, but not for the stylized mouths and postures peculiar to sophisticated Chinese art that emerged in recent millennia. Yet, until Chen made his pilgrimage to the museum, no Shang specialist had ever studied the Olmec The scholar emerged from the exhibit with a theory. After the Shang army was routed and the emperor killed, he suggested, some loyalists might have sailed down the Yellow River and taken to the ocean. There, perhaps, they drifted with a current which skirts Japan's coast, heads for California and peters out near Ecuador. Betty Meggers, a senior Smithsonian archaeologist who has linked Ecuadorian pottery to 5,000 year old ship wrecked Japanese pottery, says such an idea is "plausible" because ancient Asian mariners were far more proficient than given credit for. But Chen's identification of the celt markings sharpens the controversy over origins even further. For example, Mesoamericanist Michael Coe at Yale University labels Chen's search for Chinese characters as insulting to the indigenous people of Mexico. There are only about a dozen experts worldwide in the Shang script, which is largely unrecognizable to readers of modern Chinese. When Prof. Mike Xu, a professor of Chinese history at the University of Central Oklahoma, traveled to Beijing to ask Chen to examine his index of 146 markings from pre-Columbian objects, Chen refused, saying he had no interest in anything outside China. He relented only after a colleague familiar with Xu's work insisted that Chen, as China's leading authority, take a look. He did and found that all but three of Xu's markings could have come from China. Xu was at Chen's side in the National Gallery when the Shang scholar read the text on the Olmec celt in Chinese and translated: "The ruler and his chieftains establish the foundation for a kingdom." Chen located each of the characters on the celt in three well-worn Chinese dictionaries he had with him. Two adjacent characters are usually read as "master and subjects," but Chen decided that in this context they might mean "ruler and his chieftains." The character on the line below he recognized as the symbol for "kingdom" or "country" -- two peaks for hills, a curving line underneath for river. The next character, Chen said, suggests a bird but means "waterfall" completing the description. The bottom character he read as "foundation" or "establish," implying the act of founding something important. If Chen is right, the celts not only offer the earliest writing in the New World, but mark the birth of a Chinese settlement more than 3,000 years ago. At lunch the next day, Chen said he was awake all night thinking about the sculpture. He talked about how he had studied Chinese script at age 5, tutored by his father, the director of the national archives. But Chen's father did not live to enjoy the honors the son reaped, such as a recent assignment to compile a new dictionary of characters used by the earliest dynasties -- the first update since one commissioned by a Han emperor 2,000 years ago. Color Nuances Chen was so taken with the Olmec sculpture that he ventured beyond scholarly caution. The group sculpture, he said, might memorialize "a historic event," either a blessing sought from ancestors or the act of founding a new kingdom or both. He was mesmerized by the tallest figure in the sculpture -- made from red sandstone as porous as a sponge, in contrast to the others, which are highly polished and green-blue in hue. Red suggests higher status, Chen said. Perhaps the figure was the master of the group, a venerated ancestral spirit. The two dark blue figures to the right might represent the top noblemen, more important than the two others, carved out of pale green serpentine. The Smithsonian's Meggers says that Chen's analysis of the colors makes sense. But his reading of the text is the clincher. "Writing systems are too arbitrary and complex. They cannot be independently reinvented." More than 5,000 Shang characters have survived, Chen says even though the soldiers who defeated the Shang forces murdered the scholars and burned or buried any object with writing on it. In a recent excavation in the Shang capital of Anyang, archaeologists have found a buried library of turtle shells covered with characters. And at the entrance lay the skeleton of the librarian, stabbed in the back and clutching some writings to his breast. The Olmec sculpture was buried under white sand topped with alternate layers of brown and reddish-brown sand. Perhaps it was hidden to save it from the kind of rage that sought to wipe out the Shang and their memory. (U.S. News & World Report, 11/4/96.) Why This is Important It demonstrates that shortly after Noah's Flood, there was wide migration of the families who were descendants of Noah. They were intelligent -- not evolving brute beasts -- and by 1200 BC (actually even much earlier) were able to navigate on the world's oceans. This diminishes the need for a Siberia-to-Alaska ice/land bridge crossing. In fact, the scanty evidence we find for ancient settlements in Alaska could even be the remains of migrants coming from south of Alaska instead of from Siberia. The Native Americans, then, were probably of oriental descent and did not "evolve" locally from some lower form of life in the Americas.

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© 2003 David Livingston    

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Taken from: http://davelivingston.com/postfloodciv.htm