From: Hagbard Celine

***********************************************

June 1993

I make no claims of being a Biblical scholar. However, through my experiences
in a class at San Francisco State University earlier this year, I can share the
following bits of info, which I believe may be of interest to EarthRite users.
If you disagree with any of the information in this posting, I encourage you to
respond as you see fit (short of violence, ridicule, miscel- laneous mayhem,
etc.). What follows is simply a semi-refined version of my classroom notes; I
am not the original source for any of what follows. If there are factual errors
below (there are probably a few transpositions and typos, too), they are the
result of my trying to write down as much information as I could, as fast as I
could, while I had access to the information. This stuff comes from Biblical
scholars all over the world and I will try to include recommended reading at
the end of this scroll.

In large part, this posting is about how the Bible is a highly derivative
collection of unrelated stories cannibalized from other, older religions, then
stitched together clumsily by later scribes, most of whom had political,
xenophobic agendas.

(Funny how such writings could eventually inspire the violence and hatred so
many of us have experienced at the hands of supposedly spiritual people. The
price of monotheism is apparently xenophobia.)

I have been assured that the most historically and linguistically accurate
translation of the Bible is the James Moffatt translation, published since the
1930s by Harper & Row. All references in this text (unless otherwise indicated)
are references to the text as it appears, correctly translated, in Moffatt.

Since I'm typing this at EarthRite Central, roughly 900 miles from my reference
library, and the low-end word processor I'm using here cannot flag any
potentially misspelled words, there may be some English language errors below,
either ridiculous or sublime. If so, mea culpa.

Please post any comments, responses to Hagbard Celine, c/o EarthRite
(93:9060/208).

Thanks!



=====1

There are several creation stories in the Old Testament, not just one. One of
these stories is actually a retelling of the Babylonian myth known most
commonly to the Western world as Enuma Elish. If you are familiar with that
myth (or even if you're not), you might want to read the following Biblical
passages in Moffatt:

        Genesis 1:1-2    \
        Psalms 74:11-17    \
        Isaiah 27:1          \   Enuma
        Job 26:5-14          /   Elish
        Isaiah 51:9-10     /
        Psalms 89:10     /

This myth is roughly the same age as the myth of Gilgamesh and Enkidu, which
was adapted in the Bible as the story of Noah's Ark and the flood (written
roughly 1,500 years before Homer).

=====2

The King James version of the Bible is so poorly translated that whole sections
of it are riddled with structural and historical errors. For example, Isaiah
9:1 in the King James version says precisely the opposite of what it says in
the original Hebrew. And in Isaiah 1:10, the King James version mistranslates a
metaphorical reference to the story of Sodom as being a literal reference.

The New World translation mixes up past, present and future tense, so that
nothing in it makes any logical sense whatsoever.

=====3

Despite popular belief, David wrote no more of the Bible than 1/2 of one psalm.
Solomon, too, wrote virtually none of what is attributed to him.

=====4

Much of the Bible was written thousands of years before there was any such
thing as a Bible. In fact, the word Bible is derived from the Greek word
"biblion," so the stories of the Bible were not compiled in their more-or-less
familiar form until Alexander the Great had conquered what was left of Israel.
The Old Testament (Tenach) was written before there was any concept of a Bible.
Until the time of Jesus, what few of these writings had been compiled were
known as The Law and The Prophets.

=====5

Parts of the Bible contradict one another because they were written by warring
tribes who worshipped different gods -- Yahweh and Elohim being the most
obvious example of such gods -- that were blended together by later redactors.

=====6

The first chapter of Genesis was written 500 years after the second chapter of
Genesis. They feature entirely different creation stories because they weren't
written by the same people or about the same god. In the second chapter, man is
created in desert conditions, not in a garden. Question for xians: If the Bible
tells stories that are mutually exclusive, how can it be inerrant?

=====7

The second chapter of Genesis was written several hundred years after the
biography of King David that's found in 2 Samuel. That's why there's no
religion in the biography story: it was never meant, when written, to have any
religious context, content or interpretation.

=====8

God has at least 15 names in the book of Genesis because the stories in Genesis
actually come from many different and distinct mythologies. And remember, even
these individual mythologies were mostly polytheistic. God uses the so-called
"royal we" in Genesis, even though the "royal we" wasn't created until the 17th
century. That's because more than one god is speaking at a time. Yahweh was a
single deity, but "Elohim" translates as the plural "gods."

=====9

Chapters 1 and 5 of Genesis were written by the Priestly astronomers who were
Elohim worshippers; chapters 2, 3 and 4 were written by their enemies, the
farmers who worshipped Yahweh.

=====10

The serpent in the Genesis story is not the Devil. No such character exists in
Old Testament writings. The serpent is actually the hero of the story, saving
his consort, Eve, from a life of ignorance. But her creator is afraid of having
equals.

Although Joseph Campbell has been accused of many horrible things, he does
present accurate and non- hateful information in "The Serpent's Bride and the
Mother-Goddess Eve," a chapter in his book The Masks of God: Occidental
Mythology. The serpent is Eve's (Havah's) consort. (Havah=Yahweh). This was
originally a story of goddess worship.

Also, the god in this story is not the creator of all living things and the
text says as much in chapter 3 of Genesis, verse 1; the text says plainly that
this god did not create the serpent.

=====11

Ishtar = Eve = Havah = Astarte = Ashtarot, etc. All the same character
originally. The Tetragramaton has been translated as JHVH and YHWH, which is
where we get names like Yahweh and Jehovah (written Hebrew has no vowels).

=====12

Although Yahweh as a character is derived largely from the Midean god Yah, the
word "yahweh" is very closely related to the Hebrew verb "havah," meaning "is."
The goddess Havah (Eve) preceded Yahweh as a Hebrew diety.

=====13

Genesis 2:16-17 -- god's first words to humanity are a lie. This doesn't bode
well. Compare to heroic serpent.

=====14

Genesis 2:15 -- god says the garden needs to be protected, but from what? What
is this god afraid of?

=====15

Genesis 2:18-20 -- having noticed that the other animals are having wanton
sexual relations, Adam "examines" every single animal in the garden during his
search for potential sexual partners. When he's worn out all the wombats,
weasels and wildebeasts, he asks his creator to invent just one more animal.

According to Rabbinical interpretation and revision of this story 1,000 years
later, the mate provided to Adam was Lilith (also a goddess -- the goddess of
newborn children -- from the fading matriarchal society crushed by the rising
patriarchy), not Eve.

=====16

The first 5 books of the Old Testament are often misnamed the Books of Moses,
as if he wrote them, which he most certainly did not. These stories were part
of the oral tradition for so long that they were distorted from matriarchal to
patriarchal stories over time.

=====17

Genesis 6 and Genesis 7 are two different stories, written hundreds of years
apart, that have been intertwined. In the Moffatt translation, this
contradictory doublet has been separated into italicized and Roman type. Both
of these stories are about Noah and the flood, but each serves the distinct
political agenda of its time.

(Note that the door to Noah's ark is closed by Yahweh, with his anthropomorphic
hand. At the time these stories were written, Yahweh was not yet invisible, or
in any other significant way different from human beings.)

=====18

The oldest myths are the (a)etiological myths, which served in their time the
same function served now by science. Etiological myths are myths of origins.
"Where did women come from?" is a completely different etiological myth than
"Where did men come from?". Other such myths: Why does humanity have to work so
hard? Why is childbirth painful? Why don't snakes have legs? Why do we work on
a set schedule? Why do we wear clothing?

Most of the stories in Genesis 2,3 and 4 are etiological stories, and were used
to educate children. Most of these stories were at least several hundred years
old before anybody knew how to write them down -- and in those hundreds of
years, the etiological myths spread from one population to another, mutating
and contorting to suit the agendas of the story-tellers in each of those
communities. That's one of the reasons why so many of the same basic themes are
repeated in the myths of many societies/religions (and perhaps why virtually
every religion begins with giants and a flood).

=====19

Genesis 1 is not as etiological as Genesis 2, which explains the work week and
the origin of matter. Anthropomorphic deity needs to rest at the end of a week.

=====20

Genesis 3:8 -- god tromps through the garden, unaware of where Adam and Eve are
hiding. This is omniscience?

=====21

Genesis 3:21 -- god guts and skins animals for Adam and Eve to wear tunics.
(God has to sew?)

=====22

Genesis 3:22 -- the god in the Garden of Eden is vengeful, arrogant, vain,
fearful, a liar, and jealous of human beings.

=====23

Genesis 6: 1-4 -- angels can fornicate with the best of 'em.

=====24

Genesis 6: 6-8 -- god makes a gaffe, has regrets/ self-doubt.

=====25

Genesis 6:19 contradicts Genesis 7:2, re: number of animal-pairs Noah should
bring upon the ark.

=====26

Genesis 8:20 -- animal sacrifice -- God likes the smell of burning flesh.
Later, in Leviticus, god explains the proper way to offer him an animal
sacrifice for his maximum enjoyment. But then, in Isaiah 1:11, he changes his
mind and gets huffy about it.

=====27

Genesis 9: 18-27 -- very confusing trying to determine whether Canaan is the
son or the grandson of Noah, because the story was partially re-written to
justify the genocide of Canaanites (Phoenicians/Palestinians). In the original
version, Noah's sons were Canaan, Shem and Japeth. But the revision introduced
a new son, the cursed Ham, and made Canaan Ham's son. This hateful myth gained
a new lease on life in the 19th century when it was combined with an
unscientific study of differences in language and used to justify the vicious
mistreatment of African black people in the western world (because the 19th
century theory said dark-skinned people were the cursed descendants of Canaan).

This ridiculous theory is still in use in S. Africa.

Ham/Canaan's crime, as revealed in Robert Graves' book, Hebrew Myths: When a
drunken Noah exposed his genitals to his children, an outraged Canaan (Ham)
castrated his father.

=====28

Genesis 11:6-7 -- spiteful god

=====29

Genesis 1:29 is pro-vegetarian; Genesis 4:4 is pro- carnivore --  so guess
which chapter was written by the agrarian society and which chapter was written
by people into animal husbandry (no, not the kind Adam practiced).

=====30

Daniel is underground, revolutionary, political propaganda, -- wholly fictional
-- from whence Jews derive their belief in an afterlife. Daniel was written
several hundred years after the Babylonian captivity and about 170 years before
the birth of Jesus. Also, Daniel is unusual for having been written partially
in Aramaic (from the word "Aramaic" in Daniel 2:4 through the end of chapter
7).

Daniel provides the first references in hundreds of years to political action,
and so represents the beginning of a new political state in Israel. In many
ways, Daniel is a "modernized" version of the story of Joseph in the final 14
chapters of Genesis.

Scholars know Daniel is fictional because it was written several hundred years
after it says it was; we know more about the events it claims are contemporary
than the author knew. Daniel makes no historical sense because it was actually
written between 168 and 165 BCE. The character Daniel is a fictional version of
Judas Maccabeus, intended to inspire pious loyalism to Judas Maccabeus. The
references in Daniel to Babylon are actually sly, coded references to Greece.

=====31
                      \
        2 Samuel 1:26   \
        1 Samuel 20:41    \  Was King
        1 Samuel 20:1-4   /  David gay?
                        /
                      /

=====32

Some of the lost books of the Bible include the Book of the Wars of Yahweh, and
the Book of Nathan, both of which are referred-to in Biblical passages.

=====33

Genesis 12: 10-20 (Yahwist) is a doublet with Genesis 20:1 and Genesis 26
(Elohist), re: Abram & Sarai. Genesis 12 is Yahwist mythology and Genesis 20 is
Elohist morality.

(An interesting side note to this doublet: Recent archaeological excavations in
Syria have proven that at the time the Yahwist version was written, wives were
called "sister to the brother," because of patrilineal inheritance rights. But
500 years later, the Elohist writer didn't have that knowledge and -- thinking
the older story was accepting of incest -- changed it.)

When Abram's name changed to Abraham in the stories, it was because Abram means
"Ram is my father," and indicated his family's worship of a non-Hebrew deity.
It was politically expedient when the stories were being transcribed to change
his name to Abraham, which means "father of many."

Abram/Abraham was probably not an individual person -- in the stories, some
scholars believe he represents a tribe of at least 70 people, all fairly
closely related. (This isn't as strange as it may sound. In the Old Testament
the word "Israel" can represent Jacob, or his descendents, or all Israelites,
or their land/country, or just the northern part of their country.) However, a
post-WWII archaeological dig in Syria seems to confirm the historical existence
of Abram.

=====34

Genesis 19 -- story of Sodom is about middle eastern hospitality laws, not
homosexuality.

=====35

               Adam
                |
               Noah
     ___________|___________
    |           |           |
   Ham         Shem       Japeth
    |           |
    |           |________
    |           |        |
Canaan        Abram     Lot
                |    _____|____
                |   |          |
                |  Moab      Ben-Ammi
                |
             Itzchak
             (Isaac)
                |
                |
             Ishmael
             (Jacob)
                |
                |
              Judah
        (Had 11 brothers;
       12 tribes of Israel)
                |
                |
          (eventually)
              Jesus

Assuming that these characters were ever real people, they were almost
certainly not related by blood. But for the sake of continuity and for the sake
of simplifying religious bigotry, the Bible says they WERE related by blood.
Stories of characters descended from OFF the center line are xenophobic stories
about people who are not Hebrew. Judah is in the center line so Jesus will
descend appropriately (for dramatic impact, etc.). Since Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob worshipped three different gods, it's unlikely that they were
grandfather, father, and son.

=====36

Genesis 32:2 is from the Yahwist account; Genesis 32:7 is from the Elohist
account -- these offer conflicting explanations for why Joseph's brothers
despised him. Elohist account describes behavior offensive to Elohists; Yahwist
account describes behavior offensive to Yahwists.

=====37

Genesis 34 is two stories, not one. These stories were later interleaved. The
Priestly version of the story is the later of the two, and begins with a
marriage broker, NOT a rape. The Priestly version was written 500 years after
the original, at a time when Jewish self-rule had been nearly obliterated and
-- as a response -- their leaders set religious laws against marrying non-Jews.

=====38

Psalm 137 -- written post-David, when  Hebrews were living in Babylonian
captivity. This is a reverential poem about genocide, about killing foreigners.
Like most of the Priestly writings, this is undiluted hatred for all things
non-Jewish.

=====39

The name of Isaac's god translates into English literally as "Terror."

=====40

Exodus 6:2-8 is a Priestly doublet for the earlier Exodus 3, written by both
Elohists and Yahwists. The Priestly version provides the Hebrew proper names
for three gods. Translated into English, these are God, The Eternal, and God
Almighty. Exodus 3:11 calles him Elohim. Then 3:14 calls him
I-Will-Be-What-I-Will-Be (in other translations: I Am That I Am). This one is
actually a Hebrew phrase in future tense: ehyeh ashor ehyeh, with the two H's
as in Yahweh (YHWH), which means, sort of, "to become." The most natural
translation into English would be "I am what I am," but the comic strip
character Popeye ruined this phrase for Biblical translators. Some of god's
other names in the Bible transliterate as "I cause things to come into being,"
"I bring war into existence," and "I will be."

=====41

Exodus 2:10 -- Egyptian meaning of Moses: Like "Ramesses" meant son of Ra, and
"Thutmose" meant son of Thoth, and "Ahmose" meant son of Ah (Ra, Thoth and Ah
all being ancient Egyptian gods), Moses was named on the assumption that he was
the son of a god, but nobody knew which one... they hadn't decided. He probably
had a Hebrew name, too, but it has been forgotten. The revisionists who forget
to look at Moses' name in light of his having been raised as Egyptian royalty
say that his name means "removed," but they're wrong.

=====42

In Exodus, god tries to kill Moses, but fails to do so because a woman
outsmarts him. This is one of the most puzzling, primitive and enigmatic
stories in the Bible.

        Exodus 2:23a   \
        Exodus 4:19-20   \  order in which the
        Exodus 4:24-26   /  story should be read
        Exodus 2:23b   /

Why would Yahweh want to kill Moses? Probably for the same reason that Yahweh
(described plainly and simply as a man) attacks Jacob in Genesis 32:22. In both
stories, god fails to defeat mortal men in simple hand-to-hand combat. The
Genesis account also says that Yahweh has to flee the scene of the conflict
before dawn. These stories support archaeological evidence that the Hebrews
appropriated Yahweh from stories in Midean mythology of a fearsome night demon
named Yah, who was not visible in the daylight.

The Midean story revised in Exodus features a woman resolving the crisis, which
suggests it predates the patriarchy. The foreskin tossed at Yahweh's feet weds
Yahweh to Zipporah -- symbolic of the hymen breaking in virginal intercourse,
particularly when you know that feet in the Old Testament usually represent a
penile erection. Yahweh intended to rape Zipporah, but her magic confused him.
The earliest version of the story probably had no infant and probably featured
the circumcision of Moses (or the man for whom Moses became a stand-in in the
Biblical account).

=====43

Many of the "miracles" described in the Old Testament were miracles only to the
people describing them, because they were witnessing various natural phenomena
with which they were not previously familiar. The story of the parting of the
reed sea (a low-level lake, not red at all, its English name was spelled
awkwardly in the days of Middle English non- standardized spelling, leading to
a prevailing mispronunciation of the translated name) was not even slightly
"miraculous." A small lake (known variously as Maeotis, Bardawi, and Baudouin)
is separated from the Mediterranean Sea by a VERY thin strip of land, but only
when the weather is clement. During inclement weather the path is completely
obscured by water and is indistinguishable from the Mediterranean. The path
here is a far more likely path for the Exodus than the one through the Red Sea.

The story of Manna from Heaven also involves a misunderstanding. In fact, one
reasonable translation of the Hebrew word manna is "What is it?". Manna is an
extrusion of sap from the tamarind tree -- it comes out of the tree in the
early morning, when a worm/bug has bitten the tree. Because these critters
store their excrement in the manna, it becomes an unpleasant dining experience
shortly after it comes out of the tree. The folks who originated the story of
the miraculous manna believed it formed on the trees overnight, like dew, and
therefore must be a gift from Heaven. Manna is sold in Israeli shops today
under the brand name Mannite. Although it tastes something like maple syrup
(before it's spoiled with bug shit), Mannite is sold as fertilizer, not food.

=====44

Isaiah 6:9-13 -- god loves people so much, this is his plan:

        Make the minds of the people dull,
        make their ears heavy and close up their eyes,
        lest their eyes see, lest their ears hear,
        lest their minds understand
        and their health be restored.

When asked how long he wants this torture to go on, god says:

        Till they are ruined,
        till their towns are empty,
        and their houses uninhabited,
        and the land left desolate...

        ...even if a tenth of them be spared,
        they too must be burned up,
        like stumps of oak and terebinth
             that have been felled

=====45

The book of Joshua is entirely fictional, historians and scholars say. Ditto
for Daniel (a political potboiler) and some others.

=====46

The word "prophet" is a Greek mistranslation of the Hebrew word "nabi," and the
mistranslated word incorrectly implies that the Biblical prophets were
believed, and considered sane by their people. The opposite is true. And
contemporary usage of the word "prophet" has misled many people to think
Biblical prophets were predicting the future, or even trying to. All the
prophets cared about was revising the behavior and beliefs of the Hebrew race
in order to forstall/prevent its annihilation. Prophesy means speaking forth.

=====47

Isaiah's name was really Yeshayahu. "Yahu" means god, as in Yahweh or ehyeh,
and "yesh" means "to save." So Isaiah means "Yahweh Saves," but this has
nothing to do with individual salvation like the "Jesus saves" slogan is meant
to imply. Instead, Isaiah's name was meant as a constant reminder to save the
tribe.

=====48

Joshua chapters 6-10 are meant as a justification of genocide.

=====49

S. Israel (Judah) raised crops, worshipped Yahweh. Wrote from roughly 950 to
850 BCE.

N. Israel (Ephraim) raised animals, worshipped Elohim. Wrote from roughly 850
to 750 BCE. After 721, those who survived moved to the southern kingdom and
inter-married.

During Babylonian captivity, Priestly writers (astronomers) wrote about Elohim
and genocide from roughly 500 to 400 BCE. A few of the populationss they
aspired to slaughter were the Phoenicians, the Moabites, the Philistines, the
Ammonites, the Assyrians, and the Arameans (which I've almost certainly
misspelled).

=====50

Christians later interpreted Isaiah 7:14 as a reference to Jesus. Such
interpretation is historically and grammatically absurd, since the passage is
written in the Hebrew equivalent of past perfect tense.

=====51

Among the groups that are purportedly part of the lost 10 tribes of Israel: the
indigenous people of North America, the indigenous people of Japan, the
"Anglo-Israelites" of England, and the Felacias (probably misspelled) of
Ethiopia.

=====52

2 Kings 17:21 -- now worshipping Elohim is a sin

=====53

Isaiah 11 -- this poem was seminal in the development of the concept of a
messiah, back when that meant an earthly king, not a holy one

=====54

Isaiah 1:4 -- "Majesty of Israel" as name for a god to worship.

=====55

Isaiah 1:24 -- "Hero of Israel" as name for a god to worship.

=====56

Isaiah 1:12-15 -- god says this about churches:

        Crowd my courts no more, bring offerings no more;
        the smoke of sacrifice is vain, I loathe it;
        your gatherings at the new moon and on sabbath,
        I cannot abide them;
        your fasts and festivals, my soul abhors them,
        they are a weariness to me, I am tired of them.
        You may stretch out your hands,
        but I will never look at you,
        and though you may offer many a prayer,
             I will not listen.

=====57

Hosea 2:8 -- Yahweh is growing, changing from his previous role as a god for
shepherds -- new name might as well be Yahwehelohim or Yahwehadonai, since the
merger has now begun between the gods of the north and the south.

=====58

Hosea 2:14-15, 2:17 -- god tells Canaanite followers of Baal that he can also
be such a god -- a god of fertility and agriculture, not just a god for
shepherds.

=====59

One of Saul's sons was Ishbaal, whose name meant "man of Baal (god.)" Ish is
from the Hebrew and Baal is from the Canaanite. But later scribes changed his
name in Biblical accounts to Ishbosheth (Ishibosheth?), meaning "man of shame."

A similar transformation occurred in the Bible with the common woman's name
Meribaal, changed by later scribes to Mephibosheth.

Names incorporating both Hebrew and Canaanite words were common at this time
because the two cultures had become almost indistinguishable.

=====60

Hosea 2:18, 2:21-23 -- Yahweh will destroy Israel unless its people worship him
instead of Elohim.

=====61

When reading any of the prohetic writings (Isaiah, Hosea, Jeremiah, etc.) watch
for references to Moses. You will notice that Moses gets none of the credit for
freeing the Hebrew slaves of Egypt. The prophets all hated Mosaic law.

=====62

No Bible prints the stories in chronological order, as they were written,
because that's considered too radical, too revealing. However, the paperback
edition of the Bible, as published by Houghton-Mifflin, apparently makes at
least an attempt at chronology.

=====63

Hosea 11:9 -- first declaration that god is more than just a particularly
astute man. This idea was very slow to catch on.

=====64

A jeremiad is what you say while you're shaking your fist and
criticizing/shaming someone.

=====65

Jeremiah 1:5 -- used by Operation Rescue-type groups:

        Before I formed you in the womb, I chose you; ere
        ever you were born, I set you apart...

But they leave out the rest of the verse, because it's clearly aimed at
Jeremiah and Jeremiah alone:

        I have appointed you a prophet to the nations.

Jeremiah 1:6 -- god's name here is Lord Eternal

=====66

Jeremiah 1:18 -- Yahweh says his army will defeat Elohim's army

=====67

The book of Deuteronomy is considered the fifth book of Moses, even though it
was written 1,000 years later than the other four. No one ever took the credit
for writing it.

=====68

Jeremiah 20:14 has an entirely fictional doublet in Job 3.

=====69

Jeremiah 20:7-11 -- in modern, psychiatric terms, Jeremiah would probably be
diagnosed as having schizophrenic paranoia.

=====70

Jeremiah 31:27-34 -- one of the most important prophesies in the Bible, since
it says sins no longer travel through the generations (i.e. sins of the
father). Here, sweeping changes occur in the religion, including the abolition
of organized worship, of priests, and of sins. Here, individualistic religion
dawns as a response to conditions of slavery and genocide. But this law was
apparently a law for the moment, with the assumption that it would be abandoned
if things ever improved. What Jeremiah was proposing was a way to keep their
religion alive while they were in captivity.

=====71

Ezekial 1:4 -- since electron is the Greek word for amber, electricity was
named for the reference to it in this passage:

        ...as I gazed, there was a storm-wind blowing from
        the north! -- a huge cloud with fire flashing out of
        it, and with a sheen encircling it and issuing from
        it, the colour of amber.

But this passage continues through verse 14 and becomes interesting for an
entirely different reason. In this passage, Ezekial is attempting to re-shape
the religion of his people into a religion of animal-worship. Biblical animal
gods appear for the first time (not the last) in Ezekial:

        Out of it appeared the forms of four creatures, and
        this was their appearance: they had the same form,
        each with four faces and four wings, with limbs
        straight and gleaming like burnished bronze, and
        with the soles of their feet rounded like the feet
        of calves. Under their wings, on the four sides of
        them, were human hands. As for their four faces and
        wings -- their wings touched one another, and their
        faces never turned as they moved; each moved
        straight forward. As for the likeness of their faces
        -- all four had in front the face of a man, on the
        right the face of a lion, on the left the face of a
        bull, and the face of an eagle at the back. Their
        wings were stretched out, one pair to touch the
        next Creature, the other pair to cover the body.
        Each moved straight forward; wherever the Spirit
        impelled them to go they went, never turning as they
        moved. Also, in the middle of the Creatures there
        was Something moving to and fro, like gleaming
        coals, like torches, a fire that gleamed and flashed
        out lightning.

The description continues through verse 28, with references to wheels and a
variety of additional, extremely peculiar appendages. Finally, dwarfed by the
spectacle around him is -- ho hum -- god, sitting down and seeming
unimpressive.

But the description of Ezekial's vision is actually just a retread of
Babylonian mythology -- remember Genesis hasn't been written yet -- and Babylon
was a polytheistic soceity.

Oh, and by the way, previous writers had said anyone who saw or described
Yahweh -- even saw him in a vision -- would die immediately. But Ezekial
didn't. So go figure.

=====72

Dreams and visions in the Bible are almost always incoherent -- yet they form
the foundation of the religions based on the Bible.

=====73

Ezekial's writings are -- for lack of a term used at the time they were written
-- science fiction.

=====74

Isaiah was not one writer. Starting in chapter 40, the book of Isaiah was
written by someone scholars call Duetero-Isaiah, who was the first Biblical
monotheiest.

EVERYTHING IN THE BIBLE WRITTEN CHRONOLOGICALLY BEFORE CHAPTER 40 OF THE BOOK
OF ISAIAH WAS WRITTEN BY PEOPLE WHO BELIEVED IN MORE THAN ONE GOD.

(But remember that the stories in the Bible are not arranged in the order in
which they were written.) So whoever Duetero- Isaiah was, s/he was showing
enormous chutzpah by writing in Isaiah 44:24:

        ...I am the Eternal, maker of all things,
        I alone stretched out the heavens,
        'twas I who spread out the earth; who aided me?

Monotheism emerged at the nadir of Hebrew/Jewish history.

=====75

Every time in the bible that reference is made to the creation of the universe,
you can be pretty sure you've encountered yet another god from yet another
religion.

=====76

Isaiah 40:3 -- Yahweh accompanied the Jews to Babylon and now he's going to
walk with them back to Israel. This prophesy is rewritten in Luke 3:4 so that
John becomes the level road to Jesus and Yahweh needn't travel through the
desert. The New Testament almost always garbles its references to the Old
Testament, and never accidentally.

=====77

Ezekial 37:1-14 -- first Biblical reference to immortality, influenced by the
near-genocide of the Hebrew people and their return to Judah. Not intended as
individual immortality, but an immortal race. No reference to Heaven or Hell.

=====78

The book of Daniel and the story of Jonah are fictional, not prophetic, and
represent the failure and decline of the prophetic movement. These writings
were followed by the writings of anonymous scribes attributed to famous men of
the distant past (David, Solomon, etc.), then by Priestly writing, which led
into a new testament intended for Greek audiences (not Hebrew or Aramaic).

=====79

The word "wisdom" in the Old Testament is often used as an oblique reference to
goddess worship.

=====80

What the dream means in Daniel 2:31-36:

        Gold            = Babylonians
        Silver          = Mideans
        Bronze          = Persians
        Iron            = Early Greek Empire (Alexander)
        Iron/Clay       = Later Greek Empire (Epiphanes)

Iron and clay cannot alloy; clay destroys iron. Epiphanes has feet of clay and
cannot maintain the empire handed to him.

From 330 to 50 BCE, Greeks had a huge influence on Hebrew culture. This dream
is also referential to Book One of Ahbed's (sp?) Metamorphases, a Latin
consumption of parts of the Old Testament.

=====81

Daniel 4:32 -- god gets another new name: The Most High.

=====82

Daniel 4:37 -- god gets another new name: King of Heaven (this is the first
time Heaven has been a place).

=====83

Proverbs chapter 8 proclaims the dawn of a new religion, one in which men and
women are equal, one with both a god and a goddess...

       Wisdom (a kind of religious writing) \
 Hypostasis (inductive creation of new god)   \
           Hochma (Hebrew goddess of wisdom)    \    a brief
                          Hacham (wise man)       \  vocabulary
                  Sophia (goddess of wisdom)      /  lesson
                          Gnosis (knowledge)    /
                                  Sapientia   /
                                            /


The goddess says (Proverbs 8:22-31):

        The Eternal formed me first of his creation,
            first of all his works in days of old;
        I was fashioned in the earliest ages,
            from the very first, when earth began;
        I was born when there were no abysses,
            when there were no fountains full of water;
        ere he sunk the bases of the mountains,
            ere the hills existed, I was born,
        when earth and fields were not created,
            nor the very first clods of the world.
        When he set the heavens up, I was there,
            when he drew the Vault o'er the abyss,
        when he made the clouds firm overhead,
            when he fixed the fountains of the deep,
        when he set the boundaries of the sea,
            when he laid foundations for the earth;
        I was with him then, his foster-child,
        (alt. vers.: I was with him then, his architect,)
            I was his delight day after day,
        playing in his presence constantly,
            playing here and there over his world,
            finding my delight in human-kind.

Lest you think the goddess is an innocent bystander in the cosmos, however, she
also says this (Proverbs 8:12, 14-21):

        I Wisdom have intelligence in hand,
            knowledge and insight I command,
        counsel and skill are mine,
            I possess mind and might.
        It is by me that monarchs reign,
            and rulers deal out justice,
        by me that great men govern,
            and magnates rule the earth.
        Those who love me, I love them;
            those who seek me find me.
        I hold wealth and honour,
            position and good fortune;
        what I yield is better than the best of gold,
            what I bring in is better than rare silver.
        I deal right fairly,
            justly do I act,
        enriching those who love me,
            and filling their stores full.

FYI: Hochma is introduced in Proverbs 1:20, and further references follow in
chapters 2 and 3 (as "wisdom"). By chapters 7 and 8, her sect (the Kabbalists)
has grown in influence. Proverbs 7 is very funny, re: father's advice to his
hormonally-engulfed pubescent son.

=====84

Wisdom literature was an international phenomenon, and seems to have struck
everywhere simultaneously, very similar from one culture to the next. All
wisdom literature is centered on the concept of hochma, meaning wisdom as a
human trait. Biblical wisdom literature virtually never mentions god; much more
emphasis placed on philosophy/gnosticism.

=====85

Proverbs 31 and 32 were written originally in Arabic, not Hebrew, which tells
you something of their origins.

=====86

Gnosticism was lost to history until shortly after WWII. Gnostics emphasized
salvation (from physical destruction) through knowledge. Gnosticism was popular
for about 500 years, with the birth a Jesus marking a rough half-way point.
Like xianity and Isis-worship, gnosticism was one of the "mystery religions,"
though it was more intellectual than xianity. The earliest writings about
Christ are gnostic in origin. Gnostics believed faith = ignorance.

By 330 AD in Rome, gnosticism was suppressed -- which is how it stayed for the
next 1,600 years. Until 1946, the only evidence to indicate there had ever been
any such thing as gnosticism were the religious tracts opposing it. But in
1946, 52 gnostic documents were recovered in the Egyptian village Nag Hammadi.
Similar to but broader than the New Testament. The best-known of these is the
Gospel of Thomas, written circa 50 BC, which features sayings by Jesus without
any narrative context. Thomas was the twin brother of Jesus (some of their
other siblings were James, Joses, Judas and Simon). The recovered gnostic texts
have required the xian religious establishment to perform theological damage
control, particularly since the gnostics never mention niggling details like
resurrection, organized worship, an external god, or sin.

=====87

There are two kinds of gods: higher and lower. The higher god
(godhead/gottheit) is ineffable, unknowable, mysterious, both male and female,
beyond any anthropomorphicization. The lower god (demiurge) has human
tendencies. By these definitions, neither Judaism nor xianity has a higher god,
because Yahweh and Christ are both gods with human tendencies.

=====88

Proverbs 31:10-31 -- the nicest thing the Bible ever says about women.

=====89

Although the characters in the book of Job are all Arabic characters, the story
has survived only in the Hebrew tradition, not in any Arabic language or
tradition. The book of Job questions whether the Hebrew god is a just god.

=====90

In Job, the first two chapters and the last chapter are Yahwist in origin. All
the other chapters are Elohist.

=====91

Job 1 introduces the "adversary," for which the Hebrew word is satan
(pronounced saa-taan). This character is in no way related to Lucifer or to the
serpent in the garden.

=====92
        Elohim
        Eloah
        Allah
        Loa
        ?

=====93

The story of Job is a metaphor for the history of Judaism to that point, and is
probably the best-written part of the Bible.

=====94

Job 38-40 -- Elohim mocks Job's pain, while bragging about his own strength and
efficiency. This is a snotty, malicious, ironic, sarcastic god.

=====95

Mark and John -- authors are unknown; these books were written hundreds of
years after the death of Jesus, whom these writers never knew. Luke and Matthew
were written roughly 40 years after the death of Jesus, at the time of the Fall
of Jerusalem. This is not a coincidence. Another 20 years passed before anybody
invented the story of a resurrection -- 60 years after the death of Jesus.

=====96

Two kinds of Biblical scholarship: tendentious/religious (i.e. JPP,
Impramatuer, Harper, Jovanovich) and independent/historical (JDEP -- almost
always non-dogmatic).

=====97

A quote from professor Waidelich of SFSU's World and Comparative Literature
Department (now retired): "More than nine-tenths of the New Testament is
fiction; lies, lies, lies everywhere -- that's standard."

=====98

In the New Testament, the word "fulfilled" is a dead giveaway that the passage
is fictional or contains recreated dialogue, particularly if uttered by Jesus.

=====99

After the time of Jesus, there were five major Jewish sects:

        Pharisees
        Sadducees
        Essenes
        Zealots
        Christians

=====100

Higher criticism says the Bible was written by mortal men who were not divinely
inspired.

Lower criticism examines nonce words and text in a technical way.

These two are combined in form criticism, which is linguistic, literary
criticism, looking at what words were used and what those words meant in the
original context.

=====101

The Jesus Seminar was a 5-to-6-year project, probably disbanded by now,
designed to combat televangelists, apocalyptics and pious platitudes with
scholarly, non-theological Biblical research. Their findings and other good
books are published by the:

        Polebridge Press
        19678 Eighth St. E
        Sonoma, CA 95476

The Mellon Press is also associated with the Jesus Seminar.

According to the Jesus Seminar, it is fairly simple to identify which
quotations attributed to Jesus are completely fabricated. The real sayings of
Jesus were short, pithy, memorable, and provocative. When speaking, Jesus used
aphorisms and parables, often calling for a reversal of roles or upset
expectations. His sayings are humorous, exaggerated and paradoxical.

Most of the sayings attributed to Jesus were part of the pre-existing oral
folklore, or were written by the church to further its agenda.

Also, in history, Jesus never claimed to be a messiah, the son of god, or the
annoited one. If anything, he said "su legeis," which is a Greek translation of
an idiomatic Aramaic phrase meaning, "you said it!". KJV translates this as
"thou sayest" and Moffatt translates this as "certainly," but since no witness
recorded the moment, it is almost certainly fictional.

=====102

One of the early church fathers, an Egyptian named Origen (185-255 AD), said --
and this is paraphrased because I don't have access to the actual quotation:

        =The scripture wove into the story some things that
        did not happen and some things that could not happen.
        The careful reader will detect thousands of such
        passages in the gospels.=

=====103

        Marcan Jesus    \
        Lucan Jesus       \   These stories
        Johannine Jesus   /   are Greek myths
        Matthaian Jesus /
        Gnostic Jesus.........A Coptic (Greek in Egypt?) myth
        Historical Jesus......Factual

=====104

St. Paul invented Christianity. He created the myth almost single-handedly. See
Hyam Maccoby's book, The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity.
Also see The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception.

Paul (Saul) was an enemy of Jesus; read Acts.

Paul invented anti-Semitism; read Acts 7:60, Acts 8:1-3, Acts 9:1-2. Paul wrote
that God wanted the Jews to kill Jesus so that people would know Jews were evil
and persecute them forever. Two points to remember: Jesus was killed by Roman
soldiers, not Jews; and Paul lied about his supposedly Jewish heritage in order
to lend credibility to his anti-Jewish hatred.

Paul wrote Romans, including 11:1, where he lies about his supposedly Jewish
lineage -- his native language is Greek and he knows nothing about the birth,
life, or ministry of Jesus.

=====105

Acts and Luke were written by the same author.

=====106

At least one passage in the gnostic Secret Gospel of Mark (see: p.329, The
Historical Jesus) says outright that Jesus enjoyed participating in sexual acts
with other men.

=====107

Jesus was not the only messiah. In fact, there were at least 2,000 messiahs
crucified. Titus bragged that in 70 AD there were 500 or more messiahs
crucified every day of the year. However, only one crucified skeleton has ever
been found in that area.

Each Roman soldier was required to bury the men he crucified; all the stories
of family participation in the burials is xian mythology.

=====108

We don't know for a fact that the historical Jesus was a violent man, but
Biblical passages can be used to refute xian teachings that Jesus was
exclusively (or even predominantly) a man of peace. Whether those passages are
historically accurate or not, they do point to an inconsistent portrayal of
Jesus in the Bible and a selective portrayal of Jesus by the church. And if
Jesus was perfect, he wouldn't need 20th century sugar coating.

=====109

Peter was the first bishop of Rome, but even the word "bishop" goes against
everything Jesus stood for, since it comes from the Greek word episcopos,
meaning overseer. Jesus' entire movement was based on unbrokered
egalitarianism, where no one assumes dominion over peasants. The church
immediately demolished the ideal of equality espoused by Jesus.

=====110

Simplifying the theories of author John Dominick Crossan, author Paul
Hollenbach has this to say about Jesus as radical, healer (this is a paraphrase
of a paraphrase):

Medicine was virtually unknown among Jesus' people. Most diseases don't even
have names. Jesus was a magician/healer. He was a political figure fighting
oppression, suffering and squalor. He comforted downtrodden people with his
words, while his hatred of the oppressive Rome grew and grew.

The cases of "possession" cured by Jesus were actually just cases of
oppression. Possessiion and exorcism are common worldwide phenomena through
history. Hollenbach says the phenomenon is cross-cultural and
transcontemporable (sp?). The situations of social tension that cause
possession are

        * economic exploitation
        * the erosion of revered traditions
        * colonial domination

Exorcism = revolution -- people venting their anger. Divided minds and schizoid
dreams are a cry for revolution. Domination and rebellion encourage mental
illness among the oppressed. Mental illness is an oblique protest against
oppression. But salvation by "possession" doesn't threaten the social position
of the oppressor. It's an ineffective protest. All those who are "possessed"
are social deviants, so society says all social deviants are "possessed." This
creates a symbiotic relationship when the oppressor can accuse the oppressed of
being "possessed." Colonized people conspire in their own oppression if they
don't fight for freedom. Insanity is an individuated symbolic revolution. (Such
oppression can occur in families, too.)

=====111

Beelzebub = Baal = lord of the flies.

=====112

Peter, Andrew, and John were illiterate -- not authors.


           ======================================
           R E C O M M E N D E D   R E A D I N G:
           ======================================

Ahbed (sp?)             Metamorphases
                        (may be written in Latin)

Anchor Biblical Commentary

Auerbach, Elias         Moses

Barnstone, Willis, ed. The Other Bible

Brandon, SGF            Jesus and the Zealots

Bultmann, Rudolf        Primitive Christianity

Campbell, Joseph        The Masks of God: Occidental
                        Mythology

Crossan, John Dominic   The Historical Jesus: The Life of a
                        Mediterranean Jewish Peasant

Freud, Sigmund          Moses and Monotheism

Graves, Robert          Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis

Helms, Randel           Gospel Fictions

Hick, John              The Myth of God Incarnate

Hoffmann, R. Joseph     Jesus Outside the Gospels

Horsley, Richard        Jesus and the Spiral of Violence:
                        Popular Jewish Resistance in Roman
                        Palestine

Horsley, Richard        Bandits, Prophets and Messiahs

Jesus Seminar           The Parables of Jesus, red letter
                        edition

Jesus Seminar           The Gospel of Mark, red letter
                        edition

Keller, Werner          The Bible as History

Meyer, Marvin, trans. The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden
                        Sayings of Jesus

Miller, Robert J. The Complete Gospels, annotated
                        scholars version

Maccoby, Hyam           The Mythmaker: Paul and the
                        Invention of Christianity

Maccoby, Hyam           Revolution in Judea: Jesus and the
                        Jewish Resistance

Parrot, Andre           Babylon and the Old Testament

Patai, Raphael          The Hebrew Goddess

Robinson, XXXXX         The Nag Hammadi Library

Rosenberg, David        The Book of J & Harold Bloom

Schweitzer, Albert      The Psychiatric Study of Jesus

(Unknown)               The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception

(Unknown)               The Nag Hammadi Library in English
                        ISBN# 0-06-066929-2
                        LC# 77-7853

(Unknown)               The Lost Books of the Bible and the
                        Forgotten Books of Eden
                        LC# 63-19519

(Unknown)               The Historical Jesus

(Unknown), Elaine       The Gnostic Gospels

Wolfe, Roland E.        The 12 Religions of the Bible
