Birth of the Book ZOHAR - Pt. 3

DARK NIGHTS OF EXODUS AND DESTRUCTIONS AT SODOM AND GOMORRAH:
3rd PRIMARY COLLECTIVE TRAUMA.

The Mysterious J:

The manuscript now known as The Book of J is the probable immediate point of origin for The Hebrew Bible. In Judaism, the Holy Scriptures are called Tanakh which is an acronym for Torah (or the Teachings; The Pentateuch; or the Five Books of Moses) + the Nevi'im (writings of the Prophets) + the Kethuvin (the Writings). As such, The Book of J is the probable immediate point of origin of the Christian Old Testament.

The current word Jew derives from the Hebrew word yehudi which means a Judean which was a descendent of Judah, who was Jacob's fourth son and heir of the original blessing of Yahweh, which was first given to the protopatriarch Abram [Exalted Father] or Abraham [Father of a Host of Nations].

The relationsahip of Tanakh to Old Testament is as follows:

Tanakh Old Testament
Bereshith Genesis
Shemoth [Names] Exodus
Wayiqra [And He CAaled] Leviticus
Bemidbar [In the Wilderness] Numbers
Debarim [Words] Deuteronomy

In examining the Hebraic "borrowings" and "incorporations" from more recent sources, : we turn to The Wisdom of Solomon 11:17: "For Thine all-powerful hand that created the world out of formless matter lacked not the means to send upon them a multitude of bears or fierce lions". The Wisdom of Solomon combines Semitic with Greek thought. The phrase "formless matter" delineates pure Greek philosophy. This concept does not appear anywhere in Semitic thought. Greek influence on Hebraic thought could be as early as the Alexandrian conquest of 333 BC or as late as the adult lifetime of Philo Judaeus of Alexandria (30 BC-45 AD).


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The Moabite Stone:

Although controversial, this very early text directly is directly relative to Judaism The text of the Moabite Stone discusses the Israelite wars with the Moabites. I from the Moabite viewpoint. It is instructive to now give a short history of this stones discovery, its destruction, and what the papier mache squeezings of some (then) existing large fragments have to report.

The Discovery of the Moabite Stone:
......
.......[ Rev Parkinson's 19th century book excerpts]


What Does the Moabite Stone Say?
The Moabite Stone records the wars of Mesha, King of Moab with the kings of Israel - Omri (12 years), Ahab (22 years), Ahaziah (2 years), and Joram orJehoram(12 years) his successors which lasted perhaps for a total of forty-eight years. It is evident that this stone is one record from the period of the life and death struggle of King Mesha of Moab to revolt from the military power of Israel, and whose desperate resistance to the united forces of Jehoram, Jehoshaphat, and the King of Edom, which is recorded in the Bible in the third chapter of the book of 2 Kings: "The Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab" (2 Kings: I.1).

As Omri gained the throne of Israel approximately 929 BC, we can estimate that the Moabite Stone was created circa 889 BC.


The Moabite Stone: Translation of Its Inscription:

1.) I, Mesha, am son of Chemoshgad, King of Moab, the
2.) Dibonite. My father reigned over Moab thirty years, and
3.) I reign-ed after my father. And I erected this stone to Chemosh at Korcha ( a stone
of )
4.) (sa)lvation, for he saved me from all despoilers, and let me see my desire upon all my
enemies.
5.) Now Om(r)i, king of Israel, he oppressed Moab many days, for Chemosh was angry
with his
6.) l(a)nd. His son succeeded him, and he also said, I will oppress Moab, In my days he said (let us go)
7.) and I will see my desire on him and his house; and Israel said, I shall destroy it forever. Now Omri took the land
8.) MEDEBA and (the enemy) occupied it (in his days and in) the days of his son, forty
years. And Chemosh (had mercy)
9.) on it in my days; and I built Baal Meon, and made therein the ditch, and I (built)
10.) Kirjathaim. For the men of Gad dwelled in the land A(tar)oth from of old and the
k(ing of I)srael fortified
11.) A(t)aroth, and I assaulted the wall and captured it, and killed all the wa(rriors of)
12.) the wall, for the well-pleasing of Chemosh and Moab; and I removed from it the spoil and (of
13.) fered) it before Chemosh in Kirjath; and I place therein the men of Siran and the me(n of)
14.) Mochrath. And Chemosh said to me, 'Go, take Nebo against Israel (And I)
15.) went in the night, and I fought against it from the break of dawn till noon, and I took
16.) it, and slew in all seven thousand (men, but I did not kill ) the wom-
17.) en (and ma)idens for (I) devoted (them) to Ashtar-Chemosh; and I took from it
18.) (the ves)sels of Jehovah and offered them befor Chemosh and the king of Israel fortif(ied)
19.) Jahaz, and occupied it, when he made war against me; and Chemosh drove him out before (me, and)
20.) I took from Moab two hundred men, and all its poor, and placed them in Jahaz and took it,
21.) to annex to Dibon. Ibuilt Korcha, the wall of the forest, and the wall
22.) of the city, and I built the gates thereof and I built the towers thereof, and I
23.) built the palace, and I made the prisons for the crim(inal)s with(in the)
24.) wall. And there was no cistern in the wall of the Korcha, and I said to all the people,
make for yourselves
25.) every man a cistern in his house. And I dug the ditch for Korcha with the (chosen)
men of
26.) (I)srael. I built Aroer, and I made the road across the Arnon;
27.) I built Beth-Bamoth, for it was destroyed; I built Bezer for it was cu(t down)
28.) by the armed m(en) of Dibon, for all Dibon was now loyal; and I reign(ed)
29.) from Bikran, which I added to my land, and I bui(lt)
30.) (Beth-Gemul) and Beth-Diblathaim and Beth-Baal Meon, and I placed there the
p(oor
31.) people of ) the land. And as to Horonaim (the men of Edom) dwelt therein (on the
descent from of old)
32.) And Chemosh said to me, Go down, make war against Horonaim and ta(ke it. And I assaulted it,
33.) And I took it, for) Chemosh (restored i)t in my days. Wherefore I ma(de)........
34.) year....and I...."

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The Shapira Manuscripts:

Again controversial, the second earliest text of Judaism may well be the Shapira manuscripts. Moses Wilhelm Shapira, born a Polish Jew, but a convert to Christianity, through his marriage to a German Lutheran deaconess, for many years had been an antiquities dealer in Jerusalem. He had supplied libraries in London and Berlin with valuable ancient Hebraic manuscripts (chiefly from sources in Yemen). He had found a commentary to the Midrash written by Moses Maimonides. Also, he had sold some crude Moabite statuettes to the Berlin Museum which were later claimed to be forgeries by Charles Clermont-Ganneau, who was then the French Consul at Jerusalem. Clermont-Ganneau found a local workshop that had admitted they had manufactured them. No further investigation was made and they were declared fakes. Additionally, Shapira sold some ancient manuscripts to Alfred Sutro, who was then the mayor of San Francisco, CA. These manuscripts still exist in the San Francisco Public Library.

In a letter to a friend in Germany, Shapira wrote that in July of 1878, he had visited the house of the Arab sheik, Mahmud el-Arakat where he talked with several Bedouin who told him of Arabs who had taken refuge from the local law in a cave at Wadi el-Moujib, near the east bank of the Dead Sea, where had existed the ancient Israelite tribe, the Reuben now Jordanian territory). In one of the caves they had noticed "several bundles of very old rugs" inside of which they found "black charms". Realizing that these might be very valuable artifacts, Shapia with the aid of Sheik Mahmud al-Arakat, managed to purchase or trade for these "embalmed leather" fragments which he initially deciphered as a version of "the last speech of Moses in the plain of Moab". In other words,a very early version of Deuteronomy and a version which contained marked differences from the standard, accepted Biblical text. These scrolls numbered fifteen strips of leather, each one being about 3 1/2 X 7 inches (coincidentally, very similiar to the later Asian book page style popular in early Indochina, Tibet, and China).

By 1883, Shapira concluded these documents to be genuine and brought these texts to London, England. The fragments with their translations were published in The London Times. Prime Minister William Gladstone discussed with Shapira, their possible purchase.

Dr. Christian Ginsberg published his tranlations of these texts in installments in The London Times and The Athenseum. Smaller newspaper and magazines reprinted these translations.

But because of rampant anti-semitism and a desire not to upset the Biblical applecart, Shapira was attacked almost as soon as he arrived in London.

Adolf Neubauer, a Hebrew scholar at Oxford University declared on August 18, that the manuscripts were forgeries.

Walter Besant, popular Victorian novelist and then secretary of the PAlestine Exploration Society, had made the statement in 1877 that Shapira was "a Polish Jew converted to Christianity, but not good works... He was a man of handsome presence, tall with fair hair and blue eyes, not the least like the ordinary Polish Jew, and with an air of modest honesty which carried one away..." In discussing the manuscripts, Besant added, "It was written in fine black ink, as fresh after three thousand years as when it was laid on..." and that it was found "in a perfectly dry cave in Moab..."

Claude R Conder, surveyor of Western Palestine, assured Besant that "...There is not a dry cave in the country". Conder states that any manuscripts made of perishable leather could be buried for more than two thousand years and survive in a land with a twenty inch rainfall.

On August 21, 1883, The London Times published a letter from Shapira's old enemy Clermont-Ganneau who wrote "The fragments are the work of a modern forger. This is not the expression of an a priori incredibility, a feeling which many scholars like me, have experienced at the mere announcement of this wonderful discovery. i am able to show, with the documents before me, how the forger went to work. he took one of those large Synagogue rolls of leather, containing the Pentateuch, written in the same square characters, and perhaps dating back two or three centuries, rolls which Mr. Shapira must well be acquainted with, for he deals in them, and has sold to several public libraries in England sundry copies of them, obtained from the existing Synagogues of Judaea and Yemen. The forger cut off the lower edge of this roll - that offered him the widest surface. He obtained in this way some narrow strips of leather with the appearance of comparative antiquity, which was still further heightened by the use of proper chemical agents. On these strips of leather he wrote with ink, making use of the alphabet of the Moabite stone, and introducing such 'various readings' as fancy dictates, the passages from Deuteronomy which have been deciphered and translated by M. Ginsburg with patience and learning worthy of much better employment." He had only taken a cursory glance at these manuscripts!

Further remarks made by Clermont-Ganneau include: that he might "make a fittting sequel to the Deuteronomy of Mr. Shapira..." and that it would have "the slight advantage of not costing a million sterling..."

On September 6, 1883, The Manchester Guardian accused Clermot-Ganneau of having "...shown the hand of a critic a little too soon for British notions of fair play..."

The Reverend Albert Loewy was one of the early doubters of the genuiness of the Shapira manuscripts. Also, he believed that the MoabiteStone was a fake.

The British Museum exhibit was summarily ended. Shortly afterwards, on March 9, 1884,Moses Shapira is supposed to have shot himself with a revolver in his hotel room in Rotterdam, Holland. The scholar John Allegro believes that Shapira may have been murdered. Why? The manuscripts indicated an ancient form of the book of Deuteronomy in which "gods" instead on "a single god" are mentioned.

The original leather fragments were purchase by a Bernard Quaritch, London antiquarian book dealer for L10 5s. Then, they disappeared. One rumour is that they were taken to Australia. Another rumor has it that some or all of the fragments along with Shapira's personal papers has been sent by Mrs. Shapira to a Professor Konstantin Schlottman at Halle and that these manuscript fragments and papers now reside in a collection at Halle University.

Ultimately, the arguements against authenticity were thatthere were linguistic anomolies and inconsistencies in the ancient Hebrew usage, as well as grammatical errors and late Rabbinic words. All of these inconsistencies do apply to the language of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Recently, Menahem Mansoor, chairman of Hebrew and Semitic Studies at the University of Wisconsin has stated that"neither the internal nor the external evidence, so far as yet published, supports the idea of a forgery..."(quoted by J. L. Teicher: "The Genuiness of the Shapira Manuscripts", The Times Literary Supplement, March 22, 1957, p.184).

J. L. Teicher goes on to say that"On re-examining the evidence on which the manuscripts were pronounced to be forgeries, one ralizes with a shock that the verdict was unfounded and that the manuscripts were in fact ancient and genuine". (p.225)

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The Exodus:

The story of the Mosaic Exodus has been world famous for many centuries, but what really happened? There are two very interesting possibilities.

We note that Amenhotep IV (1375-1358 BC) who changed his name to Akhenaton was unpopular during his reign. At his death, most of his monuments and personal possessions were effaced or destroyed, his name removed from stele. Why? Because he started a revolutionary monotheistic religion in which there was only one supreme god named Aten - the God of the Sun; the Bringer of Life. Ancient legend has it that Akhenaton was set adrift in a reed basket as a child. Obviously, this story is very similiar to the infancy stories of Moses. Akhenaton was married to Nefertiti (?-? 14th century BC) and had several children. Later, he married his mother Queen Ty, and thereafter Queen Nefertiti vanishes from history.

Was it possible that Nefertiti took a band of Akhenaton's followers and led them into hiding as Akhenaton's empire collapsed; later leading this small dispised group of people to the area which became Judea and Palestine.

The worship of the Golden Calf then could be a return to the Worship of the Cow Goddes Hathor and a rejection of monotheistic Aten-worship of Akhenaton. After Akhnenaton's death or Sdisappearance, there was a strong, hostile, and violent "fundamentalist movement to restore the "true ancient gods". In the late 20th century, we have seen how the Ayatollah Khomeini attacked and virtually destroyed modern Islam in favor of his back-to-the-past fantasies of an Islamic 8th, 10th, or 12th century AD world.

Or perhaps,it is some form of worship of the Vedic goddess, Aditi. The Rig Veda names Aditi as the progenetrix of the cosmos and its creations. She holds Agni, the God of Fire and creator god in her womb like a mother. Aditi is the Yoni or Vagina of the Universe. She is the Cosmic Womb. As the mother goddess of the Vedic pantheon, she gave birth to most of the gods within this pantheon.Aditi is shining and luminous. She upholds the Law. She is gentle and kind. In her bountiful form, she is portrayed as the Unslayable Cosmic Cow. She is the circulator of the life substance of all there is.


What about the Crossing of the Red Sea? Perhaps, the area that actually was crossed was The Lake (or Sea) of Reeds (Yam Suph) near the upper extremity of the Gulf of Suez. There are many reports (some military) of shallow water being blown back considerable distances by very strong winds. The waters of Lake Menzaleh at the entrance of the Suez Canal have been known under the impact of the powerful east wind to receed as much as seven miles.

Others feel strongly that the evidence gathered and synthesized from studying the volcanic explosion on the isle of Thera, (Autumn 1628 BC) indicates that the well-known Red Sea is the one which was indeed the famous Red Sea commonly believed to be the one of the Mosaic Exodus.

Following this line of thought, the the reigning Egyptian pharoah would be Tuthmoses III, the son of the female pharoah Hatshepsut, who was perhaps, (along with Akhneton one of the more fascinating Egyptian pharoahs. As Tuthmosis I was nearing the end of his reign of 35 years, he married his daughter, Hatshepsut. he had her dressed in men's clothes and she began wearing a crafted gold beard. Tuthmosis I proclaimed her both king and queen of Egypt. Royal inscriptions about her alternated with the pronouns "he" and "she" and she was placed under the protection of Seth and Horus.

Of herself Hatshepsut wrote:

Thou shalt triumph...
Move your arm and attack, damage, and destroy the bow-people...
My power overwhelms them who are across the sand [at Sinai]...
Asiatics...bring me the best things: cedar [from Lebanon]
And all the fine woods of the Gods' land.
My authority unites the Nile River's banks.
The Black Land [Nubia?] and the Red Land [Sinai?] are terrified of me.
My personal power causes other countries to kneel in front of me.
The Gods of the Northerners [Syrians, Hyksos, and Canaanites] are made into amulets to adorn me.

Familial enemies made it necessary for her to marry. She married her sister's son and named him Tuthmosis II and made him co-regent. He was exactly what she wanted. He was physically weak, somewhat transgendered in a male-to-female fashion. Officially, he ruled the army. In actuality he did very little.

Tuthmosis II died 1630, 1635, or 1645 BC. It is most likely that his concubine, Isis poisoned him to bring her son to the throne as Tuthmosis III. In fact, this occurred. Now there were two rulers of Egypt, Tuthmosis III and Hatshepsut.

Hatshepsut had married her father, her brother, and her son. To raise the stakes, Hatshepsut declared herself the product of a divine birth, through a hazy idea of immaculate conception or "formed in the womb be the Gods" and thus, she was divine. Hatshepsut gained the support of the priests of Karnak who proclaimed her the absolute salvation of both Upper and Lower Egypt. She was now the Saviour of Egypt.

Sometime later, there was a close fly-by of what was probably Halley's Comet, and Tuthmosis III seized the opportunity to proclaim that this Pillar of Fire above them was the announcement by the Gods of his own divinity. This message was publicly proclaimed to the masses by various priest, political allies, and his svengali-like primary minister, Rekhmire.

Now, Egypt was a country ruled by two "divine" beings who were politically at war with one another. The prize being the sole ownership of the throne of Egypt.

Eventually Hatshepsut died. Tuthmosis III set up poisonings and assasinations of her closets friends, ministers, and advisors. Tombs of her friends weredefaced. All likenesses of her were mutilated. he built walls around monuments she had built. Even the records of her death were destroyed. Most likely, the pharoah Tuthmosis II feared the ressurrection of Hatshepsut. She had cursed anyone who had or would despoil her grave.

During the next three months, Tuthmosis III had himself crowned as sole pharoah of Egypt and began to attack "the Asiatics" On the plains of Har-Megedon, Tuthmosis III attacked the kings of Palestine, Syria, and Kadesh (northeastern corner of Sinai Peninsula). Tuthmosis III defeated all of them. He took the sons of these "Asiatic" rulers into his palace and raised them as his own sons. basically, this is an obvious Egyptian version of the story of the young Moses. The Egyptian word "Tuthmoses" means Son (mosis) of Thoth, the God of Wisdom (Tuth).

In the autumn of 1628 BC, the isle of Thera exploded. It was a catastrophe for the entire Mediterranean and Middle east areas. Everything was now a survival issue.

Reconstructions of the effects of this disaster support the accuracy of the observations listed in the book of Exodus. This volcanic explosion is postulated as 50 times more severe than that of Krakatoa in 1883 AD.

Tsunamis would have occurred. Quite possibly, the parting of the Red Sea was the observation of a tsunami. Plagues of locusts and mice can easily take place after major ground shocks. These creatures are driven from their normal habitats and suddenly seem to appear all over the place. Volcanic ash in the atmosphere would darken the day, "blotting out the sun". People would be injured or killed by rocks blown into the sky, now falling back to earth. Incadescent volcanic ash could vaporize people or produce skin leisons and boils. Fierce winds could destroy almost everything their path.

The Egyptian document, Lament of the Writer Ipuwer known as the Ipuwer Papyrus corroborates the Old Testament book of Exodus:
The land - to its whole extent - confusion - terrible noise.
A period of 9 days existed, during which no one could exit the palace or see the face of another. Upper Egypt now devasted. Blood is everywhere.
Pestilence is throughout Egypt.
The sun is covered. The sun does not shine in the eyesight of a human.
Life is not possible with the sun hidden in clouds.
Ra has turned his face from we the humans.
If only the sun would shine for a short measured time.
No one can measure the sun to know when it is noon.
A person's shadow is invisible.
The sun looks like the moon.
Our fertile land is desert.
Towns are destroyed.
A foreign bow-people[Asiatic tribes or Israelite groups - all seen as "terrorists"] have invaded Egypt.
People now flee.
The fleeing people live in tents, like nomadic people.

If we rearrange the Old Testament Book of Exodus, we get a very close second version:
(Exodus 20:14-15)
(Exodus 10:22-23)
(Exodus 7:21-22)
(Exodus 9:15)
(Exodus 10:21)
(Exodus 9:23-26)
(Exodus 1:1)
(Exodus 14:5)
Exodus 33:11)


Sodom and Gomorrah:
Could the destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah have taken place at the same time? The answer is most probably yes. But now there is a problem. Where were and what were Sodom and Gomorrah. In the Hebrew, these two cities are named Sedom and Amora, which along with two other "cities of the plain" were completely destroyed. Could there have been a combination of events to make this happen? Could incandescent volcanic ash, flamable gases, high wind, open oil desposits or "foul water" which could have been water polluted with oil, etc, have created a large, vast firestorm? Yes. Have archeologists been able to identify the sites of the historic Sodom and Gomorrah and/or the other "two cities of the plain"? No.


Lot's Wife:
When they had brought them outside,
they said, "Flee for your life; do not look back
or stop anywhere in the Plain;
flee to the hills or else you will be consumed."
Genesis 19:17

Immediately after the volcanic explosion of Thera, there would have been zooming vortices of incandescent volcanic ash, especially in an area "Sodom and Gomorrah" which was subject to incredible fires or firestorms. There is the terrifying picture of Lot and his family trying to avoid these sudden or wormlike vortices. What would it look like to a person in the period 1628 BC to see a human suddenly move into a cloud of incandescent volcanic ash? The Biblical description is quite accurate for this situation:

Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah
sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven,
and he overthrew those cities,
and all the Plain, a
and all the inhabitants of the cities,
and what grew on the ground.
But Lot's wife looked back,
and she became a pillar of salt.
Genesis 19: 24-26

and then:

Abraham went early in the morning
to the place where he had stood before the Lord,
and he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah
and toward all the land of the Plain
and saw the smoke of the land
going up like the smoke of a furnace.
Genesis 19: 27-28


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Who were the Israelites?

The Isrealites were nomadic tribes, loosely organized under local sheiks or "judges". When threatened, the local sheik would orgainze his group into a citizen's army until the threat was eliminated. As time passed, this was perceived as an inefficient method of protection and rulership. These various groups were united under a single king who was entitled "The Anointed of Jehovah". Saul was the first king. His rulership was followed by that of David. It was david who reduced the almost impregnable Zion to helplessness and established his capital city: Jerusalem. The expansion of this kingdom continued under the next ruler , the legendary Soloman, who avoided war by adding the daughters of hostile rulers to his Harem. The luxury of his court was so great that by the end of his reign, his subjects were almost on the point of rebellion. At the same time, Solomon built the first temple in Jerusalem.

Upon the death of Solomon, his kingdom was divided into two parts: 1.) Israel in the north; 2.) Judah in the south. There were frequent problems, border warfare, and violence between thse two kingdoms. These two kingdoms became pawns in the struggle of several empires: Egypt to the south; Asyria to the East; Babylon to the east; Persia to the north; as well as smaller hostile groups who felt that conquest of these two areas was possible.

The Canaanites were a fairly civilized group. after several attacks by the Hebrews, when the Israelites conquered several Canaanite cities and settled in the more easily defensible hills, while the Canaanites continued to occupy the plains until both groups merged into a predominate Hebrew culture.The invader Hebrews, adopted the Canaanite (Phoenician) script which ultimately became the Hebew script as also was the Aramaic (Aram=Syria) script which largely displaced Hebrew script in later centuries.

Also, Hebrew tribes lived in the swampy pastures in northeastern Egypt during the period of Ancient Egypts decline - the Hyksos Period ( BC).

Even in the 8th century BC, the Israelites of Canaan were not montheists but henotheists - they believed in a plurality of gods, one of whom, Jehovah, maintained a special relationship with their group.When Jehovah was/is referred to as "The Lord of Hosts", it means "The God of War" Also,The Israelites were deeply involved in the worship of gods connected with fertility cultsand later celebrated their sexual orgies in the groves of Astoreth (Semitic version Aphrodite and Venus). There are stories of prophets who condemned these practices, saying that the Hebrew people should only worship the one god, Jehovah - the God of War. Also, the Israelites mention themselves as being the messengers of Jehovah and his divine servants.

After 721 BC, when Samaria fell, the people of the northern kingdom were carried away 'beyond Damascus" and disappear from history. Samaria was colonized by people from other areas who were forced marched to this land by the Assyrian military. These colonists intermarried with the remaining Israelites and this new combined group was known by the name "Samaritans".who were continually dispised by the other groups of Israelites until after the time of Jesus Christ. Only the writings of their prophets remain. "What does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy,and to walk humbly with your God?" (Micah)

To the south, Judah survived the Assyrian military takeover. Religious prophets became statesmen, practicing a relatively successful diplomacy. Theses prophets had to gues right about when wars might break out and among which groups and then stratigize accordingly by siding with the likely winner. When it was important to do so, they paid tribute. At other times, they did not. As time went on their advice was taken less seriously and disasterous consequences ensued for both the kingdoms of Judah and "Post-Samaria".

. In 586 BC, Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians as warned by the Judan prophet Jeremiah who had made it clear that this would happen if the Judans would not bow to Babylonian power while there was still time to do so, instead of depending upon unstable alliances with Egypt and other groups. The issue seems to be the debate of whether Jehovah, the god of the Judans and "Post-Samarians" was also the god of the Babylonians.

Probably, just prior to this period, what we know as the Shapira manuscripts were written.
It was during this period which produced the book of the second law, known as Deuteronomy. This was a revision of the Mosaic law. It was written as though it was a revelation from Moses himself.

Some of the descendants of the original Judans (or "Jews") who had been transported as cultural prisoners to Babylon, returned to Judah (now known as Judea) after the Babylonians were overthrown by the Persians. The Persian Imperial policy included the restoration of Jerusalem and a limited amount of Judean Autonomy. The Babylonian exile had caused the exiles to deepen and expand their worship and allegiance to Jehovah and now to see themselves not only as a closely knit religious group, but also, as a religious community - "the chosen of Jehovah".

During this post-exile period, both the prophetic and Deuteronomic movements fell into neglect. The main point of focus was the rebuilding of the Temple and its worship and the restoration of Jewish exclusivism. Required was the minute observation of the Sabbath. Marriage outside of the born Jewish group was not allowed. Samaratans from the north who wanted to help work to complete this restoration were excluded and treated with contempt and were sometimes killed.

These centuries following the exile, produced few inspired prophets. It was mainly a period of priestcraft. priestly functions were zelously defined and codified. Their hierarchical structure was fully created and became quite powerful.

We do not know the origin of priesthood within Hebrew society. Perhaps, it was a natural developmnet from subconscious sources within the Hebrew group or perhaps, it was the Hebraic emulation of Babylonian and Canaanite priests, who had been and were in existence.

Further, during this period, the historic records (disallowing myths and self-serving historical allegories) are sparse and confusing. It is known that there were many wars and border skirmishes; that the Hebrew group lived and functioned within a theocracy administered by priests (kohen). Their geographic areas were frequently overrun in the ongoing conflict between Egypt and Persia. During this period, many Jews settled in Egypt as refugees. The area near the Egyptian waterways may be responsible for the concept of "green pastures" from the 23 Psalm of David. At Yeb (Elephantine) in southern Egypt, these refugees even built a temple to their god, Jehovah. This temple was destroyed in 410 BC by Egyptian priests.

Less than 80 years later, Alexander the Macedon defeated the Persians and in 333 BC, he triumphantly entered Jerusalem. For a single decade, Judea was not oppressed or menaced. With the death of Alexander in 323 BC, the fragile peace ended.

Two of Alexander's generals divided the Macedonian empire between themselves, which then created two rivaling factions: 1.) The Ptolemies centered in Egypt; 2.) The Seleucids centered in Syria.. Judea now was the DMZ between these to beligerent empires.

After three abortive attempts, the Ptolemy I conquered Palestine in 302 BC and it remained a province of Egypt until 198 BC and from this latter date the Ptolemaic empire began its decline.

The Seleucid kingdom had been in decline for some time. During the reign of Antiochus III (---------BC), this empire was restrengthened and began its own internal recovery.

Next came Antiochus IV self-named Epiphanes (="The Appearance of God"). He attempted to suppress the Jewish religion of Jehovah. In this he was helped by two apostate Jewish priests, Jesus (later changed to Jason) and Menelaus. In 170 BC, Antiochus IV ordered the massacre of the Jews and plundered their temple. In 168 BC, he decreed this temple rebuilt as a temple of Zeus. He had successfully transformed Jerusalem into a Greek city, garrison by Syrians, and decreed that observation of the Sabbath to be a capital offense.

In 167 BC, Mattathias Maccabaeus, a Judaic priest, was ordered by an officer of the emperor to defy Judaic law and sacrifice on a pagan altar. An enraged Mattathias, who "...burned with zeal for the Law" (1 Macc. 2:26 killed the greek officer and a Jewish priest who had agreed to make this sacrifice. Immediately, he began the Maccabaen revolt to attempt the destruction of ther Seleucids, "Let everyone who is zealous for the Law and supports the Covenant come out with me!" (1 Macc. 2:27). This new revolutionary group became known as "The Hammers" or Maccabees. With his three sons, Judas, Jonathan, and Simon, and two other people, and with a band of men called the "Hasidaens" who were "...mighty warriors of Israel, every one who offered himself willingly for the law" (i Macc 2:42) On his deathbed mattathias exhorted all to "show zeal for the Law and give your lives for the Covenant of your fathers" (! Macc. 2:50). A great deal of bloodshed ensued.

Now leadership of this movement was in the hands of Judas, who "withdrew into the wilderness, and lived like wild animals in the hills, with his companions, eating nothing but wild plants to avoid contracting defilement" (2 Macc. 5:27). Perhaps, Judas had a religious vision of starting a fresh community and of "a new beginning". Perhaps, Judas had a mental breakdown from being involved in continous bloodshed (post-traumatic stress syndrome) or completely lost his mind, or a combination of these elements. In any case, it is known that he was murdered in 161 BC.

In the year 153 BC, the brother Jonathan gained the power to appoint himself the Jewish High Priest..

By 152 BC, the Maccabeans had walked over the bodies of their opponents and gained control of the entire area (roughly Palestine), pacified all areas, removed all "pagan" aspects from the Temple, and administered the Law with fundamentalist ferocity. Their role model was Phineas invoked from "The Covenant of Phineas". The story is as follows: after the Hebrews had established themselves in Palestine, they were devastated by a plague. Phineas castigates a man who has married a pagan foreigner. Seizing a spear, he immediately kills both man and wife. Jehovah, now declares that Phineas is the only man to "have the same zeal as I have" He makes a Covenant with Jehovah, in reward for which, Jehovah makes Phineas and his descendants permanent holders of the priesthood throut eternity ( 1 Macc. 2:54).



copyright 2001 Caiyros Verree