According to an article by Joshua Holland on AlterNet, the explosive book by Tel Aviv University scholar Shlomo Zand or Sand, has sent ripples of shock throughout Israeli society. The book, published in 2008 (as of this writing no English translation) became a best-seller in Israel. The title of the book is When and How Was the Jewish People Invented? Holland goes on to say, "And what if most modern Israelis aren't descended from the ancient Israelites at all, but are actually a mix of Europeans, North Africans and others who didn't 'return' to the scrap of land we now call Israel…" Holland continues with, "What if the entire tale of the Jewish Diaspora—the story recounted at Passover tables by Jews around the world every year detailing the ancient Jews' exile from Judea, the years spent wandering through the desert, their escape from the Pharaoh's clutches—is all wrong?"
Several years ago, I authored an article for my blog titled History: A Tapestry of Hallucinations. And in this blog posting I ask "What if the history we have been taught in schools and religions isn't true?" During the period of researching for my books Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls and Mary Magdalene, Her Legacy, I learned that history is a fluid movement according to who is writing the history. James Cameron who wrote the Introduction to The Jesus Family Tomb wrote, "I came to realize that history is a consensus hallucination. It is a myth upon which we all agree to agree." I use the word hallucination in the context of perceived reality or a false or mistaken idea.
In my research, I found that most Western researchers and so-called authorities on the Bible missed a wealth of information by not concentrating on Egyptian history. What has been postulated is recycled ignorance and this includes the much-quoted Jewish historian Josephus. The validity of Josephus is suspect. Author/researcher Ralph Ellis began comparing the information in the autobiography of Josephus and the supposedly biography of the Apostle Paul in the New Testament Book of Acts. When comparing their lives, births and travels, they are too similar to dismiss. Could Josephus have created Paul? Perhaps Paul represented what Josephus wanted to be. This also reflects on the Jewish history.
My understanding of the great Exodus from the Hebrew point of view is that the Jews were enslaved and wanted to be free of the tyranny of Egypt. Under the guidance of Moses and his brother Aaron, they departed Egypt and wandered for 40 years before they came to the Promised Land. Have you ever wondered where they spent those 40 years when it only takes about three hours to travel by SUV from the Nile Delta to Palestine?
There are a number of researchers who question the validity of the Exodus story. Published on October 29, 1999, Ze'ev Herzog wrote an article titled, "Deconstructing the walls of Jericho" In Ha'aretz, the leading newspaper in Israel stating that after "70 years of intensive excavations in Israel, archaeologists learned that the Israelites did not sojourn to Egypt or make an exodus. They did not wander in the desert." If there is no evidence of Israelites being in Egypt, then what is the Exodus all about?
Perhaps the Israelites were known under another name other than the one given in the Old Testament. If one were to research Egyptian history as given in hieroglyphics, paintings and other ancient writings, then another picture begins to unfold. This is like cracking a hidden code. The Jewish scholars who promote the hypothesis that the world is only 5764 years old could be correct from the point of view that the Jews or Hebrews had no beginning prior to 5764 BCE. I also found that Jewish history scholars could not agree upon the timelines when important events took place such as the Exodus. In The Gift of the Jews by Thomas Cahill, he writes that the Talmud came into being from oral history and there is no reliable record of written Hebrew before the 10th century BCE. If you have ever played the 'whisper' or 'telephone' game, you have an idea of how garbled the original statements become.
Immanuel Velikovsky researched Egyptian history and the O.T. history extensively without the use of a computer or Internet. His research indicated that Egyptian history and the O.T. history were parallels and when he learned how to reconcile the differences in the time counted, he realized their histories were the same. When in the O.T. it is written that Abraham journeyed south into Gerar, it could be he was traveling into Egypt because the names Gerar and Egypt were the same. What is revealed is the Hyksos were also the Israelites.
Where did the Hyksos come from? Some allege they came from Babylonia and others say Anatolia or Asia. What is known is that the Hyksos came to Lower Egypt bringing with them chariots and horses, which had been previously unknown in Egypt. It was at this time that Egypt was split in two with Lower Egypt ruled by Hyksos pharaohs and Upper Egypt including Ethiopia and Nubia ruled by Egyptian pharaohs. The approximate span for this split was from 1780 BCE to 1560 BCE.
It becomes even more interesting that the pharaohs and those called kings had many different names. According to Velikovsky, there was the birth name, throne name, a name for different countries and it was usual to change the name by royal decrees so that the name would sound more agreeable to the ears of foreign people. As an example: A pharaoh of the Middle Kingdom changed the name of Joseph (Genesis 41-45) to Zaphnaph-Paaneah. Therefore, it is a challenge to know who was who. We cannot assume that the names given in the Old Testament are the correct names. It is much like wandering through a labyrinth of truths and fiction.
There is much more to be revealed and in my next article, I will write about the Exodus and another view of the story.
No comments:
Post a Comment