Originally posted by frogstomp
Was there not wisdom is the original myths the Enuma Elish and Xiusudra's Flood among others?
How does and awake mind reconcile the god of Joshua ordering him to do the same to Ai, as was done to Jehrico with the god the father of Jesus.
And a god whose very name is something His followers deny.
His name was EL.
I do very much a ...[text shortened]... isdom is it not?
Sometime the Truth hurts but Wisdom without truth isn't wisdom at all.
There has been plenty of research done linking the Sumerian Enuma Elish with the book of Genesis in particular; Zecharia Sitchin is one scholar who is fluent in both Hebrew and Sumerian cuneiform, and he has unearthed many surprising correspondences. Alas, Sitchin is not all that well known, as his 8 or 9 books have been designed and published in such a fashion as to make him seem like a slightly more sophisticated version of that crackpot Erich von Daniken. And Sitchin himself probably gets too rigid in places, refusing to budge from his theory that there is a "Planet X" that is beyond the orbit of Pluto, possibly as far as 100 Astronomical Units out, and that passes dangerously close to Earth about every 3,600 years, resulting in global effects similar to the ones described in the Book of Revelation, or as found in various Flood myths.
By the way, Flood myths are found in over a hundred cultures on Earth, including in Tibet, of all places. This seems to suggest something more than mere metaphor.
One thing Sitchin notes is that the Hebrew word for "serpent" -- "nehesh" -- is the same word in the ancient Fertile Crescent cultures (Sumeria, Akkadia, etc) for "teacher". This is consistent with the Gnostic view of the Old Testament, which turns the orthodox interpretation on its head and asserts that the serpent is the actual teacher, or bringing of knowledge, attempting to emancipate Eve and Adam from their entrappment by Yahweh. The Gnostic idea is that the Old Testament "God" is really a custodian, an overlord who is more concerned with control above all else. The serpent brings them knowledge in the form of the fruit from the tree of life, which enables them to mature into self-awareness, much as a child develops an ego and the capacity for self-reflection.
The God of the Old Testament seems to be very similar to a Mobster Godfather at times, being tremendously loving if you are subservient to him, and murderously vengeful if you are not. Sitchin (and others) explains this seemingly schizoid behaviour on the part of the "Lord God" as a result of an improper transmission of Sumerian myth into the Old Testament when Genesis was written around 500 BC (about the time Buddha was getting enlightened under the Banyen tree in north India). The key Sumerian gods were Enlil and Enki, who were perpetually at each other's throats, the one bad (Enlil), the other good (Enki). And incidentally, Enki is associated with the serpent.
In Sumerian myth, the flood was caused by Enlil, who did not like the way the human race was developing and sought to "begin from scratch", so to speak. Sitchin postulated that these "gods" were actually Anunnaki, an alien race from the planet Nibiru, all of which he claims is clearly spelled out in the Sumerian cuneiform tablets. Even if we discard the ET stuff, we are left with the interesting parallel in the Flood myths, and in particular how the seemingly schizoid behavior of the Old Testament God can be easily explained if we consider that this "God" was actually the result of the merging of Enlil and Enki when Sumerian myth was drawn upon during the writings of the OT.
More particularly I favour the view that the Adam myth is a metaphor for the evolution of the human mind. Prior to eating the forbidden fruit, Adam and Eve are the primal humans, in the pre-ego stage. They are not differentiated from their source. Eating the fruit is actually necessary, in that it allows them to separate from their Source so that they can experience autonomy and free will. Then as Paul described much later in the NT, there is the "birth of the second Adam" which is symbolic of the post-ego phase that is basic to all spiritual transformation. So really the process is from child -- to adult --- to wise person. Unfortunately, most get stuck in the child phase, never breaking out of dogmatic molds, or don't advance beyond the adult phase, getting stuck in too much convention and mediocrity.
This is the intellectual speculation; fun, but perhaps kind of useless for our actual experiential awakening of the mind. On that note I'm fond of an old story from Zen Buddhism -- a philosopher who has spent many years studying and meditating in the mountains, comes down one day to test his understanding with a Zen master in a nearby monastery. It is raining on the appointed day, and the philosopher leaves his shoes and umbrella outside the door of the Zen master as he enters his room. He sits before the Zen master, and begins to expound on all his knowledge, what he has come to learn from his many years of study.
Suddenly the Zen master interrupts him. "One minute," he says. "Before you go on, I have a question. You left your shoes and umbrella outside. Did you leave your umbrella on the left side or the right side of your shoes?"
Try as hard as he could, the philosopher could not remember.
"You have failed the test," said the Zen master. "Return to the mountains and meditate for one more year."
Open debate with any non-Christian
20 Mar '05 04:53
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