Showing posts with label academia.edu John R Salverda Jacob Ptah Hephaestus Cush Hermes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label academia.edu John R Salverda Jacob Ptah Hephaestus Cush Hermes. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

The Institution of Marriage: John R. Salverda

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As noted, the Genesis account contains the origins of the institution of marriage. However, the kind of marriage that first appeared, the one that led to the Original Sin, was one that Adam described as; "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife:" (Genesis 2:24 KJV). In essence it was the marriage arrangement of a matriarchal society, one where a man left his own family and went to live with his wife's. The children born to such a social structure belonged to the family of their mother, using, no doubt the mother's family name, and following the dictates of the matriarch. It was what we would call today, full-blown feminism. This system did not work out, it led directly to the Original Sin. God Himself described Adam's mistake as; "thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife" (Genesis 3:17 KJV). After all, this original feminist concept of marriage was apparently Adam's idea in the first place, a decision in which God seems to have taken no part. (see Genesis 2:23,24).
After the committing of the Sin, which is characterized by Moses as eating from the forbidden tree, God Himself prescribed the remedy to mankind's, originally perverse, marriage arrangement, directly to the woman; "thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." (Genesis 3:16). This is a complete departure from the previously attempted matrilineality. This, much overlooked, reading of the Genesis account, garners a kind of confirmation from the Jewish Legends, wherein a woman named Lilith is said to be Adam's first wife. "Like him she had been created out of the dust of the ground. But she remained with him only a short time, because she insisted upon enjoying full equality with her husband. She derived her rights from their identical origin. ... She takes her revenge by injuring babes--baby boys during the first night of their life, while baby girls are exposed to her wicked designs until they are twenty days old." (Louis Ginzberg, "Legends of the Jews" Vol. I, Chap. II, "Woman") Legendary it may be, but Lilith, as the allegorical figurehead of modern feminism, still injures babes to this very day, through the contrivance of the women's liberation movement's favorite political imperative, abortion!
How does this understanding of the Scriptural origin of patrilineal matrimony compare with what we know about what Greek mythology has to say about it? The two, supposedly separate, cultures have surprisingly corresponding accounts. The Greek myths tell us that it was Cecrops, who, upon leading the people up out of the land Egypt (a matrilineal society), was the first to recognize patriarchal paternity. While, to the Hebrews, it was Moses who led the people out of Egypt and wrote Genesis 3:16 (Unto the woman he said, …thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.) in order to redefine the roles of men and women for the Israelites as opposed to the custom of their previous Egyptian overlords (Athena, of Cecrops' Athens, had “accidentally” killed Pallas in the Greek myth, much the same as Eve had superseded Lilith in the writings of Moses.).
At this point let us recall the Athenian myth that covers this same episode. According to Marcus Varro (a Roman historian who died about 28 BC. he wrote a now lost book called "De Gente Populi Romani" from which Augustine, who had access to it back then, got this story), the choice between worshiping Athena or Poseidon was put to the vote of the people of Attica. They were asked to pick which would be more beneficial to mankind, Athena’s olive tree or Poseidon’s fountain. In those days, women had an equal vote with men. The men all voted for the god, and all the women voted for the goddess, but since there was one more woman than there were men, Athena won the referendum. Angered, Poseidon sent a great flood. So terrible was his judgment that it was decided to deprive women of the vote and to forbid children to bear their mother's names for the future. (Augustine, De civitate Dei xviii.9). Notice how, in accordance with the Greek myth, before choosing the serpent woman's tree, children born to the Athenian women (people who were led up out of the land of Egypt by their great lawgiver and settled into twelve national groups), were raised under their mother's name; and women, by virtue of their majority vote, ruled over the men. When it turned out that the choice of the women angered the male god, the situation was rectified in nearly the same way that it was in the Scriptural narrative.
John Gill's commentary on Genesis 2:24 says; "Athens ... had a king named Cecrops, whom, as all antiquity is full of fables, they represented to have been of both sexes, because he was the first to join male and female in marriage." (Justin, "Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus" Volume 2. 2. c. 6.), whence he was said to be "biformis" (twi-formed) and was called "difyis" (according to the "Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology" under the article "CECROPS" by William Smith "Some ancients referred the epithet "difyis" to marriage of which tradition made him the founder") unless, as some (William Salden, "Otia Theologica" Exercitat. 1. sect. 14. p. 13, 14.) have thought, that he and Moses were one and the same who delivered out the first institution of marriage. (Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible, perhaps quoting John Calvin, on Genesis 2:24). Notice how the quote from Justin, is seemingly referring to the serpent half of Cecrops, as representing women; and how the quote from William Salden shows that it was thought by some, that Moses and Cecrops, were the same person!

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Greek Serpent Ladon and Hebrew Leviathan






John R. Salverda Writes:

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The Serpent

Although the serpent Ladon is associated with the tree in the Greek myth, it is apparently the tree of life, and not the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. As noted the Greek serpent is not enticing people to pick from the tree, but like the Cherubim in the Scriptural account, he is portrayed as guarding it; "So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." (Genesis 3:24 KJV). Accordingly the quest for immortality by Herakles required him to kill the serpent before he could receive the apples. "the serpent Ladon, a son of the Libyan soil, had kept watch over the golden apples in the Garden of Atlas, while close at hand and busy at their tasks the Hesperides sang their lovely song. But now the snake, struck down by Herakles, lay by the trunk of the apple-tree. (Apollonius Rhodius, "Argonautica" 4. 1390 ff.). "Some say, however, that he did not take the apples from Atlas, but killed the snake that guarded them, and picked them himself." (Apollodorus, "Bibliotheca" 2. 121). Thus Herakles (however blasphemous you may consider the idea to be) is portrayed as fulfilling the "Messianic" promise; "God said unto the serpent, ... I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." (Genesis 3:14,15 KJV). "Jupiter, in admiration of their struggle, placed it among the stars; for the Draco has its head erect, and Hercules, resting on his right knee, tires to crush the right side of its head with his left foot." (Hyginus, "Astronomica" 2. 6, citing a work now lost called "the Heraclea" by a Greek poet of the 5th century BC. named Panyassis). "The huge Draco, Typhon’s son, which used to guard the golden apples of the Hesperides, he (Herakles) killed near Mount Atlas" (Hyginus, Fabulae 30). "Atlas, mindful of an oracle since by Themis, the Parnassian, told, recalled these words, `O Atlas! mark the day a son of Jupiter [Zeus] shall come to spoil; for when thy trees been stripped of golden fruit, the glory shall be his.' Fearful of this, Atlas had built solid walls around his orchard, and secured a dragon, huge, that kept perpetual guard, and thence expelled all strangers from his land." (Ovid, "Metamorphoses" 4. 617 ff.). Take note, how an ancient prophecy (here called an "oracle") had promised the eventual arrival of an avenging son of god (Zeus); when he came he famously killed the serpent; the labor was immortalized in the Heavens, where a constellation was described by Hyginus, as Herakles crushing the serpent's head with his foot.
Apparently the Scriptural "Leviathan," already linked by many scholars with the "Lotan" of the Ugaritic myth of Baal, is the source for the Greek serpent Ladon. Yahweh defeats the, many headed, Leviathan (as Baal does the seven headed Lotan, and Herakles Ladon): "It was you who crushed the heads of Leviathan and gave him as food to the creatures of the desert." (Psalm 74:14) "An immortal serpent guarded them, the child of Typhon and Ekhidna, with one hundred heads which spoke with voices of various types." (Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 2. 113). Take note that Apollodorus makes the serpent Ladon to be immortal, having one hundred heads, and like the one in Eden, it has the ability to speak. In regards to Leviathan serving "as food to the creatures of the desert," Apollonius Rhodius bemoans the unfortunate fate of the flies that feed upon the dead "serpent Ladon, a son of the Libyan soil" ("Argonautica" 4. 1390 ff.).
This battle is sometimes expressed as if in fulfillment of the Messianic prophecy, depicting a future victory over the "serpent" Leviathan; "In that day the Lord with His severe sword, great and strong, will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan that twisted serpent; He will slay the reptile that is in the sea." (Isaiah 27:1). Ladon himself was not thought to be a sea serpent as such however, he is often associated with the sea, and did live in the sea in the sense that his home, in the Garden of Hesperides, was, at least sometimes, thought to be on an island of the sea; "The Hesperides who guard the rich, golden apples and the trees bearing fruit beyond glorious Okeanos." (Hesiod, Theogony 215 ff.); "Over the waves and the waves and the deep brine they came to the beautiful island of the gods, where the Hesperides have their homes" (Stesichorus, Geryoneis Fragment S8, from Oxyrhynchus Papyrus 2617 C6th to 7th BC.). He sleeps and will, one day be awoken; "those who are ready to rouse Leviathan." (Job 3:8). The Scriptures make an unambiguous identification of the Messianic adversary in the apocalyptic literature; "And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world." (Rev. 12:9).
As a Messianic prerequisite, eliminating the serpent is the determinant method of acquiring eternal life. It is so in the case of many mythical gods and heroes that the prophetic requirement, "her seed … shall bruise thy head" (Genesis 3:15), is a kind of Messianic identifier. It is the individual qualifying characteristic, attribute, or activity, by which the Messiah would be recognized and distinguished. In the Scriptures it is the cherub’s job to guard the way to the tree of life, however as we have seen, there is a well known and wide spread mythological equivalent. For not only is a serpent guarding the way to the “golden” apples of the Hesperides, but also the way to the “golden” fleece is guarded by a dragon. Gold, a most valued commodity indeed, is often a mythological substitution for the most valued possession of all, “life.” We can thereby identify the cherub as it appears in many other myths such as the winged gryphon (of the “Scythians”) whose job it is to guard “gold” in general. However life is not always symbolized by gold, there are many myths that use no symbol for it and use the term “life” literally or prosaically. Cerberus keeps us from gaining immortality, or rather, life after death. Heracles was seeking immortality as an Olympian when he crushed the head of the hydra and stepped upon the “crab,” wounding his foot, (Heracles sought life for everyone in capturing Cerberus, he also destroyed the serpent that guarded the aforementioned “golden” fruit of the famous tree in the ancient garden of Hesperides.) and the “scarab” is a well known Egyptian symbol of eternal life. (The “gryph” in gryphon is an evident shibboleth of “cherub” as is the “serp” in serpent, the “Cerb” in Cerberus, the “scorp” in scorpion, as well as the words “crab,” “scarab,” and “harpy.”).
Ezekiel, in a much speculated, and very enigmatic statement, hints that there may have been some justification for imagining a connection between the serpent and the cherub; "Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; … Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire." (Ezekiel 28:13-16 KJV). Christianity has traditionally linked this reference to the fall of Satan. The Hebrew word, here used twice as an adjective, "covereth" and "covering," to describe the cherub, is "sakak" (saw-kak'), is from a primitive root the primary, proper, use of which is "to entwine" as a screen (a serpent "entwined" on a tree?) by implication to fence in, cover over, (figuratively) protect: cover, defend, hedge in, join together, set, shut up. This is quite comparable to the word rendered "keep" in the KJV of Genesis 2:15 and 3:24, shamar (shaw-mar'), to hedge about, that is, guard; generally to protect, attend to, etc. It seems to me, that there is something missing in the Scriptural narrative, that should explain the relationship between the serpent and the cherub. I balk at using mythology to fill in the blank, so I'll just leave it at that.

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Zeus and Hera in Ancient Paradise

 


John R. Salverda Writes:
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"If Adam and Eve, in the Greek religious system, have become Zeus and Hera, there should be literary evidence for their presence in this garden, and there is. Apollodorus wrote that the apples of the Hesperides “were presented by Gaia [Earth] to Zeus after his marriage with Hera.” This matches the Genesis account: Eve became Adam’s wife right after she was taken out of Adam (Genesis 2:21–25), and the next recorded event is the taking of the fruit by the first couple. Connecting Zeus and Hera with the Hesperides connects them with the serpent and the fruit tree with which the Hesperides are always represented." (From Chapter 9: "The Forbidden Theory of Ancient Greek Art")
The record of Greek mythology presents several "messianic" heroes in the same light. The marriage of Zeus and Hera is not the only one that features the symbols of the Hesperides, for example after Cadmus destroyed the serpent of Ares he had a very high profile wedding feast, at which; "the gods shared their marriage feasts" (Pindar, Pythian Ode 3. 86 ff.); "There, as they say, by the Tritonian Lake, Kadmos the wanderer lay with rosycheek Harmonia, and the Nymphai Hesperides made a song for them, and Kypris (Aphrodite) together with the Erotes (cherubs) decked out a fine bed for the wedding, hanging in the bridal chamber golden fruit from the Nymphai’s garden, a worthy lovegift for the bride; rich clusters of their leaves Harmonia and Kadmos twined through their hair, amid the abundance of their bridechamber, in place of the wedding-roses. Still more dainty the bride appeared wearing these golden gifts, the boon of golden Aphrodite. Her mother’s father the stooping Libyan Atlas awoke a tune of the heavenly harp to join the revels, and with tripping foot he twirled the heavens round like a ball, while he sang a stave of harmony himself not far away." (Nonnus, "Dionysiaca" 13. 333 ff.). Take note that, according to Nonnus, the wedding of Cadmus not only featured the golden fruit, but it also took place in the vicinity of Mount Atlas.
Then there was the wedding of Peleus and Thetis; "Singing of Peleus' Bridal of Delight, which all the blest Immortals brought to pass by Pelion's crests; sang of the ambrosial feast when the swift Horai brought in immortal hands meats not of earth, and heaped in golden maunds; sang how the silver tables were set forth in haste by Themis blithely laughing; sang how breathed Hephaistos purest flame of fire; sang how the Nymphai (the Hesperides) in golden chalices mingled ambrosia." (Quintus Smyrnaeus, "Fall of Troy" 4. 128 ff.). Not only did the Hesperides appear, but so did one of their golden apples as Eris, angered at not getting an invite, used the fruit to cause the Trojan War as an act of revenge; "And now she bethought her of the golden apples of the Hesperides. Thence Eris took the fruit that should be the harbinger of war, even the apple, and devised the scheme of signal woes. Whirling her arm she hurled into the banquet the primal seed of turmoil and disturbed the choir of goddesses." (Colluthus, "Rape of Helen" 58 ff.). Take note that the fruit, that was elsewhere touted as the fruit of the quest for immortality (ie. from the tree of life), is depicted here as "the primal seed of turmoil."
Nonnus, in his "Dionysiaca," says of the participation of the Hesperides at the marriage of Helios and Clymene; "The light that shone on that bridal bed come from the starry train; and the star of Cypris (Aphrodite), Eosphoros (the Morning Star), herald of the union wove a bridal song ... The Hesperides raised the joy-cry." (Nonnus, "Dionysiaca" 38. 135 ff.).
Although I can find only one account that links the apples of the Hesperides, with the golden apples in the myth of Atalanta (the usual story is that they were supplied by Aphrodite, the mother of the cherub Eros, with no word as to where she got them), Virgil (c. 30 BC.) clearly makes this association as his Orpheus croons about Atalanta; "he sings of the maid who marveled at the apples of the Hesperides." (Virgil, "Georgics" 6. 61 ff.). Thus Virgil credits the apples of the Hesperides with facilitating the marriage of Atalanta to Hippomenes.
It is apparent that the symbols of the Hesperides were not exclusive to the marriage of Zeus and Hera, but rather that the Hesperides and their symbolisms were traditionally applied often to the wedding feasts of many other gods and heroes. There is no doubt that all of these traditions can be traced back to the origin of all marriage in the Garden of Eden, but this is not really evidence that any or all of these couples, and their respective weddings, are depictions of the story of Adam and Eve. It could be that, among the Greeks, the symbols of the original wedding, became those of all weddings. Furthermore, the ancient mythological record is not unanimous as to the location of the wedding of Zeus and Hera; "several places in Greece claimed the honour of having been the scene of the marriage, such as Euboea (Steph. Byz. s. v. Karustos), Samos (Lactant. de Fals. Relig. i. 17), Cnossus in Crete (Diod. v. 72), and Mount Thornax, in the south of Argolis. (Schol. ad Theocrit. xv. 64; Paus. ii. 17. § 4, 36. § 2.)" (from William Smith's "Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology").
"The chorus in Euripides’ play Hippolytus speaks of “the apple-bearing shore of the Hesperides” where immortal fountains flow “by the place where Zeus lay, and holy Earth with her gifts of blessedness makes the gods’ prosperity wax great.” Thus Euripides put Zeus in the garden, and his language affirms that this is where Zeus came from." (From Chapter 9: "The Forbidden Theory of Ancient Greek Art")
I shall here present the same quote, without the ellipses, as translated by the English classical scholar, Philip Humphrey Vellacott (The parenthetical remark is from the notation that is included at the "Perseus Project."); "The apple-bearing Hesperian coast, of which the minstrels sing. Where the Lord of Okeanos denies the voyager further sailing and fixes the solemn limit of Ouranos which Giant Atlas upholds. There the streams flow with ambrosia by Zeus's bed of love (The reference is to the marriage of Zeus and Hera, which the scholiast implies was consummated here.) and holy Gaia, the giver of life, yield to the gods rich blessedness." (Euripides, "Hippolytus" 742 ff.).
The Tree and the Fruit
There were two famous trees in the Garden of Eden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the tree of eternal life; "And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever" (Genesis 3:22 KJV). But which tree is being referred to in the Greek myth? The tree of the knowledge of good and evil, was introduced in the Scriptural narrative before the creation of Eve; It was not given (by God,) to Adam, in fact God forbade him from it (although He did not set a guard on it as he did later with the tree of life).
 
"You have probably heard one time or another about Eve eating the apple. The Hebrew word for fruit in Chapter 3 of Genesis is a general term. The idea that Adam and Eve took a bite of an apple comes to us as part of the Greek tradition." (From Chapter 9: "The Forbidden Theory of Ancient Greek Art")
 
Not only does it appear that Greek mythology has imposed itself upon Judeo-Christian theology, with the Greek "apple" becoming the "fruit" of the Original Sin, it also seems like the influence also flows in the other direction as well. For the golden apples of the Hesperides are, now-a-days thought to impart immortality upon one who eats of it, however I can't find one ancient Greek source that says so (and even though these apples are acquired by some, nobody ever seems to take a bite of one). This idea is apparently taken from the Edenic "tree of eternal life" (not the one picked and eaten by Adam and Eve, but a different tree altogether) and is then back-applied by we moderns upon the Greek myth without any real justification (Herakles was said to have achieved immortality by completing his 12 labors, of which obtaining the golden apples was but one. It is nowhere stated that he ate from the apples.) It should here be noted that the Greek myth hopelessly conflates the two trees, the tree producing the forbidden fruit of Original Sin, with the tree producing the fruit of eternal life. The serpent who entices people to pick from the tree of knowledge in the Hebrew story, becomes, in the Greek myth, the Scriptural Cherubim who guards the way to prevent people picking from the tree of life. Perhaps it was Gaea, the serpent woman (Gaea is the archetypal mother of all the mythic serpents and monsters, she is the mother of Typhon, Echidna, Python, the dragon who guarded the golden fleece, as well as the grandmother of Ladon, the never sleeping, serpent guard, of the apples of Hesperides.) who played the role of a Greek, female, personification, of the serpent; and, of course, it was the serpent who gave the apples to Eve, sometime after her separate creation. There is no story or depiction, picture or sculpture, connecting Zeus and Hera with the serpent at the time that they received the fruits. Placing the serpent as a guard at the tree was supposed to have been a later development. The unauthorized pilfering of the tree, the resultant expulsion, and the guardian serpent are associated more with Atlas, his wife Hesperos, and her daughters, than with Zeus and Hera.
 

Goddess Hebe Derived From Eve





John R. Salverda Writes:

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Similar attachments, making the story of Hera more Eve-like, are also discernible, for instance, consider her two daughters, Hebe and Eileithyia. Could these two names be nothing more than Greek transliterations of the names Eve and Lilith?
A footnote from the book "Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis" by Robert Graves and Raphael Patai (New York: Doubleday, 1964), pp 65-69 explains the Hebrew form of the word "Eve" rendered here as "Hawwah"; "… this may well be a Hebraicized form of the divine name Heba, Hebat, Khebat or Khiba … Her Greek name was Hebe, Heracles's goddess wife." Scholars often suppose the Greek Hebe to have been derived from the Hurrian goddess Hebat, through Greek contact with the Hittites who had adopted the Hurrian goddess.
They also expect that Eve was developed from Hebat through Hebrew contacts with the Hittites.
More likely, in my view, is that the Greek Hebe was influenced directly from the Hebrew Eve through ancient Greek contact with the Israelite/Phoenicians. After all Lilith (Eileithyia), an associate of Eve mainly in the Hebrew culture, seems to have come along with her.
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'Goddess Metis a kind of female personification of the clever serpent'.


 
 

John R. Salverda writes to Robert ‘Bowie’ Johnson Jr.:

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Zeus took over from his father Kronos, who was a previous Adam figure (destroying his offspring with an act of "eating"). Kronos had himself, taken the place of his father Ouranos, the god of Heaven, an even earlier depiction of Adam (the husband of Gaea, an original mother figure). Eventually Herakles, the son of Zeus by a mortal woman, would sacrifice himself and be found worthy to wed Hebe (another Eve).
Hesiod informs us, that before marrying Hera (the queen of heaven) Zeus had several other paramours, including the goddesses Metis, Themis, Eurynome, Demeter, Mnemosyne, and Leto; "Lastly, he made Hera his blooming wife : and she was joined in love with the king of gods and men, and brought forth Hebe and Ares and Eileithyia." (Hesiod, Theogony 921 ff.). Noteworthy in Hesiod's list of Zeus' pre-Hera lovers, as we attempt to connect him with Adam, is the Goddess called "Metis." She is a kind of female personification of the clever serpent; "Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made." (Genesis 3:1 KJV) "Now Zeus, king of the gods, made Metis his wife first, and she was wisest among gods and mortal men. … But Zeus put her into his own belly first, that the goddess might devise for him both good and evil." (Hesiod, Theogony 886-900 ff.) thus Zeus eats to acquire his knowledge of good and evil. "For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:5 KJV). It is almost as though motifs from the story of Adam had been incorporated by design into the biography of Zeus in order to make him more acceptable to an Israelite constituency.
 
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For full discussion, see: http://genesisflood-amaic.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/re-our-post-prophet-elijah-as-greek.html
 

"Marriage of the Lamb" in Greek Myth

 


John R. Salverda writes to Robert 'Bowie' Johnson Jr.:
 
Here's one for Bob about "Eden in Greek Myths"

Dear Bob,
 
I have been critical, and then a bit conciliatory, but now I will take a more commendatory stance toward your work. Your recognition of the association between the symbols of the Hesperides and the symbolisms that appear in the archetypal marriage of Adam and Eve shows remarkable insight on your part. However, I would like to suggest, that the scene portrayed in the myth of the marriage of Zeus and Hera, is less a recollection of the cosmogonic episode in the Book of Genesis, and more in anticipation of the apocalyptic "Marriage of the Lamb" that we see in the Book of Revelation.
In as much as the Lamb's marriage is the ultimate redress to the original sin, it too has it's associations with the symbolisms of the Hesperides. Receiving the "golden apples" as did Zeus and Hera at their wedding, is usually predicated upon destroying the dragon; "that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth" (Revelations 12:9). Zeus, in his original form was a kind of sacrilegious "messianic" figure, the promised "son" who would reverse the original rebellion committed by his father (Kronos) against the god of Heaven (Ouranos): "he was destined to be overcome by his own son, strong though he was, through the contriving of great Zeus." (Hesiod, Theogony 453) "There was delivered to Kronos an oracle regarding the birth of Zeus which stated that the son who would be born to him would wrest the kingship from him by force" (Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 5. 70. 1). "Saturnus received this oracle: ‘Best of kings, you shall be knocked from power by a son.’" (Ovid, Fasti 4. 197 ff.). "Gaea and Ouranos had given him prophetic warning that his rule would be overthrown by a son of his own, he took to swallowing his children at birth." (Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 1. 4 - 5). Take note of this last quote from Apollodorus for comparison with the Scriptural description of the Messianic birth at Revelations 12:4, where the evil plan was to "devour her child as soon as it was born." Zeus, in his role at the celestial wedding and in obtaining the the often sought, heroic quest, of the golden fruit, is probably a blasphemous representation of the Messiah.
This being said, as Christ is a kind of Adam in his "Marriage of the Lamb," so Zeus is depicted at his wedding; "And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit." (1 Corinthians 15:45 KJV). Whenever a god is elevated to the primary position of Greek theology, he becomes a kind of "Adam." This is probably because Adam serves as the prototype of all deified humans; "God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us" (Genesis 3:22 KJV).
 

Sunday, March 2, 2014

Plato's Atlantis was the Antediluvian World: John R. Salverda






.... Then there was the story of that previous civilization on the Earth, from which our modern culture sprang, which was destroyed, engulfed, in a great aqueous catastrophe. This previous civilization, called, "Atlantis," was named after Atlas, he was said to be their first king, and the flood which engulfed the place, is still known as the "Atlantic" Ocean. We learn the story of Atlantis from the Greek Plato, who explains why these ancient People were drowned away back then. He says that at first, their race was pure, but they earned their destruction because they had a racial fall, and had degenerated through mortal admixture. And that was that for Plato’s Atlantean civilization. So it was much like the Bible’s antediluvian civilization, where Adam’s daughters, bred with the giants, and this caused racial impurities, (His Spirit could not "strive with men indefinitely,") precursing the intolerable state which lead to Yahweh’s flood.

Atlas was cursed, just as Adam, to expect a certain "son" who could be described as nothing less than "messianic." Here's Ovid on the subject; "There dwelt huge Atlas, vaster than the race of man: son of Iapetus, his lordly sway extended over those extreme domains, ... Aglint with gold bright leaves adorn the trees,—boughs golden-wrought bear apples of pure gold. ... But Atlas, mindful of an oracle since by Themis, the Parnassian, told, recalled these words, “O Atlas! mark the day a son of Jupiter shall come to spoil; for when thy trees been stripped of golden fruit, the glory shall be his.” Fearful of this, Atlas had built solid walls around his orchard, and secured a dragon, huge, that kept perpetual guard, and thence expelled all strangers from his land." (Ovid, "Metmorhoses" Book 4. 8. 631-661 ff.). A "son of god" (Herakles) did come and in order to pluck from the tree he had to destroy the serpent.

The wife of Atlas "Hesperus" was named after the sun setting, the "Evening," or as we know it better by its common clipped form the "Eve" (The origin for this English term in defining the sun setting is lost to dim antiquity and I personally do not think that it is a mere coincidence.). Actually, according to Diodorus, the land was named after his wife, not the daughters; "Now Hesperos (Evening) begat a daughter named Hesperis (Evening), who he gave in marriage to his brother (Atlas) and after whom the land was given the name Hesperitis; and Atlas begat by her seven daughters, who were named after their father Atlantides, and after their mother Hesperides." (Diodorus Siculus, "Library of History" 4. 26. 2). Why were the daughters of Hesperus often the ones who were blamed for picking the fruit? I'm not sure, but perhaps it was a way to show the generational consequences for the act of committing the Original Sin. The term "Hesperides" may have carried an original meaning that was equivalent to the term "Daughters of Eve" indicating womankind in general.

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For complete article, go to: http://genesisflood-amaic.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/re-our-post-prophet-elijah-as-greek.html




Submitted on 2014/03/05 at 5:36 am
John R. Salverda, how do square calling Atlas Adam and then go on to refer to “Iapetus, the father of Atlas, Prometheus, and Epimetheus, … recognizable as Japheth [the son of Noah!]“?





John Replies

Dear Michael,

I'm sorry but I have no explanation that can make this obvious inconsistency conform to the rest of the story. There are many places where the Greek myths coincide with the Scriptures, but there are even more differences between them. You may just as well ask; How could Atlas be Adam if he had a brother (Prometheus) who created mankind out of clay, and another brother (Epimetheus) who was married to the first woman? Or; Why is Atlas never referred to as the first man? Occasionally the differences can tell us more than the similarities do (the Greeks still thought that men and women were created separately, first a man and then a woman, and it was she who introduced evil into the world). It is evident that the Greek myths do not accurately recount the Scriptural narrative. I think that it is fair to say that some degree of accuracy was lost to the Greeks in trying to fit all of the varied, mainly Eastern, stories into its one big system of mythology (they seem to require that everyone be related in one way or another).

Now, as to why I consider Iapetus to be recognizable as Japheth (The similarity between the names is noteworthy, but it's not just the likeness between the names). Noah preached the God of Heaven; thus, Noah being deified, it was as this God. The Greeks called him "Ouranos," and Iapetus was one of his sons. Scripturally, Japheth is portrayed as the progenitor of the Caucasian races. While Iapetus was the father of, the first, and arguably, the most famous, “Caucasian” who ever lived! Prometheus. It is difficult indeed, to picture Prometheus as the creator of all mankind but, perhaps it was true, that he was (merely) the "procreator," of a certain, "race," of mankind, the Caucasians, who, once again, can be traced back to his father, the Greek Iapetus. Why are White folks named after the well known mountain of Prometheus, Mount Caucasia?

Furthermore, there was a group of People who were known to the Greeks as the, "Leucosyri," or the "White Syrians," they lived in the land, that the Persians called "Cappadocia." Once again, White People are associated with, this time the Persian form of the name, Japheth. (The Hebrews say, "Japheth," the Latins say, "Gepetto," and the Persians, "Cappado") Given the Biblical list in the family of nations at Gen. 10, and compare this with the location of these nations in the Assyrian inscriptions, one wonders why Cappadocia isn’t immediately recognized as being named after Japheth. Meshech, Tubal, Gomer, Ashkenaz, and Togarmah, (if Togarmah truly is Armenia,) are all contiguous with Cappadocia. The Greek form, Iapetus, is most like the Hebrew in pronunciation, and as the father of Caucasians these two at least must be identified.

Now Michael, I will offer a theory, purely speculative on my part, as to why these particular stories, with highly suspicious, apparently Scriptural motifs (the Adamic Atlas, the Messianic Prometheus, and the Eve-like Pandora) have been appended onto the family of Iapetus. Perhaps the Greeks saw their Iapetus in much the same way that the Hebrews saw Japheth, as some kind of geographical, or ethnic/linguistic, classification (ie. Armenian, Caucasian, or Indo-European). And they simply saw these specific myths as related, as all coming from the same place or group, and therefore categorized (as we do when we say "Japhetic") by making them to be "sons" of Iapetus. As to why these, usually thought to be Semitic, Hebrew stories, should be classified as "Japhetic" by the Greeks, I hesitate to speculate. Perhaps it is because Noah and his family were associated with Ararat (Armenia), or because Joppa (a main point of departure for Greek immigration and the main seaport for Jerusalem) was supposed to be founded by and named after Japheth, or just a general association between Japhetics and Semites (as in Genesis 9:27), I'm really not prepared to say.

Anyway, thanks for the question and interest in my work. -John R. Salverda

Monday, February 17, 2014

"Atlas ... claimant ... for the role of Adam".

 
 

According to John R. Salverda
 
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Atlas is a rival claimant, instead of Zeus, for the role of Adam, and I think that he makes a much better fit. The concept of Zeus and Hera may have had its basis in Adam and Eve, but they were elevated into the status of gods very early in the course of Greek history. In their deified classification they were the proprietors of the garden, not its residents, neither Zeus nor Hera were said to have been born (much less created) there, and did not live there, so far as we can tell. Atlas, on the other hand, was said to have lived there, and he was punished at a place just outside the Garden. Atlas was not a god, he was a rebel giant. This is exactly as the Jews pictured Adam; "The dimensions of his body were gigantic, reaching from heaven to earth" (from Louis Ginzberg, "The Legends of the Jews" Volume I, Chapter II "Adam", Sub-chapter "The Ideal Man"). And Atlas was punished for his rebellion against god (Zeus); "Atlas through hard constraint upholds the wide heaven with unwearying head and arms, standing at the borders of the earth before the clear-voiced Hesperides; for this lot wise Zeus assigned to him." (Hesiod, Theogony 507 ff.). The method of his punishment holds a didactic lesson about the doctrine of Mount Sinai. He was condemned to be a mountain that separates the Heavens from the Earth. We all pray for the Kingdom of Heaven to come down to the Earth, but there is something in the way, it is the sin of Adam, because of which, there needs to be a "covenant with sin and death" in place, the mountain of the law.
 
Then there was the story of that previous civilization on the Earth, from which our modern culture sprang, which was destroyed, engulfed, in a great aqueous catastrophe. This previous civilization, called, "Atlantis," was named after Atlas, he was said to be their first king, and the flood which engulfed the place, is still known as the "Atlantic" Ocean. We learn the story of Atlantis from the Greek Plato, who explains why these ancient People were drowned away back then. He says that at first, their race was pure, but they earned their destruction because they had a racial fall, and had degenerated through mortal admixture. And that was that for Plato’s Atlantean civilization. So it was much like the Bible’s antediluvian civilization, where Adam’s daughters, bred with the giants, and this caused racial impurities, (His Spirit could not "strive with men indefinitely,") precursing the intolerable state which lead to Yahweh’s flood.
 
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Sunday, February 16, 2014

"Dione .... The name relates to the creation of Eve out of Adam ...".

John R. Salverda writes:
 
....

Hera was NOT "the first mother," and the ancients Greek did not portray her as such. She herself had a mother (Rhea), and even a grandmother named Gaea, of whom we can read in an ancient Greek source known as the Orphic hymn to Gaea (#25), where she, and not Hera, is hailed as "of Gods and men the source" and "all-parent"; "O Goddess, Earth, of Gods and men the source, endued with fertile, all destroying force; All-parent, bounding, whose prolific powers, produce a store of beauteous fruits and flowers, All-various maid, the eternal world's strong base immortal, blessed, crowned with every grace; From whose wide womb, as from an endless root, fruits, many-formed, mature and grateful shoot. Deep bosomed, blessed, pleased with grassy plains, sweet to the smell, and with prolific rains. All flowery demon, centre of the world" If Alcaeus, refers to Hera as “mother of all” this was not the usual Greek understanding of her, perhaps it was a mere allegory (such as Paul said of "Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all." Galatians 4:26 KJV).
"Before she was known as Hera, the wife of Zeus had the name Dione. The name relates to the creation of Eve out of Adam, for Dione is the feminine form of Dios or Zeus. This suggests that the two, like Adam and Eve, were once a single entity."
 
Dione was never known as Hera; I believe that you know this, because of the way that you worded the statement, see how you have intimated it, but did not say it outright (presenting the assertion in a way that makes it seem to fit your theory). Dione was a daughter of Oceanus and Tethys (Hesiod. Theog. 353) the cousin of Hera, and, according to others, of Gaea by either Uranus or Aether. (Hygin. Fab. Praef.; Apollod. i. 1. § 3.) in which cases she would have been Hera's aunt. Dione was a rival of Hera's for Zeus' love. She was never identified, or even confused, with Hera. Her name is probably a corruption of "Zion" in my view. Zeus, who was cheating on his wife Hera, is said by some, to have fathered Aphrodite with Dione (Apollod. i. 3. sec; i.; Hom. Il. v. 370, &c.). Hera was not Dione and so, even if we consider her name to be "the feminine form of Dios," it has no bearing on your contention that Zeus and Hera "like Adam and Eve, were once a single entity."
 
"In his Works and Days, the poet Hesiod wrote of “how the gods and mortal men sprang from one source.”3 The first couple, Zeus and Hera, were that source."
 
If one reads Hesiod, he will find that "Zeus and Hera" are not the "one source" that he is referring to (neither were they the first couple). "Or if you will, I will sum you up another tale well and skilfully -- and do you lay it up in your heart, -- how the gods and mortal men sprang from one source." (Hesiod, "Works and Days" ll. 106-108). As you can see this was the introductory statement of "another tale" about the origins of history. Before this statement Hesiod had described the creation of mankind (out of clay) by Prometheus, and how the first woman had a secondary creation, how she then proceeded to disobey a rule that she had been given and introduced all evils into the world. Surely Pandora is more Eve-like than is Hera. Hesiod then goes on to tell his other tale, but it says nothing about how the gods and mortal men sprang from Zeus and Hera, because they didn't. The tale that Hesiod then tells is the one about the 5 ages of mankind, beginning with the Golden Age, over which Kronos and Rhea (the father and mother of Zeus and Hera) presided. In the Golden Age of Kronos mankind lived in a pristine state, with lifespans of a thousand years, the Earth gave up it's produce without toil, and humans could talk with animals; much more like the Edenic account than anything connected with the stories of Zeus and Hera
 
"Hera is the single mother of all humanity"
 
As far as I can tell, in any of the ancient Greek sources that I have ever seen, Hera was not the mother of one single human.
 
"The term “father Zeus” is a description of the king of the gods which appears over 100 times in the ancient writings of Homer."
 
Although Adam was "created in the image of God" (the father), we do not say "father Adam" we do say "God the Father." Just because the Greeks worshiped Zeus as "god the father," is no evidence that they thought of Zeus as some type of Adam figure.
 
"The Greek tradition insists that Zeus and Hera were the first couple"
 
Greek tradition does not even suggest that Zeus and Hera were the first couple, let alone "insist" upon it. The Greek myths note plenty of couples that were supposed to predate Zeus and Hera; there were Ouranos and Gaea, Okeanos and Tethys, Hyperion and Theia, Krios and Eurybia, Koios and Phoibe, Kronos and Rhea, Iapetus and Clymene, and etc. These were all brother/sister and husband/wife pairs. (Hesiod, Theogony 334 - 515)
 




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Friday, February 14, 2014

The Forbidden Theory of Ancient Greek Art




Taken from: http://solvinglight.com/blog/2008/08/chapter-9-the-forbidden-theory-of-ancient-greek-art/


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Chapter 9: The Forbidden Theory of Ancient Greek Art


The cover of the February, 2008 issue of the Smithsonian featured a photograph of the Parthenon with the words “Secrets of the ancient temple.” The nine-page article focused on the precision of construction. This has never been a secret, but rather something known since the time it was built on the Acropolis of Athens in the 5th century BC.
The structure, with all its precision, had three purposes that the Smithsonian barely touched upon: first, to make a covered space for the 40-foot-tall gold and ivory idol-image of Athena; second, to elevate the seven sculptural themes; and third, to make sure their messages to posterity as expressed in the sculptures survived as long as possible.
The evo-atheist editors at the Smithsonian accept academia’s lame explanation that the sculptures depict “mythical themes,” so they do not even question their real meaning or their relevance to us today. Is that what the Jefferson and Lincoln Memorials in our nation’s capital depict, mythical themes? No, these monuments, these modern temples, say to the visitor, “Look at the historical foundations of our society. Look at the ideals we value and live by.” The ancient Greeks, who created the living basis of our Western culture, expressed the same kind of sentiment to their own citizens and to posterity with their magnificent temples. But the art historians, the archaeologists, and the anthropologists who examine the Parthenon today cannot see it. The reason: evo-atheism rules those fields of study, and even when presented with the most obvious artistic depictions of Genesis events on the Parthenon, or in any other part of Greek art, they must be summarily denied and dismissed. The Genesis interpretation of Greek art is forbidden.
As we look at my forbidden theory of ancient Greek art in this chapter, we’ll see specifically how the NAS’s taboo against postulating a Creator works against the progress of understanding in the historical sciences, and against true scientific understanding in general.
Figs. 1, 2, and 3. Greek artists made certain there was no mistaking Athena’s association with the serpent and its wisdom. Above left, from her pre-Parthenon temple, she wears a crown of serpents. In the vase-depiction below left, she wears the Gorgon Medusa, the head of serpents on her aegis, or goatskin. And as a part of her reconstructed idol-image in the Parthenon in Nashville, the ancient serpent rises up next to her as a friend. She holds Nike in her right hand: her friendship with the serpent has led her to Victory.

THE ORIGIN OF THE FORBIDDEN THEORY

I started thinking about ancient Greek art when I was a cadet at West Point. The helmet of Athena, goddess of war and wisdom, is the centerpiece of the academy crest which we wore for four years on our caps and shirt collars. Beginning with senior year, we carried the academy crest, with Athena’s helmet, on our class rings. When I first saw a replica of Athena’s Parthenon idol-image in the officers’ club, I was most struck by the huge, friendly serpent rising up next to her. As a rule, women don’t like serpents and men aren’t crazy about them either. I remember thinking, “The Genesis serpent befriended Eve. Could this be the Genesis serpent?” Such was my speculation, based on something tangible and real in humanity’s past. Scientific study begins with a question about something we observe, but don’t yet understand.
Most mythology books refer to Athena as the goddess of wisdom, but as I looked deeper into her ancient idol-image and other depictions of her, I learned that the ancient artists made a point to associate her irrevocably with the serpent. On one sculpture, she wore a crown of serpents (fig. 1). This suggests that the serpent ruled her thinking. She was often depicted wearing a serpent-fringed aegis, or goat skin, as a symbol of her authority. On that aegis, she wore the Gorgon Medusa—the head of serpents (fig. 2). Was she, in truth, the goddess of the serpent’s wisdom? The wisdom of the ancient serpent from Genesis?
From that point, I developed this working hypothesis: “Greek art depicts the early events described in Genesis, but from the standpoint that the serpent enlightened, rather than deluded, mankind.” I called it the Genesis hypothesis. For my hypothesis to progress, I needed more factual connections. Did the Greeks speak of a first couple in an ancient paradise? Yes. You can examine the plentiful evidence for this, and for other connections between Genesis events and ancient Greek art in detail in my publications and at solvinglight.com. Let me here present a brief outline of what I have uncovered.

THE FIRST COUPLE

There is no Creator-God in the Greek religious system. Ancient Greek religion is about getting away from the God of Genesis, and exalting man as the measure of all things. You may think to yourself that the Greeks are exalting gods, not man; but haven’t you ever wondered why the Greek gods looked exactly like humans? The answer is the obvious one: for the most part, the gods represented the Greeks’ (and our) human ancestors. Greek religion was thus a sophisticated form of ancestor worship. In Plato’s Euthydemus, Sokrates referred to Zeus, Athena, and Apollo as his “gods” and as his “lords and ancestors.”1 Greek stories about their origins are varied and sometimes contradictory until their poets and artists present Zeus and Hera as the couple from whom the other Olympian gods and mortal men are descended.
This brother/sister and husband/wife pair, the king and queen of the gods, are a match for the Adam and Eve of Genesis. This couple is the beginning of the family of man, and the origin of the family of the Greek gods, Zeus and Hera. With no Creator-God in the Greek religious system, the first couple advances to the forefront.

ZEUS AND HERA ARE THE FIRST COUPLE DESCRIBED IN GENESIS

According to the Book of Genesis, Eve is the mother of all humans, and the wife of Adam. Since God is the Father of both Adam and Eve, some consider them to be brother and sister as well. After they had both eaten the fruit, Adam named his wife Eve (“Living” in Hebrew) and Genesis 3:20 explains why: “… for she becomes the mother of all the living.” In a hymn of invocation, the 6th-century BC lyric poet, Alcaeus, refers to Hera as “mother of all.”2 As the first wife, the Greeks worshipped Hera as the goddess of marriage; as the first mother, the Greeks worshipped her as the goddess of childbirth.
We are told in Chapter 2 of Genesis that Eve was created full-grown out of Adam. Before she was known as Hera, the wife of Zeus had the name Dione. The name relates to the creation of Eve out of Adam, for Dione is the feminine form of Dios or Zeus. This suggests that the two, like Adam and Eve, were once a single entity.
From the Judeo-Christian standpoint, the taking of the fruit by Eve and Adam at the serpent’s behest was shameful, a transgression of God’s commandment. From the Greek standpoint, however, the taking of the fruit was a triumphant and liberating act which brought to mankind the serpent’s enlightenment. To the Greeks, the serpent was a friend of mankind who freed us from bondage to an oppressive God, and was therefore a savior and illuminator of our race.
In his Works and Days, the poet Hesiod wrote of “how the gods and mortal men sprang from one source.”3 The first couple, Zeus and Hera, were that source. Hera is the single mother of all humanity, and Zeus is, according to Hesiod, “the father of men and gods.”4 The term “father Zeus” is a description of the king of the gods which appears over 100 times in the ancient writings of Homer.5 As the source of their history, Zeus and Hera became the gods of their history. Those without a belief in the Creator have only nature, themselves, and their progenitors to exalt.
The Greek tradition insists that Zeus and Hera were the first couple; the Judeo-Christian tradition insists Adam and Eve were the first couple. Two opposite spiritual standpoints share the same factual basis.

THE GREEK VERSION OF EDEN

If the above is true, then the Greeks ought to have directly connected Zeus and Hera to an ancient paradise, a serpent, and a fruit tree. They did, indeed, make such a direct connection.
The Greeks remembered the original paradise. They called it the Garden of the Hesperides, and they associated Zeus and Hera with its enticing ease, and with a serpent-entwined apple tree.
Some mythologists have mistaken the Hesperides for guardians of the tree, but they certainly are not. Their body language, their easy actions and their very names serve the purpose of establishing what kind of a garden this is: a wonderful, carefree place. In figure 4 (next page), we see the Garden of the Hesperides depicted on a water pot from about 410 BC. The serpent entwines the apple tree with its golden fruit. The names of the figures are written on the vase. Two of the Hesperides, Chrysothemis (Golden Order) and Asterope (Star Face) stand to the immediate left of the tree. Chrysothemis moves toward the tree to pluck an apple. Asterope leans pleasantly against her with both arms. To the left of them, Hygeia (Health) sits on a hillock and holds a long scepter, a symbol of rule, as she looks back towards the tree. To the right of the apple tree, Lipara (Shining Skin) holds apples in the fold of her garment, and raises her veil off her shoulder.
The names of the Hesperides describe what the garden is like. It is a land of gold for the taking, soft starlight, perfect health, and wondrous beauty. The Hebrew word for Eden means “to be soft or pleasant,” figuratively “to delight oneself.” The Garden of the Hesperides is the Greek version of the Garden of Eden.
Figure 4: Vase-depiction of the Garden of the Hesperides, the Greek version of Eden

ZEUS AND HERA IN THE ANCIENT PARADISE

If Adam and Eve, in the Greek religious system, have become Zeus and Hera, there should be literary evidence for their presence in this garden, and there is. Apollodorus wrote that the apples of the Hesperides “were presented by Gaia [Earth] to Zeus after his marriage with Hera.”6 This matches the Genesis account: Eve became Adam’s wife right after she was taken out of Adam (Genesis 2:21–25), and the next recorded event is the taking of the fruit by the first couple. Connecting Zeus and Hera with the Hesperides connects them with the serpent and the fruit tree with which the Hesperides are always represented.
The chorus in Euripides’ play Hippolytus speaks of “the apple-bearing shore of the Hesperides” where immortal fountains flow “by the place where Zeus lay, and holy Earth with her gifts of blessedness makes the gods’ prosperity wax great.”7 Thus Euripides put Zeus in the garden, and his language affirms that this is where Zeus came from.
You have probably heard one time or another about Eve eating the apple. The Hebrew word for fruit in Chapter 3 of Genesis is a general term. The idea that Adam and Eve took a bite of an apple comes to us as part of the Greek tradition.
Up to this point, we have developed a sound working hypothesis. The evidence is compelling. But we must remember, the ruling evo-atheist paradigm is not about evidence, but rather, about validating their evo-atheist standpoint, and that’s all. My line of thinking challenges their evo-atheist standpoint; therefore, it is forbidden. Evo-atheist writer Joseph Campbell, articulates the operative taboo as it applies to the fields of art history, Classical studies, archaeology, and anthropology today:
No one of adult mind today would turn to the Book of Genesis to learn of the origins of the earth, the plants, the beasts, and man. There was no flood, no tower of Babel, no first couple in paradise, and between the first known appearance of men on earth and the first building of cities, not one generation (Adam to Cain) but a good two million must have come into this world and passed along. Today we turn to science for our imagery of the past and of the structure of the world, and what the spinning demons of the atom and the galaxies of the telescope’s eye reveal is a wonder that makes the babel of the Bible seem a toyland dream of the dear childhood of our brain.8
The Scriptures are false. Science is truth. Evolution is science. Evolution is truth. We’ve heard all of these atheistic assumptions before from the NAS. But where is the evidence that the Genesis events did not occur? And where is the evidence that evolution did occur? Campbell does not produce a shred of evidence to back up his speculation. Campbell’s writings express the same profane prattlings, and the same philosophy and empty seduction we find in the NAS book. Genesis events must be explained away as fairy tales, and never examined as history; Greek art must be explained away as myth, and never examined as history—even though Genesis and Greek art corroborate each other. The truth is that Genesis describes the key events in early human history, while ancient Greek art depicts those same events, albeit from an opposite perspective. Let’s see what else in ancient Greek art stares the evo-atheists in the face, but which they are forced to ignore and dismiss because of the narrow and limiting scope of their atheistic religious philosophy.

THE TWO ANTAGONISTIC SONS OF THE FIRST FAMILY

Now if Zeus and Hera are pictures of Adam and Eve, we would expect them to have two male children with antagonistic lines of descent just as the Genesis couple did. Zeus and Hera did have two male children: Hephaistos, the elder, and Ares; and they were as averse to each other as Kain (Cain) and Seth.
Adam and Eve actually had three sons: Kain, Abel and Seth, but Kain killed Abel before the latter had offspring. Greek artists knew all about that first murder. They depicted that event in a series of four metopes (square sculpted scenes) on the south side of the Parthenon (see Chapter 6 of The Parthenon Code). An explosion in 1687 destroyed the metopes, but fortunately, French artist, Jacques Carrey, had drawn them in 1674. You can see them at solvinglight.com. Classical scholars have no other cogent explanation for the four related scenes.
Since Seth replaced Abel, we look at Adam and Eve as having two sons, each of whom, in turn, had offspring. In the Scriptures, the line of Seth is the line of Christ. The Book of Matthew traces the lineage of Christ through David to Abraham; and the Book of Luke further traces the lineage of Abraham to Adam through his son Seth. This is often referred to as the line of belief in the Creator-God or the line of faith. On the other hand, the Scriptures define the line of Kain as one of unbelief in the Creator-God. According to I John 3:12, “Kain was of the wicked one,” a reference to “the ancient serpent called Adversary and Satan, who is deceiving the whole inhabited earth” (Revelation 12:9).
The Greeks deified Kain as Hephaistos, god of the forge. They deified his younger brother, Seth, as Ares, the troublesome god of conflict and war. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, Kain is the evil one whose way is to be shunned. In the Greek religious system, Ares, the Seth of Genesis, is the traitor and the one who causes ruin and woe.

HEPHAISTOS/KAIN

By his Roman name, Vulcan, we associate Hephaistos, the deified Kain, immediately with the forge and the foundry. According to Genesis 4:22, the members of Kain’s family were the first to become forgers “of every tool of copper and iron.” These surely included the hammer, the axe, and the tongs—the tools most often associated with Hephaistos in Greek art.
Hephaistos’ banishment from, and return to, Olympus (a place where the Creator is excluded from the pantheon) is a “myth” which constituted an essential element of Greek religion. It appeared painted, sculpted and bronzed throughout the Archaic and Classical periods. In the Greek religious system, the banishment and return of Hephaistos to Olympus corresponds, in Genesis, to Kain’s being commanded to wander the earth by God, and his defiant return to establish the first city (Genesis 4:9-17).

ARES/SETH

Zeus loved his son Hephaistos, who performed an indispensable and appreciated function as armorer of the gods. On the other hand, Zeus considered his youngest son, Ares, to be worthless, calling him “hateful” and “pestilent” and a “renegade.”9 The ancient poet, Homer, referred to Ares as “the bane of mortals.”10 The only reason Ares has a place in the Greek pantheon is that he is the son of Zeus; that is, he is one of the two actual sons of the first couple, Adam and Eve, of whom Zeus and Hera are deifications. Zeus hates Ares, but accepts responsibility for siring him: “[F]or thou art mine offspring, and it was to me that thy mother bare thee,” and then rails at this son of his, telling him that if he were born of any other god, he would have been “lower than the sons of heaven” long ago.11 Some scholars say Greek religion is anthropomorphic; that is, gods take human form. That’s not quite right. What happens is that real human ancestors retain their original identities and take on godlike qualities. Ares, as a deification of Seth, is trapped by the historical framework. His father, Zeus, had to hate him, and the Greek hero, Herakles, was expected to kill Ares’ children.
While the scriptural viewpoint defines Seth/Ares as the God-believing, or spiritual son, Greek religion defines him as hated by, and antagonistic to, the ruling gods who are part of the serpent’s system. Likewise, while Zeus-religion looks on Hephaistos/Kain as the true and devoted son, the scriptural viewpoint defines him as part of the wicked one’s system. Jews and Christians dislike and shun the line of Kain, but they can’t get rid of him or his line without altering their spiritual standpoint and history itself. Kain is part of the Scriptures, and he is there to stay. Zeus-religion has the same kind of situation. It hates the line of Ares, but it cannot eliminate the line from its history because the basic achievement of Zeus-religion, its grand celebration even, is the triumph of the way of Kain over the way of Seth. Ares is part of Greek sacred literature and art, and he is there to stay.

THE GREEK DEPICTION OF THE FLOOD

According to Genesis, the Flood temporarily wiped out the way of Kain. Noah, in the line of Seth, “a just man” (Genesis 6:9), survived with his wife, three sons, and their wives in the ark. All but these eight people disappeared into the earth. The Greeks pictured this cataclysmic event as half-men/half-horses known as Kentaurs (Centaurs) pounding a man named Kaineus into the ground (fig.5). Kaineus means “pertaining to Kain,” or more directly, “the line of Kain.”
Who were the Kentaurs? The original Greek word for Kentaur, Kentauros, means hundred (where we get century and cent) and most likely relates to the fact that Noah, the chief of the line of Seth, warned of the Flood for one hundred years.12 In most vase paintings of them, the Kentaurs carried symmetrical branches, a sign that they belonged to a certain branch of humanity. The Greeks, who embraced the way of Kain, did not acknowledge the Creator God, and so they couldn’t blame Him for the Flood. They blamed the survivors of it, that strange branch of humanity they didn’t really understand—the line of Seth.
The evo-atheists have no explanation for the connection between Kain and Hephaistos and Seth and Ares, nor do they have an explanation for Kaineus and the Kentaurs. Because ignorant atheists say so, entire fields of scientific enquiry must arbitrarily dismiss the only real evidence we have for the origin of mankind.
Let’s see what else the evo-atheists scholars and their spell-bound students are forced to ignore in the ancient Greek record.
Figs. 5 and 6. Left, Kaineus (the line of Kain) disappears into the earth during the Flood at the hands of the Seth-men (Kentaurs). Right, after the Flood, Athena welcomes the reborn line of Kain (the child is the seed of Hephaistos/Kain) from the earth in Athens.

THE RESURGENCE OF THE WAY OF KAIN AFTER THE FLOOD

For a number of years after the Flood, God’s awesome and decisive intervention in human affairs remained fresh in the minds of Noah’s descendants, and the way of Kain remained dormant. Then, gradually, a yearning for a return to the serpent’s wisdom began to take hold.
The evidence I present in my books and in my 950-slide PowerPoint presentation shows irrefutably that Greek religious art celebrated the resurgence and victory of the way of Kain after the Flood. The question is, how did the way of Kain come through the Flood? The answer is, through a woman. The evidence for this is found in an extremely well-researched 782-page book by Anne Baring and Jules Cashford called The Myth of the Goddess. The authors trace the goddesses of the ancient Near-eastern and Mediterranean world to a single original goddess named Nammu.
“The earliest Sumerian creation myth,” they write, “tells the story of Nammu, Goddess of the Primordial Waters, who brought forth the cosmic mountain, An-Ki, Heaven and Earth.”13 The Primordial Waters are the Flood waters; the cosmic mountain, where the ark landed. The peaks of the mountains of Ararat often disappeared into the clouds, so it seemed Nammu had come from above, from heaven to earth.
Most of the significant ancient goddesses were linked to the Flood in some way, beginning with the one whom they represented, Nammu. Baring and Cashford: “The images of water and sea, the unfathomable abyss of the Deep, return us to Nammu, the Sumerian goddess whose ideogram was the sea . . .”14 Baring and Cashford again: “Asherah [a Caananite goddess] was called ‘the Lady of the Sea,’ which links her to the Sumerian Nammu, and to the Egyptian Isis, ‘born in all wetness.’”15 Those descriptions of the goddess evoke the memory of the Flood. But where did Nammu come from? Baring and Cashford do not know.
Operating in the academic world under the evo-atheist paradigm, the authors cannot make the obvious Genesis connection. Genesis 4:17-22 records the descendents of Kain beginning with his son, Enoch, going down to his great-great-great-great grandson, Tubal-kain. The writer of Genesis pens one more sentence at the end of the male line of Kain: “And the sister of Tubal-kain is Naamah” (Genesis 4:22). The line of Seth (Genesis 5:6-32) mentions no women. Why is Naamah mentioned in the line of Kain?
My answer, as expressed in Section I of Noah in Ancient Greek Art, is that Noah’s son, Ham, married her, and brought her with him on the ark through the Flood. After the Flood, Naamah/Nammu reverted to the way of Kain, and instigated the rebellion which the Greeks, as well as other nations, celebrated.
The Greeks recognized Ham as the friendly Kentaur, Chiron. Other Kentaurs of the line of Seth were enemies of the resurgent line of Kain, but not Chiron. Although he was a son of Noah, Ham connected with the line of Kain through his marriage to the Kain-woman, Naamah/Nammu. Greek artists honored him for bringing her through the Flood, and depicted him in a radically different way from all the other Kentaurs. He is not pictured as a crude enemy, but as a civilized friend. His front legs are not equine, but human. If you stood directly in front of him, you wouldn’t even know that he was a Kentaur. They called him Chiron because it means “hand” in Greek, and suggests that he gave an early helping hand to the development of Zeus-religion.
On the following page, we see how the Greeks depicted and named Noah, his son Ham, his grandson, Cush, and his great-grandson, Nimrod. In The Parthenon Code and Noah in Ancient Greek Art, I present detailed evidence which connects these ancient historical figures.
Over several generations, Naamah, with the help of her son and grandson, Cush and Nimrod, won the adoration of the majority of humanity, taking credit for bringing civilization through the Flood. As the tribes and nations began to form, they worshipped different aspects of Naamah using different names.
Figure 7. An ancient depiction shows Herakles shoving Nereus aside. Nereus means the “Wet One.” The Greeks also referred to him as the “Salt Sea Old Man.” He is the Greek version of Noah. Herakles is the Nimrod of Genesis, the grandson of Naamah. He led mankind’s rebellion after the Flood with her as his guide.
I would change the title of Baring’s and Cashford’s book from The Myth of the Goddess to The Memory of the Adored Woman, because that’s what it is really all about. The authors cannot see this simple truth, and so remain puzzled as to why ancient goddesses so dominated ancient Mediterranean cultures: Ishtar, Inanna, Asherah, Isis, Demeter, Artemis, Athena—all, in their own scholarly judgment, derived from Nammu. Baring and Cashford confess that they do not know how the goddess image first arose, “whether from dreaming sleep or from waking vision.” But it was not a dream or a vision that led to the veneration of the goddess throughout the ancient world, but rather a real woman named Naamah, the last person mentioned in the line of Kain before the Flood. The majority of humanity adored her because she brought the way of Kain through the Flood, and through her offspring, Cush/Hermes and Nimrod/Herakles, reestablished its dominance.

NEREUS/NOAH

A prophet of God in the line of Seth who brought mankind through the Flood.

CHIRON/HAM

The “good” Kentaur (Seth-man) because he brought his wife, Naamah, of the line of Kain, through the Flood.

HERMES/CUSH

Born on his mother’s side from the line of Kain, turned from Noah and God, embraced and spread Zeus-religion.

HERAKLES/NIMROD

As Naamah’s grandson, led the armed rebellion against Noah and his God-fearing children.
Figure 8. Here is how the renunciation of Noah and his God proceeded from his son, Ham (who brought Naamah through the Flood as his wife) through his son, Cush, to his son, Nimrod. Or as the Greeks remembered them, from Chiron through Hermes to Herakles. The most influential person in this great spiritual transformation, Ham’s wife Naamah/Athena, is not shown here.
If, in the Greek religious system, Demeter, Artemis, and Athena are all personas or aspects of the real woman, Naamah/Nammu, why is Athena the dominant one? Why is she the favored daughter of Zeus? It is because Athena represents the most essential aspect of Naamah—dedication and submission to the ancient serpent and its wisdom. That is the heart and soul of Zeus-religion and the way of Kain. As Naamah/Demeter, the goddess of vegetation, she brought the seeds through the Flood; as Naamah/Artemis, the mistress of wild beasts, she brought the animals through the Flood. Both were very important, but it is the exaltation of the serpent’s wisdom that is the distinguishing, defining, and crucial achievement of Naamah/Athena. Only two ancestors are ever depicted in Greek art holding Nike, or Victory, in their hand. One is Adam/Zeus, the original purveyor to humanity of the serpent’s wisdom before the Flood. The other is Naamah/Athena, the woman who brought back the serpent’s enlightenment to mankind after the Flood. That is why Greek artists almost always depicted Athena with a serpent or serpents. That is why Athena’s temple stood in all its glory above the city of Athens. That is the secret of the Parthenon.
Naamah/Athena’s grandson, Nimrod/Herakles became the great hero who supplied the muscle to overthrow Noah/Nereus and his God-fearing offspring. At solvinglight.com, I present 37 images of Noah from ancient Greek art. In almost all the scenes, the patriarch’s authority is being usurped by the rebel, Nimrod/Herakles, or he is being forced by the artists to witness key events leading to the triumph of Zeus-religion. Noah/Nereus is a benchmark figure. Artists placed him in scenes as the known character, the constant against which they could portray the great spiritual/religious change taking place after the Flood.
Also at solvinglight.com, we restore the 12 labors of Herakles in color, as they originally appeared on the temple of Zeus at Olympia. Once you examine the images of Noah, the labors of Herakles, and the restoration of the east pediment of the Parthenon, with their respective explanations on the Web site, I think you will agree that the Genesis hypothesis of Greek art has become an authentic theory. I go so far as to consider it fact, but I leave that determination up to you.
Figs. 9 and 10. From opposite sides of the same vase, Cush/Hermes, with Nimrod/Herakles in his arms, runs away from his father, a bewildered, Ham/Chiron. Hermes has sided with his mother, Naamah/Athena of the line of Kain. Naamah/Athena inspired and led her grandson, Nimrod/Herakles, in his labors and other exploits.
Figs. 11 and 12. The sculpted scenes above the east entrance of the temple of Zeus at Olympia, restored by Holmes Bryant. Left, Herakles kills the three-bodied Geryon, symbolizing the authority of the three sons of Noah. Right, with Noah’s sons overcome, and with Athena’s help, Herakles pushes away the heavens, and with them, the God of the heavens, enabling the strong man to retrieve from Atlas the golden apples from the ancient serpent’s tree.
Herakles’ labors chronicle and celebrate mankind’s successful rebellion against Noah and his God after the Flood. The Greek hero’s labors and battles were directed toward one goal: getting back to the serpent’s enlightenment in the ancient garden, as symbolized by possession of the apples from its tree (figs. 11 and 12). Of course, Herakles did not really get back to the ancient garden; it is a figurative artistic statement: the Greeks will not live under Noah and his God any longer, but will re-embrace the “enlightenment” of the ancient serpent, and live by the fruit of its tree. Zeus-religion celebrates the great change in the post-Flood religious paradigm. Noah and his God are out. The serpent and its enlightenment are back in. Humanity has decided this: mankind is now the measure of all things.
This is exactly what the evo-atheists believe. This is the sentiment Zimmerman and Mr. X express in their Clergy Project Letter. The members of the hierarchy of the NAS go a step further than exalting mankind as the measure of all things. They exalt themselves as the measure of all things. They redefine science to accord with their atheism. They decide what our children will be taught about their origins. They determine which thoughts are mandatory in the science classroom, and which are impermissible. They insist that their atheistic philosophy and religion be honored as supreme.
Do the evo-atheists understand the meaning of Greek art in general or the Parthenon sculptures in particular? No. This is one of the great ironies of our time. The evo-atheists at the NAS, the editors at the Smithsonian, the thousands of other evo-atheist media chieftains, and the evo-atheists throughout academia do not recognize their own humanistic belief system as it appears glorified in ancient Greek sculpture and vase-painting. They are blind to it. In their enchanted state of cognitive obliviousness, it doesn’t matter to them.
In all my research, I have never encountered a sound theory of Greek art, other than the one presented here. That is because nothing but the Genesis theory fits the facts. After the Flood, the Greeks rebelled against Noah and his God, preferring to idolize their human forebears in the way of Kain who had reestablished and systematized their man-centered religious outlook. It is as simple and as obvious as that.
Modern academia has yet to learn the simple lesson that, without reference to the early events described in the Book of Genesis, it is not possible to make any real sense of ancient Greek art and religion. In fact, the entire formidable religious framework of ancient Greek society means virtually nothing without reference to those events. The problem for these academics is that they cannot entertain the Genesis theory of Greek art without abandoning, or at least seriously questioning, their own evo-atheism. The evo-atheist taboo forbids them to explore a rich world of deep intellectual (in the best sense of the term) stimulation and understanding. They are called teachers and professors, yet they fail to comprehend the meaning of the symbolic art that our ancient ancestors have left for us, just as they fail to recognize the handiwork of our Creator throughout the earth, and within all the life upon it.
Atheism leads nowhere. It is nothing more than an outright denial of what is intuitively apparent. Atheists have taken over the National Academy of Sciences. With God pushed out of the picture, they need to concoct an alternative explanation for our existence. That’s all molecules-to-man evolution is—a concocted rationale for atheism.
Today, those working in the historical sciences who want their careers to progress must rigidly follow the evo-atheist paradigm of the NAS. Mainstream archaeologists hardly think about Genesis. The NAS insists that mainstream anthropologists study chimpanzees, while ridiculing those who dare to examine with open minds the true record of our origins found in ancient art and literature.
Look what the NAS atheists have done to science in order to justify their own unbelief in God. To them, science is not an open-ended search for truth. Beginning with their denial of the obvious, they have made science into the manipulation of language, the philosophical contamination of nature, and the fabrication of evidence to validate the atheism of the NAS hierarchy.
Their illogic and their seductions cannot bear the salutary tonics of open debate and free inquiry. The NAS atheists detest the valid God hypothesis and the proven (in my opinion) theory of the meaning of ancient Greek art. They cannot disprove these ideas, so they must intimidate those who are inclined to consider them. Brandishing a club as dangerous as the one wielded by Herakles, the NAS hierarchy threatens us, spiritually attacking our children and our way of life in a most serious and sinister way. It is time to call them to account for the evil they have done, and are doing, in the name of “science.”

NOTES

CHAPTER 1
1. Julian Huxley, Essays of a Humanist (New York: Harper and Row, 1964), p.125.
2. Provine, Will, “No Free Will,” in Catching Up with the Vision, ed. by Margaret W. Rossister (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), p. S123. Thanks for citations 1 and 2 to Henry M. Morris in ‘The Scientific Case Against Evolution,” icr.org.
3. Richard Dawkins, “Put Your Money on Evolution,” The New York Times (April 9, 1989), section VII, p. 35.
4. Law, Stephen, “Is Creationism Scientific,” in Darwin Day Collection One, ed. by Amanda Chesworth, et. al (Albuquerque: Tangled Ban Press, 2002), p. 291.
CHAPTER 2
1. Unlocking the Mystery of Life: The Scientific Case for Intelligent Design, DVD/VHS, Illustra Media, 2002.
CHAPTER 3
1. Peter Hastie, Creation Magazine, Sep.-Nov. 1995, Vol. 17, No. 4, pp. 14-16. Creation Ministries International.
2. Niles Eldredge, as quoted in: Luther D. Sunderland, Darwin’s Enigma: Fossils and Other Problems, fourth edition (revised and expanded), Master Book Publishers, Santee (California),1988, p. 78.
3. Scienceagainstevolution.org/v7i1n.htm
4. Feduccia, A.; in: V. Morell, “Archaeopteryx: Early Bird Catches a Can of Worms,” Science 259(5096):764–65, 5 February 1993.
CHAPTER 4
1. Henry M. Morris, “The Scientific Case Against Evolution,” Institute for Creation Research, icr.org, p.4
CHAPTER 6
1. Ruse M., Darwinism Defended: A Guide to the Evolution Controversies Addison-Wesley: Reading MA, 1983, Third Printing, p. 280.
2. Kofman, Sarah, Socrates: Fictions of a Philosopher, Cornell University Press, 1998, p. 203.
CHAPTER 7
1. Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, Acquiring Genomes: A Theory of the Origins of the Species, (Basic Books, 2003), p. 29.
CHAPTER 9
1. Plato, Euthydemus, from: The Dialogues of Plato, Jowett, B. (Translator), Third Edition, Vol. I, Oxford at the Clarendon Press: Oxford University Press, Humphrey Milford Publisher, 1892, 302d.
2. Hornblower, S. and Spawforth, A. (Eds.), The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization, Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 1998, p. 332.
3. Hesiod, Works and Days, Evelyn-White, H.G. (Translator), William Heinemann Ltd and Harvard University Press, London, 1914, 105.
4. Hesiod, Ref. 3, 59.
5. Homer, The Iliad, Lattimore, R. (Translator), University of Chicago Press, Lattimore, R. (Translator), University of Chicago Press, Iliad Chicago and London, 1961, 503 and frequently.
6. Apollodorus, Apollodorus, The Library, with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, 2 Volumes, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. and London, 1921, 2.5.11.
7. Euripides, Hippolytus, Kovacs, D. (Translator), Harvard University Press, Cambridge,1996 , 744–750.
8. Campbell, Joseph, The Masks of God: Occidental Mythology. The Viking Press, Inc., New York, 1964, p. 520.
9. Homer, Ref. 5, 885–889.
10. Homer, Ref. 5, 846.
11. Homer, Ref. 5, 895.
12. See 2 Peter 2:5; Genesis 5:32 and 7:6.
13. Baring, Anne and Cashford, Jules, The Myth of the Goddess, Arkana Penguin Books, London, 1993, p. 152.
14. Ibid., p.473.
15. Ibid., p.454.

Solving Light

A Blog by Robert Bowie Johnson