'13-11-06, 22:15 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus stijndeloose wrote: For all I know the image in the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia could say "19th-century Christian depiction of that sect's vision of the Arc of the Covenant". Of course the bloody context is important. Do you really think that the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia would have printed a Christian vision of the Arc? What makes you think that they would care??? I'm not going to embarrass myself in looking that one up. stijndeloose wrote: Re your claims re "Amen": citation required. You can read the references cited in the Wikipedia article if you like. As I said, it's conjectural, since the Hebrews weren't going to write down that they were pretending to worship Amun. But just so you know that I'm not making this stuff up, here's the info... Popular among some theosophists,[10] proponents of Afrocentric theories of history,[11] and adherents of esoteric Christianity [12][13] is the conjecture that amen is a derivative of the name of the Egyptian god Amun (which is sometimes also spelled Amen). References: 10. "COLLATION OF THEOSOPHICAL GLOSSARIES – Amen". Archived from the original on 15 March 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-12. 11. The Origin of the Word Amen, Ed. by Issa & Faraji, Amen Ra Theological Seminary Press. [1] as quoted in the Lexington Herald-Leader, "Scholar traces origins of 'Amen' He says word is of African, not Hebrew, origin", December 2007 12. "Assembly of Yahweh, Cascade (an Assembly of True Israel, of the Diaspora) – Words and Definitions critical to the correct understanding of the Scriptures and Christianity". Archived from the original on 26 February 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-12. 13. "Amen". The Assembly of IaHUShUA MaShIaChaH. 15 December 2005. Archived from the original on 6 February 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-13. Let me know what the references say, if you please. stijndeloose wrote: Oh, and you still haven't demonstrated any Jewish consensus on cherubs. The "official consensus" is always going to be that the OT is correct, but then the way the Ark is depicted is very different, and that's the whole point. There isn't going to be anything more than that in the literature, because the question is a matter of why there is a departure from the literature.
'13-11-06, 22:48 Oldskeptic	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: stijndeloose wrote: I don't know Hebrew, so I have no idea if there is a connection between the word "Amen" and Amun. If you want to claim that there is, it'll be up to you to provide evidence. Tutankhamun is also spelled Tutankhamhen, and we know that in both cases, the name refers to Amun, so the spellings are interchangeable. "Amen" doesn't mean anything in Hebrew, This simply isn't true, as you could have found out if you had done a simple google search The usage of Amen, meaning "so be it", as found in the early scriptures of the Bible is said to be of Hebrew origin;[5][6] however, the basic triconsonantal root from which the word was derived is common to a number of Semitic Languages such as Aramaic or Syriac. The word was imported into the Greek of the early Church from Judaism.[1][7] From Greek, amen entered the other Western languages. According to a standard dictionary etymology, amen passed from Greek into Late Latin, and thence into English.[8] Rabbinic scholars from medieval France believed the standard Hebrew word for faith emuna comes from the root amen. Although in English transliteration they look different, they are both from the root aleph-mem-nun. That is, the Hebrew word amen derives from the same ancient triliteral Hebrew root as does the verb ʾāmán.[9] Grammarians frequently list ʾāmán under its three consonants (aleph-mem-nun), which are identical to those of ʾāmēn (note that the Hebrew letter א aleph represents a glottal stop sound, which functions as a consonant in the morphology of Hebrew).[8] This triliteral root means to be firm, confirmed, reliable, faithful, have faith, believe. In Arabic, the word is derived from its triliteral common root word ʾĀmana (Arabic: آمن‎), which has the same meanings as the Hebrew root word. Popular among some theosophists,[10] proponents of Afrocentric theories of history,[11] and adherents of esoteric Christianity [12][13] is the conjecture that amen is a derivative of the name of the Egyptian god Amun (which is sometimes also spelled Amen). Some adherents of Eastern religions believe that amen shares roots with the Hindu Sanskrit word, Aum.[14][15][16][17] There is no academic support for either of these views.[citation needed] The Hebrew word, as noted above, starts with aleph, while the Egyptian name begins with a yodh.[18] The Armenian word ամեն /ˌɑːmˈɛn/ means "every"; however it is also used in the same form at the conclusion of prayers, much as in English http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amen#Etymology
'13-11-06, 23:13 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus Oldskeptic wrote: Grammarians frequently list ʾāmán under its three consonants (aleph-mem-nun), which are identical to those of ʾāmēn (note that the Hebrew letter א aleph represents a glottal stop sound, which functions as a consonant in the morphology of Hebrew).[8] This triliteral root means to be firm, confirmed, reliable, faithful, have faith, believe. That's contentious. Show me a Hebrew, Aramaic, or Syrian usage of ʾāmán that predates the emergence of Amun as an important deity in Egypt.
'13-11-07, 01:23 Oldskeptic	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: Oldskeptic wrote: Grammarians frequently list ʾāmán under its three consonants (aleph-mem-nun), which are identical to those of ʾāmēn (note that the Hebrew letter א aleph represents a glottal stop sound, which functions as a consonant in the morphology of Hebrew).[8] This triliteral root means to be firm, confirmed, reliable, faithful, have faith, believe. That's contentious. Show me a Hebrew, Aramaic, or Syrian usage of ʾāmán that predates the emergence of Amun as an important deity in Egypt. You wrote ""Amen" doesn't mean anything in Hebrew,". You were wrong. Why can't you just admitted it, instead of moving goalposts again? By the way that Egyptian ark of yours looks suspiciously like sarcophagi from after the period of Akenaten. http://www.touregypt.net/museum/tutl59.htm So, which one is your Egyptian arc actually similar to? You really don't do your homework do you? It seems to me that have a massive case of conformation bias where you ignore anything that does not support your position.
'13-11-07, 02:46 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus Oldskeptic wrote: You wrote ""Amen" doesn't mean anything in Hebrew,". You were wrong. Why can't you just admitted it, instead of moving goalposts again? I could have phrased my statement more carefully. How about this... One hypothesis is that "Amen" didn't mean anything in Hebrew (and related Semitic languages) until the people were all encouraged to worship Amun under Egyptian governors. Since the Egyptian influence was strong throughout the Levant, it's impossible to rule out the possibility that such was the true etymology. So I consider it to be an open issue. Does that work for you? But I should like to add that every once in a while, it's good to employ a little bit of common sense. Consider the following scenario: you walk into a sports bar at this time of year in Baltimore, Maryland, and you shout, "Go Ravens!" 3000 years from now, scholars could argue about whether you are referring to the football team of that name, or to the poem by Edgar Allen Poe. But since you're saying it in a sports bar during football season, everybody in the bar thinks that you're referring to the football team, and you know this if you're from Baltimore. Similarly, under Egyptian governorship, in a religious context, if you were to suffix a prayer with the name of the dominant Egyptian god at the time, everybody (including you) would think that you were referring to the Egyptian god. 3000 years later, in the highly political debates concerning Hebrew heritage, we might see rationalizations for the denial that the Hebrews were ever anything other than Canaanites who lost their taste for pork. But that doesn't change the fact that in the 13th Century BCE, under Egyptian governorship in the Levant, in a religious context, "Amen" was the name of an Egyptian god to all those within earshot. Oldskeptic wrote: By the way that Egyptian ark of yours looks suspiciously like sarcophagi from after the period of Akenaten. So, which one is your Egyptian arc actually similar to? Here's what I actually said in post #159: Interestingly, the depiction chosen by the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia most closely resembles the way they're depicted in Tutankhamun's tomb (see http://www.thelivingmoon.com/42stargate ... kgodlg.jpg), which of course was not known until modern times. And you're going to use a sarcophagus from Tutankhamun's tomb to disprove my point about similarity with art in Tutankhamun's tomb?
'13-11-07, 06:11 Agrippina	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler you still haven't presented me with any historical evidence that the Ark of the Covenant actually existed, i.e. that it was a real thing. There is no evidence, not for its ever having existed, or for what happened to it. Every attempt by historians to find it has been thwarted. The latest one is that it is hidden somewhere in Ethiopia and that access to it is allowed to only a few priests who refuse to allow historians to examine it. To me, it's like "God" something that only exists in the minds of people who believe in it. And yes, I've read the biblical description of it several times, and yes, I've argued again and again that the Exodus never happened and if it didn't happen, then neither did the building of the Ark.
'13-11-07, 08:21 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: stijndeloose wrote: For all I know the image in the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia could say "19th-century Christian depiction of that sect's vision of the Arc of the Covenant". Of course the bloody context is important. Do you really think that the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia would have printed a Christian vision of the Arc? What makes you think that they would care??? I'm not going to embarrass myself in looking that one up. That was an extreme example to underline the importance of context. Noted that you don't want to provide any, though. As it is, that drawing doesn't tell us anything. CharlesChandler wrote: stijndeloose wrote: Re your claims re "Amen": citation required. You can read the references cited in the Wikipedia article if you like. As I said, it's conjectural, since the Hebrews weren't going to write down that they were pretending to worship Amun. But just so you know that I'm not making this stuff up, here's the info... Popular among some theosophists,[10] proponents of Afrocentric theories of history,[11] and adherents of esoteric Christianity [12][13] is the conjecture that amen is a derivative of the name of the Egyptian god Amun (which is sometimes also spelled Amen). References: 10. "COLLATION OF THEOSOPHICAL GLOSSARIES – Amen". Archived from the original on 15 March 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-12. 11. The Origin of the Word Amen, Ed. by Issa & Faraji, Amen Ra Theological Seminary Press. [1] as quoted in the Lexington Herald-Leader, "Scholar traces origins of 'Amen' He says word is of African, not Hebrew, origin", December 2007 12. "Assembly of Yahweh, Cascade (an Assembly of True Israel, of the Diaspora) – Words and Definitions critical to the correct understanding of the Scriptures and Christianity". Archived from the original on 26 February 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-12. 13. "Amen". The Assembly of IaHUShUA MaShIaChaH. 15 December 2005. Archived from the original on 6 February 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-13. Let me know what the references say, if you please. That's your job, mate. You claimed that Amen was connected to Amun. It's your claim, it's your job to bring on the evidence, not mine. I tend not to rate theosophical and esotheric sources particularly highly, though. stijndeloose wrote: Oh, and you still haven't demonstrated any Jewish consensus on cherubs. The "official consensus" is always going to be that the OT is correct, but then the way the Ark is depicted is very different, and that's the whole point. There isn't going to be anything more than that in the literature, because the question is a matter of why there is a departure from the literature. You haven't even demonstrated yet that there is. That one drawing, without any context whatsoever, doesn't tell us anything.
'13-11-07, 13:03 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus Agrippina wrote: I've argued again and again that the Exodus never happened and if it didn't happen, then neither did the building of the Ark. I have no reason to disagree on either of those points. My thesis is not that there was an Exodus, but rather, that there was an Exile. The number of people who left Egypt and started teaching Atenism to Bedouins might have numbered in the single digits, and there might not have been enough extra hands to carry a ceremonial box. That doesn't change my thesis, which concerns the exchange of ideas. So if I say that the oral and/or written tradition of the Hebrew Ark is similar beyond chance to Amarna art, you can say that the Hebrews never built an Ark, and you can say that Akhenaten never built an Ark. So what? There are similarities in the surviving literature and artwork, and that's my point. To demonstrate how bogus your argument really is, let's consider one of your earlier statements concerning babies in baskets. Agrippina wrote: An Egyptian princess adopts a baby floating in a basket and brings him up to be a prince. Wait, haven't we heard this story before, except I think the prince's name was Sargon, and he was a real person. See how the Bible writers refurbished history to make it their own? If you're going to claim that the stories of Sargon and Moses are related, you have to: Locate Sargon's basket (i.e., the physical one, not the literary one). Locate Moses' basket (i.e., the physical one, not the literary one). Prove to the satisfaction of rational skeptics that the baskets are similar beyond a reasonable doubt, and that there is no way that Moses' mother could have independently arrived at the same idea as Sargon's. If you fail to prove any of these points, then rational skeptics will reject all of your claims, and consider you to be a fool. This, of course, is absurd. "Comparative Literature/Art" is useful in understanding cross-cultural influences, and there doesn't have to be a physical anything, except some sort of surviving artistic or literary artifact for us to analyze. You understand this concerning your points, but when it comes to somebody else's, you entertain the most ridiculous of positions. Show me the basket... show me the basket...
'13-11-07, 13:51 Agrippina	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus No I don't have to produce the basket. It was written down in Babylonian history. Here you go, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sargon_of_Akkad A real person, real history, written down by people who were there to witness it, or possibly just a legend. My argument is that this story predated the biblical one, so the bible writers copied it.
'13-11-07, 13:59 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus Agrippina wrote: My argument is that this story predated the biblical one, so the bible writers copied it. But if you can't prove that there was a physical basket, you got nothin'. Show me the basket... show me the basket...
'13-11-07, 14:55 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus The Jewish Encyclopedia page on Cherubs may make for an interesting read. It doesn't exactly supports CC's claims: The prophet Ezekiel describes the cherubim as a tetrad of living creatures, each having four faces—of a lion, an ox, an eagle, and a man—the stature and hands of a man, the feet of a calf, and four wings. Two of the wings extended upward, meeting above and sustaining the throne of God; while the other two stretched downward and covered the creatures themselves. They never turned, but went "straight forward" as the wheels of the cherubic chariot, and they were full of eyes "like burning coals of fire" (Ezek. i. 5-28, ix. 3, x., xi. 22). Ezek. xxviii. 13-16 is manifestly a true account of a popular tradition, distinct from that in Gen. ii., iii. From the brief and meager Biblical descriptions of the statues representing the cherubim, it is impossible to judge of their real form. They were hardly sphinx-shaped; for all the representations of the winged sphinx have the wings bent backward rather than extended toward the sides. Whether the cherub was a union of man and some animal form, such as the hawk-headed man so frequently found on Egyptian monuments and also at Nineveh, or only a winged man, as the representation of the palace guardian at Khorsabad, is not certain. Such figures, however, are very common in Babylonian decorations; and winged men and animals are found in ancient sculptures throughout Syria. Cheyne considers the cherubim of Hittite origin, the originality of the Hittites in the use of animal forms being well known. Probable Source. The Hittite griffin appears almost always not as a fierce beast of prey, but seated in calm dignity, like an irresistible guardian of holy things. The Phenicians, and probably the Canaanites, and through them the Israelites, attached greater importance to the cherub. The origin of the cherub myth antedates history, and points to the time when primitive man began to shape his ideas of supernatural powers by mystic forms, especially by the combination of parts of the two strongest animals of land and air—the lion and the eagle. Many are the grotesque figures found thus far, survivals of ancient Oriental sculpture. Thus, in Babylonia there is the winged sphinx having a king's head, a lion's body, and an eagle's wings (see B. Teloni, "Zeitschrift für Assyriologie," vi. 124-140; text published by Bezold, ib. ix. 114-119; and Puchstein's comment, ib. 410-421). This was adopted largely in Phenicia. The wings, because of their artistic beauty, soon became the most prominent part, and animals of various kinds were adorned with wings; consequently, wings were bestowed also upon man. The next step, from cherubim to the angels of the Old Testament as well as of the New, was inevitable.
'13-11-07, 15:22 Agrippina	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: Agrippina wrote: My argument is that this story predated the biblical one, so the bible writers copied it. But if you can't prove that there was a physical basket, you got nothin'. Show me the basket... show me the basket... Yeah, yeah! (Is it OK if it's made of recycled plastic bags?)
'13-11-07, 16:30 Oldskeptic	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: Oldskeptic wrote: You wrote ""Amen" doesn't mean anything in Hebrew,". You were wrong. Why can't you just admitted it, instead of moving goalposts again? I could have phrased my statement more carefully. How about this... One hypothesis is that "Amen" didn't mean anything in Hebrew (and related Semitic languages) until the people were all encouraged to worship Amun under Egyptian governors. Since the Egyptian influence was strong throughout the Levant, it's impossible to rule out the possibility that such was the true etymology. So I consider it to be an open issue. Does that work for you? Not really. Your "hypothesis" hinges on Egyptians trying to impose their religion in areas that they conquered, and I don't think that this is correct. In fact I think that it is wrong. it's good to employ a little bit of common sense. Consider the following scenario: you walk into a sports bar at this time of year in Baltimore, Maryland, and you shout, "Go Ravens!" 3000 years from now, scholars could argue about whether you are referring to the football team of that name, or to the poem by Edgar Allen Poe. But since you're saying it in a sports bar during football season, everybody in the bar thinks that you're referring to the football team, and you know this if you're from Baltimore. Similarly, under Egyptian governorship, in a religious context, if you were to suffix a prayer with the name of the dominant Egyptian god at the time, everybody (including you) would think that you were referring to the Egyptian god. 3000 years later, in the highly political debates concerning Hebrew heritage, we might see rationalizations for the denial that the Hebrews were ever anything other than Canaanites who lost their taste for pork. But that doesn't change the fact that in the 13th Century BCE, under Egyptian governorship in the Levant, in a religious context, "Amen" was the name of an Egyptian god to all those within earshot. Fail. Oldskeptic wrote: By the way that Egyptian ark of yours looks suspiciously like sarcophagi from after the period of Akenaten. So, which one is your Egyptian arc actually similar to? Here's what I actually said in post #159: Interestingly, the depiction chosen by the Universal Jewish Encyclopedia most closely resembles the way they're depicted in Tutankhamun's tomb (see http://www.thelivingmoon.com/42stargate ... kgodlg.jpg), which of course was not known until modern times. And you're going to use a sarcophagus from Tutankhamun's tomb to disprove my point about similarity with art in Tutankhaymun's tomb? I'm using a sarcophagus that actually existed to show that your drawing of an Egyptian ark is not an ark at all. So, your biggest supposed similarity is gone. As for your similarity in artistic style there is none except for the two Egyptian artifacts being similar and apparently somewhat common. But this does not extend to any art of the ark of the covenant because your drawing is only what someone imagined the cherubs to look like. Next, the winged creatures on the sarcophagus are not cherubs, they are goddesses. I can find no description of near eastern cherubs with female faces, or beings that are female.
'13-11-07, 18:11 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus stijndeloose wrote: The Jewish Encyclopedia page on Cherubs may make for an interesting read. It doesn't exactly supports CC's claims: Which claims of mine are not supported?
'13-11-07, 18:14 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus That the cherubs on the ark should actually be angels (or that cherubs look like angels). You still haven't supported that claim.
'13-11-07, 19:14 CharlesChandler	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus stijndeloose wrote: That the cherubs on the ark should actually be angels (or that cherubs look like angels). You still haven't supported that claim. "Should be" in what sense? I'm saying that the OT describes them as cherubs, but surprisingly, in modern depictions approved by authorities in the OT, they are portrayed as angels, contrary to the OT. All the more surprisingly, the angels are in the Amarna style. This is surprising because Jewish scholars are adamant that the Hebrews had no Egyptian heritage. So why did the authorities depart from the OT, and go with an Egyptian motif? Either that's two very strange things, or one direct connection.
'13-11-07, 20:52 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: stijndeloose wrote: That the cherubs on the ark should actually be angels (or that cherubs look like angels). You still haven't supported that claim. "Should be" in what sense? Forgot a part, my apologies. "That the consensus is that the "cherubs" on the Ark should actually be angels." I'm saying that the OT describes them as cherubs, but surprisingly, in modern depictions approved by authorities in the OT, Which authorities in the OT? And how are modern deictions relevant? they are portrayed as angels, contrary to the OT. you have yet to demonstrate this. All the more surprisingly, the angels are in the Amarna style. You have yet to demonstrate this. This is surprising because Jewish scholars are adamant that the Hebrews had no Egyptian heritage. So why did the authorities depart from the OT, and go with an Egyptian motif? You have yet to demonstrate that they did.
'13-11-07, 21:05 Oldskeptic	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus CharlesChandler wrote: stijndeloose wrote: That the cherubs on the ark should actually be angels (or that cherubs look like angels). You still haven't supported that claim. "Should be" in what sense? I'm saying that the OT describes them as cherubs, but surprisingly, in modern depictions approved by authorities in the OT, they are portrayed as angels, contrary to the OT. All the more surprisingly, the angels are in the Amarna style. This is surprising because Jewish scholars are adamant that the Hebrews had no Egyptian heritage. So why did the authorities depart from the OT, and go with an Egyptian motif? Either that's two very strange things, or one direct connection. False dichotomy, meaning you give only two choices as to why later modern Jews would not portray the ark as described in the Old Testament. There is at least one other possible and more likely explanation. While living mostly in Christian countries and being surround by mostly antagonistic Christians, rather than portraying the ark like this and possibly being accused of using and worshiping pagan symbols they opted for a more Christian friendly portrayal like this.
'13-11-08, 04:45 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus Somehow those angels/cherubs (again, you can't see their faces) look (neo)classical rather than "Armana"-style, if you ask me. Mozes must've been Greek.
'13-11-08, 05:15 stijndeloose	Re: The Pharaoh of the Exodus "Cherubs", neo-Assyria (between 900 and 700 BC). "Cherubs", excavated at Nimrud, 9th century BC. Another. Another. Another.