TIME (Zeman - זמן - in Yehudit).
Chronos: The Greeks personified time as a god, shaped like a serpent, but with three heads, reflecting the three stages of time: past, present and future. The heads were a man, a bull, and a lion. His consort was the serpent Ananke, also given as Anangke, Anance, or Anagke (from Greek: Ἀνάγκη meaning "force, constraint, necessity"), whose name conjures up the inevitability of time ending with death and may, though it is a stretch, be a version of the African Anansi; she most definitely is a version of Ophion, the snake that encircled the primal world egg, and which Marduk sliced in half with his sword to engender Creation. In the Greek version Chronos and Ananke partner in their encirclement of the egg and it is their coils which split it apart to form the ordered universe of earth, sea and sky. The connection with the first Biblical Creation myth is not difficult to recognise.
In much the same way the Romans portrayed Janus, the god of January, the first month of the year, with two heads, one looking back at the year just ended, the other forward to the year just started.
Day in Yehudit is Yom (יום), probably a corruption of CHAM (חם), the word for heat.
Night = Lailah (לילה); connected to LILIT, the evil female spirit of darkness, and her LILIM, a kind of Harpies or Furies. The darkness itself is ruled by the god Choshech (חוֹשֶׁך)
Week = Shavu'a (שָׁבוּעַ), from the root Sheva (שבע = 7)
The week in various cultures:
English: Sun Moon Tiwes Woden Thor Freya Saturn
Greek: Sun Moon Mars Mercury Jupiter Venus Saturn
Babylonian: Samas Sin Nergal Nabu Marduk Ishtar Ninib
Assyrian: Sabia Samas Sin Nergal Nabu Bel Beltis Cronos
Roman: Latin Dominus Luna Mars Mercury Jupiter Venus Saturn
Nordic: Sonne Mani Zivis Wotan Thor Freia Saturn
Old English: Sunnan Monan Tiwes Wodnes Thunres Frige Saetern
Yehudit: Rishon Sheni Shlishi Reviyi Chamishi Shishi Shabat
The Babylonian week is known to have been ruled by Samas, a variant form of Shemesh and Tammuz (also Shimshon/Samson) both giving the Sun. The Sabians of Harran took part in the Sea People's invasion of northern Syria about 1200 BCE; their principal deities were Sabia, Sin, Nergal, Nabu, Bel, Beltis and Cronos. Samas is obviously Shemesh/Tammuz the sun god whose day is Sunday; Sin is the moon for Monday; Nergal equates with Mars or German Zivis, a variation of Nordic Tiwes, to make Mardi = Tuesday; Nabu equates to Mercury or German Woden to make Wednesday; Bel equates to Jupiter and German Thor, Babylonian Marduk; Friday is Beltis, equating with Venus/Ishtar and Freia/Frigg; Saturday is Saturn's day, Ninib in Babel, Cronos to the Sabians.
SUNDAY, the first day of the week, saw the creation of light, thereby identifying ELOHIM with SAMAS or SHEMESH the sun-god; probably Tammuz is a Chaldean variant of Shamas (bearing in mind the etymological connection of Sheen (ש) and Tav (ת) but more particularly the cult of Tammuz which connects to the sun and mostly to the corn (cf Yoseph in Egypt). It is significant however that the sun as such is not created until the fourth day, when the moon and stars are also made. Sunday also creates the skies and earth out of the void; thus identifying these respective gods together as well; compare this to the division of gods elsewhere. Dimanche in the French comes from the Latin Dominicus, meaning Lord.
MONDAY - Days in Yehudit have numbers, unlike almost every other European and Indic language, which give them god-names like the months; we are therefore obliged to speculate and hypothesise as to which gods applied to which. Since the second day to everyone else is the moon, can we evince a moon out of YOM SHENI (יום שני)? Alas no, though the Gnostics, who were originally an Egyptian cult connected with Pythagoras, did so, because the letter Shin (ש), which sounds an awful lot like Sheni and contains the same letters, stands for El Shadai, the name of Av-Raham's god, or goddess probably, because Shadai (שדי) means "my breast", and fertility deities who lactate are not generally male. Shin in Yehudit (שן) also means "a tooth"; no mystic has yet come up with a convincing application of that meaning to their would-be moon-god. Nevertheless, Monday is the day on which the Heavens are made.
And for those of you who want to challenge me, by reminding that there was an Egyptian moon-god named Sin; yes there was, as there was an Akkadian moon-god named Su'en, which may be a variant pronunciation of Sin. But this was Sin - in Yehudit with a Seen (ש) or Samech (ס), not a Sheen. Su'en was known by the Sumerians as Nanna, and later there was Inanna, who was a moon-goddess...and Yah the Hittite moon-goddess becomes Yah the moon-aspect of the monotheistically male Beney Yisra-El god YHVH...so was Sin a later Egyptian masculinisation of an earlier moon-goddess, and this remembered in the Gnostic world? Very possible.
TUESDAY: Who was Nergal anyway? Find out here - and then you will also know why Islam regards Tuesday as the Day of Death and Destruction. Otherwise this is Mars' day; the principal planet? Tuesday sees the earth and skies created in a more substantial form, the firmament, the dry land etc where before there was just Earth and Sky. Also the first fruits of the earth begin to appear.
WEDNESDAY: Mercury, Nabu and Wotan, or Woden. The completion of the first day's work, light becoming sun moon and stars; the calendar as a whole; omens and portents connected to this god
THURSDAY: Jupiter, Marduk, Bel, Thor. The first creatures appear; a very strong feeling of evolution runs through all this.
FRIDAY: Venus, Beltis, Ishtar, Freya: the great goddesses! And this the day on which Man is made. Woman creates man. Or rather goddess creates god.
SATURDAY: Day of oaths, day of rest - Saturn, Ninib and Cronos.
Month = Chodesh (חוֹדֶשׁ), from the root Chadash = "new" or "renew"; since the month begins with the renewal or rebirth of the moon (the 1st-day festival is called ROSH CHODESH: Head of the Month).
The Babylonians from 3,200 BCE used two systems of numeration: decimal and sexigesimal.
And you can now go back to the "Age" page of this blog, and answer the question that I left there:
which is:
What is most extraordinary is that Chinese mythology contains precisely the same table of ten ante-diluvian kings. The epoch was called Chou-time.
In much the same way the Romans portrayed Janus, the god of January, the first month of the year, with two heads, one looking back at the year just ended, the other forward to the year just started.
Day in Yehudit is Yom (יום), probably a corruption of CHAM (חם), the word for heat.
Night = Lailah (לילה); connected to LILIT, the evil female spirit of darkness, and her LILIM, a kind of Harpies or Furies. The darkness itself is ruled by the god Choshech (חוֹשֶׁך)
Week = Shavu'a (שָׁבוּעַ), from the root Sheva (שבע = 7)
The week in various cultures:
English: Sun Moon Tiwes Woden Thor Freya Saturn
Greek: Sun Moon Mars Mercury Jupiter Venus Saturn
Babylonian: Samas Sin Nergal Nabu Marduk Ishtar Ninib
Assyrian: Sabia Samas Sin Nergal Nabu Bel Beltis Cronos
Roman: Latin Dominus Luna Mars Mercury Jupiter Venus Saturn
Nordic: Sonne Mani Zivis Wotan Thor Freia Saturn
Old English: Sunnan Monan Tiwes Wodnes Thunres Frige Saetern
Yehudit: Rishon Sheni Shlishi Reviyi Chamishi Shishi Shabat
The Babylonian week is known to have been ruled by Samas, a variant form of Shemesh and Tammuz (also Shimshon/Samson) both giving the Sun. The Sabians of Harran took part in the Sea People's invasion of northern Syria about 1200 BCE; their principal deities were Sabia, Sin, Nergal, Nabu, Bel, Beltis and Cronos. Samas is obviously Shemesh/Tammuz the sun god whose day is Sunday; Sin is the moon for Monday; Nergal equates with Mars or German Zivis, a variation of Nordic Tiwes, to make Mardi = Tuesday; Nabu equates to Mercury or German Woden to make Wednesday; Bel equates to Jupiter and German Thor, Babylonian Marduk; Friday is Beltis, equating with Venus/Ishtar and Freia/Frigg; Saturday is Saturn's day, Ninib in Babel, Cronos to the Sabians.
SUNDAY, the first day of the week, saw the creation of light, thereby identifying ELOHIM with SAMAS or SHEMESH the sun-god; probably Tammuz is a Chaldean variant of Shamas (bearing in mind the etymological connection of Sheen (ש) and Tav (ת) but more particularly the cult of Tammuz which connects to the sun and mostly to the corn (cf Yoseph in Egypt). It is significant however that the sun as such is not created until the fourth day, when the moon and stars are also made. Sunday also creates the skies and earth out of the void; thus identifying these respective gods together as well; compare this to the division of gods elsewhere. Dimanche in the French comes from the Latin Dominicus, meaning Lord.
MONDAY - Days in Yehudit have numbers, unlike almost every other European and Indic language, which give them god-names like the months; we are therefore obliged to speculate and hypothesise as to which gods applied to which. Since the second day to everyone else is the moon, can we evince a moon out of YOM SHENI (יום שני)? Alas no, though the Gnostics, who were originally an Egyptian cult connected with Pythagoras, did so, because the letter Shin (ש), which sounds an awful lot like Sheni and contains the same letters, stands for El Shadai, the name of Av-Raham's god, or goddess probably, because Shadai (שדי) means "my breast", and fertility deities who lactate are not generally male. Shin in Yehudit (שן) also means "a tooth"; no mystic has yet come up with a convincing application of that meaning to their would-be moon-god. Nevertheless, Monday is the day on which the Heavens are made.
And for those of you who want to challenge me, by reminding that there was an Egyptian moon-god named Sin; yes there was, as there was an Akkadian moon-god named Su'en, which may be a variant pronunciation of Sin. But this was Sin - in Yehudit with a Seen (ש) or Samech (ס), not a Sheen. Su'en was known by the Sumerians as Nanna, and later there was Inanna, who was a moon-goddess...and Yah the Hittite moon-goddess becomes Yah the moon-aspect of the monotheistically male Beney Yisra-El god YHVH...so was Sin a later Egyptian masculinisation of an earlier moon-goddess, and this remembered in the Gnostic world? Very possible.
TUESDAY: Who was Nergal anyway? Find out here - and then you will also know why Islam regards Tuesday as the Day of Death and Destruction. Otherwise this is Mars' day; the principal planet? Tuesday sees the earth and skies created in a more substantial form, the firmament, the dry land etc where before there was just Earth and Sky. Also the first fruits of the earth begin to appear.
WEDNESDAY: Mercury, Nabu and Wotan, or Woden. The completion of the first day's work, light becoming sun moon and stars; the calendar as a whole; omens and portents connected to this god
THURSDAY: Jupiter, Marduk, Bel, Thor. The first creatures appear; a very strong feeling of evolution runs through all this.
FRIDAY: Venus, Beltis, Ishtar, Freya: the great goddesses! And this the day on which Man is made. Woman creates man. Or rather goddess creates god.
SATURDAY: Day of oaths, day of rest - Saturn, Ninib and Cronos.
Month = Chodesh (חוֹדֶשׁ), from the root Chadash = "new" or "renew"; since the month begins with the renewal or rebirth of the moon (the 1st-day festival is called ROSH CHODESH: Head of the Month).
THE MONTHS IN THE CALENDAR OF THE BENEY YISRA-EL: (the solar equivalents are approximate):
TISHREY September/October
CHESHVAN October/November - also known as MARCHESHVAN
KISLEV November/December (from the December new moon, originally the 9th month)
TEVET December/January
SHEVAT January/February
ADAR February/March
NISAN March/April (the month of flowers - properly NITSAN from NETS - נץ); originally known as AVIV = Spring
IYAR April/May (probably from the root OR - אור = light)
SIVAN May/June (Chaldean SEVAH = "to rejoice")
TAMMUZ June/July (Syrian Adonis/Adonai)
AV July/August (see Gesenius)
ELUL Aug/Sept (Elil = "vain" in Babylonian)
Gesenius moves all the months one forward from the common list
The year consisting of 360 days is the reason why a circle has 360 degrees. The other five days that make up the full calendar are feasts-day. The Egyptians believed that they were the days which Thoth won at draughts from Isis, and celebrated the birthdays of Osiris, Horus, Set, Isis, and Nephthys on them, in that order.
FESTIVALS:
14th NISAN Pesach - New Year of the Corn - original date of the New Year - start of the counting of the Omer
21st NISAN First fruits of the Barley
27th NISAN Modern Holocaust Remembrance Day
4th IYAR Modern Fallen Soldiers Remembrance Day
5th IYAR Modern Independence Day
6th SIVAN Shavu'ot - 7 weeks + 1 day after Pesach (the one day reflecting the fact that Pesach begins in the evening before the full moon - 14th Nisan - and not, as with most holidays, on the day of the full moon) - the end of the grain harvest; season of vine-tending
17th TAMMUZ Fast of Tammuz
9th AV Destruction of the Temple (in fact both destructions are celebrated on the same day, as the exact date of the destruction of the first is not known); the fast of Av may well have preceded the temple celebration as a pagan festival.
15th AV Festival of the full moon of Av
15th ELUL Olive harvest
24th ELUL 1st day of Selichot, the preparatory prayers of repentance before the New Year
1st TISHREY Modern New Year, the Shabat of months - the season of ploughing starts
3rd TISHREY Fast of Gedaliah
9th TISHREY Kol Nidre
10th TISHREY Yom Kippur
15th TISHREY Sukot - the season of grain-planting starts; Tabernacles (Sukot): a Cannanite vintage feast; Josiah and the Biblicists simply cut out the sexual abandon and the Dionysic/Bacchic rites and appended the use of tents in the wilderness as a posthumous pretext. The Egyptian/Canaanite feast of unleavened bread which was already the Passover before Mosheh likewise.
22nd TISHREY Shemini Atseret - the Yizkor or memorial service is usually held on this day
29th TISHREY Commencement of the reading of the Torah - (to all intents and purposes this series of festivals denotes the end of summer and the beginning of autumn)
25th KISLEV Chanukah - the festival of lights (Chag Ha Or), the Jewish equivalent of Diwali, though recently it has become more like a Jewish equivalent of Christmas
15th SHVAT New Year of Trees
14th ADAR Shushan Purim
Year = Shanah (שָׁנָה or in Aramaic שנא). The Hey (ה) version is from the root SHANAH = "to change", and therefore has the sense of "starting afresh", as at the New Year. The Aramaic version links to the Yehudit/Aramaic root YASHAN (ישן)= "to sleep" and is less easily explicable. But the time-scale of SHANA is not explicit, nor can it be presumed, as Beney Yisra-El calendars vary between 12 and 13 months. The term may even imply seasons, in which case division by 4,12 or 13 would give solar equivalents - e.g. in Genesis 5 Adam is 130 at the birth of Shet and 930 at his own death, which may, in our terms, be ÷4 = 32 at Shet's birth and ÷12 = 77 at his own death.
The word SHANAH may also be connected to SHIN or SIN the Egyptian moon-god (see above, under Monday), which would confirm the division by 12; it would allow us to understand the word SHANAH as having originally meant a month and not a year.
Numerically SHANAH = Sheen (300) + Nun (50) + Hey (5), or in Aramaic Aleph (1) = 355/351. The Beney Yisra-El year = 13 months of 28 days = 364 says + Adar Bet (the leap year extra month to re-synchronise with the sun cycle; technically known as intercalation, though the Moslem system is not the same as the Jewish).
SHANAH has sense of repetition (twice) from same root as SHENI = 2. Note that the feminine form changes Sheen (ש) to Tav (ת), though this may again be through the Aramaic, where the two letters are often interchanged.
Before the exile, the Beney Yisra-El year began in the spring; in Babylon it became identified, through the story of Ester (Esther), with Shushan Purim, the Pharsee New Year celebration, also in the spring. The Persian story of the victory of MARDUK and ISHTAR over the god of the underworld CHAMAN, is retold by the Jews as the story of MORDECHAI and ESTHER triumphing over the evil Prime Minister HAMAN.
TISHREY September/October
CHESHVAN October/November - also known as MARCHESHVAN
KISLEV November/December (from the December new moon, originally the 9th month)
TEVET December/January
SHEVAT January/February
ADAR February/March
NISAN March/April (the month of flowers - properly NITSAN from NETS - נץ); originally known as AVIV = Spring
IYAR April/May (probably from the root OR - אור = light)
SIVAN May/June (Chaldean SEVAH = "to rejoice")
TAMMUZ June/July (Syrian Adonis/Adonai)
AV July/August (see Gesenius)
ELUL Aug/Sept (Elil = "vain" in Babylonian)
Gesenius moves all the months one forward from the common list
The year consisting of 360 days is the reason why a circle has 360 degrees. The other five days that make up the full calendar are feasts-day. The Egyptians believed that they were the days which Thoth won at draughts from Isis, and celebrated the birthdays of Osiris, Horus, Set, Isis, and Nephthys on them, in that order.
FESTIVALS:
14th NISAN Pesach - New Year of the Corn - original date of the New Year - start of the counting of the Omer
21st NISAN First fruits of the Barley
27th NISAN Modern Holocaust Remembrance Day
4th IYAR Modern Fallen Soldiers Remembrance Day
5th IYAR Modern Independence Day
6th SIVAN Shavu'ot - 7 weeks + 1 day after Pesach (the one day reflecting the fact that Pesach begins in the evening before the full moon - 14th Nisan - and not, as with most holidays, on the day of the full moon) - the end of the grain harvest; season of vine-tending
17th TAMMUZ Fast of Tammuz
9th AV Destruction of the Temple (in fact both destructions are celebrated on the same day, as the exact date of the destruction of the first is not known); the fast of Av may well have preceded the temple celebration as a pagan festival.
15th AV Festival of the full moon of Av
15th ELUL Olive harvest
24th ELUL 1st day of Selichot, the preparatory prayers of repentance before the New Year
1st TISHREY Modern New Year, the Shabat of months - the season of ploughing starts
3rd TISHREY Fast of Gedaliah
9th TISHREY Kol Nidre
10th TISHREY Yom Kippur
15th TISHREY Sukot - the season of grain-planting starts; Tabernacles (Sukot): a Cannanite vintage feast; Josiah and the Biblicists simply cut out the sexual abandon and the Dionysic/Bacchic rites and appended the use of tents in the wilderness as a posthumous pretext. The Egyptian/Canaanite feast of unleavened bread which was already the Passover before Mosheh likewise.
22nd TISHREY Shemini Atseret - the Yizkor or memorial service is usually held on this day
29th TISHREY Commencement of the reading of the Torah - (to all intents and purposes this series of festivals denotes the end of summer and the beginning of autumn)
25th KISLEV Chanukah - the festival of lights (Chag Ha Or), the Jewish equivalent of Diwali, though recently it has become more like a Jewish equivalent of Christmas
15th SHVAT New Year of Trees
14th ADAR Shushan Purim
Year = Shanah (שָׁנָה or in Aramaic שנא). The Hey (ה) version is from the root SHANAH = "to change", and therefore has the sense of "starting afresh", as at the New Year. The Aramaic version links to the Yehudit/Aramaic root YASHAN (ישן)= "to sleep" and is less easily explicable. But the time-scale of SHANA is not explicit, nor can it be presumed, as Beney Yisra-El calendars vary between 12 and 13 months. The term may even imply seasons, in which case division by 4,12 or 13 would give solar equivalents - e.g. in Genesis 5 Adam is 130 at the birth of Shet and 930 at his own death, which may, in our terms, be ÷4 = 32 at Shet's birth and ÷12 = 77 at his own death.
The word SHANAH may also be connected to SHIN or SIN the Egyptian moon-god (see above, under Monday), which would confirm the division by 12; it would allow us to understand the word SHANAH as having originally meant a month and not a year.
Numerically SHANAH = Sheen (300) + Nun (50) + Hey (5), or in Aramaic Aleph (1) = 355/351. The Beney Yisra-El year = 13 months of 28 days = 364 says + Adar Bet (the leap year extra month to re-synchronise with the sun cycle; technically known as intercalation, though the Moslem system is not the same as the Jewish).
SHANAH has sense of repetition (twice) from same root as SHENI = 2. Note that the feminine form changes Sheen (ש) to Tav (ת), though this may again be through the Aramaic, where the two letters are often interchanged.
Before the exile, the Beney Yisra-El year began in the spring; in Babylon it became identified, through the story of Ester (Esther), with Shushan Purim, the Pharsee New Year celebration, also in the spring. The Persian story of the victory of MARDUK and ISHTAR over the god of the underworld CHAMAN, is retold by the Jews as the story of MORDECHAI and ESTHER triumphing over the evil Prime Minister HAMAN.
And now to resume the challenge set up on the "Age" page
The Babylonians from 3,200 BCE used two systems of numeration: decimal and sexigesimal.
Sexigesimal: 60 seconds = 1 minute, 60 mins = 1 hour; 360 degrees = one circle, based on seconds and minutes as well. The Mesopotamian year had 360 days = a circle in time as well as space. At the centre of the circle were the five points of the ziggurat = 4 angles to the quarters + the summit. To the year were added five festal days for the old year to die and the new year to be born; thus enabling the full 365 day year, which they already understood, though not with absolute precision. Each year was part of a cycle leading to the Great Year, an eon ended by flood, cosmic dissolution and return (i.e. cosmic death and rebirth).
The lives of the patriarchs of the Beney Yisra-El seem to reflect that of Mesopotamia. A Sumerian tablet (Weld-Blundell prism, 62; now in Oxford) gives a list of 10 kings who ruled 456,000 years from the Descent of Kingship to the Flood. An alternate list names only 8 of these, for 241,200 years. Berossus (280 BCE) gave all 10 but said 432,000 years.
Babylon was not alone in these gargantuan measurements. The Icelandic Edda says that Odin's hall at Valhalla had 540 doors (compare John 14:2, "my father's house has many mansions"), through which went 800 warriors in the cosmic battle at the end of time (Götterdämmerung). 540 x 800 = 432,000, cf Berossus above.
Ancient India likewise. The Mahabarata (400 CE) has a cosmic cycle of four ages, made up of 12,000 divine years of 360 human years each; which = 4,320,000. We are living in the last and worst of these cycles, the Kali Yuga, which comprises one-tenth of the whole - 432,000.
Now for some Lewis Carroll fun. Observe the heavens at the spring equinox (March 21) and they are not quite where they were last year. Because there is an annual lag of 50 seconds. Every 72 years this sums 1 full degree (50" x 72 = 3600" = 60" = 1ø). 2160 years sums to 30 degrees = 1 sign of the zodiac. The sun at its equinox today is in Pisces, but in Jesus' time it was in Aries, and in early Sumer it was in Gemini. This lag first was noted by Hipparchus of Bithynia around 140 BCE; but not perfectly. Copernicus got the figures right in 1526. Yet the Sumerians seem to have known it:
Lag in one year is 50 seconds. 72 years = 1ø. 2160 years = 30ø. 25,290 makes one complete cycle of the zodiac, which they call a Great Year (the Greeks called it a Platonic Year). 25,290 divided by 60 = 432 - that figure again.
Can we presume that Berossus based his list on cosmic eras, and that the Sumerians did too, but had the calculations out because they did not understand processional lag? I think we can.
The key figure in all Sumerian and Akkadian tablets is 12,960,000. 12,960 x 2 = 25,920 = Great Year. Why 12,960,000? Simple. The base figures are 6 and 10, which multiplied make 60. 60 x 60 x 60 x 60 = 12,960,000. Or see this calendrically. A year of 360 days (60 x 60) was based on 72 five-day weeks, and a great year on 72 360-day years = 25,290, to which must be added the extra five days per year which makes a further 360 days, or one leap year, per cycle. The logic is remarkable.
Two final pieces of data, which may be marginal:@
a) From Dynasty V (2350 BCE - which date needs noting in connection with key changes to the role of the deity in Sumer as well, and links to the Av-Ram at Ur story) the lion began to replace the bull in Egyptian liturgy and mythology, and human sacrifice was abandoned (does that provide a date for the Akeda?). Till then Pharaoh was "the great god" (Av-Ram and Jupiter have the same meaning). During Dynasties 1-4 "the good god" (a change similar to Av-Ram becoming Av-Raham?).
a) From Dynasty V (2350 BCE - which date needs noting in connection with key changes to the role of the deity in Sumer as well, and links to the Av-Ram at Ur story) the lion began to replace the bull in Egyptian liturgy and mythology, and human sacrifice was abandoned (does that provide a date for the Akeda?). Till then Pharaoh was "the great god" (Av-Ram and Jupiter have the same meaning). During Dynasties 1-4 "the good god" (a change similar to Av-Ram becoming Av-Raham?).
b) However, this clashes with the order of the astrological table, in which Leo, the Lion, comes between Cancer and Virgo - the positioning is based on the ecliptic longitudes of the constellations, with Aries at 00, Taurus at 30, and Pisces at 330, making the progression from Bull to Ram to Fish logical; Leo is at 120. As per the paragraph below, the change may in fact have been from a lunar to a solar calendar, rather than the arrival of a new epoch in the celestial calendar.
which is:
How do the mathematical calculations above help us calculate the precise ages of the patriarchs in our numbers?
And the answer, sadly, is: not that much.
The date for No'ach, for example, is not correct - the age given is at the time of the Flood but there is no information from which to date the Flood from his birth. Also Chanoch (Enoch) appears twice, with different ages, because the list is a combining of two lists. So we can't make any deductions on the basis of these figures. The Beney Yisra-El calendar may in fact have taken the Babylonian methodology and adapted it to its own theological needs; the numbers 6 and 10 are not significant to the Beney Yisra-El (yes, there are Ten Commandments in the final redaction, but that is late; there were originally only 7 or 8); and at different points the numbers 7 and 8 were the key numbers (which is why the Menorah has 7 candles but the Chanukiah 8; nothing to do with oil-miracles, everything to do with pantheons of gods and goddesses); so again deductions for comparison can't be made. However, an equivalent set of calculations can be, using the same formulas as in the decimal and sexigesimal, but adapting them to septal and octal. And then, for example, divide 1656 by 72 and the figure reached is 23. I wonder if, knowing the full years of No'ach and the correct original list, a division by 72 wouldn't yield 25.92 = one-tenth of a great year (the total to make this would be 1814.40, a difference of just 158.4 years).
The date for No'ach, for example, is not correct - the age given is at the time of the Flood but there is no information from which to date the Flood from his birth. Also Chanoch (Enoch) appears twice, with different ages, because the list is a combining of two lists. So we can't make any deductions on the basis of these figures. The Beney Yisra-El calendar may in fact have taken the Babylonian methodology and adapted it to its own theological needs; the numbers 6 and 10 are not significant to the Beney Yisra-El (yes, there are Ten Commandments in the final redaction, but that is late; there were originally only 7 or 8); and at different points the numbers 7 and 8 were the key numbers (which is why the Menorah has 7 candles but the Chanukiah 8; nothing to do with oil-miracles, everything to do with pantheons of gods and goddesses); so again deductions for comparison can't be made. However, an equivalent set of calculations can be, using the same formulas as in the decimal and sexigesimal, but adapting them to septal and octal. And then, for example, divide 1656 by 72 and the figure reached is 23. I wonder if, knowing the full years of No'ach and the correct original list, a division by 72 wouldn't yield 25.92 = one-tenth of a great year (the total to make this would be 1814.40, a difference of just 158.4 years).
It is also worth making this calculation: one Jewish year = 365 days. Multiply by the 23 we reached, add the five leap-year days such a period would require and you get precisely 1200 seven-day weeks; multiply that by 72 and we get 86,400. Treat the Babylonian week as seven-day instead of 5, and the recalculation of the sum that originally yielded 432,000 now, divided by 5 as it must be, also yields 86,400. So in fact it does work! And we can therefore treat the Beney Yisra-El list as reflecting, not the lives of human kings at all, but the ten eons or jubilee periods of the ante-diluvian time, periods ruled by divinities not men. Thus the evidence builds for arguing that the Biblical patriarchs are a diminution into human tales of an astrological account of the Creation. Drummond would be delighted if he knew!
In India to this day the same integer is used. 1200. (1200 x 201 = 241,200; 1200 x 360 = 456,000; 1200 x 360 = 432,000
60 = the soss
600 = the ner
3600 = the sar
216,000 = the great sar (60 x 3600)
Two great sars = 432,000
600 = the ner
3600 = the sar
216,000 = the great sar (60 x 3600)
Two great sars = 432,000
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| No'ach, Ziusudra or Utnapishtim? |
Fu Hsi in the I Ching is accredited with the symbols on which that book is based (a form of alphabet), and with discovering the crafts of fishing and hunting.
Shen Nung ruled the world for 17 generations (circa 340 years); he invented the plough and instituted markets.
Huang Ti, the Yellow Emperor, had twenty-five sons from whom the Chou Dynasty grew. He invented fire, cleared the bush, and drove out the wild animals to establish cattle-breeding. He also drove in an ivory chariot drawn by six dragons with the wind-god in the vanguard, the rain-god to sprinkle the road, tigers and wolves galloping ahead of him, spirits behind him, serpents on the ground and phoenixes above - the normal symbolic animals of the mandala.
Shao Hao reigned only 7 years - an echo of the ritual regicide.
Chuan Hsu was also known as Kao Yang; a deluge story is told about him, but he did not survive it.
K'u had 2 wives, Chiang Yuan and Chien Ti, both of whom had sons by miracles - the first by treading on god's footprint.
Ti Yao. Yao means divine (cf Yah/Ea). The model sage before Confucius. Like the early Subarians (Sag-Giga), his people were known by the epithet "black-haired".
Shun. Another deluge story attaches to him.
Yu. The Great Yu to whom god gave the Great Plan (cf Moses on Sinai) and who overcame the Flood unlike his predecessors (and like Noah was lamed in the process and became drunk afterwards).
Why the eight-year reign and not the seven-year reign of the sacred king? Perhaps because of the cycle of phases of Venus, which requires 584 days to complete - known as a synodic period. Five synods = 2920 days which is precisely eight years. Were the astrologers then watching for the reappearance of Venus? And does this also help explain the Yisra-Eli shift from 7 to 8, and then back again?
But there is more. There is also Homer's account of the Journey of Odysseus.
The war lasted ten years and his journey home another ten. The astronomer Meton, whose Metonic Cycle was the world's calendar until the Roman and then the Julian replaced it, calculated a "Grand Cycle of Nineteen Years" within which the lunar and solar cycles coincide. The lunar has 12 months of 354 days (plus a few hours), the solar 364 (plus a few hours). "On the last day of the 19th year," according to Gilbert Murray, "which was also by Greek reckoning the first of the twentieth, the New Moon would coincide with the New Sun of the Winter Solstice; this was called the 'Meeting of Sun and Moon'. It happened precisely once every 19 years" (was this what the keystone at Stonehenge was about?). Murray has pointed out that Odysseus arrived home "just as the rising of that brightest star which heralds the light of the Daughter of Dawn" and rejoined his wife Penelope "on the twentieth year" - i.e. at the conjunction of the 19th and 20th, at that new moon which the Athenians called "Old-And-New", "when one month is waning and the next rising up" in the words of Homer.
Copyright © 2015 David Prashker
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| Odysseus in his "Ark" |
His patron saint was Hermes, god of the caduceus, which links him with the trinity of Aphrodite, Hera and Athene, who caused the great Trojan War.
Now it happens that this new moon was also the day of the Feast of Apollo, the solstice festival which we celebrate today as Christmas. Homer tells us that Odysseus had 360 boars, of which one died every day, and that the cattle of the sun were in seven herds of fifty each, making 350. Odysseus' journey goes to the west, passes through the realm of the dead, comes up in the east "where the Daughter of Dawn has her dwellings and her dancing-floors and the Sun is uprising", while his Moon-wife Penelope sits at home throughout, weaving and unweaving her web. He is the sun, she the moon. The tale is an attempt to describe the planetary activities by analogy. We are once again witnessing Samson and Delilah, Av-Raham and Sarah, Ishtar and Marduk, Isis and Horus, Arthur and Guinevere, Gradlon and Dahut.
Odysseus sailed in a party of twelve ships, chose twelve men to accompany him when he harrowed hell...and now go read my life of King David, "City of Peace", or my novel "The Land Beside The Sea", and the rest of this should fall into place of its own accord.
Odysseus sailed in a party of twelve ships, chose twelve men to accompany him when he harrowed hell...and now go read my life of King David, "City of Peace", or my novel "The Land Beside The Sea", and the rest of this should fall into place of its own accord.
Copyright © 2015 David Prashker
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