The Bible Story,

An academic circumspection:

Is there truth in this Story?

By: David Freed 11/01/2006

 

Part two,

the cultural manipulation of the Jewish people

 

 

Hopefully, one day, I’ll have a chance to tell this story in some type of recorded media, because I fully understand the slow read of scripture, but for now, this exercise will help to build the perfect script. It would be impossible to include all aspects of the entire story, without reproducing the Bible itself.

 

I know that there is a lot of information to cover, just in the origin stories alone; therefore I have abridged the information as much as possible and will only focus on two parts. Part one begins with our initial creation and covers the de-evolution of man. Part two Ponders the cultural manipulation of the Jewish people and their role in twenty-first century current events.

 

Remember, Heavenly inspired or not, the Bible is one of the most complete records of mankind throughout our history. Actually, it claims to start at the very beginning of our creation and predicts our future demise. So, not only does it claim to cover the entire history of our reality, but also it is additionally supported by a wealth of reference material and commentary, both pro and con.

 

Genesis is the oldest text in the Bible and its authorship is debated. Therefore, every argument about the Bible being “not-factual,” and full of transcription and translation errors, must apply to Genesis in spades. So, lets just examine this Bible Story, from our larger and more cosmologically academic perspective.

 

  

 

 

 

 

Abram

 

City of origin,

 

Ur

 

 

Country of origin,

 

Present day Iraq

 

 

 

 

People are scattered around and speaking different languages, then from a place called Ur, which is located in the heart of Iraq – momentary pause for reflection on current Middle Eastern events – came Abram, his wife Sarai, and their nephew Lot.

 

  

 

Gen 12:1 “”The Lord said to Abram, ‘Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.’”

 

Gen 12:2 “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you: I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.”

 

Gen 12:3 “I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all people on earth will be blessed through you.”

 

I am sure that Abram sure sat up and took notice upon hearing the Lord. Just a simple boo would wake me up for sure, but to be told all these amazing and wonderful things. Here I am only to page twelve of the NIV Bible I am using to write the essay, and already there is a hint of the Christ to come. So, what does Abram decide to do?

 

Gen 12:4 “So Abram left … and Lot went with him…”

 

Abram was 75 years old when this adventure begins and where does God send him to claim as his own?

 

Gen 12:5 “…they set out for the land of Canaan…”

 

Gen 12:7 “The Lord appeared to Abram and said, ‘To you offspring I will give this land.’ So he built an alter there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.”

 

Of course, where else, they went to the homeland of the descendants of Hamm’s son Canaan.  Again, here I am only to page twelve of the NIV Bible I am using to write the essay, and already there is a hint of the roots of today’s Middle Eastern current events. Abram goes into the land of Canaan and calls it his own, just as the Israelis did to the Palestinians in 1948 when Israel once again became a nation and the Dome of the Rock, upon the Temple Mount, is built on around this most sacred rock alter.

 

 

Abram in Egypt

 

 

Gen 12:10 “Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there a while…”

 

Gen 12:11 – 16 However, Abram has this weird idea to pretend that his wife Sarai was actually his sister. She was beautiful and Abram didn’t want to be killed for her, so they played this little game. Then Sarai wound up as the Pharaoh concubine anyway

 

Gen 12:17 “But the Lord inflicted diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram’s wife Sarai.”

 

Gen 12:20 “The pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way, with his wife and everything he had.”

 

Interesting story, Abram and his people go to Egypt because of a famine, the Pharaoh’s household is afflicted by a plague of sorts and Abram and his people are booted out of Egypt. Isn’t this the same story as retold by the Exodus?

 

Abram and his people move back to the very place where Abram built his alter to the Lord, Gen 13:4, and just where again was this place?

 

Gen 13:7 “… The Canaanites … were also living in the land …”

 

Gen 3:8 –11 However, the land couldn’t support every one and their flocks. So to prevent conflict between the peoples of the area, Abram decides that they should all separate and gives his nephew Lot first pick of all the world by saying to Lot,

 

Gen 13:9 “Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; If you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.”

 

Sure can’t fault Abram for being a nice guy.

 

Gen 13:12 “Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tent near Sodom.

 

Gen 13:14 “The Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, ‘Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north, south, east and west.’”

 

Gen 13:15 “All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.”

 

Gen 13:18 “So Abram moved his tent and went to live … where he built an alter to the Lord.”

 

Now I am into the 13th page of my NIV Bible and again here is the story of Abram being given the land that is already populated by the people and culture of the Canaanites. And possibly Abram is living in modern day Jerusalem near the alter on the Temple Mount where is now located The Dome of the Rock. The correlation to current Middle Eastern Events is staggering and sure hints of credibility, if not validity, to the Story as a whole.

 

  

 

Abram rescues Lot

 

 

Then war erupted between “… among the cities of the plain…” and Sodom and Gomorrah both fell to their attackers and the spoils of war were carried off, Gen 14:1 – 11.

 

Gen 14:12 “They also carried off Abram’s nephew Lot and his possessions, since he was living in Sodom.”

 

Gen 14:13 “One who had escaped came and reported to Abram the Hebrew.”

 

So now Abram is a Hebrew and he went and,

 

Gen 14:16 “… brought back his relative Lot and his possessions…”

 

What a nice and heroic man this Abram is. Again, I am only on page 14 of my NIV Bible but the principle of God’s chosen becoming the tool of salvation of the righteous has been set. This act not only wins Abram many new allies in the area, but he is also honored by a special visitor.

 

Gen 14:18 “Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. He was the priest of God Most High, and he blessed Abram … “

 

He was the priest of God Most High… and He brought out bread and wine, the communion meal.

 

Gen 14:20 ”…The Abram gave him a tenth of everything…”

 

And in enters the concept of tithing.

 

God’s covenant with Abram

 

 

Gen 15:1 “After this the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision …”

 

A clear and no nonsense statement of clairvoyance, and acknowledging the fact that some people actually see things shown to them from the outside.

 

Gen 15:2 “But Abram said, ‘O Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless…’”

 

Gen 15:4 “then the word of the Lord came to him… a son coming from your own body will be your heir.”

 

Gen 15:5 In fact, the Lord say that Abram’s descendants will be as numerous as the stars themselves.

 

Gen 15:6 “Abram believed the Lord….”

 

Gen 15:7 – 11 God instructs Abram to make a sacrificial offering and afterwards Abram falls asleep.

 

Gen 15:12 “…Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick dreadful darkness came over him.”

 

Gen 15:13 “‘Know for certain that you descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and they will be mistreated four hundred years.’”

 

Gen 15:14 “But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves…”

 

 Gen 15:18 “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said. ‘To your defendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates.”

 

Once again information is imprinted during a deep sleep, clairvoyant event, and all the land from the Nile to Baghdad and the Euphrates River is given to Abram’s descendants, but predicted (or perhaps programmed) expectations for their future sounds packed with perils, and once again, Abram is promised some one else’s land.

 

 

 

Hagar and Ishmael 

 

Gen 16:1 “Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had born him no children…”

 

Gen 16:2 “so she said to Abram … Go, sleep with my maid servant; perhaps I can build a family through her.”

 

Gen 16:3 “So after … living … in Canaan ten years …”

 

Gen 16:4 “He slept with Hagar, and she conceived….”

 

It only took Abram to go from believing in the promises of the Lord and being persuaded by his wife, and helper, to do things their own way. Is this another example of the Adam and Eve story?

 

Gen 16:4 “… When …(Hagar)… knew she is pregnant, she began to despise her mistress.”

 

Gen 16:5 “Then Sarai said to Abram, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering…’”

 

It was Sarai’s idea, but Abram is responsible. There can be no doubt they were married and not much different than you and I.

 

Gen 16: 6 “… Abram said, ‘Do with her whatever you think best.’ Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.”

 

What a soap opera this plays out to be. Reminds me of the people in some of the stories we hear today. Abram and Sarai are just ordinary folk just like you and I. However, as Hagar is running away into the desert, an Angel of the Lord found her and told her to,

 

Gen 16:9 “…Go back to your mistress and submit to her.”

 

Gen 16:10 “The Angel added, ‘I will so increase your descendants that they will too numerous to count.”

 

Gen 16:11 “The Angel of the Lord also said to her: “You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael …”

 

Gen 16:12 “He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

 

Ishmael becomes the father of the Islamic Nations of the region and the predictive (or programmed) ability to describe the attitudes and behavior of the peoples of those nations. The amazing predictive ability to describe current Middle Eastern events and only 16 chapters, and 16 pages, into my NIV Bible.

 

Also notice here that it is the Angel that promised to increase her descendants. The text doesn’t say that the “Lord said” anything. The Angel said, “…I will do it.” Then Hagar turns right around and calls this Angel her God.

 

Gen 16: 13 “… You are the God that sees me…”

 

Gen 16:16 “Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael.”

 

  

The Covenant of Circumcision

 

 

Gen 17:1 “When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, ‘I am God Almighty….”

 

Gen 17:23 “I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers.”

 

Gen 17:5 “No longer will you be called Abram; for your name will be Abraham…”

 

Gen 17:6 “… I will make nations of you and kings will come from you.”

 

Gen 17:7 “I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants… to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.”

 

Gen 17:8 “The whole land of Canaan where you are now an alien, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants…”

 

Yet again, God give the Hebrews the land occupied by the Canaanites.

 

Gen 17:11 “You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be a sign of the covenant…”

 

Gen 17:15 “… As for Sarai, your wife, … her name will be Sarah…”

 

Gen 17:16 “I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of people will come from her.”

 

Gen 17:17 “ Abraham fell face down, he laughed and said to himself, ‘Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety-nine?

 

Gen 17:18 “… Abraham said to God, ‘If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!”

 

After all, in every cultural tradition at the time and today, Ishmael was the first-born and the rightful heir.

 

Gen 17:19 “God said, ‘Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him…”

 

Gen 17:20 “And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him … he will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation.

 

Ok, it is God himself that promises to make Ishmael into a great nation; but is this in addition to the Angels promise? Who was it that Hagar called her God?

 

Gen 17:21 “But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you…”

 

First there was Cain and Able, where the first-born didn’t get the inheritance, but rather it went to a replacement. Then there was the first pre-deluvian age of man that was replaced by modern times, and now again, it is not the first-born that gets Abraham’s inheritance, but the replacement.

 

 

The three visitors

 

 

Gen 18:1 – 8 Then the Lord appeared to Abraham with two other visitors. Abraham hurriedly prepared them a meal and while eating asked,

 

Gen 18:9 “Where is your wife Sarah…?”

In the tent, says Abraham.

 

Gen 18:10 “Then the Lord said, ‘I will surely return to you in about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son. Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent…”

 

Gen 18:11 “Abraham and Sarah were already old and well advanced in years, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing.”

 

Gen 18:12 “So Sarah laughed…”

 

Gen 18:13 “Then the Lord said to Abraham, ‘Why did Sarah laugh…?’”

 

Gen 18:14 “Is anything to hard for the Lord? …”

 

 

Abraham rescues Lot again

 

As Abraham three visitors leave they tell Abraham about their plan to go to Sodom and Gomorrah and destroy them. However Abraham’s nephew Lot lives over there. So, Abraham begins to plead in Lots behalf.

 

Gen 18:23 Abraham asked, “… Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?”

 

And evidently, Abraham’s plea was adequate because when the three visitors got to the two cities two Angels went into the city ahead of the destruction and told Lot to gather up his family and leave town. This is the story where his wife looked back at the destruction and turned into a pillar of salt, Geneses chapter 19.

 

This is the second time that Abraham intervened to save Lot from harm. The second time that Abraham was responsible for rescuing, or saving, Lot from evil. Additionally, the second salvation also accompanies the destruction of wicked man, just as the second coming is the final solution to our end-times.

 

  

 

The birth of Isaac

 

 

Gen 21:5 “Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.”

 

However, Sarah becomes upset with the living arrangements with Hagar and Abraham’s eldest son Ishmael still living with them, Gen 21:8 – 9.

 

Gen 21:10 Sarah said “… to Abraham, ‘Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.’”

 

 

                      

 

 

 

So Hagar and Ishmael are sent away, which saddens Abraham because Ishmael is his son and he will miss him, but God tells Abraham again,

 

Gen 21:13 “I will make the son of the maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”

 

Three times a blessing is given that Ishmael will become a nation of much population, once by the Angel to Hagar, and twice by God to Abraham. No wonder Ishmael’s descendants fill the Middle East today as the Arab States and Islamic Nations.

 

 

Abraham Tested

 

 

Gen 22:1 “Some time later God tested Abraham…”

 

Gen 22:2 “Then God said, ‘Take your son, your only son, Isaac whom you love, and go … sacrifice him … as a burnt offering.”

 

But, at the last minute an Angel of the Lord called out to him from Heaven.

 

Gen 22:12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy…. Now that I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”

 

Interesting that the true test, the proof if you will, is the sacrifice of an only son.

 

Islamic tradition tells this same story as the moment when Abraham disobeyed God by not going through with God’s commandment. The birth-right, the inheritance, belongs to Ishmael as the first-born, and therefore, all the land between the Nile in Egypt and the Euphrates River belongs to them by God’s very own covenant with Abraham. In fact the Islamic Koran calls for a return to obedience to the God of Abraham.

 

I Ponder the location of this alter, can anyone tell me?

 

Only twenty-two chapters in the Bible Story and already world history is laid out in front of us. The battle for the land of Canaan is set in stone. Our species has de-evolved and our progress stunted over and over to insure a slow progressive crawl to the inevitable Armageddon solution. As long as there is evidence that religious zeal is genetically imprinted, then genetic manipulation and programming possibly plays a role in our larger societal reality.

 

 

 

Isaac becomes Israel

 

 

Gen 24 When Abraham was old and advance in years he called his chief servant to him and made him promise, in the name of the Lord, that Isaac will not have a wife from the land of Canaan. Instead, a wife was to be found from Abraham’s home country and his relatives there. Rebekah is found back in modern day Iraq and become Isaac’s wife. At first, Rebekah was thought to be barren, but when Isaac was sixty tears old she gave birth to twins.

 

Gen 25:23 “The Lord said to her, ‘Two nations are in your womb, and the two peoples within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.

 

 

Jacob and Esau

 

 

Gen 25:25 “The first to come out was red, and his whole body was like a hairy garment; so they named him Esau.”

 

Gen 25:27 “The boys grew up, and Esau became a skilful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was a quite man, staying around the tents.”

 

Gen 25:28 “Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.”

 

Gen 25:29 “Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished.”

 

Gen 25:30 “He said to Jacob, ‘Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!’”

 

Gen 25:31 “Jacob replied, ‘First sell me your birthright.’”

 

Gen 25:32 “’Look I am about to die,’ Esau said. ‘What good is the birthright to me?’”

 

Gen 25:33 “But Jacob said,’ Swear to me first.’ So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.”

 

Gen 27 Years later when Isaac was near death, he called his eldest son, Esau, to him. He instructed Esau to go hunt some game for a meal, at which, Isaac would pass over his inheritance with a blessing. Rebekah heard this conversation, and as Esau disappeared into the countryside to hunt, she went to Jacob with a plan. Jacob was to go into Isaac pretending to be Esau to receive the inheritance and blessing by deceit and when Jacob appeared the least bit hesitant,

 

Gen 27:13 “His mother said to him, ‘My son, let the curse fall on me. Just do what I say…’”

 

Jacob put on some goatskins to simulate his brother’s hairy appearance, and then he put on some of Esau’s clothes to simulate his brother smell, and tricked Isaac into giving him, the younger brother, the birthright of Esau’s. Once again, the first-born did not get the birthright, just as the first-born of Adam, Abraham, and now Isaac. Just as the first age of man was replaced and as the Second Coming becomes the ultimate conclusion, and again a wife, helper, and this time a mother, is involved. 

 

 

Jacob becomes the father of the twelve tribes

 

 

Gen 28 Naturally; Jacob is told – not to marry a Canaanite woman – but to go back to Abraham’s homeland to find a wife from the same genetic pool as Sarah, and Rebekah, yet another genetic reference from the Old Testament.  However, on his journey through Canaan to find a wife,

 

Gen 28:12 “He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on earth, with its top reaching into heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.”

 

Gen 28:13 “There above it stood the Lord and he said, ‘I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying.”

 

Again, the land of Canaan is given to the peoples of Abraham, Isaac, and now Jacob.

 

Gen 29 On his journey Jacob comes to well where he meets Rachael. She must have been something because at this very first meeting,

 

Gen 29:11 “Then Jacob kissed Rachael and began to weep aloud”

 

Jacob makes an arrangement with Laban, Rachael’s father, that he could marry Rachael in exchange for working for seven years. However, on the wedding night, Jacob wound up with Rachael’s older sister Leah, by surprise.

 

Leah was the older sister and deserved to be married first, at least, according to her father, Laban. So Jacob, married Rachael also, and stayed to work seven more years. Now Jacob has two wives, Leah that he didn’t choose, and Rachael whom he desired enough to work fourteen years just to have her as his own.

 

  

 

The sons of Jacob

 

 

Gen 29:31 “When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he opened her womb, but Rachael was barren.”

 

 

        Gen 29:32          Reuben     first-born of Leah

        Gen 29:33          Simeon     second-born of Leah

        Gen 29:34          Levi          third-born of Leah

        Gen 29:35          Judah         fourth-born of Leah

           

By now Rachael is really anxious about not having children. So, just as Sarai gave Abram Hagar, she gave her servant Bilhah as a wife to Jacob.

 

        Gen 30:5-6         Dan          first-born to Bilhah

        Gen 30:7            Naphtali     second-born to Bilhah

           

        Leah copies Rachael’s idea and gives her servant Zilpah to Jacob.

 

        Gen 30:10-11     Gad            first-born to Zilpah

        Gen 30:12-13     Asher        second-born to Zilpah

 

        Gen 30:17-18     Issachar   fifth-born to Leah

        Gen 30:19          Zebulum    sixth-born to Leah

        Gen 30:21          Leah also had a daughter named Dinah

 

Gen 30:22 God remembered Rachael and allowed her to conceive.

         

        Gen 30:23-24     Joseph              first-born of Rachael

       

Joseph was the favorite of Jacob, because he was born from Rachael. Jacob displayed this favoritism to the extent that siblings became jealous.

 

 

Joseph then began having clairvoyant dreams of his brothers bowing

to him and the jealousy became so bad that some of the brothers wanted to kill Joseph. In the end, the brothers sold Joseph to a passing Ishmaelite caravan

 

Gen 35:16-20     Benjamin            second born of Rachael

 

                                      

Pharaoh’s Dream,

and the unification of Israel

 

 

Gen 39 The caravan of Ishmaelites that bought Joseph from his brothers took him to Egypt, where Joseph becomes enslaved, employed, by a prominent official. However, there was some soap opera type of saga that found Joseph innocently imprisoned. In prison where he gained a repetition for having the ability to accurately interpret dreams.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gen 41 Two years later when the Pharaoh has a dream, his staff remembers Joseph’s gift. Although, Joseph points out that it is not his gift, but only God can interpret dreams.  Pharaoh tells Joseph the dream and Joseph correctly interprets it as a foretelling of seven years of plenty followed by seven years of drought and want. Pharaoh is so impressed with Joseph that he makes him the second most powerful man in the kingdom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gen 42-50 Once again famine precipitates the clan of Abraham moving to Egypt, where Joseph had organized huge granaries in preparation.

 

 

                                

               

 

Once Joseph, Jacob, and the brothers are reunited, the twelve tribes of Israel are finally together as one people, as one nation. However, they spend the next four hundred years as slaves to the Egyptians.

 

 

 

 

The Exodus

 

 

Finally, Israel is a nation of one people, although, they are trapped in bondage and servitude. The world stage is set. All the players are in place and even the land has been prepared. Now here comes the push that puts everything in motion toward that final battle, which will play out in the Middle East.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Exodus 1-13 During a time when, all male Israeli children are being killed at birth, In order to prevent the Israeli people from becoming too strong for Egypt’s control, a male child is born and is hidden from harm. But instead of running away to Egypt with is family, Moses was cast afloat in a basket of reeds, found and raised by a princess. Raised in a culture that is separated from his father's, you might say. Moses tried to run away from Egypt as an adult, then, the Lord spoke to him, from a burning bush, and Moses returned to Egypt to deliver them from bondage. Taking Aaron along as his spokesperson.

 

 

 

Moses and the plagues

 

Hollywood has been kind to the Judeao-Christian Heritage and we are all aware of Moses and the Exodus story.  I am personally fascinated with new correlative evidence that the Exodus of Moses was synchronous with the explosion of the volcanic island of Santarini. Look for a future paper in this series about the –The Exodus of Moses and a Volcano.

 

The Lord kept telling Moses to say to Pharaoh,  “Let my people go!” And of course, the Pharaoh’s heart was hardened through each plague until the last one.

 

        Ex 7           The Plague of Blood

        Ex 8           The Plague of Frogs

        Ex 8           The plague of Gnats

        Ex 8           The plague of Flies

        Ex 9           The Plague on Livestock

        Ex 9           The Plague of Boils

        Ex 9           The Plague of Hail

        Ex 10         The Plague of Locusts

        Ex 10         The Plague of Darkness

        Ex 11         The plague on the First-Born and Passover

 

Once the Pharaoh yields, the Hebrew nation of Israel packs up and leaves town.

 

Ex 13:21 “By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light...”

 

 

                             

 

 

 

But it doesn’t take Pharaoh long to change his mind and sent the army after them. This is where Moses parts the Red Sea long enough for approximately two million Israelis to cross the sea. Then it falls back in on the perusing army of Pharaoh, destroying them to every man, Ex 14.

 

Ex 14:22

 

 

 

 

  

Interesting that the very first story about Israel as a united nation involves the birth story of the male instrument of salvation and punctuates it with the sacrifice of sons.

 

Ponder this, one man, with a sidekick, went to the most powerful nation on the earth and performed the impossible, both diplomatically and militarily.

 

This was also the most culturally developed religious system on the planet at the time; and the power of the Lord of Moses, who is the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac and Jacob sure turned out to be greater than any god the Egyptians had ever encountered before. Therefore, since Pharaoh was considered a God himself, not only did one man defeat the most powerful nation on the planet; but that man also defeated all the gods of that nation.

 

The Exodus and the Arc of the Covenant

 

The next step in this great Exodus from Egypt was to spend the next forty years wandering around the wilderness of the Sinai. Using those forty years to redefine them selves as a nation. Since their unification as a people, they have only known servitude. What a unique cultural heritage to take into a wilderness for forty years. Two million, or more, people in a desert wilderness totally dependent on the Lord, and Moses as his messenger, for their very survival, a dependence on the very source that is molding their culture along a programmed direction.

 

When needed, food came from Heaven in the form of manna, and Quail flew into their camps, Numbers 11, Exodus 16, and Joshua 5. When the masses were parched, all Moses had to do is strike his staff upon a rock and a spring of water appeared, Numbers 20.  

 

         

 

 

This is also the time that all Jewish religious practices are established. Moses receives the Ten Commandments from God in person.

 

 

 

                         

 

 

 

Moses smashes the Ten Commandments to destroy idolatrous secular religious practices forever, and thereby, raising the Jewish cultural consciousness to a more spiritual relation with their God than is possible with anything made by man.

 

 

                       

 

 

 

 

The Jewish priesthood is established, ordained, and all of the Laws, traditions, practices, dos and don’ts of the Jewish religion are given by God, through Moses, to the people of Israel and recorded in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

 

 

               

 

 

The Ten Commandments are replaced (once again it is the replacement model) and very precise instructions are given to build the Arc of the Covenant to house the stone tablets. The Jewish priesthood is provided with special garments to wear near the Arc. Special instructions are given for the storage and handling of the Arc. 

 

                       

 

 

A temple is built to house the Arc and it is in this Temple that the priest are in communication with God, right there in the midst of the people. In fact, it becomes the mission of the people to carry this Temple and Arc around the desert of the Sini for years.

 

Sequestered away from the rest of the world, becoming more and more culturally unique and ethnically pure. Subservient to their newly defined Lord and Master, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Then to complete this cultural conditioning, a cultural cleansing is performed by not allowing anyone that physically walked across the Red Sea floor into the Promised Land, not even Moses.

 

 

The Promised Land

Joshua, Palestine, and the Arc of the Covenant

 

 

Just where is this Promised Land?

 

Abram was 75 years old when this adventure begins and where does God send him to claim as his own?

 

Gen 12:5 “…they set out for the land of Canaan…”

 

Gen 12:7 “The Lord appeared to Abram and said, ‘To you offspring I will give this land.’ So he built an alter there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.”

 

And again,

 

Gen 13:12 “Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tent near Sodom.

 

Gen 13:14 “The Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, ‘Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north, south, east and west.’”

 

Gen 13:15 “All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.”

 

Then, while journeying through the land of Canaan and camping for the night, Jacob,

 

Gen 28:12 “…had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on earth, with its top reaching into heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.”

 

Gen 28:13 “There above it stood the Lord and he said, ‘I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying.”

 

This land was never the original property of the Jewish people. God gave it to Abraham, some 600 years earlier, and again, God gave it, to Jacob, some 500 years earlier. In the meantime the Jewish people have been limited in growth and culturally isolated from the rest of the world. A nation of Israel that now has a Jewish religious faith that is indistinguishable from its government. Sounds pretty much like today.

 

 

                           

  

In the mean time, the land of Canaan and the surrounding Middle Eastern Area saw great population growth. The Canaanites were only one of many tribes, bands, or nations inhabiting the area. There were many cities and communities of many ethnic backgrounds, but they were pretty much all of a central Middle Eastern heritage.

 

Just look at a map. The Middle Eastern culture extends all the way from the Sarah Desert to the boundaries of Russia, China, and India. This entire area is Arabic, potentially Islamite by heritage, and today predominately Muslim.

 

Rename the Land of Canaan to Palestine and how can any one not acknowledge the predictive accuracy of this story, in light of Modern Day World Wide Current Events?

 

After Moses dies, Joshua takes over leadership and as a general leads his people into the Promised Land. Marching always, with the Arc of the Covenant, the symbol of the Lord God, at the front of his army.      

 

 

                    

                       

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At the very first battle, the army of Israel announced to the entire area that God was on their side. Jericho was a tremendously impenetrable citadel fortress with huge perimeter walls, undefeatable, until now.

 

Joshua 6:3 The Lord told King Joshua to “March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days.”

 

Joshua 6:4 “Have seven priest carry trumpets of ram’s horn in front of the Ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times, with the priest blowing their trumpets.”

 

Joshua 6:5 “When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have all the people give a loud shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the people will go up, every man straight in.”

 

As instructed by the priest, Joshua marched the Arc of the Covenant around the city for six day, while blowing trumpets, and the walls just fell down by themselves.

 

Talk about shock and all, president Bush!

 

People are so worried these days about the Middle Eastern countries developing weapons of mass destruction. The Arc of the Covenant turned out to pack quite a punch itself.

 

1 Samuel 6:19 Just for looking into the Ark some Hebrew manuscripts record that 70 men were struck dead, but most Hebrew manuscripts, and the Septuagint, record that 50,070 men were struck dead.

 

1 Samuel 4 Tells the story of the Philistines capturing the Ark in battle.

 

1 Samuel 5 & 6 Then describes how the idol god, of the Philistines, mysteriously falls with its face in the dirt before the Ark. Once re-erected, it falls again, only to have its head, arms, and legs broken off. Then the Philistines suffered plagues of tumors to the point that they gladly returned this weapon of mass destruction back to the Israelites, their mortal enemy.

 

Talk about a cool weapon, not only is it a powerful Weapon of Mass Destruction, that out classes all the weapons of the enemy, and it also, genetically incompatible with your enemy. Lets see the CIA and the American Military Complex do that.

 

 

 

 

Is there truth in this story?

 

If we were to stop reading the Bible story right now, what type of conclusions could we draw? Is this story not a complete and accurate to guide to modern day? Doesn’t his ancient text, possibly full of transcription and translation errors nail the big picture for predictive world wide current events?

 

 

 

Fact # five:

There does seem to an element of predictive accuracy contained within the Bible Story. I am not going to discuss individual verses and phrases, but the overall story is as obvious as a forest full of trees and I believe that there is truth to be found in the Bible Story, at least in the biggest of pictures.

 

 

Fact # six:

What are the chances of nailing the big picture so accurately, if a lot of the smaller points within that same scripture are incorrect? Something to Ponder - isn't it? So, I am expanding Fact # five to the possibility that a lot of the smaller scriptural points may also be closer to factual that previously considered.

 

 

 

 

img in this paper are from: thebiblerevival.com/clipart

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