| Origen (184 - 253 AD) was an early Christian scholar who commented on the practices of the Jews, their customs, and the origin of their myths and deities. In the next paragraph, quoting from Contra Celsus, Origen suggests the Jewish faith was not the creation of any new idea or belief: “If, then, in these respects the Jews were carefully to preserve their own law, they are not to be blamed for so doing, but those persons rather who have forsaken their own usages and adopted those of the Jews. And if they pride themselves on it, as being possessed of superior wisdom, and keep aloof from intercourse with others, as not being equally pure with themselves, they have already heard that their doctrine concerning heaven is not peculiar to them, but, to pass by all others, is one which has long ago been received by the Persians, as Herodotus somewhere mentions. ‘For they have a custom,’ he says, ‘of going up to the tops of the mountains, and of offering sacrifices to Jupiter, giving the name of Jupiter to the whole circle of the heavens.’ … ‘And I think,’ continues Celsus, ‘that it makes no difference whether you call the highest being Zeus, or Zen, or Adonai, or Sabaoth, or Ammoun like the Egyptians, or Pappaeus like the Scythians. Nor would they be deemed at all holier than others in this respect, that they observe the rite of circumcision, for this was done by the Egyptians and Colchians before them; nor because they abstain from swine's flesh, for the Egyptians practiced abstinence not only from it, but from the flesh of goats, and sheep, and oxen, and fishes as well; while Pythagoras and his disciples do not eat beans, nor anything that contains life’.” (12) Then, who were the ancient Hebrews? The ancient Hebrews, called Habiru, meaning dusty or dirty, (13) were a band of nomadic vagabonds originally made up of “rebels, outlaws, raiders, mercenaries, bowmen, servants, slaves, and laborers,” sometimes called the “Apiru.” (14) Basically, they were what we call today, “gypsies.” They were disenfranchised orphans who had either been orphaned from childhood due to their parent’s death or they were cast out from their tribes for being too despicable of people or not respecting tribal laws or customs, similar to the people who roam the streets today, who have no homes, no family, and no heritage. Society has pretty much rejected them, and they have nothing or little to lose. Sometimes those people would band together as gangs of misfits, causing local havoc. The word Habiru occurs in hundreds of texts from the 2nd millennium BC, which cover a 600-year time period from approximately the 8th through the 12th century BC, and found at sites all throughout the Middle East from Egypt, Canaan, Syria and Anatolia and used interchangeably with the Sumerian SA-GAZ, phonetically equivalent to the Akkadian word saggasu which means “murderer” and “destroyer.” (15) Now it should also be made clear that like every group of people, not all of them were bad folks. There were good people among them, too. (16) |
If we are going to be fair here, the early Israelites or Habirus, despite their paternal/maternal head trips, were probably much like our modern day hippies who had been convicted by law, thrown out of their homes, cast out of society and turned to a life of crime (trading in untaxed contraband, or even petty theft like dine and dash and dumpster diving.) The first time I was on a Grateful Dead parking lot, after the show, I swear I was back in Egypt or Canaan and I recognized many of my Bedouin brothers and sisters walking about, doing what we did thousands of years ago, namely selling and taking psychedelics and herbs like cannabis and mushrooms. The times have changed, but conditions under Rome/Britain remain the same. (17) The people most associated with the Habiru were the Hurrians. - Professor Meek, in his Hebrew Origins, (1936), writes of them: “These and similar analogues between the early Hebrews and the Hurrians, along with the occurrence of Hurrian names and references to Hurrians in the Old Testament, indicate quite clearly that the two migrations went together. Hurrians and Habiru, or Hebrews, were found together in Mesopotamia, and it is likely that they would be found together in the west…” (18) The Hebrew people referred to their own language as “the language of Canaan.” (19) In order to identify the god Yahweh or Jehovah we need to look at the similarities to the other goddesses or gods before him. Tammuz had become a grain and harvest god who was still worshiped at the time of Jehovah and the first Israelites. Each year first fruits or grain would be brought from Bethlehem (The House of Bread), and each year the women would wail, cry and weep for Tammuz during the “Feast of Unleavened Bread.” (20) It is written in the Gospel of the Egyptians, after the founding of the world, Sakla said to his angels: “I am a jealous god, and apart from me nothing has come into being.” (21) (12) Origen. Contra Celsus BOOK V., Chapter 41 (13) Rainey, Anson F. (2008). "Who Were the Early Israelites?" (PDF). Biblical Archaeology Review. 34:06, (Nov/Dec 2008): 51–55 (14) Coote, Robert B. (2000). "Hapiru, Apiru". In David Noel, Freedman; Allen C., Myers. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible; McLaughlin, John L. (2012). The Ancient Near East. Abingdon Press; Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2007). David and Solomon: In Search of the Bible's Sacred Kings and the Roots of the Western Tradition. Simon and Schuster; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habiru (15) Rainey, Anson F. (2008). "Who Were the Early Israelites?" (PDF). Biblical Archaeology Review. 34:06, (Nov/Dec 2008): 51–55.) (Rainey, Anson F. (1995). "Unruly Elements in Late Bronze Canaanite Society". In Wright, David Pearson; Freedman, David Noel; Hurvitz, Avi. Pomegranates and Golden Bells. Eisenbrauns (16) Youngblood, Ronald (2005). "The Amarna Letters and the "Habiru"." In Carnagey, Glenn A.; Schoville, Keith N. Beyond the Jordan: Studies in Honor of W. Harold Mare. Wipf and Stock Publishers (17) Blenkinsopp, Joseph (2009). Judaism, the First Phase: The Place of Ezra and Nehemiah in the Origins of Judaism. Eerdmans (18) T. J. Meek, Hebrew Origins, 1936, p. 15-16 (19) Before the Bible, p. 131 (20) White Goddess, p. 118 (21) The Nag Hammadi Library - The Gospel of the Egyptians- Translated by Alexander Bohlig and Frederik Wisse |