Sumerian tales versus the bible, page 2

reply to post by illece

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The earliest clay tablets come from the Sumerian cities of Uruk and Jamdat Nasr around 5,300 BP.

Originally posted by illece
reply to post by EdenKaia

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thanks for your answer,i am coming to the belief that the sumerian texts did in fact come first .BUT-is there any archaeological and scientific proof that they did.
i have read the English version of the Gilgamesh epic and i know it does contain the flood story but there are different ideas of the date.

I just gave the dates for the oldest recorded copies of either. What else do you need? The tablets are proof in and of themselves. As for the dates for the Gilgamesh account of the flood, it comes many generations before the time of Gilgamesh's rule (obviously, if he is encountering Utnapishtim himself) and he ruled around 2700 B.C. You will not find any archaeological evidence of a bible story coming before that time. In fact, many of the more popular books, such as the Gospels, were written at least a hundred years after the facts anyway. The New Testament is even worse; composed entirely from what Emperor Constantine and the council of Nicea concluded would be the most appropriate books to paint the most "divine" picture of christ. Anything that made him out to be simply human was left out. These are what make up the "Gnostic Gospels".

There is plenty of proof out there, but the real question has been stated before. How much do you really want to know, and how badly will you flip your views on your faith to find out the truth?

You can learn alot from the bible without it being the oldest thing in the world. To have faith is to do exactly that. You reason with yourself what makes the most sense to you and then form your opinions of faith based on that. So what if the bible borrowed stories from other cultures and made them its own? Does that make the stories any less morally sound? Hell, Jesus wasn't even born December 25th. The concept of Santa Claus and Christmas are borrowed from earlier pagan beliefs. The entire Christian religion is based on compromise and the combination of various cultures and ideas to form one happy family. Is there anything wrong with this? No. Not at all. You just have to decide what you will accept and what you will not.

reply to post by EdenKaia

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hi again, i did not realize these were substantiated ,as you may guess i have been searching the net for some time and have had conflicting evidence for the dates.
i also realize if mankind followed the bible the world would be a much better place .

reply to post by illece

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Religions evolve and change over time, they absorb bits and pieces of other beliefs and cultures.

i also realize if mankind followed the bible the world would be a much better place .

Would the world be a better place if everyone followed the bible? Probably not, as there would be no agreement (as is clearly demonstrated by history) as to what the correct interpretation of the bible is.

Civilization and mankind did okay without Christianity, the majority of the world continues on without it also today.

I've heard Muslim, Jews, Hindoos, Shinto, Buddhists, Communists and Sikhs all make the same claim - if everyone just followed our version of belief everything would be better - that appears to be a tenet of all belief systems - which makes sense if you believe.

reply to post by FlyersFan

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One has to think about the world back then. Very, very few people were literate, if they were they were probably only literate in one language. There was virtually nothing to read so most communication of ideas was oral. - which was greatly hampered by language barriers - there was no way to learn a language except to find a person of that culture and bang out an understanding. Guides and interpreters were key people in those times.

Stories ran around, you see them in Sumer, showing up in the bible and slightly different versions appearing in the Qu'ran. Mohammed couldn't read or write so he must have heard the stories too and incorporated them.

reply to post by SlyFox_79

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Civilization is a crock, human societies existed for tens of thousands of years prior to the Sumerians. Even the Sumerians' own Kings lists attest to this fact.

And that brings me to this point...the Bible is refering to personages that logically must have always existed. Why if you are the Son of God in Roman times and possess everlasting life then you must have existed before all Civilizations. Otherwise the Bible is not what it claims to be, but just a lie.

I set it up for whomever.

reply to post by Hanslune

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And according to the Ethiopians Adam is buried at Bet Golgotha in Lalibela, Ethiopia.

The only reason I would believe the Muslims is if they admitted that the Kaaba Stone is the smooshed up remains of all the Sons of Adam that they've killed.

Otherwise they are probably telling more lies.

reply to post by huckfinn

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Yes and the grave of Jesus is in Japan

Jesus in Japan

And according to the Ethiopians Adam is buried at Bet Golgotha in Lalibela, Ethiopia.

The only reason I would believe the Muslims is if they admitted that the Kaaba Stone is the smooshed up remains of all the Sons of Adam that they've killed.

Otherwise they are probably telling more lies.

Believe tends to generate more and more belief based ideas.

The Kaaba stone is probably just a meterorite that was popular with the pagan religions of pre-Islamic Arabia.

The Qu'ran is no more believable than the bible, it does have one advantage over the bible we know with some certainly who created it and when and who wrote it down.

reply to post by Hanslune

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Thats a funny one hans


Jesus in japan

But, there is a fascinating documentary by a french film maker about his quest to find the truth about the bhuddist St. Issa of Nazth.

It really opened my eyes, St Issa was a person who arrived in the hindu-kush in the early years of the first milleium. He came from the west with a trade carravan, and studdied buddhism at a monastary for a few years before taking his ministry on the road through the himalayan area.
He eventually ended up at another monastary where he returned to his meditation and writing. It is said that he attained enlightenment at this monastary, that is still there today in Nepal.
They say that they have his original writings still in their library.
The monks at the first monastary he taught at, say that they had a large collection of his works till it was confiscated by the british at the turn of the century.
The story they tell is that an anglican missionary was given access to their library to read the old works. After coming across the writings of St Issa they say he left the monastary with one of the works and went to the nearest british governmental seat and returned a couple of weeks later with a small detachment of british army and they confisctaed the library and hauled off the books never to be seen again.
It is said that siant Issa left the himalaya in his late twenties early thirties to return to his home to preach.
It is also said that he returned many years later and told a tale of surviving crucifixtion.

he is buried at a site in the hindu-kush that is revered by all the local religions.

There is another place, a very high pass (18-19,000 feet), where there is a shrine to him and you will find buddhists, hindus and moslems praying at it.

There is also a sect of buddhists that revere him, they follow a code of austere living and medatative prayer, sound familiar.

Heres an interesting side note/coincidence the prayer beads that these monks use is exactly the same as the rosary.
The same number of beads and in the same configuration.
The filmmaker also noted that in the earliest depictions of Christ show him in a garment set that is almost identical to that of period buddhist monks even down to the burgundy colored shawl.

Also, in a sci-am aticle a few years ago, there was a theological historian who put forth that the idea that Jesus survived the crucifixion, with the help of the jewish underground and sympathizers, ie longinus.

Here theory is that when jesus was stabbed by longinus that the spear was poisoned and that the poison gave the appearance of death.

Longinus's proclomation "In truth this man was son of God", gives some measure of validity to the idea that he was a jewish sympathizer.

Some of the finer points of her theory are, the wound as it is traditionaly depicted would not have been fatal, and if done correctly caused little actual injury.

Then , the mollusc that royal blue or tyrrian purple is made from is poisinous, and that it is a relative of the mollusc that is used to "zombie poison" in the carribean. In the right dose it will give the appearance of death for several hrs.

Then there is a old mosaic somewhere in the holy land, that depicts the proccesion, the crucifixion, his removal to the tomb, then there is a curious panel that shows Him being carried out of the tomb under the cover of night.

The funny thing is that the researcher who put forth this idea was a nun that worked for the vatican, and she was excommunicated for her theory.

Howdy Punkinworks

Yep that is some seriously strange stuff. Oh here is the document in question.

St Issa

Ones choices are:

The manuscripts never existed, and all the claims to have seen them are fraudulent.

The manuscripts existed, but are late pseudepigrapha, composed after 19th century missionaries brought Christianity to Tibet.

The manuscripts are early apocrypha, reflecting an early Christian tradition but essentially false.

Jesus visited India as a young man.

reply to post by VelvetSplash

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Howdy VS

I was listening to an audio lecture recently that gave a nice idea that religion was the first science - That is, religion was man's first way of describing and explaining the natural world around him.

Yes, exactly, science is man's second attempt at explaining the world around him. In my mind it does a far better job than the many religions.

Yep the stories out of Sumer are interesting and probably reflect stories that had been around for hundreds or thousands of years before.

reply to post by Hanslune

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Hey there hans,
I actually hadnt seen that text,


there are other indian records of st issa and his travels, records written while he was alive. There is even a picture of him in one text.
There are some texts held in an indian museum that give a passing reference to his travels, as a side note to other events of the day. Events that are known to have occured at the proper time.
The christian tradition has a long history in central asia,
it could be that the story was manufactured millenia ago.

But I dont think so, because those that still follow his teachings are NOT christians, they are hindus and budhists. If the story was propogated after christs "death" by early christians then it would be a christ centric tradition, as we have seen everywhere chritianity was spread.
There is even a place on the west coast of india, where the local are christians, nothing out of the ordinary. Except that they have been christians since the begining, they say their ancestors fled persecution, shortly after the crucifixion, and ended up in india.
The cool thing is, that if you put out to see from yemen at the proper time of year, the trades will blow you right to this part of india.
It was on a travel show that I saw this and that is how the host came across this place, he caught a ride with arab sailors in yemen and sailed to india in a rickity old dhow.
The locals have even produced family heirlooms that can be traced back to the proper period. Roman coins minted in the holy land at the right time and some other everyday objects.
Any way my point being that if it was an early spreading the story they would have spread the story of christ not of Issa.





When the film maker visited the monastary in nepal he found monks that were there to specificaly study the works of Issa. He even found an american that had taken up buddhism and ended up at the monastary and had actually read the some of the texts.
Had his timming not been bad he would have been given accsess to the original works they still have.
But only the high abbot can open that library and he only comes around every 5 years or so, and they invited him back when the library would be open.
I wonder if he ever did go back.
I wish I could remeber the name of the film, it was very good
The story is one to think about.

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