I follow Leolaia. I was reading too much into the point. The parallels of chaos to lawlessness are very interesting, thankyou.
The skinny on the Leviathan and Rahab monsters
by Leolaia 36 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Leolaia
Valis...... be careful, be verrrry careful!!
Hey, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!
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Leolaia
darkuncle.... I was born to research!!
Narkissos....The WTS is certainly off-track in equating Jesus with Michael, but I think Daniel's expectation of Michael as the coming deliverer, attested also in the Qumran War Scroll, did enter into the Christian tradition as can be witnessed by the early popularity of angel christologies which Hebrews 1:1-6 was written to refute and which is found also in Simon Peter's characterization of Jesus as a "righeous angel" in Gospel of Thomas 13:2. Revelation 12:1-12 presents Michael instead as the protector of the Messiah, as he also protects Israel, and the same theme (perhaps a compromise position?) is found in the Gospel of the Hebrews, in the rather bizarre statement that Michael the Archangel incarnated himself as the virgin Mary:
"When Christ wished to come upon the earth to men, the good Father summoned a mighty Power in heaven, which was called Michael, and entrusted Christ to the care thereof. And the Power came into the world and it was called Mary, and Christ was in her womb for seven months" (Gospel of the Hebrews, fr. 1).
Revelation 12 however clearly presents the woman-figure as someone distinct from Michael, just as both are distinct from the Messianic child hunted by the primeval dragon.
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Leolaia
PP....Sure, the golden calf story is clearly polemical, condemning the cult surrounding the golden calves of King Jeroboam (1 Kings 12:28-30; 2 Kings 10:29; cf. 2 Kings 17:16), but the evidence does indicate that early Yahwism particularly in the Northern Kingdom included bull/calf iconography and imagery (cf. the name 'gl-yw "Young bull is Yahweh" in Samaria Ostracon 41:1, bovine imagery of Yahweh in Genesis 49:24; Numbers 24:8; Psalm 132:2, 4, and the remarkable description of Yahweh's temple in 1 Kings 7:25 which included a ym "Sea" supported by twelve bronze bulls), and 1 Kings 12:28-30 asserts that Jeroboam's calves were dedicated in memory of the exodus event -- a motif also separately picked up by the Elohist/JE writer in Exodus 32 (and later repeated in the poetic tradition of Psalm 106:19-22 and Nehemiah 9:18). So the story is one element in a cluster of motifs connecting Baal to the exodus salvation event (cf. also the toponym Baal-Zephon, the storm theophany, power over the Sea as expected by the combat myth, etc.).
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Narkissos
As far as I know the bull symbolism belongs to both El and Baal...
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Leolaia
True.....but I believe the calf/young bull alone belongs to Baal.
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Narkissos
Leolaia: I prepared to argue that the Exodus/Kings "calf" was actually a "young bull" when I noticed your last post was edited...
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Leolaia
PP, Narkissos....Anyway, enough about bulls and calves, what do you think of the general thesis? I think the conflict myth explains a heck of a lot in the Bible....
Let me mention two more things I just noticed. One is the connection of the exodus traditions with a Mount Horeb, where Yahweh had his storm theophany, which is based on the same Hebrew root *chrb "to dry up, lay waste, slay, smite" that occurs in Exodus 14:21 to refer to the dry land created in the midst of the ym "Sea", Isaiah 51:9-10 to refer to "drying up" of the Sea, Isaiah 19:5, 44:27 to refer to a future drying up or smiting of the Sea and River (i.e. Yamm and Nahar). Now I know that name Horeb could simply just refer to the very arid and desolate conditions in the Sinai peninsula, but the verb chrb is the perfect word to evoke the primeval battle between Yahweh and the Sea, and note that in most versions of the conflict myth, the battle happens on or near the storm-god's holy mountain.
The other interesting thing is the Lotan myth mentioned in Isaiah:
Isaiah 27:1: "That day Yahweh, with his hard sword, will punish (ypqd) Leviathan (lwytn) the fleeing serpent (nchs brych), Leviathan the twisting serpent (nchs 'qlltn), he will kill the sea-dragon (tnyn 'sr b-ym)".
KTU 1.5 i 1-4: "When you smite (tmchz) Lotan (ltn) the fleeing serpent (btn brch), finish off the twisting serpent (btn 'qltn), the close-coiling one (slyt) with seven heads, the heavens will wither and go slack like the folds of your tunic".
As you can see, the first half of the Ugaritic text is paralleled in Isaiah 27:1. But the second underlined part sounds familiar, doesn't it? It closely resembles the following passages in Isaiah 34:4 and Psalm 102:25-27:
Isaiah 34:4: "All the host of heaven (smym) will wither away (mqq), and the heavens (smym) will roll up like a scroll. All their host shall fall, as leaves from the vine, like leaves falling from the fig tree."
Psalm 102:25-27: "The heavens (smym) are the work of your hands. They will perish ('bd), but you endure; they all will wear out (blh) like a garment (bgd). You change them like a raiment (lbws), and they pass away (chlp)."
Compare with the Canaanite precursor: "The heavens (smm) will wither (ttkch) and go slack (ttrp) like the folds of your tunic ('pd)." Although the wording is different, the connection with the later biblical version seems quite evident. I wonder what else in the OT is borrowed right out of the Canaanite poetic and literary tradition!
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metatron
Great stuff, Leolaia! I was waiting for you to do Leviathan!
metatron
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jst2laws
Leola,
You posts are always of interest to me. But this one happens to cover some research (EL) that I have been doing. I'm suprised you have not emphasized the Sumarian myths and their uncovered library, or is that covered under the Chaldean mythology?
Jst2laws