-Caveat Lector-
W.W. Prescott in his book, "The Spade and the Bible" says,
"Not a ruined city has been opened up that has given any comfort to
unbelieving critics or evolutionists. Every find of archaeologists in the Bible lands
has gone on to confirm and confound its enemies."
Life centered around the temple. The temple towers of Babylonia were of the
same design, a series of vast, almost square platforms, with stairways leading up. The
shrine for the god was on the top.
Th ziggurats at Ur had three to eight platforms. The shrine at the top was in
blue glazed brick with a golden metal roof. The Babylonian word ziggarat means a
pinnacle on top of a mountain. The theory is that the ancient conquerors of these
plains, were mountaineers who, either from homesickness or from religious conservatism
or both, wished to worship their god on the high places as they had always done. In
Chaldea they had to make the high places with their own hands. The account of the
building the tower of Babel is the record of such an event.
In Genesis 11:2-3 we read;
"And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they said one to
another, God to, let us make brick and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for
stone, and asphalt had they for mortar. And they said, Go to, let us build a city and
a tower whose top may reach into heaven."
These temples were not only places of worship. Around their courts were store
houses for the tithes and offerings brought in by the faithful worshipers, or paid as
rent by tenants. There were living quarters for the priests and the temple servants.
There were workshops and factories where the men and women, attached to the temple
were employed, spinning and weaving into cloth the wool which the farmers brought.
There was also casting and hammering into art objects the copper and silver paid as
tithes by the merchants of the city.
Exhaustive accounts were kept of what was received and what was disbursed.
Immense cattle yards were kept where the live stock, given to the temple, were cared
for. Contracts were found setting forth their responsibilities and regulating their
profits, documents referring to granaries, freight boats, etc.
The temple stood in relation to the people as the state does in modern times
and the records here are of administration. The records show an efficient and well
organized community. Each person had a cylinder seal, which was rolled over the wet
clay and used in place of a signature. These seals are very small, some only 5/8ths of
an inch long. It took great skill and very tiny tools to carve these. Various semi
precious stones were used. One of gold was found in the tomb of a queen.
About 3750 B.C., the art of the seal reached perhaps its highest expression.
They carved figures whose physical characteristics were emphasized realistically. At
the center of the composition there was a panel containing an inscription. One
inscription shows a bearded hero watering buffalo from a vase out of which flowed two
streams, then it shows water and a rock border at the bottom. The inscription names
Ibnisharrum as the owner of the seal and dedicates it to Shargalisharri, king of
Akkad. He was a grandson of Sargon, or Cain as we know him. This whole scene was on a
cylinder seal less than an inch long and perhaps the size of ones little finger. No
modern jewel engraver could do better.
Because it is difficult to imagine life other than in terms of that which they
knew, they assumed that man's occupations and needs hereafter would be similar to what
they have been in the past, that the next world is a continuation of this world.
Whatever a man used in this lifetime he will use after death. The woman took her
spindle, needle, mirror and her cosmetics. The carpenter took his saw and chisels, the
soldier his weapons of war. The king must be provided with a goodly sample of his pomp
on earth. It is not surprising then that the archaeologists derives most of his
material from the cemeteries of the old world.
What he finds illustrates not only their beliefs and burial customs, but also
their life style. From the royal tombs at Ur, dating about 3000 B.C., come some very
beautiful things. The famous gold dagger of Ur, a weapon whose blade is gold, its hilt
of lapis lazuli decorated with gold studs, and it sheath of gold filigree work. With
it was another object scarcely less remarkable. It was a cone shaped container of
gold, ornamented with a spiral pattern and containing a set of little toilet
instruments, tweezers, lancet and pencil, also of gold.
The royal graves all had a harp. The most magnificent yet found, has a
sounding box bordered with a broad edging of mosaic in red, white and blue. The two
uprights were encrusted with white shell and lapis lazuli and red stone arranged in
zones separated with wide gold bands. Shell plaques engraved with animal scenes
adorned the front. Above these projected a splendid head of a bearded bull wrought in
heavy gold, with a lapis lazuli beard.
Queen Shubad, on her deathbed, wore an ornate headdress of a long gold hair
ribbon covered by beaded wreaths with gold pendants. She also wore heavy gold earrings
and a golden Spanish type comb with five points ending in lapis centered flowers of
gold. By the side of the body lay a second headdress. On a diadem, made of soft white
leather, had been sewn thousands of minute lapis lazuli beads. Against this background
of solid blue, were set a row of exquisitely fashioned gold animals, stags, gazelles,
bulls and goats. Between them there were clusters of pomegranates, three fruits
hanging together shielded by their leaves. There was a helmet of beaten gold made to
fit low over the head with cheek pieces to protect the face. It was in the form of a
wig, the locks of hair hammered in relief, the individual hairs shown by delicate
lines. The ears were rendered in high relief and are pierced so as not to interfere
with hearing.
"Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does NOT
mean to stand by the President or any other public official
save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the
country. It is patriotic to support him insofar as he efficiently
serves the country. It is unpatriotic not to oppose him to the
exact extent that by inefficiency or otherwise he fails in his
duty to stand by the country." (Theodore Roosevelt)
"False propaganda, to be truly effective, Has to exist
in an environment in which there are no alternatives
to contradict it. Otherwise, it can be seen for the lie
that it is."
There are three kinds of people in America:
1). Those that know what is going on;
2). Those that think they know what is going on; and
3). Those that don't have a clue as to what is going on.
"5% of the people think. 10% of the people think they think.
The rest would rather die than think."
"How long would it take a blind giant, hammering upon an
anvil, to produce a watch?" That's how long it would take the
evolutionists to explain their stupid theory.
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