Canaanite mythology in Bible

[Gottle_of_Geer]

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[color=black:
[QUOTE]
dkward2
[/QUOTE]
]For instance, I always took the evidence that so many religions have a flood story (even the ancient Native Americans) as partial proof that it happened.]

I’ve read that too - I doubt it was world-wide, for several reasons: Genesis 6-8 were not written by people who knew of the USA, for a start. We do - so we take for granted that the “whole earth” they speak of is as big as the one we know. People do likewise when reading Revelation.​

quote]Are you saying that the flood was simply put in the Bible because other religions already had a flood story? If so, in what way does God make the story unique for Himself to illustrate His nature?

See above ​

If all these stories came from other religions, in what way are they inspired?

##Alternatively: if those stories are known, why not turn them to good use by telling them so that they express Israel’s faith in her God ? Why must they be original with Israel - why can’t they be transformed from their non-Israelite use ? Why can’t they be purified ?

“Mythological” imagery and motifs are important artistically - they add vividness to a narrative: a story about God coming down and confusing the speech of mankind may or may not be related to a Sumerian tale about the unity of mankind, but it is more memorable than the bare assertion, “God confused the speech of mankind”. Imagery in Isaiah 27.1 about God slaying the sea-serpent with His sharp sword is “mythological” - it is also very vivid, and does not stop that passage being an oracle of judgement: the message is unhindered. Other literatures are vivid and colourful - why can’t the Biblical books be too ? If grace perfects nature, why should the grace of inspiration be incompatible with literary ability and the means by which it is shown ? JHWH, as a “man of war” has a

• sword [Judges 7.18; Isa. 27.1]
• net [Ezekiel 12.13],
• bow, arrows & spear [Gen. 9.13; Habakkuk 3.11];

as well as a chariot, house, priests & people & much more; so He is much like some other gods in one way - it is because He is different from them in kind that He is unique. He does or has many things any self-respecting god would do or have - yet He is radically different from them all. So He can absorb attributes of theirs without harm. To tell Him from Baal or El or Marduk needed faith; and it was because the poet of Isaiah 40-55 had this faith, that he could say that JHWH was not simply the only god of His people, nor the only god who mattered, but the only God there is at all. That is what is special about Him - not the many similarities, but the few crucial differences.

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[Gottle_of_Geer]

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What do we do at Mass, but re-enact a myth ? It just happens to be the one myth that is also an historical fact with a date and place: that’s why we mention Pilate when we say it; it was during his term of office that God was tried & crucified

The Cross is the Cosmic Tree

The altar is the Holy Mountain

Priests & people are the assembly of the sons of God

The banquet of the gods is the Eucharistic meal

Christ Himself, of Whom the altar is a metaphor in stone, is the Bond of Heaven and earth.

So the Bible, by being full of mythology, is doing & being no more than Christ did & was. It has mythic features, because He has. He was not “original” either - he was not the first god to die: Baal died too - and was restored to life. The difference with Jesus is, that where Baal restores the cycle of fertility, Jesus restores the human race and the world itself. He gives to men the Life of God, which is Love - Baal restored only the fertility needed by men to live on earth. He did not give them the life of the gods.

Calling Mary “mother of God” is not original either - it was a title of Isis, as the mother of Horus: that does not make it any less appropriate and right for Mary to be called that: because here also, myth becomes historical fact. Nor was she the first mother to be a virgin, by a long way. That’s why that Ugaritic text which is word for word the same as Isaiah 7.14 is so important - in Jesus, all these “pagan” things come together and are unified. If Mary can be called by an unoriginal title - why can’t the OT be unoriginal in drawing on the materials & ideas it shared with its neighbours, while transforming the significance of what it shared with them ?

Apart from anything else: if the Bible is a genuinely human book, why should those who compiled it be expected to be unaffected and untouched by the cultures around them ? St. Paul quoted Stoic ideas - if he and his letters are undamaged by so doing, why is it damaging, bad, or distorting for the rest of the Bible to be affected and influenced by the world of its times ? Being in a specific culture at a specific time under certain conditions rather than others, goes with being a human being, and with being produced by men - so the OT received certain influences, rather than others. If Isaiah had been a modern Nigerian, his book would have been very different; but he was an eighth-century Jew, so his book shows this. This is all a part of the “scandal of particularity” - the worry that some people have about the “limitedness” of believing that Jesus of Nazareth is the unique Divine Redeemer of the human race. If God is to be really a man, he has to live as one - & in Jesus He did. It is these particularities, that are studied by those who are able to.

If anything, the virgin mothers & dying gods people so often mention as objections to faith in Jesus Christ the Son of Mary, far from being difficulties, are evidence of the care which God took to prepare the world for the Incarnation of Christ. If God is really going to be crucified - why be surprised that there is a myth about the similar sufferings of Prometheus ? If He is to be King of Kings and Lord of Lords - why is it surprising to find Osiris called that ? Since the Israelites lived among such ideas, why could they not be made to serve the purposes of God by being in the OT, which is perfected in Christ ? ##

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Melchior:

It shouldn’t be. I am dissapointed to see many of the responses. It seems too many people take 20th century higher criticism way too seriously. It is a skeptics approach to scripture.

No more so than any other - but we can put that on one side, I think. It’s too big a topic to be adequately discussed in a single exchange of posts.​

Stick with the tradtional views of the father and orhtodox theologians who know what they are talking about. reinventing the wheel 2000 years later should give great pause to anyone who has studied scripture seriously.

That is pretty well what was said about using Aristotelian ideas in theology - Walter of St.Victor calls Aristotle & Plato “infernal men”. The works of Aristotle had been used by John Philoponus in the 500s; he ended up being accused of tritheism. In 1215, several of Aristotle’s works were forbidden. “When the theologians of Europe floundered in their attempt to cope with the eastern learning that was flooding the West for the first time after many centuries, Albert the Great, with the insight of genius, divined the situation and probed the needs of his time. He realized that neither flight from Aristotle, prohibition of his works, nor eclectic choice of his texts was the right solution. Christian thought must enter into this heritage and make it its own.”​

op.org/domcentral/trad/domspirit/spirit06.htm

Not all the Fathers were ready to condemn all pagan learning: St. Basil encouraged Christians to make use of it. St. Jerome was very familiar with the works of Cicero. Augustine was deeply influenced by Neo-Platonism; too much, perhaps.

What really surprises me is the similarity between those Protestants who condemn Catholicism for being “pagan”, & those Catholics who condemn their fellow-Catholics’ interest in the Bible’s origins and cultural background.

The complaint is the same: something holy and divine is being degraded, by being studied as though it were compiled by real, living, thinking, human beings. That’s like saying the Sacraments are being degraded by those who think in detail about what is humanly involved in the act of consecration of a Host. Yet they, quite rightly, are not accused of “rejecting the supernatural”. They are aware that God uses human things to accomplish His work - so they study those things. They write books about them. Those books are read. They build up the Church. Even though much of their analysis uses ideas which come from pagans. When an analogous operation is performed upon the details of the OT, those who perform it are sternly rebuked as sceptics, disturbers of faith, rationalists, heretics, liberals, rejecters of the supernatural; not thanked for the immense work they have done in making the character of the Bible clear, in general and in detail.

In the NT, St Paul quotes a Stoic poet. Are those who point out his quotations from pre-Christian pagans criticised ? No. Good. So why are those who show how the OT draws upon pagan things faulted for so doing ? If citing a hymn to Zeus does not spoil St Paul or Acts 17. why does echoing a Ugaritic myth spoil Isaiah 7.14 and its prophet ?

It could be that ideas (say) not part of the culture and religion of God’s People, are being ennobled, purified, sanctified, consecrated, so as to become further means by which God can make His People more & more able to think of Him rightly. If water can be made fit to sanctify and give life, why can’t ideas about holy hills be taken over from Canaan for use in the OT ? Why is it wrong to trace the use of a motif or idea or image: to compare the vision of Micaiah son of Imlah in 1 Kings 22 with its divine council imagery, to other uses of the same imagery in Isaiah 6, Revelation 4-5, & comparable scenes in Mesopotamian literature ? ##

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[Daniel_Marsh]

Thanks Geer, I have the Ras Shamra Parallels on order for interlibrary loan. They are only avilable in a few libraries, so I may not be able to get them.

 

[Peter_John]

The Book of Tobit has some influence from the story of Ahiqar or Ahikar, which has an Assyrian or Babylonian origin.

The Book of Job is perhaps the most obvious. The basic story is older than any other story in the Bible, but the form in which it comes to us reflects the changes in understanding of God that had eveloped since. If the Holy Spirit inspired the translators and the retellers, that makes it no less scripture – and perhaps more – than in its original form as an ancient pre-Abrahamic fable. God inspires poets, musicians and historians too.

 

[edwest2]

“Genesis does not contain purified myths.” Pontifical Biblical Commission, 1909

Peace,
Ed

 

[Peter_John]

“Genesis does not contain purified myths.” Pontifical Biblical Commission, 1909
Peace,
Ed

I am not sure how that relates. Did someone claim that Genesis has purified myths?

 

[rcjones]

The toledoth in Genesis when compared to the form of writing on ancient Babylonian tablets that predate Abraham suggest that Genesis was written by eyewitnesses and so puts written ‘Jewish’ history back to Adam, Seth, etc.

As such all Canaanite myths devolved from a true knowledge of God that Adam had just as the Bible records.

Look up P.J. Wiseman and Genesis

One must remember that the accepted histories of ancient civilizations are but myth themselves when compared to the documented history of the Bible.

Those who will not believe will grasp at any fable to support their disbelief. Since the tablets which give this evidence were not discovered until the 1940’s, it has not yet worked it’s way into popular scholarship. But the evidence indicates that Geneis was constructed by copying clay tablets, with their colophons intact onto papyrus.

The colophon contains the name of the author or tablet owner giving testimony to the eyewitness nature of the events contained therein. It suggests that the tablets were passed father to son until Jacob went to Egypt, that they were likely placed in Pharaoh’s library by Joseph and discovered there by Moses, which is how he knew his people’s history.

The naysayers denied there was a literal Jericho until relatively recently when it was discovered. Doubt after doubt about the Bible has been proven to be true by science. So if you don’t understand something now, just wait.

And the book of Job is a prophecy of the tribulation of Christ. The only reason that it appears to be myth are the elements of heavenly dialogs, which suggests more of the ignorance of the doubters concerning the nature of time and eternity and the unpacking of prophecy than it does of the mythic nature of the Bible.

 

[Peter_John]

The toledoth in Genesis when compared to the form of writing on ancient Babylonian tablets that predate Abraham suggest that Genesis was written by eyewitnesses and so puts written ‘Jewish’ history back to Adam, Seth, etc.

As such all Canaanite myths devolved from a true knowledge of God that Adam had just as the Bible records.

Look up P.J. Wiseman and Genesis

One must remember that the accepted histories of ancient civilizations are but myth themselves when compared to the documented history of the Bible.

Those who will not believe will grasp at any fable to support their disbelief. Since the tablets which give this evidence were not discovered until the 1940’s, it has not yet worked it’s way into popular scholarship. But the evidence indicates that Geneis was constructed by copying clay tablets, with their colophons intact onto papyrus.

The colophon contains the name of the author or tablet owner giving testimony to the eyewitness nature of the events contained therein. It suggests that the tablets were passed father to son until Jacob went to Egypt, that they were likely placed in Pharaoh’s library by Joseph and discovered there by Moses, which is how he knew his people’s history.

The naysayers denied there was a literal Jericho until relatively recently when it was discovered. Doubt after doubt about the Bible has been proven to be true by science. So if you don’t understand something now, just wait.

And the book of Job is a prophecy of the tribulation of Christ. The only reason that it appears to be myth are the elements of heavenly dialogs, which suggests more of the ignorance of the doubters concerning the nature of time and eternity and the unpacking of prophecy than it does of the mythic nature of the Bible.

I do not think I called Job a myth. I did call it a Fable, but perhaps I should have called it a Parable instead, as it does not involve such features of fables as anthropomorphism. None of that means it is a completely fabricated story, or that it is not the Word of God, but a parable may or may not describe events that literally happen to make its point…

The story did exist in the region of Abraham’s promised land before Abraham was there. It has been retold various times before reaching us in its current form, which is the form the Lord intends us to know it.

Whether God told Adam everything, man lost and had to regain it or not, the Bible shows a continual unfolding of the nature of God as the people develop better understanding of Him. The fact that some ancient Israelites persisted in worshipping the gods of the Land (i.e. the Canaanite gods) is an inherent part of the history of their slow acceptance of the one God, and is inherent in the stories of the Old Testament.

None of that justifies the conclusions that this apostate worship was acceptable before God or that other “gods” really do exist. Maccabees and Wisdom are adamant on this. Any other gods are not real at all, and have no power whatsoever.

 

[Peter_John]

The toledoth in Genesis when compared to the form of writing on ancient Babylonian tablets that predate Abraham suggest that Genesis was written by eyewitnesses and so puts written ‘Jewish’ history back to Adam, Seth, etc.

As such all Canaanite myths devolved from a true knowledge of God that Adam had just as the Bible records.

Look up P.J. Wiseman and Genesis

One must remember that the accepted histories of ancient civilizations are but myth themselves when compared to the documented history of the Bible.

Those who will not believe will grasp at any fable to support their disbelief. Since the tablets which give this evidence were not discovered until the 1940’s, it has not yet worked it’s way into popular scholarship. But the evidence indicates that Geneis was constructed by copying clay tablets, with their colophons intact onto papyrus.

The colophon contains the name of the author or tablet owner giving testimony to the eyewitness nature of the events contained therein. It suggests that the tablets were passed father to son until Jacob went to Egypt, that they were likely placed in Pharaoh’s library by Joseph and discovered there by Moses, which is how he knew his people’s history.

The naysayers denied there was a literal Jericho until relatively recently when it was discovered. Doubt after doubt about the Bible has been proven to be true by science. So if you don’t understand something now, just wait.

And the book of Job is a prophecy of the tribulation of Christ. The only reason that it appears to be myth are the elements of heavenly dialogs, which suggests more of the ignorance of the doubters concerning the nature of time and eternity and the unpacking of prophecy than it does of the mythic nature of the Bible.

Wiseman’s ideas may intrigue, but they do not reflect realities.

First, all the languages were scattered at the Tower of Babel, and in addition the various cultures had changing languages throughout that time… How did anyone read the alleged records from before the Tower of Babel, since the language was different. Did Moses know all these languages? If, as it suggests Ishmael wrote Isaac’s story, and Esau wrote Jacob’s story, that would certainly lend weight to Islam

In addition, it assumes the invalidity of Oral tradition to accurately tell a story. In fact oral tradition requires people to tell and retell stories perfectly before they are authorized to present them publicly. The problem arises when too many of the story tellers die at once, just as with written records inconsistencies arise with misspelling, diminished access to scribes, and loss through fire, or perhaps a giant global flood.

If it were all eywitnesses, who eyewitnessed the six days of Creation?

It is no wonder that only one other scholar in most of a a Century (not counting Wiseman’s sone) has given any credit to the idea, and that no new evidence has arisen to support it.

The Book of Job I could consider an allegory of the tribulation of Christ, less than an all out prophecy. However, that allegory is in the portions the Holy Spirit brought forth through redaction as much as through individual composition. God uses writers, editors, and compilers all like pens in his hands, not like dictating machines.

Hosea is a good example of this. He did not tell Hosea what to write so much as make Him fall in love with someone who wouldn’t appreciate it any more than we people often appreciate His love for us. Then God told Hosea to write about the experience, but did not tell him what to write, except for maybe saying, “Now you know how I feel,” first.

 

[rcjones]

Wiseman’s ideas may intrigue, but they do not reflect realities.

I’ll know who to turn to now whenever I want to know absolute truth… so glad to meet you.

First, all the languages were scattered at the Tower of Babel, and in addition the various cultures had changing languages throughout that time…

How did anyone read the alleged records from before the Tower of Babel, since the language was different. Did Moses know all these languages?

It suggests that the proto Hebrew was the one that remained the same since the family that had the tablets could read them.

If, as it suggests Ishmael wrote Isaac’s story, and Esau wrote Jacob’s story, that would certainly lend weight to Islam

They were both the first born children who had their birthright taken. The only thing left was the tradition of writing the story. Many commentators comment that the Bible preserves the sinful nature of the Patriarchs such as Jacob. This is easily explained if it were written by his brother who thought he was cheated. Jacob and Esau were reconciled giving him a chance to learn what happened that he didn’t witness directly.

Likewise Isaac and Ishmael together buried their father so that such information could be recorded. Ishmael did get the blessing and is part of the promise made to Abraham. His children are called dust (Ishmaelites without the word) sand of the sea shore (Jews washed by the word) and stars in the firmament (lights in Christ).

My theology doesn’t say that God has no place for the Ishmaelites.

In addition, it assumes the invalidity of Oral tradition to accurately tell a story. In fact oral tradition requires people to tell and retell stories perfectly before they are authorized to present them publicly. The problem arises when too many of the story tellers die at once, just as with written records inconsistencies arise with misspelling, diminished access to scribes, and loss through fire, or perhaps a giant global flood.

It doesn’t assume anything, as anyone actually reading Wiseman would know. It is an observation and correlation of clay tablets and the toledoth. The suggested history of the development of Genesis simply does not require oral tradition other than brothers talking to each other.

If it were all eywitnesses, who eyewitnessed the six days of Creation?

God. The signature is that of “the heavens and the earth”. This is taken from Genesis 1:1 where the sensus plenior says: In Christ, the not dark, separated the eternal Father and Holy Ghost from the incarnate Son. As such, “the heavens and the earth” is the signature line of God in Trinity.

It is no wonder that only one other scholar in most of a a Century (not counting Wiseman’s sone) has given any credit to the idea, and that no new evidence has arisen to support it.

Modern scholars no longer do scholarship, they parrot one another. And archeology has been severely limited in the region since the 40’s. It seems the Ishmaelites don’t want much more evidence discovered that weighs against them in the historicity of the Bible.

The Book of Job I could consider an allegory of the tribulation of Christ, less than an all out prophecy. However, that allegory is in the portions the Holy Spirit brought forth through redaction as much as through individual composition. God uses writers, editors, and compilers all like pens in his hands, not like dictating machines.

Nice opinion, however, when you discover a complete second narrative underlying it you may have a change of opinion, but probably not.

Hosea is a good example of this. He did not tell Hosea what to write so much as make Him fall in love with someone who wouldn’t appreciate it any more than we people often appreciate His love for us. Then God told Hosea to write about the experience, but did not tell him what to write, except for maybe saying, “Now you know how I feel,” first.

Your God is smaller than mine. My God was in complete control of Hosea’s DNA, his education, his language, and all of the circumstances surrounding his life such that when he wrote his book, he wrote exactly what God wanted him to, and he could not have written anything different. Similarly to the book of Job, unbeknown to him, his words contain a complete second narrative which is a prophecy of Christ.

 

[Peter_John]

Your God is smaller than mine. My God was in complete control of Hosea’s DNA, his education, his language, and all of the circumstances surrounding his life such that when he wrote his book, he wrote exactly what God wanted him to, and he could not have written anything different. Similarly to the book of Job, unbeknown to him, his words contain a complete second narrative which is a prophecy of Christ.

I do not see how what you state in this is any different from what I have expressed. I am saying God did not whisper in their ears and tell them what to write, but that their entire nature and experence produced what they wrote.

My God is big enough to even include people who edited material through history. Hence when a story arose from a pre-Abrahamic culture in Canaan (as did Job – the essential story is among the Bible’s oldest) he brought out people to adapt the form: The form that came down to us includes cultural references and Hebrew poetic techniques that did not exist in the earlier cultures. God used editors and compilers, along with their DNA and the uinderstanding he gave them of their own cultures to refresh the story for new geneations, including the Messianic allegory (which means a second story laid on top of the first – your post agrees with what I said).

You seem to be responding to what you expected I waqs going to say instead of what I actually expressed. You have no need to be so defensive just because – along with all but one other Christian scholar – do not accept Wiseman. You apparently assum that because I disagree with one thing you say I disagree with it all.

The great thing about the Book of Job is that at the beginning when Job gets hit with all these misfortunes, he asks, “If a man die shall he live again?” At the end he has no question. He says, “I know that my redeemer lives and that he shall stand at the last day upon the Earth … yet in my flesh I shall see God.”

This testimony is inconsistent with one of the seeking questions of earlier periods of Hebrew understanding of God, as for generations they believed that personal success and prosperity was the proof of God’s favor. Failure and loss evidenced God’s disfavor. Job offered an inconquerable paradox until this aspect of the redeemer was introduced. But it had not been there all along, since the culture from which it came was not even part of the Covenant.

I am sure your God is big enough to take a story/event that originates anywhere and incorporate it into a lesson for his covenant people by using those who tell it and retell it like pens in his hand, by setting up the circumstances in their lives, right down to the DNA to produce exactly the words He wants…

 

[CougaNova]

• The Ancient of Days in Dan. 7.10-13 seems to owe a lot to El, the supreme god in Ugarit
• El dwells at twin water-sources - rather as the four rivers in Gen. 2 all flow out of the Garden of Eden.
• The story about Dagon in 2 Sam. 5, from the same set of gods, looks as if it is making the point that he is falling on his face in worship; & so, acknowledging the superiority of Israel’s god
• Asherah in 1 & 2 Kings (for instance) is Atirat, the wife of El.
• The gods of Ugarit assembled on a holy mountain. Zaphon, “North” seems to be its Hebrew name - as for mentions of a mountain used for this purpose, it is behind OT references to JHWH’s [holy] hill/mountain", and to “the hill/mountain of the Lord”; as in Psalms 2, 15, etc.
• the “sons of El/god/the gods” are this assembly
• The title JHWH Sabaoth/“of Hosts” reflects the position of JHWH as the leader of this assembly in war: sometimes the hosts are stars, sometimes “angels”; sometimes the stars are a flock of sheep
• The promise in Isaiah 7.14 is word for word the same as a line in a Ugaritic myth.
• **Psalm 29 ascribes to JHWH functions exercised by Baal (AKA Hadad, Ramman)

This is just a few, from Canaan only - if one looks at books devoted to the topic of parallels to the Bible, a great many more crop up. Given that Israel was not isolated from its neighbours, this is unsurprising. **
The Edinburgh Ras Shamra Project

Ugaritic and Hebrew Parallels Project

In this case the Biblical writer just took the Canaanite myth and turned it around and said, "No, you dumbbells! Yahweh, not Baal, assumes those functions.

 

[Vladd]

I believe the Bible - and the presence of all that mythology helps to make the Bible far more interesting, and far more truly human, than the notion that the Bible is a parable-free, mythology-free, saga-free, rhetoric-free zone. Why should the Biblical texts be unique in giving the reader a dull, unhuman, body of texts ? Israel’s neighbours had myths - why should these be wholly undetectable in the Bible ?​

Elijah does what Baal does - which is presumably why he disappears in a chariot in 2 Kings 2: as so often, he beats Baal at his own game

IMO, the presence of these elements is theologically important, because it helps to show that what was alien to Israel’s faith in JHWH could be used to serve that faith. ##

Sounds like Elijah and Baal were in some kind of air craft and since it’s unidentified it’s a UFO, that the definition for UFO, so why do people reject that idea is what I wonder? I don’t see a problem with the idea of heaven being another planet out of our galaxy.

 

[Gorgias]

Sounds like Elijah and Baal were in some kind of air craft and since it’s unidentified it’s a UFO, that the definition for UFO, so why do people reject that idea is what I wonder? I don’t see a problem with the idea of heaven being another planet out of our galaxy.

Why reject the idea? Well, for starters, you’re taking the current definition of “UFO” and trying to apply it to a completely different context. When you say “UFO” today, you’re talking about extra-terrestrial creatures; the context of the Bible story would never try to make that claim.

And, of course, that’s the the second problem with your assertion: the “problem with the idea of heaven being another planet” is that it means that God is from another planet, right? And this would imply that God is creature, not creator. When (some) atheists poke fun at the “big man in the sky”, it’s frustrating, since they just don’t get it – the God we’re positing isn’t just another creature, He’s the uncreated creator of all, and exists outside of creation.

 

[Vladd]

Why reject the idea? Well, for starters, you’re taking the current definition of “UFO” and trying to apply it to a completely different context. When you say “UFO” today, you’re talking about extra-terrestrial creatures; the context of the Bible story would never try to make that claim.

And, of course, that’s the the second problem with your Iassertion: the “problem with the idea of heaven being another planet” is that it means that God is from another planet, right? And this would imply that God is creature, not creator. When (some) atheists poke fun at the “big man in the sky”, it’s frustrating, since they just don’t get it – the God we’re positing isn’t just another creature, He’s the uncreated creator of all, and exists outside of creation.

I’m talking about Elijah and Baal. What else would it mean ? He says they left to the heavens in chariots . The heavens and anyone knows this is now known as space and back then the way mankind got around or a rich man was a chariot so they wouldn’t know what else to call a air craft but a chariot. You tell me what they were talking about the please , because I can’t think of what else it would be. Any answer or suggestion will be accepted because I’m here to learn. So what was that chariot headed to the heavens and disappeared ? Why do people think just because it’s a UFO or extra terrestrial that it’s ET? That’s so childish and like me thinking a guy who eats spinage will grow muscles or if I see a deer on the road then Santa Claus must of had a wreck , I don’t see it as a bad thing . Why can’t someone in a UFO be a advanced being that looks just like us? Why does it have to be ET? Please tell me what that chariot was then?

 

[bmullins]

I’m talking about Elijah and Baal. What else would it mean ? He says they left to the heavens in chariots . The heavens and anyone knows this is now known as space and back then the way mankind got around or a rich man was a chariot so they wouldn’t know what else to call a air craft but a chariot. You tell me what they were talking about the please , because I can’t think of what else it would be. Any answer or suggestion will be accepted because I’m here to learn. So what was that chariot headed to the heavens and disappeared ? Why do people think just because it’s a UFO or extra terrestrial that it’s ET? That’s so childish and like me thinking a guy who eats spinage will grow muscles or if I see a deer on the road then Santa Claus must of had a wreck , I don’t see it as a bad thing . Why can’t someone in a UFO be a advanced being that looks just like us? Why does it have to be ET? Please tell me what that chariot was then?

Well, throughout the old testament God’s presence is often expressed with fire. The Israelites were led by a column of flame that went before them as they journeyed with the Ark of the Covenant. The very first experience of Moses with God was a burning bush. The vision that Abraham had of the covenant was of a smoking fire pot representing God passing through the ritual area.

To primitive man, fire gives off light. Even the son was considered nothing more than a flame in the sky (and they weren’t far off). The writers described what they saw with what they were familiar with. Elijah was pulled up by God into heaven. Now whether or not there were actual chariots, or not we are not sure. My thought is that the words were used in a descriptive sense. It describes a ‘whirlwind’ pulling him up and chariots of fire separating them.

We also see that Elisha prayed in 2 Kings 6 that God open the yes of the fellow that was with him to see the army of ‘chariots of fire’ that surrounded and protected them. Where they literal chariots of fire and horses? Maybe. Or it could have represented a powerful army of angels. It would be akin to us looking out and seeing a massive army surrounding us and when trying to explain how powerful it was saying, they had tanks and nuclear bombs! Chariots were THE weapon of the elite, the powerful way of fighting wars.

That doesn’t exclude the possibility that God can make his angels appear IN actual chariots of fire. I just think a lot of it could also be allegorical language.

 

[Vladd]

Well, throughout the old testament God’s presence is often expressed with fire. The Israelites were led by a column of flame that went before them as they journeyed with the Ark of the Covenant. The very first experience of Moses with God was a burning bush. The vision that Abraham had of the covenant was of a smoking fire pot representing God passing through the ritual area.

To primitive man, fire gives off light. Even the son was considered nothing more than a flame in the sky (and they weren’t far off). The writers described what they saw with what they were familiar with. Elijah was pulled up by God into heaven. Now whether or not there were actual chariots, or not we are not sure. My thought is that the words were used in a descriptive sense. It describes a ‘whirlwind’ pulling him up and chariots of fire separating them.

We also see that Elisha prayed in 2 Kings 6 that God open the yes of the fellow that was with him to see the army of ‘chariots of fire’ that surrounded and protected them. Where they literal chariots of fire and horses? Maybe. Or it could have represented a powerful army of angels. It would be akin to us looking out and seeing a massive army surrounding us and when trying to explain how powerful it was saying, they had tanks and nuclear bombs! Chariots were THE weapon of the elite, the powerful way of fighting wars.

That doesn’t exclude the possibility that God can make his angels appear IN actual chariots of fire. I just think a lot of it could also be allegorical language.

Thanks you , this is a good answer that I can accept. Thanks for your time and patience . I just never have seen the issue with my God couldn’t have advanced technology and all you know.