Who is Jesus?

“One word of truth shall outweigh the whole world.”--Alexander Solzhenitsyn 

"I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do."--Jesus Christ

Alice C. Linsley

Jesus Christ is the Son of God, fully human and fully divine, light from light, and true God from true God. Yet He has been made so "meek and mild" that his eternal nature and divine power are hardly apparent. Is it any wonder that many find him little more than an interesting historical figure?

Study of Jesus' Horite Hebrew ancestry and the Horite Hebrew marriage and ascendancy pattern verifies certain historical facts about Jesus of Nazareth. First, he was born of the priest lines that can be traced back to Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors.  Second, his priest caste were known to be shepherds, and third, he was of royal blood going back to Eden. Jesus' royal blood is traced through the Horite kings of Tyre. God told Ezekiel to "raise a lament over the king of Tyre and say to him: Thus says the Lord God: You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and flawless beauty. You were in Eden, in the Garden of God; every precious stone was your adornment... and gold beautifully wrought for you, mined for you, prepared the day you were created." (Ezekiel 28:11-18)

When we describe Jesus as the "Good Shepherd" or "our Great High Priest" or "the King of Kings" we are not speaking figuratively. He was indeed all of these.


The Seed of the Woman

Jesus is the "Seed" of Genesis 3:15. This first promise of the Bible foretells how the Seed of the Woman will trample the serpent under foot. This is a reference to the defeat of death and the restoration of Paradise. The serpent often symbolized the worm of death. The Apocalypse of St. John (Revelation) identifies the dragon as "that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray" (Rev. 12:9, 20:2). In John's vision the serpent is associated with the serpent of Eden.

In the resurrection, Jesus Christ trampled down death by death and bestowed life on those in the tombs, as recited in the ancient Liturgy. Jesus is the Seed of the Woman, the long-expected Immortal Mortal, the Sent-Away Son who defeats the serpent, subdues all God's enemies, and establishes an eternal kingdom. Jesus' mission involves all these tasks and more.

This Messianic hope started small and grew over many centuries among Jesus' Horite Hebrew ancestors. It is based upon the promise that a Woman of the Horite Hebrew lines would bring forth the "Seed" who would crush the serpent's head and restore Paradise (Gen. 3:15). Jesus identified himself as that Seed in John 12:24. He tells his disciples that he is going to Jerusalem to die and when they object, he explains: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit." The purpose of a seed is to die and be buried in the ground. Unless this happens, it cannot bring forth life.  Here the ordinary expresses something most extraordinary!

The Seed of Genesis 3:15 was to die and rise again in order to defeat the worm/serpent, and to give life to the world. As C.S. Lewis noted, even the pagans of Europe and the Hindus of India had dreams of the god who dies and rises again. This idea appears in their sacred writings. In Mere Christianity, Lewis writes that God "sent the human race what I call good dreams: I mean ... about a god who dies and comes to life again and, by his death, has somehow given new life to men." As Stephen Freeman has written, "Jesus did not come to make bad men good, but to make dead men live."

The Ancient of Days

The Ancient of Days in Aramaic is Atik Yomin and this title appears in the book of Daniel.

"I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of Days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire." (Daniel 7:9)

Variations include the Ancient of Ancients and the Ancient Man. Consider these references:

"Whenever Judgment looms and the forehead of the Impatient One is revealed, the Forehead of the Ancient of Ancients is revealed; Judgment subsides and is not executed." (Idra Rabba, Zohar 3:136b)

"The Ancient Man danced on the serpent, who still spewed poison from his eyes and hissed loudly in his anger, and he trampled down with his feet whatever head the serpent raised, subduing him calmly as if he were being worshipped with flowers. Kaliya, his umbrella of hoods shattered by the gay dance of death, his limbs broken, vomiting blood copiously from his mouths, remembered the Guru of all who move and are still, the Ancient Man, Narayana, and he surrendered to him in his heart." (Srimad Bhagavatam 10:6, from Andrew Wilson, Ed. World Scriptures, p. 449)  This is a reference to "Hari Krishna" or  the ruler-priest "Christ"

The Bhagavata Purana is a sacred text of Hinduism. It draws on ancient oral sources but was not inscribed until around 500 A.D, about 1000 years after the book of Daniel.

The oldest of all these references is found in Daniel 7 and continues with this description of the Christ coming to the Ancient of Days.

13 “I saw in the night visions,
and behold, with the clouds of heaven
there came one like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
and was presented before him.

14 And to him was given dominion
and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, and languages
should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
that shall not be destroyed.

Daniel 7:14 parallels Psalm 145:13: "Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures through all generations."

He Subdues God's Enemies

Jesus Christ is the mighty warrior of God and he will be victorious over all the enemies of God. Psalm 110, recognized as a reference to the Messiah, says: The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.”

Messianic passages such as this have parallels in ancient Horite texts. Remember that Abraham and his ancestors were Horites who expected a woman of their ruler-priest lines to bring forth the Seed. The Horites were devotees of Horus, Son of Ra. Consider how Horus, the archetype of Christ, describes himself in the Coffin texts (passage 148): 

I am Horus, the great Falcon upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name. My flight has reached the horizon. I have passed by the gods of Nut. I have gone further than the gods of old. Even the most ancient bird could not equal my very first flight. I have removed my place beyond the powers of Set, the foe of my father Osiris. No other god could do what I have done. I have brought the ways of eternity to the twilight of the morning. I am unique in my flight. My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet in my name of ‘Red Cloak’. (Myth and Symbol in Ancient Egypt by R.T. Rundle Clark, p. 216)

Job 39:27-30 presents another image of the one who devours enemies and feeds her young with bloody bits of flesh from the carcasses of the fallen. Does the vulture (nesher) mount up at thy command, and make her nest on high? She dwells and abides on the rock, upon the crag of the rock, and the strong place. From there she seeks the prey, and her eyes behold afar off. Her young ones also suck-up blood: and where the slain are, there is she.

In Exodus 19:4, we read: Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and, how I bare you on vulture's (nesherim) wings, and brought you unto myself.

The Hebrews (Habiru) grasped the force of this metaphor since the vulture was an emblem of power and protection in ancient Egypt. Images of the vulture mother of Nekhbet of Elkab are shown with outspread wings on Egyptian monuments and temples. Jesus looking at the Holy City said, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing." (Matt.  23:37)

The vulture represented Hathor's devoted care of Horus, the son of Ra. Horus is the pattern by which some of Abraham's Jewish descendants recognized Jesus as the promised Son of God. Jesus subdues the enemies of God in order that God's children might live and prosper. This is expressed in Psalm 2:12: "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him."


The Lamb/Ram of God

Horus of the two horizons (east-west) and Horus of the two crowns (north-south) are examples of how meaning is derived by holding two points in view. We see this in the Passover sacrifice at twilight, what is called in Hebrew ben ha-'arbayim, meaning "between the two settings." Rabbinic sources take this to mean "from noon on." According to Radak, the first "setting" occurs when the sun passes its zenith at noon and the shadows begin to lengthen, and the second "setting" is the actual sunset (p. 55, vol. 2, The Jewish Publication Society Torah Commentary, "Exodus").

In the Horite Hebrew tradition, Horus rises with the sun as the lamb on the eastern horizon. After his sacrifice at the sacred center (high noon), he grows to full strength as the ram on the western horizon. Now we understand the story of the binding of Isaac. As they ascended Mount Moriah, Isaac asked his father "where is the lamb" for the sacrifice? Abraham replied that God would provide the lamb, but God did not provide a lamb. God provided a ram. The ram caught in the thicket proved that Abraham's act of faith had been acknowledged by God. It appears that Abraham believed Isaac to be the Seed of the Woman (Gen. 3:15). Isaac did meet several of the expected conditions, but God would supply his own Lamb who passed from weakness (kenosis) to fullness of power (resurrection). Jesus is symbolized here. He is the Lamb of God who comes to full strength as the Ram of God.

Horus was called the Lamb in his weaker (kenotic) existence and he was called the Ram in his glorified strength. Both are associated with the death and resurrection symbolism of the vernal equinox. This sheds light on the story of Abraham's offering of his son. James 2:21 says, "Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar? Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?"

When John pointed to Jesus and called Him the "Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world", he identified Him as the fulfillment of the first promise. John writes: "Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God." (I John 5:5) Who passes from fleshly weakness through death to divine strength? Only those who are in the Lamb who has become the Ram.

To be in the strength of the Ram, that is the resurrected strength, one must believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Christianity is not an inclusive religion. There is no free pass to the eternal kingdom.


The Calf of God

Among Abraham's Proto-Saharan ancestors the lamb of God was instead the calf or the red heifer. They were cattle-herding people.

Bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let us eat, and celebrate..." - Luke 15:23

John the Baptist pointed to Jesus and said, "Behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world." John knew that his cousin was born in Bethlehem, the home of an ancient and highly respected line of shepherd priests. Jesus speaks of himself as the "Good Shepherd" in John 10, but he never referred to himself as the "Lamb" of God. Instead he posed himself as the fatted calf in the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Here Jesus speaks of himself as the sacrifice (Θυσατε) and the feast (Eucharist) that come when the Father embraces the repentant sinner. The fatted calf is about sacrifice and the Eucharistic feast, as noted in Clark's Commentary:

The fatted calf, and kill it - Θυσατε, Sacrifice it. In ancient times the animals provided for public feasts were first sacrificed to God. The blood of the beast being poured out before God, by way of atonement for sin, the flesh was considered as consecrated, and the guests were considered as feeding on Divine food.

Clearly the "fatted calf" is a Messianic reference. The sacrificed red cow was to have been a perpetual sacrifice for the people of Israel. The cow is sacrificed and burned outside the camp and the ashes used for "water of lustration." (Numbers 19:9)

Among Abraham's cattle-herding ancestors the fatted calf was sacrificed and eaten to solemnize covenants, upon resolving disputes over water rights, and when making reconciliation between opposing parties. Clearly, the "fatted calf" is not merely a metaphor of celebration for someone's long-awaited return.


The Fixer of Boundaries

The wisdom of the Horites extended to medicine, astronomy, writing, commerce, navigation, natural sciences, and architecture. They were the inventors of the earliest known writing systems. They were the early scribes and wise men or prophets. Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors were dedicated to observation of the planets and constellations. They observed that the planets and the constellations have an orderly clock-like movement. They conceived of this order as fixed and established by the generative force which makes existence possible (logos, nous, ruach, etc.)

Horite wisdom was unrivaled in the ancient world and much of the wisdom ascribed to the ancient Greeks was borrowed from the Horites. Iamblichus wrote that Thales of Miletus insisted that Pythagoras go to Memphis to study because the priests there were esteemed for their knowledge and wisdom. Plato studied for 13 years in Egypt under the priest Sechnuphis and his conception of the eternal Forms was based on Horite metaphysics.

In the works of Plato and Aristotle horos or horismos refers to landmarks, boundaries and categorical limits. The Greek word for boundaries in creation is oros or horos, a reference to the celestial archetype of Horus who who marked the cosmic boundaries and established the "kinds" (essences). He guarded the four directional points and controlled the waves/currents and the winds. This is illustrated in the account of Jesus calming the winds and the waves in Mark 4:35-41, Luke 8:22-25 and Matthew 8:23-27. The veteran fisherman are terrified and cry out to Jesus, saying, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?" The Gospel of Mark then states that: He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?" They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!"

The Storm on the Sea of Galilee by Rembrandt, 1632

The Harmattan trade wind that blows across the Sahara was named for Horus. The word is comprised of the biradicals HR for Horus and MT, meaning order. Horus was invoked to send favorable winds for sailing. The four winds appeared as birds at the four quarters of the heavens. On the walls of Amenemhat's burial chamber at Hawara Horus is depicted at the cardinal points and associated with the resurrection of the ruler. The canopic jars that hold the ruler's organs are topped with the four images of Horus.

For Abraham's Horite ancestors, the Sun spoke to them of their deity, HR (Horus in Greek). He was regarded with his father Ra as the marker of boundaries. Horos (oros in Greek) refers to the boundaries of an area, or a landmark, or a term. From horos come the English words hour, horizon and horoscope. The association of Horus with the horizon is seen in the word Har-ma-khet, meaning Horus of the Horizon.

Horus' mother was Hathor. She conceived miraculously by the overshadowing of the Sun and she is shown on Egyptian monuments holding her child in a manger. Horus is the archetype by which Abraham's descendants would recognize Jesus as the promised Seed of the Woman (Gen. 3:15). His authentication was His rising from the dead on the third day, in accordance with Horite expectation.

In a 5 day ceremony, the Nilotic peoples fasted as a sign of grief for the death of Horus at the hand of his brother. On the third day the priests led processions to the fields where grain was sowed as a sign of Horus' rising to life. Jesus described his death as a seed of grain falling into he ground and dying (John 12:20-26). He foretold his rising on the third day. St. Augustine noted that the Egyptians took great care in the burial of their dead and never practiced cremation. Abraham's ancestors believed in the resurrection of the body and awaited a deified king who would rise from the grave and deliver his people from death to life eternal.

Related reading:  Nicky Gumbel on "Who is Jesus?"; Jesus Christ in Genesis; Who Were the Horites?; Which Bethlehem was Jesus' Birthplace?; Why Jesus Visited Tyre; Theories of Change and Constancy; The Ostrich in Biblical Symbolism; Eden: A Well Watered Region; The Priests of Nazareth; The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y; The Re-Horus-Hathor Narrative