Who Laid the Foundations of Science?

A reader of Biblical Anthropology has asked:

"Sages affirm that all antediluvian sciences originate with the Egyptian Hermes [Tehuti], in Upper Egypt (namely Khmunu (Hermopolis). The Jews call him Enoch and the Muslims call him Idris. He was the first who spoke of the material of the superior world and of planetary movements...Medicine and poetry were his functions... [as well as] the sciences, including alchemy and magic." [Cf. Asin Palacios, Ibn Masarra, p. 13],

Based on this evidence, is there a possibility that the second line of the inscription is referring to Enoch of the Bible?


Alice C. Linsley

Sufficient historical, anthropological and archaeological evidence exists to justify the hypothesis that astronomy, mathematics, medicine and mummification, binary thought and triangulation (pyramids), metal work, mining technologies, cultivation techniques, animal husbandry, the earliest priestly writings, and the earliest known trade records are found among the Nilo-Saharans.

Plato wrote that Nilotic scribes had been keeping astronomical records for 10,000 years. He should know since he studied with a priest in Memphis for 13 years, and knew about Earth's Great Year. This is the time of between 25,000 and 28,000 years that it takes for Earth to complete the cycle of axial precession. This precession was known to Plato who defined the "perfect year" as the return of the celestial bodies (planets) and the diurnal rotation of the fixed stars to their original positions. The ancients understood much more than we moderns recognize.

By 4245 BC, the priests of the Upper Nile had established a calendar based on the appearance of the star Sirius. Apparently, they had been tracking this star and connecting it to seasonal changes and agriculture for thousands of years. The priest Manetho reported in his history (c. 241 BC) that Nilotic Africans had been “star-gazing” as early as 40,000 years ago.

None of the advancements I listed above can be positively identified with a single individual. Instead they are connected to great rulers and their scribes, priests and metal workers. Enoch is a variant of Anak, and it is a royal title. The Anakim are identified as the "mighty men of old" in Genesis.

Keep in mind that royal names appear with more than one person, so it is difficult to identify which Enoch/Anak is referenced here. There is Enoch, the father-in-law of Kain and Seth; Enoch, the son of Kain (Gen. 4:17-18); and Enoch the father of Methuselah (Gen. 5:21-13). Likewise, there is Lamech the Elder (Gen. 4:18-24) and Lamech the Younger (Gen. 5:26-31); Esau the Elder and Esau the Younger; Joktan/Yaqtan the Elder and Joktan/Yaqtan the Younger, etc. Joktan is linked to the Joktanite clans of Southern Arabia (Mohammed's people).

To further complicate matters, we have seemingly conflicting claims about these great chiefs who built territories in the ancient world. Consider the case of Irad, Kain's grandson (Gen. 4:18). The name has these variants: Jared (Gen. 5::18-20) and Yared of Igbo history. Yared is the best rendering of the ruler's name as it has the distinctive initial Y - a solar cradle - indicating divine appointment by overshadowing. This is how it would have appeared among the Proto-Saharan Nilotic peoples. DNA studies have confirmed that the Igbo's ancestors came from the Upper Nile during the Africa Wet Period when the great water systems interconnected. However, many Igbo say that they have always lived at the confluence of the Niger-Benue rivers and that Yared was the founder of their writing system.

The late Igbo apologist, Dr. Catherine Acholonu, pointed out: "Sumerian texts say that the first city built by the gods on earth was called Eridu. There they placed the members of Adam’s family. Adam’s great grandson was named Yared, meaning ‘He of Eridu’, ‘person from Eridu’. Its Igbo equivalent, with the same meaning, is Oye Eridu. The father of Yared was Enosh/Enu-Esh. His name meant ‘Master of humankind’, for the first people were called Esh, Adam too was called Esh in vernacular Hebrew. In Sumerian this sacred word Esh means ‘Righteous Shepherd’. All Sumerian kings bore the title Esh. Equally in Igbo land Esh/Eshi/Nshi is a sacred word implying divine origins of the first people, who indeed were wielders of supernatural powers." (From here.)

There is a connection between the Sumerians and the Igbo, but that is because the Sumerians and the Igbo both have a common point of origin in the Nile Valley thousands of years before either group emerged as a separate ethnicity.

Note that Dr. Acholonu's etymologies are irregular. The Hebrew generic word for man is ish. Therefore, she cannot make an explicit connection to Adam. Further, Eridu is Ur of the Idu, that is Ur of the red Horites living in Mesopotamia.

There is a site called Eridu in Nigeria also. It is located to the south-west of the Yoruba town of Ijebu-Ode in Ogun state southwest Nigeria (6°47′13″N 3°52′30″E / 6.78700°N 3.87488°E / 6.78700; 3.87488). It has ramparts 72 feet high and the wall runs a distance of 100 miles around the ancient shrine city. The British archaeologist studying the site is Patrick Darling. He has described it in these words: "The vertical sided ditches go around the area for 100 miles and it is more than 1,000 years old. That makes it the earliest proof of an kingdom founded in the African rain forest." (From here.)

The Eridu in Nigeria is not nearly as old as the Eridu mentioned in the ancient Sumerian text above. However, it is the work of people connected to the Horites of the Bible. It is associated with the Ijebu who are called "Jebusites" in Genesis. Melchizedek was the Jebusite ruler-priest who attended to Abraham after Abraham incurred blood guilt in battle.

The modern day Jebusites/Ijebu of Nigeria live near and have close association with the modern day Edomites who are called Edo, who live in Benin. In Canaan, the Jebusites had close connections with the Horite Hebrew of Edom, who the Greeks later referred to as the red people of Idumea.

The Bible identifies Edom as an ancient seat of wisdom in Jeremiah 49:7. Abraham was a Horite Hebrew ruler in Edom. His territory extended on a north-south axis between Hebron (where Sarah resided) and Beersheba (where his cousin wife Keturah resided) and on an east-west axis between Engedi and Gerar. This means that Abraham controlled most, if not all, of the land of Edom. The rulers of Edom who descend from Seir the Horite are listed in Genesis 36.

The Horite Hebrew ancestors represent the oldest known caste of royal priests (ha-biru/Hebrew) and their oldest known shrine was in Nekhen on the Nile. There they offered prayers to Horus, the Creator God's son, as the Sun rose in the east.

The Horites dispersed out of Africa into Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, Cholcis, Iberia, and as far as Southern China. They were in service of the rulers of all the lands shown on the map. This includes modern Turkey, Georgia, and southwestern Russia. It is believed that it was from this region that the Horite ruler-priests of the Kushan moved into the Balkans, and from there to Ireland and the British Isles.


Related reading: Solving the Ainu Mystery; The Urhemiat of the Canaanite Y; Who Was Melchizedek?; Adam Was a Red Man; The Kushite-Kushan Connection; Why Nekhen is Anthropologically Significant

The Land of WaWaT

Nubian incense burner (3200-3000 BC)
Discovered at Qustul, Cemetery L, tomb 24

Alice C. Linsley

The Upper Nile appears to be the point of origin of the features of religion that are associated with Moses and his people. This includes animal sacrifice, the burning of incense, circumcision, ruler-priests, the Holy Name YHWH, and the solar imagery of the Habiru/Hebrews.

Of special interest is ancient Nubia between c. 3100 and 2300 B.C. This region was called by different names. The ancient Egyptians called the land south of the first Nile cataract "Ta-neh-su." In Tanehsu, they called the land between the first and second cataracts, Wawat. It was described as a region rich in gold. It may correspond to the Biblical description of the land of Ha-vilah. In 2007, archaeologists from the Oriental Institute discovered a 4000 year gold-processing center along the Nile in the region of Wawat. The site is called Hosh el-Guruf. More than 55 grinding stones made of granite-like gneiss were found at the site. The ore was ground to recover the gold and water from the Nile was used to separate the flakes from the particle residue.

Geoff Emberling, Director of the Oriental Institute Museum and a co-leader of the expedition that discovered the gold working operation at Hosh el-Guruf, reported that his team also discovered a cemetery at nearby al-Widay with high-status pottery vessels that appear to have been made at Kerma, about 225 miles away. Wi means mummy in ancient Egyptian. The earliest mummification took place among the Saharans who discovered that the bodies that were buried in the desert and covered with sand became mummies through a natural process. Some of these mummified persons have been found in pan graves.

The al-Widay cemetery included 90 closely packed stone circles. The covered shafts were circular and lined with stones, a typical feature of the Pan Graves of Proto-Saharan nobility. Pan Grave cemeteries have been found at a number of sites in Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia. These graves are associated with the Beja, an ancient metal working people of the Sahara. The Egyptians called them "Medja-yu." They brought gold to Egypt from mines deep in the heartland of Nubia. At the Temple at Dendur in Nubia the sons of a local Beja chieftain, Pedisi and Pihor, are honored. Ped-isi refers to Hathor who was later called Isis, and Pi-hor refers to Horus.

Kerma was one of the most important centers of ancient Nubia. In a royal cemetery to the east of Kerma, four massive grave tumuli were discovered. They contained several hundred human remains and were surrounded by thousands of cattle skulls. This was a common burial practice among to the Nilo-Saharan cattle people, often referred to as the C-Group Culture (2300-1550 B.C.). C-Group cemeteries ranged from Heliopolis (Biblical On) to Ethiopia.

Wawat clearly had a long history of occupancy by Nilo-Saharan peoples. It appears to be the region of Nubia's trade with the Upper Nile and the Sahara. They traded incense, copper, gold, shell artifacts, semiprecious stones, and perhaps Nubian beer which was laced with tetracycline.


Wawat and the Pharaohs

In 2300 B.C., the peoples living between the first and second cataracts were under different rulers. The territories were called Irtjet, Setju, Medja, and Wawat. Later all of the land between the first and the second cataracts was called Wawat. The kingdoms of Irtjet and Setju were brought under Wawat's ruler and Wawat became the center of government for that region of the Nile. Under Pepi II, pharaoh of the 6th Dynasty, Pepinakhte Hekiab led a campaign against Wawat and Irtjet, with an army of 20,000 with the determination to "hack up Wawat.” A reported 17,000 prisoners were taken and Pepinakhte compelled the "two rulers of Wawat and Irtjet" to travel to Memphis and pay homage to Pharaoh. From the 12th Dynasty to Ptolemaic times the whole of Lower Nubia was called Wawat.

Old Kingdom texts (2980–2475 B.C.) mention Yam in connection to Wawat. Harkhuf', the governor of Aswan, made several journeys to Yam, according to his autobiography. His journey involved sailing and traveling by donkey, which suggests that Yam was in a more desert area of Upper Nubia, probably toward the hills. On Harhuf's third trip to Yam, three hundred donkeys were brought back to Egypt.The inscription on Harkhuf's tomb explains: "The majesty of Mernere my lord, sent me, together with my father, the sole companion, and ritual priest Iry, to Yam, in order to explore a road to this country. I did it in only seven months."

Harkhuf headed four expeditions to Upper Nubia and Yam in the reigns of Merenre and Pepi II. Harkhuf traveled by land across the hill country of Irtjet northwards, and in his travels he was dependent upon the troops of Yam who accompanied him. On one of these ventures he captured a pygmy, though he is called a "dwarf" in Breasted's translation. An excited young pharaoh promised Harkhuf that he would be greatly rewarded if the pygmy were brought back alive. This letter was preserved as a lengthy inscription on Harkhuf's tomb:

Come northward to the court immediately; [...] thou shalt bring this dwarf with thee, which thou bringest living, prosperous and healthy from the land of spirits, for the dances of the god, to rejoice and [gladden] the heart of the king of Upper and Lower Egypt, Neferkare, who lives forever. When he goes down with thee into the vessel, appoint excellent people, who shall be beside him on each side of the vessel; take care lest he fall into the water. When he sleeps at night appoint excellent people, who shall sleep beside him in his tent, inspect ten times a night. My majesty desires to see this dwarf more than the gifts of Sinai and of Punt. If thou arrivest at court this dwarf being with thee alive, prosperous and healthy, my majesty will do for thee a greater thing than that which was done for the treasurer of the god Burded in the time of Isesi, according to the heart's desire of my majesty to see the dwarf. (James Henry Breasted Ancient Records of Egypt, Part I 328ff)


Yam:  Place of water rituals

Yam's central shrine city was at Kerma on the frontier between Irtjet and Setju. Kerma was likely the location of the "house of the ruler of Irtjet and Setju" mentioned in Harkhuf’s autobiography, and the ruler resided near the temple. Excavations at Kerma have uncovered a walled town surrounding a monumental mud-brick temple. Clearly Kerma was a place of rituals that included water purification and blessings.

The Nile is called yam, meaning "sea" in various Biblical references (Job 41:31; Na 3:8; Isa 18:2). Yam is comprised on two ancient lexemes: Y and M. The Y is the Y solar cradle, indicating divine appointment or anointing by the overshadowing of the sun, Ra's emblem. The form represents the long horns of the Saharo-Nubian cattle. These were venerated as the animal totem of Hathor-Meri, the mother of Horus. She is shown with the Y crown cradling the solar orb. Hathor was venerated at Yam, where her plant totem was the "southern sycamore," a type of fig tree.

The M also represents the concept of water. In ancient Egyptian mw or mu means water. YM suggests a place of anointed waters or a place of water rituals associated with the Horites, devotees of Ra, Horus and Hathor.

3200-3000 B.C. incense burner from Qustul in Wawat. It shows Nilo-Saharan boats, 
a ruler wearing the white crown (Wrrt or Hedjet) of the Upper Nile, and the falcon totem of Horus

W is an ancient lexeme indicating a number of related ideas: Nile waters (wadj - green), purification (w'b.t), priest (wab), waves, effects of sun (w) and moon (warih), wandering or meandering, etc. The T is another ancient lexeme that speaks of crossing from one side to another, the solar arc, and the rising of the sun, or a bnbn, or a sacred pillar. The Egyptian word for the rising sun is wbn. The white crown of the Upper Nile was called the wrrt crown. Wrt means "great one." Wawat suggests a natural place for people to cross the Nile. The region was a place of commerce along ancient trade routes controlled by the authorities of the Nile shrines.

The Divine Name found on the sacrificial altar at the Almaqah temple in the Ethiopian Highlands bears a 7th century B.C. inscription with the name of Yeha (YH).This temple was constructed on the ruins of an earlier Nubian structure. As this was a mountain shrine with an elevation well above the Nile floodplain there is no W as in the Divine Name. The W was a symbol for the Nile waters.


Abraham's Nubian Ancestors

The intermarriage of the Horite ruler-priest lines appears to be unbroken from the Genesis kings to the time of Jesus. This endogamous pattern suggests that the Horites were a caste, rather than an ethnic group. Abraham's Nubian ancestors are called "Kushite" in the Bible. However, the term is anachronistic since many of these ancestors lived before the time of Kush, Noah's grandson.

The  term "Kushite" must be understood to include many peoples: red Nubians, black Nubians, Nilo-Saharan peoples, Bedja, Anu, and Horites. Wenis (who reigned from 2356 to 2323 B.C.) recruited five different Nubian peoples when he assembled Pepi I's army for the military campaign to Canaan.

Archaeological, linguistic, and DNA studies indicate that the Nilo-Saharan peoples dispersed widely, and it is safe to say that many originated in the region of Nekhen (Hierakonpolis) in Sudan and Wawat in Nubia.

Related reading: The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y; Kushite Gold; The Locations of Yam and Kush and Their Historical Implications; Terah's Nubian Ancestors; Is Nehesi Related to the Name Nahor?; The Habiru Were Devotees of Horus; The Saharan Origin of Pharaonic Egypt; Boats and Cows of the Nilo-Saharans

The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y

Minoan horns or feathers (c.1700 BC) Both horns and feathers speak of divine judgement.

Alice C. Linsley

Biblical Anthropology involves research into the origin and development of the scripts of biblical populations such as the Sumerians, the Proto-Saharans, the Egyptians, and the Canaanites. The German word for the primitive homeland of the language is "urheimat" and the discovery of the urheimat requires linguistic, genetic, anthropological, and archaeological research.

Genetic, archaeological and linguistic studies of Nilo-Saharan-speaking populations point to the urheimat in the Nile Valley before 6000 BC when the Sahara was wet and sustained herds. There were subsequent migrations along the Nile Valley into Kenya and Tanzania, and westward to the Chad Basin, Noah's homeland. Nilotes also moved into Canaan and Mesopotamia.

The linguists Peter T. Daniels and William Bright note in the Preface to the work they edited that the oldest known scripts are those of the ancient Near East. They state, "At the root of the single tree of all the scripts that serve the rest of the world is the Canaanite." (The World's Writing Systems, p. xxxvi)

The cattle-herding Proto-Saharans and the later Egyptians had similar imagery to represent the presence of the High God. For the Nilo-Saharans the long horns of the bull were viewed as a cradle for the Sun, the emblem of the High God. Among the Egyptians, this was conveyed by two upright, parallel feathers which constituted the letter Y, a solar symbol. 

Hathor wearing the double solar crown. Relief found at the Hathor Temple at Dendura.

Hathor

Among the Horite Hebrew divine appointment was symbolized by the overshadowing of the Sun. On ancient murals Hathor is shown overshadowed as a sign of her divine appointment to bring forth Horus, the son of Re. 

When she asked how she was to conceive the Messiah, the Virgin Mary was told that she would be "overshadowed" (Luke 1:35). In Christian art this is conveyed by images of the Holy Spirit hovering over Mary's head in the form of a dove.

The biblical texts indicate a link between the Sun cradled in the bull's horns and the parallel feathers and the Canaanite Y. The Y designates a divinely appointed ruler or priest, which is why it appears in the Hebrew names of many biblical persons: Yaqtan (Joktan); Yishmael (Ishmael); Yishbak; Yitzak (Isaac); Yacob (Jacob); Yehuda (Judah); Yosef (Joseph); Yetro (Jethro); Yeshai (Jesse), Yonah (Jonah), Yeroboam (Jeroboam), Josedech (Yosedech) and his son Yeshua (Joshua) who wore the double crown (Zechariah 6:11). 

The Y-shaped headdress of the Somali nomads is called barki and refers to the sun's blessing upon the wearer. The word corresponds to the Hebrew word birka.

The Y symbol was associated with the horns of the cow, the animal totem of Hathor, the mother of Horus, called the "son" of God. Images of Hathor show her with the sun cradled in the horns. This solar symbolism for the High God is why cows were venerated in the ancient world.

Hathor was the patroness of metal workers. A Canaanite temple dedicated to Hathor was discovered at the southwestern edge of Mt. Timnah by Professor Beno Rothenberg of Hebrew University. Timnah is the site of the oldest copper mines in the ancient Near East.

The Y symbol is found in the "Canaanite" alphabet shown in the center of the chart below. Hebrew was one of the languages that developed from the Canaanite. However, the oldest known Semitic language is Akkadian. Tha Akkadian reflects the linguistic worldview of the Afro-Asiatics.

The symbolism of the Y involves the wider solar symbolism of Abraham's ancestors who regarded the sun as the Creator's emblem. These archaic ancestors apparently hoped for life after death through the agency of a great ruler. The ruler would come of the ruler-priest line and his name would bear the initial Y as a sign of his divine appointment.

The ancient Nilo-Saharans, the Egyptians, and the Canaanites regarded the Sun as the emblem of the Creator and believed that the sun's rays inseminate the earth and give life. Today we know from science that there would be no life on earth without the Sun.

Looking again at the chart above, note a close connection between the ancient Egyptian and the North Cushitic Beja. The Beja (Arabic: البجا‎) live in parts of Sudan, Egypt and the Horn of Africa. Their name comes from the ancient Egyptian word for meteroric iron - bja (metal from heaven), and they were/are metalworkers. Beja corresponds to the Sanskrit word bija, meaning semen or seed.

Hathor with ankh

We also know, as did these ancient peoples, that there is a relationship between solar events and the winds on earth. This is expressed in the Egyptian ankh. In ancient Nile monuments Hathor is often shown holding an ankh to someone's lips, offering them the animating Breath of Life or the Ruach (Wind/Breath) of God.

The Agadez Cross (left) is crafted by the Inadan smiths of Niger and symbolizes the same sense of divine blessing and appointment. It is equivalent to the Canaanite Y and to the Egyptian ankh. All three are solar symbols.

This common solar symbolism suggests that the scripts and cultural perceptions of the Nilo-Saharans, the ancient Egyptians, the Canaanites, and the Mesopotamians share a point of origin, probably the Nile Valley. This also appears to be the point of origin of Messianic expectation long before the emergence of Judaism.


Related reading: The Canaanite Y and the Phaistos Disk; Boats and Cows of the Nilo-Saharans; A Tent for the Sun; Iron Seeds From Heaven; The Aleph as Ox Head; Celestial Symbols that Speak of God; The Virgin Mary's Horite Ancestry; Who is Jesus?; Who Were the Wise Men?; The Ra-Horus-Hathor Narrative

The African Cultural Context of Genesis 1-12

Alice C. Linsley

In assessing the literature that pertains to the Genesis Prehistory, it is evident that most scholars have missed the African cultural context of this material. Lacking this perspective, it is difficult to resolve some questions consistent with findings in archaeology, linguistics, migration studies, climate studies and molecular genetics. However, when we place the Genesis "prehistory" in its proper Nilo-Saharan context, textual questions can be resolved quite satisfactorily. This is my field of expertise and why I have labeled my work "Biblical Anthropology."

My disclaimers say that the cultural context of Abraham's people is Mesopotamian and therefore Near Eastern. These people clearly do not understand my 35 years of research. Africa is not the Near East.

The cultural context of Abraham's Mesopotamian ancestors is Nilo-Saharan and usually referred to as "Kushite." Analysis of the kinship and ascendancy pattern of the Genesis kings reveals that Abraham is a direct descendant of Nimrod, a Kushite ruler. Genesis 10 explicitly states that Nimrod was the son of Kush. The language of Nimrod's kingdom was Akkadian, and Akkadian cuneiform is essentially a Nilo-Saharan script/language.

Genesis 4 and 5 tell us about Abraham's Nilo-Saharan ancestors who are the "mighty men of old." They were the rulers of the ancient Afro-Asiatic Dominion. They were city builders, and the archaeological evidence indicates that their cities were shrine centers with sophisticated Neolithic technologies. They were not the first people of earth.

When we place this material in the Nilo-Saharan context we are able to resolve a key question concerning Kain. Eve represents the first Mother, but there is a huge gap of time between the historical Eve and Kain of Gen. 4.

The text does not say that Eve gave birth to Kain. Here is what it states:

Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, "I have gotten/gained (qa-nithi) a man with the help of the Lord."  Gen. 4:1, The Hebrew Study Bible

The human knew Havva his wife, she became pregnant and bore Kayin. She said: Kaniti (Qanithi)/ I have gotten a man, as has YHWH.  Gen. 4:1, The Schocken Bible, Vol. 1

Qany(ty) or Qan-itti comes from Nilo-Saharan languages similar to Oromo and ancient Egyptian. These languages share many phonemes with ancient Akkadian. The Akkadian itti, as in itti šarrim, means "with the king" or "for the king." It is attached to the names of royalty. Even today the Oromo of Ethiopia and Somalia attach itti to names: Kaartuumitti, Finfinneetti and Dimashqitti. That itti is associated with Nilotic rulers is evident in the name of the great Egyptian queen Nefertitti.

Based on this information, the best interpretation of Gen. 4:1 is that the first mother knew that she was the founder of a line of rulers. This suggests a very early belief among Abraham's African ancestors that humans are uniquely equipped to "have dominion" over the earth and other creatures, a belief expressed in Gen. 1:28.

This idea is linked to another belief of Abraham's African ancestors: the idea that humans reflect the image of the Creator, the Ruler of the Cosmos. We are meant to be rulers. Abraham's ancestors took this seriously and dispersed along the ancient water systems. The Nilo-Saharan or "Kushite" dispersion out of Africa has been confirmed by DNA studies.

They also believed that there would come a ruler whose kingdom would be eternal because he would defeat death. That is why the ancient Nilo-Saharan rulers were buried with extreme care. This is the origin of Messianic expectation.


Related reading: The African Context of Biblical Material; Recovering the African Background of Genesis; Adam and Eve: The Blood and the Birther; Horite Temples; The Kushite Marriage Pattern Drove the Kushite Expansion Out of Africa; DNA Research Confirms the Kushite Migration; Righteous Rulers and the Resurrection; On Gaps and Overlaps