Was the Yellow Emperor a Mesopotamian Priest Physician?

 

The Yellow Emperor as depicted in the album Portraits of Famous Men c.1900 AD.

Housed in the Philadelphia Museum of Art

A member of the Bible and Anthropology Facebook group has asked an excellent question about the origin of Chinese medicine and a possible connection to the Yellow Emperor. He notes that according to the Book of Jubilees knowledge of medicine was given to Noah prior to the flood. This was then passed on the Shem, who has been said to be the grandfather of China's Yellow Emperor.

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

The traders and merchants of the ancient world did business along the great rivers. That is why the oldest settlements are along major rivers in Africa, Mesopotamia, India, and China. The traders carried valuable commodities as well as information and technologies. Some were royal officials who acted as emissaries between rulers. Adventurers and itinerant priests traveled with the traders for safety. In the ancient world healing was the work of priests. 

Noah and his descendants were members of a ruler-priest caste. However, Shem could not be the Yellow Emperor's grandfather because these two men lived at least 1100 years apart.

In the ancient world, only members of the elite strata of society learned and practiced medicine. One of the earliest known medical practitioners was Eanach (Enoch). He served the Pharaoh as his priest-physician, a wab sxmt (wab sekhmet). Eanach lived around 3000 B.C. and is said to have "healed the pharaoh's nostrils." Likely, this means that he performed a healing ritual that involved placing the cross-like Ankh against the Pharaoh's nose and offering prayers for his healing.

The Mesopotamian priest-physician was called azu in Akkadian, the oldest known Semitic language. Their skills probably were learned from the early Nilotic ruler-priests who moved into Mesopotamia as early as 4000 BC in the service of the early kingdom builders like Nimrod, the Kushite (Gen. 10). Genetic studied indicate that some of the Chinese are in mtDNA haplogroup N which has its point of origin in central east Africa (shown on this map).

The priest-physicians specialized in one part of the body: head, stomach, heart, etc, as was noted by Diodorus Siculus, who wrote, "The study of medicine with them was divided between specialists; each physician attending to one kind of illness only. Every place possessed several doctors; some for diseases of the eyes, others for the head, or the teeth, or the stomach, or for internal diseases." 

Priests were often leaders of their people. They were rulers and priests. Some were deified. The legendary Yellow Emperor (Huangdi) seems to fit this pattern. However, long after his time (2697-2598 BC) he became the center of a Chinese cult, and his devotees embellished his achievements. He was credited, for example, with introducing clothing, inventing explosives, and founding Taoism.

The French Sinologist Albert Terrien de Lacouperie (1845–94) wrote about early contact between Mesopotamian peoples and the peoples of China in his 1892 book The Western Origin of the Early Chinese Civilization. He claimed that Chinese civilization was founded around 2300 BC by immigrants from Mesopotamia. According to Lacouperie's hypothesis Huangdi was a Mesopotamian chief who led his people into China around 2300 BC.

Yangshao vessel 3900-3000 BC

Ancient migrating populations settled at major water systems The Pengtoushan culture thrived along the Yangtze River between 7500–6100 B.C., and the Yangshao culture flourished along the central Yellow River between 5000 and 3000 B.C. Yangshao nobles wore silk garments and many motifs found on pottery vessels such as the one above resemble the motifs found on Mesopotamian pottery.

The early priests were also embalmers who prepared the mummies that have been found along the Nile and in the Taklamakan Desert of China. The Tarim Basin population to which the earliest mummies belonged was agropastoral, and they lived c.2000 BC in what was formerly a freshwater environment.

Related reading: Ancient Words for Priests; Physician Priests of Antiquity; Medical Care in the Ancient World

Bees and Honey in Biblical Societies

There are at least 53 references to honey in the Hebrew Bible. Archaeological discoveries reveal that the ancient Israelites kept bees as did their Hebrew ancestors. In Exodus 3:8, the land of Canaan is described as a place "flowing with milk and honey."

It was not easy to acquire honey because the bees often built their hives in the crevices of high rocks. This drawing (c. 6000 BC) from Spain shows a woman on a rope ladder collecting honey while the bees swarm around her.

Honey was used as a sweetener and as a medicine. It was applied to wounds to prevent infection. This was done during World War I to help wounded soldiers. Honey draws the moisture out of wounds. It has antimicrobial and antibiotic properties, and can kill Staphylococcus and E. coli.

Among the Nilotic peoples honeybees were kept as early as 3500 BC. Egyptians made hives out of pipes of clay and stacked one on top of another (as shown in the image above). The hives were moved up and down the Nile on rafts, allowing the bees to pollinate flowers that were in season. A marriage contract has been found which states, "I take thee to wife... and promise to deliver to thee yearly twelve jars of honey."

The bee became the symbol of royalty in Lower Egypt where a temple known as “the House of the Bee” was visited by women seeking counsel. King Tut was buried with a jar of honey. When his tomb was opened, the jar of honey was found and the honey was unspoiled.

Many examples of bee and honey hieroglyphs have been found in ancient Egyptian records.

Indo-European languages have words for honey which are based on the two phonetically very similar proposed Proto-Indo European (PIE) roots: medu and melid. The name Melissa is related to the word for honey. The root is found in the Anglo-Saxon word "mead," an alcoholic beverage made with honey, water, and a fermenting agent. In Spanish, the word for honey is miel.

The biblical name Deborah is a reference to bees. Rebecca's nurse, Deborah, was buried near Bethel beneath the “tree of weeping” or the “Oak of Weeping" (Gen. 35:8). The Hebrew word allon can refer to a large tree species, but here probably refers to either an oak, a terebinth, or sycamore fig. There is evidence that graves were sometimes placed beneath fig trees which attracted bees. The wasp lays its eggs inside the ripening figs.


Related reading: Oldest Bee Hives Discovered in Israel; The Buzz About Bees; Bees in Religion; Asian Hornets Kill Honeybees; Ancient Mythology About Bees; Deborah's Tree of Weeping; The Sacred Bee in Ancient Egypt; The Fig Tree in Biblical Symbolism