The Construction of Judaism
This thread will show articles papers and videos that relate to the construction of Judaism as a medium for an historical political takeover and examine elements of the 'Jewish story' (claimed history ) such as ; an examination of Gods, the appropriation of other cultures story and history being massaged into Judaism and the attempt to twist Egyptian history into their* own .
This threads focus is historical and not related to 'religious or faith value'.
* certain political 'powers that be' and individuals , who will arise as these posts progress .
Lets start with two fronts ; A comparison with 'King Solomon' and the Egyptian records at that time and an examination of one of the Jewish Gods
.The Biblical authors (compiled 700 AD onwards) were using records of some description when they wrote the stories that eventually wound up in a single book, but they clearly had no great historical record of these events, because we know that they were wrong/copied/altered to create a narrative about the discovery of a single god who created Israel after leaving Hebrews from Egypt. We know that story is not true, because we know the oldest sources of the story are not about this story at all, they were copied from other stories.
Let's unpack what we actually know based on archaeology.
Egypt was culturally dominant over the Levant during the bronze age, but was fought in the borderlands around modern Israel / Syria by the Hittites, then Assyrians, then Babylonians and then finally the Greeks.
a) The Canaanite cultures of the region, centred around city states, worshipped a pantheon of gods including El, Yahweh, Asherah etc, but were also reliant on Egypt for military support from at least the Amenhoteps onwards (1500ish) as evidenced by the Amarna letters.
Temples to both Egyptian and local gods can be found in Canaan (modern areas of Israel, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt etc), while Egyptian religious iconography and temple worship continued until about 600 AD.
c) The region was repeatedly invaded by Egyptians to restore control whenever bandits or foreigners incited rebellion against Egyptian rule. Monuments to Pharoahs such as Ramesses II which detail these great conquests, and it was also repeatedly invaded by Hittites, Amurites etc, leaving a border around Syria as mentioned above.
d) We can shoot down the 'revelation' of Yahweh pretty easily - he was worshipped very clearly long before the period of the mythical exodus, as evidenced even by personal names in Egypt, and at that point was also quite separate to El (who was also found in personal names in the Amarna period).
So when a series of stories about the Judean royal family begins to be written somewhere between 700-500 AD, a process interrupted by the Assyrian invasion, and the subsequent Babylonian takeover, and is then compiled into a book which creates a very anti-Egyptian narrative, we have to look at the sources for this, knowing they are then edited to make sense in a larger narrative.
'Exodus' which describes an Egyptian Royal taking an army to Canaan, with many religious preparations on the way, before fighting an army of charioteers is the story of Ramesses II invading Canaan and fighting the Hittites at Kadesh. He builds an Egyptian Altar with Isis and Nephthys on it (called the Ark in the Bible) which undermines any idea of fighting the Egyptian gods and a Uraeus (bronze serpent) to fight snakes - both of which are Egyptian religious icons, and the story of destroying the Pharoah's chariots in a sea is literally the Poem of Pentaur.
Proverbs is the 'Instruction of Amenemope' complete with a mistranslation of a reference to the 'thirty' instructions into 'three' rendering the sentence nonsensical.
Joseph - an Egyptian name - whose story follows the model of Egyptian fiction of the late Bronze Age, has an 'Egyptian' name given to him which is in fact a Hebrew name, a point the authors who added it clearly fail to understand.
So back to Solomon. We see no evidence of his existence. But we do see evidence of a king in exactly the same period, who does all the things Solomon does, but is actually a Pharoah - Siamun.
So it is likely on balance that the story of Solomon, is based on the story of Siamun. Continuing with the blindly obvious parallels between Canaanite history as recorded in the Bible and the archaelogical records in Egypt, we can see that in the period 'Solomun' reigned over the kingdom of Judah and Israel, the Pharoah was 'Siamun'.
Siamun married the previous Pharoah's daughter, ruled over Canaan (including Israel and Judah) and was marked by his huge construction of temples. Siamun was enormously wealthy and powerful. He may have been from Canaan (his predecessor was from Libya) but his origins are not recorded in any artifacts found to date. There is a lot of historical evidence for him.
Solomun married the previous Pharoah's daughter, ruled over Canaan (including Israel and Judah) and was marked by his huge construction of temples. Solomun was enormously wealthy and powerful. He may have been from Canaan (his predecessor was a mysterious shepherd boy king) but his origins are only recorded in a book of mythology. There is no historical evidence for him.
Obvious points to add are that neither a) Israel or Judah were big enough to have the wealth ascribed to Solomun the suffix 'amun' is that of an Egyptian god so the name appears Egyptian, Egypt had historically had many 'Yahweh' worshippers in its ranks and dominated Canaan culturally. .
Let's unpack what we actually know based on archaeology.
Egypt was culturally dominant over the Levant during the bronze age, but was fought in the borderlands around modern Israel / Syria by the Hittites, then Assyrians, then Babylonians and then finally the Greeks.
a) The Canaanite cultures of the region, centred around city states, worshipped a pantheon of gods including El, Yahweh, Asherah etc, but were also reliant on Egypt for military support from at least the Amenhoteps onwards (1500ish) as evidenced by the Amarna letters.
Temples to both Egyptian and local gods can be found in Canaan (modern areas of Israel, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt etc), while Egyptian religious iconography and temple worship continued until about 600 AD.
c) The region was repeatedly invaded by Egyptians to restore control whenever bandits or foreigners incited rebellion against Egyptian rule. Monuments to Pharoahs such as Ramesses II which detail these great conquests, and it was also repeatedly invaded by Hittites, Amurites etc, leaving a border around Syria as mentioned above.
d) We can shoot down the 'revelation' of Yahweh pretty easily - he was worshipped very clearly long before the period of the mythical exodus, as evidenced even by personal names in Egypt, and at that point was also quite separate to El (who was also found in personal names in the Amarna period).
So when a series of stories about the Judean royal family begins to be written somewhere between 700-500 AD, a process interrupted by the Assyrian invasion, and the subsequent Babylonian takeover, and is then compiled into a book which creates a very anti-Egyptian narrative, we have to look at the sources for this, knowing they are then edited to make sense in a larger narrative.
'Exodus' which describes an Egyptian Royal taking an army to Canaan, with many religious preparations on the way, before fighting an army of charioteers is the story of Ramesses II invading Canaan and fighting the Hittites at Kadesh. He builds an Egyptian Altar with Isis and Nephthys on it (called the Ark in the Bible) which undermines any idea of fighting the Egyptian gods and a Uraeus (bronze serpent) to fight snakes - both of which are Egyptian religious icons, and the story of destroying the Pharoah's chariots in a sea is literally the Poem of Pentaur.
Proverbs is the 'Instruction of Amenemope' complete with a mistranslation of a reference to the 'thirty' instructions into 'three' rendering the sentence nonsensical.
Joseph - an Egyptian name - whose story follows the model of Egyptian fiction of the late Bronze Age, has an 'Egyptian' name given to him which is in fact a Hebrew name, a point the authors who added it clearly fail to understand.
So back to Solomon. We see no evidence of his existence. But we do see evidence of a king in exactly the same period, who does all the things Solomon does, but is actually a Pharoah - Siamun.
So it is likely on balance that the story of Solomon, is based on the story of Siamun. Continuing with the blindly obvious parallels between Canaanite history as recorded in the Bible and the archaelogical records in Egypt, we can see that in the period 'Solomun' reigned over the kingdom of Judah and Israel, the Pharoah was 'Siamun'.
Siamun married the previous Pharoah's daughter, ruled over Canaan (including Israel and Judah) and was marked by his huge construction of temples. Siamun was enormously wealthy and powerful. He may have been from Canaan (his predecessor was from Libya) but his origins are not recorded in any artifacts found to date. There is a lot of historical evidence for him.
Solomun married the previous Pharoah's daughter, ruled over Canaan (including Israel and Judah) and was marked by his huge construction of temples. Solomun was enormously wealthy and powerful. He may have been from Canaan (his predecessor was a mysterious shepherd boy king) but his origins are only recorded in a book of mythology. There is no historical evidence for him.
Obvious points to add are that neither a) Israel or Judah were big enough to have the wealth ascribed to Solomun the suffix 'amun' is that of an Egyptian god so the name appears Egyptian, Egypt had historically had many 'Yahweh' worshippers in its ranks and dominated Canaan culturally. .
