The Origin of Israel's Faith - and its Debt to Zoroaster
Sirknight67
I'm sincerely flattered by Shapur Irani's invitation to talk with
you about the origins of Hebrew religion and the interaction with
Zoroastrianism. And start with a disclaimer. First off, I am a
tractor guy, not a professor, minister or theological expert. I happen
to know more about ancient peoples than the average salesman and have
made a lifelong study of the Hebrews so understand what most of the
experts are saying. And what I deliver to you now is what we have
learned about the ancient Middle East and the faiths it produced, but
this will not suggest what it is you are to believe. Theology is
personal, requiring that each sort it out for himself. Today, I will
interpret how history has managed to shape a given faith with hopes
that help in your understanding.
In this exercise we deal with the way God worked in history - however
you want to define or describe God. For our purposes today, it's
that element which has created the universe and peopled it with sundry
creatures, one being the homo sapien, the only one of said creatures
with the capacity to appreciate, acknowledge and ponder God. In our
quest we are applying minds which are finite, trying to understand that
which is infinite, dimensions so humongous we stutter, trying to get it
into perspective. We fail and resort to comparisons, illustrations and
often metaphors. If we cannot be precise, we guess or surmise or
conclude. Since the forces of nature are perpetually evident, we have
to deal with them and ought to comprehend how we fit within this system
where providence or the creator has placed us. The ancient Hebrews
confronted the same dilemma and had the same awe of "the force" or
the "God" who "laid the foundations of the earth" and did
"bind the chains of the Pleiades or loosened the cords of Orion".
The theory or explanation they devised is found in the Hebrew
scriptures and their odyssey started in Second Millennium B.C. They
had to answer the same questions about the creation, like why is there
lightning and what is it; what is thunder; why do earthquakes or
droughts or eclipses occur; what causes hale; why do tides rise and
fall? The natural phenomenon appeared mysterious, awesome, sometimes
destructive; and religion became the process which worked out an answer
as to what and why these things happened.
The answer: The phenomenon in the world around us is a product of the
divine forces. The sun was a god, the moon a goddess; fresh springs
were the gift of some sprite or spirit; the winds were also
manifestation of divine activity; and the changing seasons, the
province of another pair of gods. Groves, caves, tides, mountain
peaks, storms, eclipses, all managed by supernatural creatures.
Mankind made it more complicated by getting the priests and kings
involved and very quickly these two institutions ascertained how we
relate to the other worldly forces and announced the will of the god or
gods. They said the given deities or numen or demons, fairies or gods
could be handled if we plied them with gifts. Then pointed out what
happens if we don't comply. Religion became a tool to help manage
society. And it used fear as its partner.
Institutionalized religion soon became a vehicle installed by the
leadership who explained the powers of the gods and saw their own role
as the authority in the system. The Louvre has a huge diorite stele on
which the code of Hammurabi is incised. The iconography at the top
shows the king receiving the laws from Shamash, the god of the
Babylonians. Same pattern in Israel where the Ten Commandments were
delivered by God to Moses at Sinai.
Religion, in Europe, as late as the Reformation walked in lockstep with
the state, again, the ruler through the church using threats as a club
with which to beat his subjects into docility and obedience.
The Hebrews were only a small factor in this phenomenon, working out
their own understanding in the melting pot which was the Fertile
Crescent of early 18-1700 B.C. No one knows when or how they
originated. Albright thought a group called "Apiru" (probably
graduated to "Hebrews") mentioned several times in Egyptian texts
was a starting point. They were people defined by a vocation, maybe
caravan attendants, sort of gypsies, and so distinct by lifestyle, not
by ethnicity. At some point in time, a cluster of them settled in
Canaan and become sedentary. At which point the "Hebrew"
connotation is applied to a locus, time period and culture. Given a
degree of success, they created a nation of their own. But became
unique because of their theological understanding which eschews or
disregards the dozens of deities identified by other peoples and
selected a single god to be the focus of their worship and their
religion. The Bible begins their story with the patriarchal narratives
in the Book of Genesis and weaves their origins around a semi-nomadic
character named Abraham, who lived in Ur of the Chaldees.
Abraham was instructed by a new god, unfamiliar to his Sumerian
neighbors, to journey southwest into Canaan. Arriving at the venerable
altar in Shechem he fell in with a god named El, the head honcho in
Canaan. Probably El Shaddai, the storm god, the god of the mountain ala
Zeus or Thor. El seems to be a generic title, i.e. "deity" in
general. But there are other players in the Canaanite pantheon,
particularly Baal (Lord) and Asherah, plus neighboring Chemosh for the
Moabites, Dagan for the Philistines, Haddad for Syrians, a dozen
Egyptian gods, Marduk for the Chaldeans, and take it from there.
Abraham accorded all the powers in the pantheon to El, not denying, but
ignoring the others and hoped his god proved tougher than Marduk and
all the rest. Moreover, he entered into a covenant - a bargain, a
pact, a contract, which said Abraham was going to be very lucky and
very rich and very powerful and a giant in history if he kept faithful
to the worship of El.
The theme of Genesis is selection and covenant. Abraham and his son,
grandson and great-grandson all nurtured along the unfolding Hebrew
epic, noting Grandson Jacob in particular because he produced twelve
sons, thus, twelve tribes. God El made the line of Abraham a special
case, selected out of all the earth to be a special blessing. Genesis
means "origins" or beginnings and introduces many of the building
blocks of the faith...sacrifice, monolatry, covenant, circumcision,
tribal delineation, etc. The story, 40 chapters long is unique, loaded
with heroes, travel, miracles and blessings, dozens of encounters, and
differs from other ancient religions because it is fashioned from the
environment and institutions in which it originated. It employs a
lifestyle familiar to those of us who know the ancient world, meaning,
it is historically accurate, reflecting conditions, movements,
encounters, incursions, places which actually existed. It was not some
phantasm whimsy or fairy tale like "Jason and the Golden Fleece" or
"The Pied Piper of Hamlin"; not gods frolicking around on sexual
escapades and vying shamelessly with each other over trivial and
nonsensical stuff. The Hebrew deity is infinitely sterner, far more
mature, dead serious, solitary and outlasting his rivals by
millenniums. Moreover, the Hebrew heroes were flesh and blood
people...Jehu, Ahab, Omri, Saul and David, Solomon, Josiah, etc. The
stage was the Middle East not Valhalla or the lands to the west or
Olympus. Beyond that, it was geographically-specific. Ur of the
Chaldees has been excavated. Shechem was a stone age settlement; we
have excavated Beth El, Jericho, Jerusalem, Ashkelon, Samaria,
Beersheba. Plus the fact (and life) of Israel is referenced in ancient
Moabite, Assyrian, Phoenician and Egyptian texts. So we can
corroborate the historicity of locus and culture of the biblical
sequences in the Hebrew saga. If the cities and battles and monuments
are real, how about the characters? Maybe based on real-life people.
The story gets a little far fetched from time to time and is greatly
and grossly exaggerated, but surely we can say it is about history;
about peoples, customs, kings, wars, heroes, ruins and traditions, all
historic.
It was not only the history of a given people but a religion which
established a pedigree, and in the Biblical material, shaped as well as
governed a given society. Fact, it did it so well, a good many
practices are evident in a thousand Jewish communities today. My point
is it became so utilitarian because it came out of the age and society
to which it applied.
We granted ancient peoples ascribed to sundry outside powers, the
forces of nature and the destiny of man. Next, they found ways to
relate or to communicate through elaborate systems which paid obeisance
to the gods in hopes of inducing good fortune. Thus, the recourse to
temples, shrines, the use of sacrifice, thus, altars, plus what goes on
altars like flesh, incense, oil, flour, etc., and we have to sing
praises to the divine powers; establish daily, weekly and annual
rhythms for proclaiming adoration and praise; have to get dressed up in
special robes and provide special burning pits, temple furniture,
sacrificial equipment, and in a lot of pagan systems, sacred female
personages who made available sexual favors since fertility in a
hundred ways was extolled and sought. There was a defined and accepted
way to deal with gods, and Israel adopted the standard practices. All
this was a big business. Don't let anyone tell you the oldest
profession was prostitution; the oldest and most lucrative of man's
racket is the priesthood. The more frightened the populace, the more
valuable the priesthood and the more costly to the worshipper.
If all of this defines how it is gods should be approached and what
must be done to gain divine favors, we see why Abraham employed
sacrifice, was linked to the god through covenant, made male
circumcision his first sacrament, believed in and used sacred oaths.
So the early theology of Israel had a lot in common with Canaan, but
one striking difference: its monolatry.
At the end of Genesis about 1600 B.C., the 71, fourth-generation
descendents of Abraham moved to Egypt because Cousin Joseph was prime
minister and because there was a famine in Canaan. Between the two
books, Genesis and Exodus, 420 years elapsed, and the Hebrew multiplied
wondrously but were, alas in 1250 as Exodus opens, now subservient to
the Egyptians and put to forced labor. The God Yahweh, hearing of
their discomfiture, finally decided to fulfill his promise to Abraham
and created the hero Moses to free them. In Moses, by the way, we
encounter the most significant figure in Hebrew history.
Moses was raised in the royal palace and at age 40 in an altercation,
he killed an Egyptian overseer, then fled east into the desert when he
fell in with a Midianite Bedouin named Jethro and married his daughter.
Content with the solitude in Sinai, he was suddenly rousted one sunny
day by a voice out of a burning bush to "listen up". The voice
wants him to go back to Egypt and extract his people. After an
argument with the flame and the voice, Moses finally asks, "If I go
back and if the people listen, what god do I tell them sent me?"
And the voice replies, "I am Yahweh, but your fathers knew me as El
Shaddai". One guess is that maybe Yahweh was the god of the
Midianite, Jethro. But from now on, Yahweh not El is the Lord of the
Hebrews, their protector and authority.
Anyone paying attention to the Biblical text is bound to be raising
some eyebrows about all this. Abraham's god is missing from the
story, and we have a new deity called Yahweh, a form of the verb to be,
like "I am he who causes what is, to be"...a creator god maybe.
And we wonder what the deal is here. Well, the deal is we have several
writers, over something like 1200 years, dabbling with the Old
Testament text and in the stories there are two different names for
deity, one being "Elohim" and the other being "Yahweh". It is
the result of two different origins of tribal legends. The Exodus text
the writer was copying uses Yahweh and sensing the problem, provided a
very clumsy explanation. "Not to worry. It's the same God. He
now goes under a new name."
Exodus is important in understanding the faith of the Hebrews...and the
Jews today. You probably remember the ten plagues story, the battle
between Moses and Pharaoh, resulting in the release of the Hebrews.
The last episode in this protracted standoff was a bit tricky and had
to be properly programmed. God prepared to send the angel of death
over the land with instructions to strike dead the first born in every
household. But with one major exception. To avoid this fate descending
on of his own people, Moses had each family kill a lamb, then dip a
branch of hyssop in the lamb's blood, smear it on the lintels over
their doorway. So when the angel did appear that night with his sword
of death, he spared all those homes marked with blood. Israel was
instructed to roast the lamb, eat it with unleavened bread and bitter
herbs, preparatory to a journey. The event was called "Passover"
since the angel passed over Hebrew homes.
When Pharaoh found his oldest son dead, he told Moses to get those
cotton picking Hebrews out of sight and out of the country. So off
they went, through the Reed Sea (which parted for them), into the
wilderness at Sinai, arriving at the mountain of the Lord fifty days
after leaving. It was here they camped and agreed again to make Yahweh
their God, offering sacrifice to seal the covenant. It was here as
well they received the Ten Commandments. Plus several pages
completing a long, interminable law code which the people solemnly
agreed to obey. It was here as well that the priesthood was
established and installed, then given a place to operate, namely a
tabernacle, portable temple.
My point in dwelling on the Exodus story is to point out the
theological relevance of that moment in Hebrew history. On the 17th of
April this year, the Jews celebrated an event called Passover. With
roasted lamb, unleavened bread and bitter herbs, commemorating an event
they think might have first happened 3200 years ago. The Exodus
narrative describes the founding of the nation Israel. It is their
declaration of independence and constitutional convention. Under the
patriarchs they were a clan, a large family. Under Moses, they gained
their freedom, renewed the covenant with Yahweh, were given the law,
were provided a ceremonial system which would support their religious
life, were headed for a new country replete with an independent status.
In their understanding, God himself had first selected, then brought
them out of bondage, and sanctified them to be his agents. They were
divinely appointed as "a royal priesthood". The law delivered by
Moses gave to them a lifestyle which if followed would not only bring
them success but immortality. The movement Moses - and God - began
then, is still ongoing in obedience to the same God, many of the same
laws and traditions. The modern Jew owes his existence to this
formative period which defined, established and directed the Hebrews
into the next three millenniums of history.
The law would ultimately amount to 613 separate statutes and would
control all of life. It also invented an institution called "sin"
which was transgression of the laws and required some form of expiation
when committed, usually a sacrifice. Moses also installed the
theological vehicle by establishing a priesthood and if we can believe
the stories, once in the promise land, each of the 12 tribal
territories had shrines managed by the tribe of Levi. By virtue of the
law and the priesthood generations in subsequent history professed and
practiced their faith. They did it in unique ways: the nature of
dress, the size and shape of the beard, the yarmulke, mezuzahs on the
door posts, kosher diet, sacrifice, circumcision, the celebration of at
least half dozen holy days including Passover, Yom Kippur, two harvest
festivals, Hanukkah, and Rosh Hashana. They kept the Sabbath holy
(meaning, no one worked); they raised all of their children; avoided
marriage and even contact with gentiles, tithed of their produce to the
Lord. In short the nature of their religion prescribed a style of life
that kept them different...fact, keeps them unique today. The nature
of their law was so exhaustive, there was little opportunity to wonder
what was right and what was wrong.
Despite what is often repeated, they did not wander for 40 years in the
wilderness. They soon found an oasis at Kadesh-Barnea where they spent
the next 39 years. After which point, under a leader named Joshua they
invaded Canaan, and with lightening speed subdued most of it, a story
covered in the Book of Joshua.
The Lord had promised them a land "flowing with milk and honey", a
rich land, a glorious patrimony, Kerieth and Sinai were stops along the
way. In 1966 I viewed the Jordan Valley from Mount Nebo where Moses
got his first glimpse of the land. All I could think of was the God
Yahweh really had a great sense of humor. Anyone looking at the pastel
landscape in the hazy distance, dried-brick in color, all tans and buff
contrasts it with Indiana fields this time of year. Canaan isn't
even in the right league much less the right ballpark. No cattle, no
bees, only the muddy Jordan flowing into the Dead Sea. But what Yahweh
had done was move them into a very strategic, geographic location. The
Syro-Phoenician-Canaan area lies in the overlap of three continents and
the exposure to other peoples, other armies, traders and ideas
providing vulnerability, but interchanged and much opportunity.
As one examines Joshua's whirlwind conquest, he attributes it to the
fact that Canaan was a series of petty chieftains, never a single
kingdom. Then parceled into twelve different territories, one for each
tribe. When finished, the author wants us to feel the twelve tribes
are settled comfortably in the land which El had promised to
Abraham's descendents. God keeps his word, right?
But it really wasn't all that cozy in 13th Century Canaan. The next
book - Judges - describes 150 years (1200-1050 B.C.) with incursions,
disputes, constant battles with neighboring peoples, and 13 separate
judges who are called forth when trouble breaks out; each whacks the
opposition or the enemy, brings order to the land, then rules for forty
years and dies.
While beating back Moabites, Ammonites, Canaanites, Syrians and whoever
else, they also learned how to plant wheat and barley, harvest and
store it; how to make clay pots, bowls and jugs; how to plant, prune
and tend fruit trees, olive and fig trees; how to plant vines and
harvest grapes, how to breed livestock, build houses, do irrigation,
learn a little smelting, carpentry, cloth-making, and generally provide
for themselves in a land which demands a lot of labor. It was hard
time and very bloody, but ultimately brought to a close when a hero
from the tribe of Benjamin named Saul united Israel to meet a new and
more ominous foe, the Philistines. They were war-like and relatively
sophisticated people who came storming out of the western Mediterranean
and settled on the coast of Canaan in five city states. Possessing the
secret to making iron, they were hard to withstand and as Israel
developed and improved the land, their neighbors cast covetous eyes
upon it and somewhere around 1030 decided to move in.
The Philistine pressure caused the nation to unite. Saul simply
demanded recruits from every tribe for a national army and got full
support, winning the first battles. But ultimately he was unable to
prevail against Philistia.
It is during the course of his wars against the Philistines that the
future Hebrew king slowly worked his way up to become a top commander
and then a member of Saul's court. The hero was David, son of Jesse
from the tribe of Judah. He demonstrated a good deal of military skill
and considerable ability in organizing and leading and soon became a
competitor for Saul's crown. David was finally exiled, became a
guerrilla leader and gained national acclaim. So when Saul was killed
at Gilboa fighting against the Philistines, David became the obvious
choice for king and was duly elected by a council of the tribal elders.
For his capital, he sent his own army under Joab to subdue Jerusalem
which had never been captured and set up his court, consecrating the
city for all time. Yahweh had chosen David as his agent and since
David's wars had brought Israel to a high-water point, he proved the
power of the God to triumph over Israel's enemies. Yahweh was so
enamored with David that he declared Jerusalem would be his eternal
home, and David's line should rule the people Israel forever and
ever, amen.
He reigned for 40 years and subdued all the lands from the Orontes
north of Damascus to the Gulf of Aquab. It was the apogee of Hebrew
power, militarily and politically, with the tribute rolling in; the
armies invincible; and David the strongest presence in the Middle East.
Then after forty years he slept with his fathers. If you need a date,
he ascended the throne in roughly 1000 B.C., and his son Solomon was
crowned in 960.
If Moses authorized the priestly hierarchical system, it was David and
Solomon who institutionalized it. Curiously, it was David who
appointed the high priests: Zadok and Abiathar. They were his guys and
owed their jobs, hospitalization insurance, performance bonus, and
retirement programs to him. Under Solomon, the extensive, impressive
and expensive structure of Israel's ecclesiolatry is created. We had
a high priestly system now made hereditary, and 24 rotating teams of
Levites and acolytes and hundreds of functionaries involved in a
ponderous, complex, ongoing, perennial system of sacrifices,
processionals, assemblies, and business from then on. Religion becomes
a big, I mean, huge production. Morning and evening prayers, morning
and evening sacrifices, holy days, sacred areas, endless rites for
purification since there are a jillion ways to sin. The result is that
somehow or other, the religion of Israel, was superimposed like never
before on the life and thought of the people.
Solomon's temple became a visible manifestation of the faith and
since it was the most luxurious building in the nation it became the
centerpiece of the Hebrew ethos. The first draft of the earliest
written form of the Hebrew scriptures, a product which will become our
Old Testament, was probably written in the court of Solomon. We would
now have scribes and official clerks to take care of official
correspondence. A people now entrenched, powerful and successful, also
get proud and want to know their history. How did we get here? Where
did we come form? When? Who were the heroes? About 950 B.C. the
campfire stories and the scattered documents or scrolls were compiled
and the oral account was written. Incidentally, we happened to have a
phonetic alphabet at this point which made recording things infinitely
easier then hundreds of little signs or symbols. It was invented in
this part of the world maybe around the time of Moses and was refined
to 22 symbols, all consonants, which depict sounds. Important to me,
because civilization itself depends upon the ability to record and
preserve knowledge. We have to make it accessible, and the more
universally we make knowledge available, the more rapid will be
progress and the more orderly and sophisticated will be our society.
Since Solomon's editors wrote the book, they were wise enough to
validate the legitimacy of the House of David. It is Yahweh who
promised his line would rule Israel forever. The scribes also had to
butter up the king and depicted him as the wisest man in the world.
They illustrate his wisdom in several vignettes and also ascribe to him
the books, Song of Songs, Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. But let's get
the record straight. Solomon was bad news. He blew the enormous
treasury David had acquired, went into debt, and sold several of his
cities to Hiram of Tyre. He was a fabulous builder but also a
profligate one and when he died, was bankrupt and universally hated by
his people. On his death, the kingdom broke apart and became two
separate entities with a king each. Ten tribes went north and became
known as Israel, while the two left in the south became Judah. The
Northern Kingdom would last an even 200 years till 722 B.C. when they
were subdued by Sargon II. The southern kingdom had better luck and
lasted till 586...336 years after the death of Solomon. The stormy
history of both kingdoms is recounted in the Books of I and II King.
In that period the temple was a vehicle for providing history and
preserving literacy. Excavations give us scattered records to tell us
what was going on. Fact, most of the clay tablets, ostracon, or
papyrus and parchment writings are products of the state cult. The
commonplace functions and rituals to adore, propitiate and please the
gods are referenced in several sources. We are surprised to note the
faith of Israel included little of what we would today define as
"religion". Because the whole system was based on fear,
extensively ritualized and long on show and panoply, inculcating a
cowering and timorous obeisance before the God (or gods). Mankind
lived half afraid - all the time. Because kids were dying in
infancy, crops were marginal at best, insects were impossible to
control, disease was continual and frequent. All because the deities
were beating on us. So we spent a lot of time trying to stay on the
right side of them.
As late as Martin Luther, remnants of the same intimidation. He became
a monk after a violent thunderstorm frightened him out of his wits. To
escape, he promised if saved, he'd become a monk. This is 1500 A.D.
He believed in a jealous, angry god because he knew, "Many are
called but few are chosen". 96% of mankind went to purgatory or
hell, both for long periods of torture and punishment. The same dreary
theme.
So fear of divine punishment was not something all that remote or
ridiculous. We gained salvation by doing stuff. But mostly we do
what we are told to do. Religion was about obedience, subservience,
about fearing for our immortal soul or fearing about what bad is going
to happen to me next. It made people uncomfortable and unhappy. It
might have explained or related to the gods, but it did very little for
men.
Most astounding thing to us is the fact that religion had nothing to do
with morality. The issue of ethical conduct was never an item of
discussion, never part of the package. Maybe implied or imputed but
never promoted.
The Hebrew faith has been called a "cult" because it was a system
of religious expression and belief. If one part was revolutionary in
terms of its monolatry, extensive law, intolerance of other religions,
concept of sin, element of election and special status as a people,
another part was old hat; the autocratic, arrogance of the priesthood,
the partnership with the throne, the endless ceremony and pageantry,
the continuing sacrifice, the religious calendar. Plus the distance
established between the person and the God enforced by the
ecclesiastical intermediary; add the continual element of fear, the
ominous mystery surrounding the nature of the God and his impatience
with humankind, all universal. So religion held little appeal and less
promise; and when death came, all departed to the same abode, sheol,
and roamed, like shades, in the netherworld.
What finally gave theology a heart was a major breakthrough starting in
the 8th Century by a class called the prophets. They opposed the
status quo and naturally were considered dangerous revolutionaries.
The wakeup call came from a sheepherder named Amos in about 750 B.C.
when both northern and southern kingdoms were strong, prosperous,
secure, and powerful. This rough-hewn character from Tekoa, a sleepy
village a half days walk south of Jerusalem, strode into the temple at
Bethel one day and jolted the loungers there. His message was a shock.
In a long, colorful oration, he declared the Lord was sick to death of
the empty rituals and the hollow ceremonies of Israel. "I hate, I
despise your feast, I take no delight in your Solomon assemblies."
Moreover, he will no longer accept burnt offerings. Beyond that, he is
going to "punish Israel for his transgressions, I will punish the
altars of Bethel"; later "I abhor the pride of Jacob and hate his
strongholds and will deliver up this city and all that is in it."
Well! What then does the Lord want of his people? He wants,
"Justice to roll down like waters and righteousness like an
ever-flowing stream...Seek good and not evil...so that the Lord, the
God of hosts will be with you...hate evil and love good and establish
justice in the gate..." He is remarkably specific about what it is
the Lord is against. Exploitation: "Hear this you who trample upon
the needy; and bring the poor of the land to an end." Dishonesty:
Those who are trading by "Making the ephah small and the shekel
great", i.e. short weighing grain for sale with false balances. Loan
sharking: "That we may buy the needy for a pair of sandals."
I.e., loaning money to buy clothing and when the debtor can't pay,
sell him into slavery.
Fantastic language in this book and for that age, astounding insight.
Amos was saying that the poor have stature in the eyes of God, that
they are to be treated fairly and not abused and exploited, that the
religion of Israel needs to be refocused. It ought to be care for the
widow and the orphan, protect those being maltreated. Amos said God is
really worshipped when man is responsible for fellowman. He wants
kindness, tolerance, forgiveness, compassion, mercy and the strong
helping the weak. Amos, that day at the temple of King Jeroboam had
the most revolutionary idea in history. Religion, he demanded, has to
be moral. Today, it is called social justice; everyone is entitled to
a decent sort of life. Those who have should share with those who have
not, mankind is one society, not four layers of class and caste. The
theme of Amos was quietly rehearsed and reiterated through several
disciples till one day four centuries later the Hebrew religion did
indeed become moral. Not ceremonial, not sacerdotal, but become a way
of life, practiced outside the temple or shrine. Our faith must be
ethical. It must be the promoter of justice and fairness.
This all came about in a very curious fashion because Amos did not
prevail...except to a handful of disciples who preserved his message
and his words. Neither did Hosea, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Jeremiah and three
or four others, singing the same tune to different generations. Guess
why? It challenged the priesthood and the crown; each content with the
way things were going since each liked the roles it played. Amos was
booted out of Israel, the prophetic voices suppressed except as each
could make converts. But the age of the great prophets (late 7th
Century) was not one of good statecraft in Judah but rather of
conflict, first with Assyria and then Babylon. Jerusalem fell in 586
B.C. The Babylonians destroyed the city, ravaged the land, decimated
the populace. The court, aristocracy and the priesthood were marched
off to Babylon in captivity now. The entire nation of David and
Solomon was wiped off the map and had they not been different, they
would have departed history like the Phoenicians, the Philistines, the
Syrians, the Assyrians, Mitanni, Urartu, Hittites, and you name it.
But then a miracle. They survived. In the exile they had time to read
their own manuscripts and scrolls, reconstruct history, examine books
of the law, the court chronicles of the kings plus some other bits of
philosophy and wisdom. They also studied the works of the prophets
heretofore ignored by court and temple. But confounded by a crucial
question: Why had Yahweh let them down? What happened to the promises
made to Abraham, David, Josiah about an eternal destiny? With no land,
not royal cult, no priesthood, no place of worship, what do we do next?
In the next generation, their scholars did several things which
prepared them to indeed carry forth. They discovered in the prophetic
scrolls what had happened: Their sin and transgression had provoked
the wrath of Yahweh, and that is why they were so badly clobbered.
They were punished for their iniquities. Secondly, they found a way to
rehearse and retain their faith by modifying it. They moved worship
outside the temple or shrine and centered it around the family hearth.
They compiled and reproduced their history, reading over again the long
accounts, fitting them to a single body, then spread the learning among
the more literate citizens. This fortunately engaged a lot of
non-priestly minds, bringing new insights to bear on an old subject,
namely, how do we worship god? They preserved in theory established
festivals and holy days, but reoriented them towards the family. The
father was responsible for maintaining the elements of the faith,
augmented by two things: an institution which will ultimately be called
the synagogue, and secondly, a growing class of lay experts, learned in
the Bible called scribes. This now meant scholars, not penmen or
copiers. Soon a class called Pharisees and then slightly later,
Sadducees; all religious lay experts and students. So to a
considerable extent, the laity took over the function of perpetuating
the religion of Israel now called Judaism and created a faith that
would travel, could be practiced without a land or a nation. Add to
this a growing body of knowledge which will be the Jewish scriptures, a
work we call the Old Testament.
Now given a situation where ideas could be exchanged freely, another
body of literature evolved which explained the sacred text, it
interpreted what had been mandated. For example, one of the Ten
Commandments said, "Remember the Sabbath Day to make it holy. Six
days shall thou labor and do all thy work". O.K. fine. So what is
work? How about milking the cows, baking bread, starting a fire,
having babies? How does one make a day "holy"? Can he read?
Write? In short these texts expand, illustrate and explain the laws
and the tenets of the faith.
More important, when they finally read Amos and Isaiah and Jeremiah,
then agreed Judaism was really about taking care of the widow and the
orphan, about honesty, fair play, kindness, helping out, and that the
sacrificial system is superfluous. Moreover, everyone must be taught
the wisdom of the scriptures, religion ought to be the source of moral
teaching and by the time of Jesus, the Mediterranean world marked the
Jews for their humane, decent, upright conduct, knew they were to be
trusted more than any other people. The Jews did something else which
is unique: Their scholars, or theologians, kept the faith fluid so
that it marched apace with the times. It is updated to meet today's
challenge. Theology fashioned in the 13th or the 1st Century B.C. does
not have a lot to commend it in 2003 A.D.
The period of the exile and this metamorphosis brings us to a new
element both in the story, and in the Middle Eastern epic: An Aryan
presence into the long history of the Semitic world. The Medo-Persian
suzerainty was a refreshing breath of air in the Fertile Crescent. In
the monarch Cyrus the Great, we encounter a warrior, conqueror, and
manager without the need to visit devastation on conquered people the
familiar pattern of Assyrian, Babylonian, Chaldean or Egyptian records.
We have an inscription on a stele that reveals his policy: "I am
Cyrus, king of the world, mighty king, king of Babylon, Sumer and
Akkad. When I entered Babylon, I set up the seat of domination in the
royal palace amidst jubilation and rejoicing. Marduk the great god
caused the big-hearted inhabitants of Babylon to...me. My numerous
troops moved about undisturbed in the midst of Babylon. I did not
allow any to terrorize the land of Sumer and Akkad. I kept in view the
needs of Babylon and all its sanctuaries to promote their well-being.
I lifted their unbecoming yoke. Their dilapidated dwellings I restored.
I put an end to their misfortunes. At my deeds Marduk, the great Lord,
rejoiced. The holy cities beyond the Tigris whose sanctuaries had been
in ruins over a long period, I returned to their places and housed them
in lasting abodes. I gathered together all their inhabitants and
restored (to them) their dwellings."
There are corroborating references to the Persian record in the Old
Testament Books of Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther. The former tells us that
in 536 the first year after he had subdued Babylon and fell heir to her
empire, Cyrus freed the Jews, encouraging a return to their homeland
when they might rebuild their nation. His agents returned the temple
paraphernalia so they could reconstruct their cult, and he wanted them
to reconstruct their culture.
Maybe Cyrus - and the Persians - showed a remarkable tolerance and
magnanimity because of their religion, Zoroastrianism. The history of
the founder Zoroaster is obscure, told partially in legend or is
deduced from extensive writings, references and teachings. Despite the
mysterious origins of this faith, the remarkable theological innovation
he installed flowed freely and unobtrusively into other religions,
including Israel, who lived under Persian rule from 538-330 B.C.
The creator of this faith - so the story goes - was divinely
conceived through an angel, the juice of a haoma plant ingested by a
priest, and then concourse with a woman of noble lineage. The child
from this mixture grew to manhood and became a recluse because of his
great desire for learning and his meditation, centered on seeking
righteousness. Like Jesus - he was tempted by the devil. But
resisted, thanks to his God, Ahura Mazda. Shortly thereafter said God
delivered the divine word to Zoroaster, creating the Zoroastrian
scriptures, a long opus called the Avesta, the Book of Knowledge of
Wisdom. Commissioned to preach it, like Amos, Jesus, Mohammed, Luther,
Wesley and Baha Ullah, he had marginal luck until Hystaspes, the father
of Darius was converted and agreed to spread the word among the Medes
and Persians. The prophet succeeded in his mission, lived to a very old
age and was consumed in a flash of lighting, thus, ascended into
heaven.
Before his advent the Persians worshipped animals, forbearers, the
earth, the sun and a good many elements of Hinduism. Mithra was the
chief god, then Anaita, the goddess of fertility, his consort. We also
note a bull god, Haoma who dying, rose again and gave mankind his blood
to drink, thus, conferring immortality. Priests who served this old
and cluttered pantheon were called "magi".
Zoroaster - like Mohammed - was outraged at this primitive system and
announced to the world a new god, Ahura Mazda, the Lord of Light and
Heaven. Aided by King Darius, the old superstitious faiths were
blotted out and the populace converted to new beliefs, making
Zoroastrianism the official state religion. The scripture which
instructed the faithful was the aforesaid Avesta which Durant describes
as "a mass of prayers, songs, legends, prescriptions, ritual and
morals, brightened now and then by noble language, fervent devotion,
ethical elevation or lyric piety." Included are passages from the
Rig-vea of the Hindus, Babylonian creation myths including the story of
the two first parents and a flood plus considerable Persian folklore.
Its basic premise declared two forces were at work in the world, good
and evil. Good was associated with light and sponsored by Ahura; and
evil, the dark power was the province of Satan or Ahriman. So the
world is a battleground with the contest for the hearts of men being
waged perpetually. Zoroaster declared Ahura Mazda is supreme over all
things. He says, like Isaiah or Job or the prophet Amos: "Tell me
truly, O Ahura-Mazda: Who determined the paths of the suns and stars
- who is it by whom the moon waxes and wanes - who from below
sustained the earth and the firmament from failing - who sustained
the waters and the plants - who yoked the swiftness of the winds and
the clouds - who Ahura Mazda called forth the Good Mind?"
The god has seven qualities: Light, Good Mind, Right, Dominion, Piety,
Well-Being and Immortality. His followers interpreted these attributes
as separate holy beings or influences...Amesha Spenta, "immortal holy
ones". Add guardian angels, devils or demons. The first humans had
been placed in a paradise only to be invaded by serpents, vermin,
locusts, winters, sin, sodomy, menstruation and plagues, all sent there
by Ahriman, Satan. Mankind had free will and personalities in their
own right with the option of making choices. Converts lived by a
golden rule that said, "That nature alone is good which shall not do
unto another whatever is not good unto its own self." Man's duty
was "To make him who is an enemy a friend; to make him who is wicked
righteous; to make him who is ignorant learned." Virtues are piety,
honor and honesty.
Converts faced death unafraid. Beyond this pale lay three options:
heaven, hell, purgatory. All dead souls passed over the Sifting
Bridge, the good soul reaching the other side to the Abode of Song,
welcomed by a "young maiden radiant and strong, with a well developed
bust" and lived in happiness with the god. The wicked soul fell into
the deepest hell, an abyss of darkness and terror with unimaginable
torment. If you weren't totally a lost cause, you dropped off the
bridge into a closer pit enclosed for 10,000 years and then were
redeemed. At a point in time the last judgment occurs with Ahura Mazda
battling Ahriman whom he ultimately destroys. Then, "The dead shall
rise, life shall return to bodies...and the whole world shall become
free of old age and death and corruption."
To quote my source again: "All in all, it was a splendid religion,
less warlike and bloody, less idolatrous and superstitious than the
other religions of its time, and it did not deserve to die so soon."
At this point, having given you my description of Zoroastrianism, we
want to hear the truth from a practicing member of the faith. Mr.
Irani knows more about this than anyone east of the Mississippi and has
talked to me about some of the elements still employed by Zoroastrians
to remember and practice their faith.
I was surprised at the astounding amount of material derived from
ancient Zoroastrianism transplanted to other religions. For starters,
Christmas, the 25th of December may be aligned with Roman Saturnalia
and coincident with winter solstice. But it also happened to be the
birthday of Mithra. Most striking contribution was one which rejected
the Hebrew the premise that imputed all powers to Yahweh. "I create
weal, I make woe", Isaiah's God says. I am the source of good and
I bring the bad. Besides me "There is no other." Anyone who
thinks about that claim wonders if the writer was dyslexic. When the
rational thinking would invade Judaism, this bizarre premise that makes
God the source of wickedness, tragedy and deceit would really become
ridiculous. So here is a neat way out. We leave Yahweh in charge of
righteousness but find another force for evil. The Satan appears in the
book of Job as one of God's agents sort of roaming the earth,
checking on people to be sure all are toeing the line. Judaism
revamped its thinking, now Satan became the source of evil.
Parallel with this, another clumsy peculiarity. In Moses or Elijah's
day upon death, all souls went into Sheol. Anyone thinking about this
has to ask: "What point is there in obeying the laws of Moses? My
neighbor is a cheat, a chiseller, beats his wife, molests his children,
and he ends up the same place I do. This is not right." The
Persians resolved that point as well. If there are two forces at work,
there are two destinies as well; one for the servants of Yahweh, the
other accommodates the servants of Satan. Christianity adopted this
heaven for their converts which was joy, endless comfort in the
presence of God, etc., but sans the young maiden, radiant and strong,
with big boobs. Hell is for the wicked, endless misery, pain and
torment. (In Jesus' words, a burning pit.) But Paul's system for
his church provided an inducement for good conduct and righteous
living, thus, gaining heaven making more sense and a lot more
attractive then sending everyone to Hades.
Note, too, the Zoroastrian declaring a moment of accountability. A
premise picked up by some Jewish Pharisees in the First Century A.D.
which held that the millennial age is brought about not by Ahura Mazda
but by the Messiah, who will arrive with legions of angels and meet the
forces of Satan in a climatic battle, which of course, the angels will
win. In that great-getting-up-morning as the Messiah is approaching,
all bones of faithful Jews shall arise from their graves and meet the
Christos in mid air, they rejoin him in reconstituted form to live for
a thousand years in paradise. This theory not only tidied up a lot of
loose ends but adds enormously to the attractiveness of the faith,
particularly the Christian and Muslin faiths. Why do you think suicide
bombers are so eager to die? Paul was selling Christianity to the
Roman world, critical in his pitch was a new incarnation beyond the
grave where there is neither slave nor free, male nor female, Greek nor
Jew, but all are equal in this classless, society which Jesus has
prepared for his followers. And I'm saying this final judgment and
afterlife drifted into Christianity out of those faint echoes and
suggestions of Judaism, borrowed from Zoroaster.
We now know where the Garden of Eden theory originated and learn how
all sorts of torment, pain, weeds, pain in childbirth came from Satan.
We recall other divine beings like the angel Gabriel or Michael of
Israel et al, plus the visitors to Abraham, the Seraphim Isaiah
described in the temple; the Satan in the Book of Job; the heavenly
council referenced in Isaiah, all there in Zoroastrianism. The spirit
of God is similar to the amesha spenta, the immortal holy ones of
Zoroaster. We recall the element of free will and saw it represented
very early in the Garden of Eden and Eve. I was remembering the
miraculous birth theme and think of Isaac, Samson, Samuel and, of
course, Jesus. Elijah swept to heaven in a fiery chariot is similar to
a bolt of lightening which swept up Zoroaster. The Bull God Haoma
whose blood provides immortality to its believers is something I'll
think about next time I take communion and hear "This cup is the new
covenant sealed in my blood" which is part of the Presbyterian
liturgy. The Eden story is there, plus the flood, the temptation, and
who knows what else.
All of cursory interest to folks interested, Zoroastrianism, Judaism,
Islam and the other five of the extant religions of the world of
surprising relevance to we who are Christian. Our faith was built upon
Judaism as refined and restated by Jesus, then fashioned into a
theology by St. Paul. We are legatees of that ancient journey and in
debt scores of unknown Middle Easter savants. Not all that apparent,
but I suggest you examine our 21st Century American society, which has
put a higher value on the uniqueness of the individual than any other
in history. We have become a model in the search for equality and
freedom. A major part of our national effort is taking care of people,
i.e. the least of these from Social Security retirement down to the Boy
Scouts who intend to "Do a good deed daily". Most of our
nation's budget goes ministering (in one guise or another) to
persons. We educate all our children, punish those who abuse and
exploit, demand fair play, encourage each person to develop his
potential in hopes of gaining personal success and happiness. We give
away annually $241 billion a year to worthy causes endeavoring to
enhance and ennoble our society; 156 countries in the world have less
gross domestic product. We have more volunteer organizations, doing
good works than all the rest of the world combined. And you know the
rest.
Living inside of it day after day, it never seems all that remarkable
but in the scheme of human achievement, you and I are standing on a
pinnacle never before reached in mankind's experience. And it comes
from a people motivated and conditioned by the Protestant work ethic as
represented in the men who framed our nation and wrote our founding
documents. They were different because of the ancient wisdom passed
down in our western culture, a significant piece of their morality and
national conscience coming from the sages of the east, primarily in
Palestine and in Ancient Persia. And in our age of universal literacy,
stability, affluence, freedom, and tolerance we can see the results
possible when religion is enlightened, is accepted, and like in Ancient
Israel, writes the rules for managing the society. It is not Hellenic
or Roman models that produce this. It may be their political patterns,
but our forms are conditioned by a theology time-tested through the
ages, structured not for show or impact but to reflect the grace and
mercy of God as it might appear in human institutions to assure the
welfare of his people.
Etienne Marais
>> "The Origin of Israel's Faith - and its Debt to Zoroaster"
I have had sleepless nights regarding the
influence of Zoroasterism, whether the
Hebrews adopted/created a branch of it,
whether an even more ancient religion may
be the proto religion or if the Hebraic
ideas were in fact the original.
I understand that the Hebrew alphabet
(as well as the Greek/Roman) are offshoots
of an ancient Phonesian form [National Geographic
magazine], could something analogous be said
of the religions ?
The Bible plays at the chicken - egg idea,
regarding what was first and whether God is
a metaphor or real.
Has science and social studies deceived us ?
--
Etienne Marais
Cosmic Link
South Africa
Sirknight67
wandering nomads originating in what is now southern Iraq. They have no
doubt adopted tales and stories from other more advanced cultures in
the region. Just look at the story of Noha's flood, a direct adaptation
from the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh. The similarities with the
Zoroastrian concepts of the final judgment, the universal God
etc...AFTER the babylonian exile seem too striking to ignore.