The Chaldean account of Genesis : $b Containing the description of the creation, the fall of man, the deluge, the tower of Babel, the times of the patriarchsSmith, George
Religion
The Chaldean account of Genesis : $b Containing the description of the creation, the fall of man, the deluge, the tower of Babel, the times of the patriarchs
It is a curious fact that the dynasty of gods, with which Egyptian
mythical history commences, resembles in some respects the list of
antediluvian kings of Babylonia given by Berosus as well as the list of
antediluvian patriarchs in Genesis.
This dynasty has sometimes seven, sometimes ten reigns, and in the
Turin Papyrus of kings, which gives ten reigns, there is the same name
for the seventh and tenth kings, both being called Horus, and the
seventh king is stated to have reigned 300 years, which is the length
of life of the seventh patriarch Enoch after the birth of his son.
Here are the three lists of Egyptian gods, Hebrew patriarchs, and
Chaldean kings.
Egypt. Patriarchs. Chaldean Kings.
Ptah. Adam. Alorus.
Ra. Seth. Alaparus.
Su. Enos. Almelon.
Seb. Cainan. Ammenon.
Hosiri. Mahalaleel. Amegalarus.
Set. Jared. Daonus. (Dun in the inscriptions.)
Hor. Enoch. Ædorachus.
Tut. Methuselah. Amempsin.
Ma. Lamech. Otiartes (Opartes).
Hor. Noah. Xisuthrus.
It is well known that Enos, like Adam, signifies “man;” hence some
writers have supposed that the list of Noah’s ancestors was originally
counted from Enos, so that Lamech, Noah’s father, would have been the
seventh in descent. There is, moreover, a curious resemblance between
the names of the descendants of Seth and those of the descendants of
Cain, Methuselah, indeed, being apparently more correctly written
Methusael (Gen. iv. 18), which is the Assyrian _Mutu-sa-ili_, “Man of
God.” Now Lamech, the descendant of Cain, is the seventh from Adam.
It may be noticed that Irad or Jared is the same word as the Assyrian
_Arad_, “servant,” and _Arad_ or _Ardutu_ is the Assyrian rendering
of the Accadian Ubara, the first part of the name of the father of
Xisuthrus, who is actually called Ardates by Abydenus.
Mr. George Smith believed that the real connection between the
traditions of Babylonia and Palestine would never be cleared up until
the literature of the Syrian population which intervened is recovered.
It is very possible that light may be thrown upon the question by the
excavations now being made at Jerablus, the site of Carchemish, the
capital of the ancient Hittites. Terah may be the same word as Tarkhu,
who seems to have been worshipped as a god by the Hittites; and Lucian
has preserved a legend of the Flood and the patriarch Sisythes, who
is evidently the Xisuthrus of the Babylonians, which was current
at Hierapolis or Mabug, a little to the south of Jerablus. In this
legend the ark has become a coffer, Sisythes and his family are alone
preserved, and the Flood was sent to punish the wickedness of mankind.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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