The Bible and cosmic number

The Bible – translated from Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Anglo-Saxon, Middle Ages English, to modern English (among the numerous paths/translations made) is in semantic, religious, historic, allegorical, poetic, psychological and other terms, a massive multi-faceted work of many lives and levels; a composite work consisting of 39 or 46 books (Protestant / Catholic versions) in the Old Testament from the first millennium Bce, and 27 books in the New Testament, which were written in the first three or so centuries Ad, and given final canonical form by various synods, and the publication of the Latin Vulgate version translated by St Jerome between 385-405 Ad.
Meaning that the entire corpus known as the Bible was at least a thousand years in the making, very possibly perhaps even longer. . . And this is without considering narratives such as the Flood and the Ark, or characters such as Samson, both of which have their roots in the mythologies of the Near East across many cultures dating back to the third millennium Bce.

(The numerous texts which have ‘apocryphal’ or ‘semi-canonical’ status in particular strands of these religions include such books as Maccabees I and II, Esdras, Judith, Baruch, Sirach, Solomon, Susanna, and so on. The criteria for a book’s inclusion for virtually all versions of the Bible is that the scripture is the ‘Word of God’, and as such comes from the godhead/ a divine source. Whether these ‘apocrypha’ as they are termed derive from cosmic or human consciousness is a matter for personal consideration. Likewise, whether they can offer any insights into the mysteries of Christianity, in their differences to ‘canonical’ scripts, indeed whether it may be part of the will of God to include additional or deeper information in these texts which was therefore ‘fated’ to be brought to mainstream attention only at a time of increased information such as the 19th and 20th centuries, etcetera). The Book of Enoch, brought to western European consciousness by the Scottish explorer and antiquarian James Bruce in 1774 from Ethiopia is one of the foremost examples of this dynamic.

But putting aside minor differences between the faiths which place the Bible at the heart of their worship, it may be said the Old and New Testaments possess together a coherent narrative/structure – concerning the ‘will of god’ for mankind – across all the events from the first page to the last. This coherence is affirmed by the massive number of prophecies written in the Old Testament regarding the coming of the Messiah Jesus, plus many other specific predictions – likewise the New Testament includes many similar prophecies, even to the period of time known as the ‘End Times’, something which may happen in the next century or so; or may not. Many periods of history have seen mass belief that the end of civilization was imminent, such as at the turn of the first millennium, at the year 1000Ad when mass hysteria gripped many communities and nations. Overall the Bible contains over a hundred prophecies, often given as a sign of the cosmic consciousness of the prophet who states them.
The immense timescale of the Bible starts from the beginning of the universe’s creation, where the ‘waters of space’ are ‘moved’ by the Word of God and the agency of the Holy Spirit to create material reality; a sophisticated cosmogony which points to the creative dimensions of energy as modern (quantum) physics does too. The Bible then details the creation of Earth and the planets, of organic life on earth, and of mankind – all the way through the events of the history of Israel, shown in many historical details, and lists of generations of different groups of the tribes of Israel and so on. In particular the Old Testament delineates the creation of the Hebrew faith, and the nation of Israel in covenant with Yahweh (Jehovah), and the establishment of a capital city in Jerusalem. As well as YHVH’s efforts to place the nation and its constituent members on a sound moral and spiritual foundation, worthy of the celestial city outlined in many of the books of the Old and New Testament. And as John Michell and other writers have noted, the descriptions of the Heavenly City contain a plethora of sacred wisdom concerning geometry, proportion and esoteric number; measures to be found within the universe, the world and the individual.

KINGSHIP IN ISRAEL AND THE NEAR EAST IN ANTIQUITY; BELIEFS, PRACTICES AND MYTHOLOGIES.

This chapter being a study of some of the clearest examples of Cos# related themes and narratives, we will start (somewhat arbitrarily) with the first king of Israel, King David, as an instructive example of some of the many important themes which are a part of the Bible’s sub-texts;

Firstly, David, estimated by biblical scholars to have ruled for Judah and Israel for 40 years circa 1000Bce, was one of the first full kings of a united Israel, after Saul unified Judah and Israel under his kingship; prior to this the tribes of Israel were ‘ruled’ by a series of priests (Moses, Aaron etc), then a series of leaders known as ‘judges’ in their role as final authority; so Samson was the 15th and last judge, just prior to the (turbulent) reign of Saul. The change, as stated by the Bible was a continuation of a need by the tribes to have a leader in war against the growing nations around them; thus kingship was a ‘new octave’, a new way of directing the society being created by the tribes of Israel, or of uniting the larger groupings of the tribes, in what seems a fairly inevitable process. The Lord YHVH (Yahweh) was less accepting of this creation of a more political, and less religious role, perhaps pointing to the limit of the tribal community as a natural boundary of the religious leader? Or the difficulty of a religious leader overseeing the demands of uniting and leading the numerous (twelve) tribes of Israel and Judah. In fact, one of the greatest religious/ ecumenical leaders in the Old Testament given the full approval of YHVH is the priest Zadok, the ‘righteous and justified’ priest who was given responsibility in 2Samuel 15.27 as guardian of the Ark of the Covenant in the time of David. Another highly important priest is Melchizedek, mentioned in Genesis 14.18 as the high priest in the time of Abraham of the site of Salem (‘Peace’) – which eventually became Jerusalem, the ‘navel of the world’. So important is he that Jesus Christ himself is described as ‘High priest forever in the order of Melchizedek’ in Hebrews 7.21. The fluid dynamic between religious and ‘political’ leader is shown in the text of Genesis in the description of the blessing of Abraham by Melchizedek after Abraham has won an important military victory – for the text is so written that it is not possible to state conclusively who gives tithe to whom, as the text says ‘And he gave him tithes of all’… (Gen.14.20).
So from the time of Moses, when the political and religious leadership was retained in the person of one man few other examples exist, (and the granting of priestly authority to Moses’ brother Aaron again indicates the almost inevitable ‘fault-line’ existing between the two roles, or the natural tendency for the two roles to ‘split apart’ with growth). Something Gurdjieff states was not always the case, referring to the era of the ‘shepherd-kings’ of ancient Sumer and the Near East as a time in ‘pre-history’ when the two roles were perfectly united (linking this era to the reformations of the ‘Saintly Ashiata Shiemash’ in his narrative – innovations which Gurdjieff said grew throughout the region for centuries until a wave of wars and political instabilities proved damaging to the conscience-based popular movements of the shepherd-kings. The campaigns of Alexander the Great, in the 4th century Bce swept away the last vestiges of this ‘sacred design for mankind’ brought by the ‘celestial messenger’ Shiemash, according to Gurdjieff, leading him to call Alexander the ‘Arch-vainglorious’ …) But again, the antiquity of this period points to the difficulty of uniting the religious and the political on a societal scale, as civilization and populations grew…

Saul was the first ‘king’ of Israel, having won an important battle against a rival tribe. His ‘kingship’ is said to be divinely approved – but later in the Book of Samuel he displays a number of character traits unworthy of a sovereign ruler; and having proved his baseness, YHVH (Yahweh, the personal name of the Lord God) punishes him (with defeat and death.) One indication of the gulf between political and religious leaders is the narrative that Saul is ‘inspired’ by YHVH when he visits the prophets at Bethel, and starts prophesying; as such the Bible states at 1Samuel10, especially verse11-12; “And it came to pass, when all that knew him beforetime saw that, behold, he prophesied among the prophets, then the people said one to another, What is this that is come unto the son of Kish? Is Saul also among the prophets? … Therefore it became a proverb, Is Saul also among the prophets?”
As such outlining the distinction between the two types of leaders. (This occurs just prior to YHVH making Saul the king of Israel, in keeping with the wishes of the people – “And Samuel called the people together unto the Lord to Mizpeh. And said unto the children of Israel, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I brought up Israel out of Egypt, and delivered you out of the hands of the Egyptians, and out of the hands of all kingdoms, and of them that oppressed you.
And ye have this day rejected your God, who himself saved you out of all your adversities and your tribulations; and ye have said unto him, Nay, but set a king over us. Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes, and by your thousands “. (1Samuel10.18-19). (Yet it is hard to see how it could have been otherwise in a period of much armed struggle in establishing the nation of Israel…)

Indeed concerning events thereafter, there are multiple kings and rulers in the Old Testament who, like Saul, having been ‘anointed’ as ruler by YHVH, are later judged as ‘falling short’, and displaced, or destroyed, by divine ‘will’. As we shall see, the Bible indicates that the seeds of these rulers downfall are in many cases the same as the seeds of their ‘greatness’; in other words, in large part, lay within the mysteries of their DNA, or the divine parentage of their bloodlines, a theme present in antique religion and mythology from the time of the civilization of Sumer, as the details of Gilgamesh and the King Lists showed. These lists began with fully ‘divine’ members of the Anunnaki, and progressed to celestial/ human parentage, and then fully’ human’ rulers, who were still ‘of the lines of the gods’…
And the powers received in this way by the lines of kings from Sumer on were those created by the celestial DNA of the ‘gods’, the Anunnaki. And the works of art and myths of Sumer represented these powers as being solar, the predominant energy of our world, the solar system, and life.

Symbols across all the cultures of the Near East from Sumer from 3200 Bce onwards, of this double-edged power included both lions, and serpents, as representing energies which made men who possessed them in abundance stronger, more intelligent, but at risk of being subsumed by them and dominated by unbalanced force.

⇦ Assyrian king at the Palace of Sargon II, 713-706Bce, in Khorsabad/Dur-Sharrukin. From the Louvre. Wikimedia, Oliver Ga, CC-by-SA 3.0.

Thus the sub-text was expressed in many stelae of kings overcoming lions, a standard artistic theme from the representations of Gilgamesh onwards – one of the commonest themes in the artworks of antiquity, and one based more on notions of the energies of the sun than on lions per se.
Incidentally this symbolism of the lion as representative of the Sun and the energies it represents within the psyche may be recognisable to those who have studied any versions of the Tarot -where card XI (Strength) means precisely this, the need of the individual to restrain and control the life-giving, growth-enhancing, but dangerous powers of the subconscious, as represented by a lion, in their personality. Note the juxtaposition in the Assyrian relief of a serpent along with the animals. Also predominating over the deeper instinctive aspects of the self can lead to a more unified being, under the primacy of the conscious mind.
This inner symbolism is reflected in the similarity of the two images displayed here, from over 2500 years apart…

An excellent example of this psychologically profound narrative, allegory or symbolism is Oannes, the deity of the Annedoti said by the 3rd century Bce historian Berossus to have come from the Persian Gulf to Sumer to give humanity civilization; ‘Annedoti’ means the ‘repulsive ones’. Berossus, a historian who was accepted into the Babylonian priesthood around 300 Bce, wrote in Greek the work ‘A History of Babylonia’ using his access to inner records. This included a list of the first kings of recorded history, like so many of these lists detailing extraordinarily long periods of time; in this case 432,000 years from the first king to the tenth king Xiusouthros – who survived the Deluge. *the WB-62 Sumerian King List in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford lists Ziusudra as the last king of Sumer prior to the Flood.

The lengthy periods in this, as in the Bible, reflect the narrative of the genetics of the heavenly rulers, who gradually gave way to the hybrid bloodlines of ‘celestial/human’ kings who thus inherited some of these aspects of longevity to a lesser degree. Berossus’ post-deluge King Lists record more normal time periods up to the kings of Babylon, in the first millennium Bce.
This hybrid nature of Oannes, like Enki, one of the most important of the deities of Sumer related cultures, was entirely representative of their ‘celestial’, solar and strongly reptilian nature…and was passed down through more than one bloodline into humankind, thus creating the hybrid lineages (primarily of ‘kings’, though not exclusively
(right) Card XI of the Rider-Waite Tarot,1909.

In Egypt this was called the ‘Shen’ ring, meaning ‘eternal protection’, in Sumer the ‘rod and ring’ as it is called. See for example the Old Babylonian depictions of the goddess the ‘Queen of the Night’, possibly Inanna/ Ishtar, or Lilutu, (who possibly inspired Lilith in Hebrew myth). This goddess was as such a deity of the underworld, possibly indicating Inanna’s descent to the ‘nether-world’ to rescue the husband of her elder sister, a mythology which found expression much later in the Greek myth of Persephone, a deity of fertility and light who was forced to live in the underworld for a part of her existence.

This ring of cord represented the protective encirclement of the kingdom by the gods of the land, as they protected the Universe likewise from the forces of Chaos. Early depictions in both cultures were of a simple cord held in a circle; whereas in other ones the symbol is slightly different, as a small handle or loop with a small container attached. This is a theory anyway, especially as there are no complete explanations of the strange small containers at present. . . indeed in this Babylonian image of Oannes it is midway between a cord and a container. If these small buckets are celestial in nature, it would indicate their (mostly divine) holders command the forces implied by the ‘waters’, ie of the ‘depths’, from which all life was believed to come. (Note also the skill with which the ‘horns’ of the Anunnaki are incorporated into the design of the fish head-wear as gills!)

(left) Oannes, at Nineveh, Assyria. From Austen H.Layard. Attribution;Wikimedi, Public Domain
These ‘symbolic’ tales and artworks were a part of every (cosmic consciousness) inspired culture from Sumer, to Akkad, Babylon, the Assyrian empire, then the Hebrew and Greek cultures later, stemming mostly from ‘worship’ stelae as well as records of sovereign’s military victories, as well as occasional representations of everyday life. As an example of some shared symbolism beneath different outward meanings, the myth of the sun figure Samson bears resemblance to that of Icarus and Daedalus; the elder of whom benefits from the powers of the Sun by controlling them, and the son of whom, Icarus, suffers the consequences of not doing so – he is destroyed by his own inadequate control of his (excess) powers in other words, a central lesson found within antiquity.

Apkallu equivalent of Oannes, with ‘pine-cone’ and ‘container’ ; Nimrud, Assyria 900 Bc. Attribution; OSM Amin, 2009. Wikimedia, CC-BY-4.0. Note the serpent arm-bands also, on many examples of this image, as well as the fine artwork and craftsmanship, and conscious meanings of the symbolism – reproduced quite consistently for at least 1200 years, from c.1800-600 Bce. ). Also noteworthy is that he is holding the ‘cord of protection’, from early Sumerian and Egyptian artworks.

A study of Samson’s extensive story in Judges ch.13-17, (four full chapters) reveals many aspects of this inner reality of solar, celestial powers owned by certain characters in antiquity.

The name Samson actually means ‘little Sun’, and is related to the Sumerian/ABA Anunnaki god Shamash, the ‘deity of the Sun’ present in the religious myths of Sumer, the epic of Gilgamesh and so on. Samson also bears strong resemblance to the character of Enkidu in the epic, the wild-man friend of Gilgamesh. Indeed, some rabbinical commentators have questioned whether Samson actually existed, so fantastic is the detail in the story of his life, and so widely known a mythos in the Near East of antiquity…
Noteworthy too is the fact that although the Judge of Israel for twenty years (mentioned twice in his story), not one example is given of his being consulted by the people of Israel as such. The only time a delegation approaches him is to plead for him to stop provoking the Philistines with acts of violence.

Confirmation of this Sun/serpent metaphor-related basis for the life of Samson, (as well as Gilgamesh, and others) comes in metaphorical form; the presence in his story of a lion; bees; honey; foxes; burning wheat/corn fields; him breaking his bonds like ‘flax burnt with fire’ (Judges 15.14/16.9, etc); threats of burning with fire (14.15); the flame of the angel ascending to heaven (13.20), and so on.
(There is also a considerable amount of number symbolism ‘encoded’ within the story of Samson, much of it based around the value of three; 30 sheets and 30 change of garments (14.12); 3 days without solving the riddle (14.14); Samson slays 30 men (14.19); catches 300 hundred foxes! (15.4); 3000 men of Judah visit Samson at the top of the rock of Elam (15.11); and 3000 Philistines are killed by his last act standing between the pillars when blind and captive. . . what this numerical symbolism actually means is completely open to debate. One possible conclusion is that taken in conjunction with the sun-related symbolism, as well as the unlikely/ miraculous/ impossible events of his narrative – such as the pillars – the writer(s) of the tale of Samson wished to convey the message that the ‘facts’ and wisdom of the Bible may be interpreted metaphorically as well as literally, something which can be a difficult step to take in a person’s widening of their understanding of the meanings of the Bible; indeed may have been written purposefully as allegories to expose the understandable tendency of the religious to accept every word of sacred texts as the literal truth; something which marginalizes the mystical, (and non-rational, uniquely sublime) aspects of ‘perfection of the soul by the divinity’s will’. In other words, by asserting such difficult to believe ‘facts’ reflecting the devout reader’s ‘suspension of disbelief’/ literalness back to them. (Conversely though, the description of ‘miracles’ – defined by Gurdjieff simply as the manifestation of the laws of a higher dimension within the material dimensions of the world – may serve to inculcate a feeling of awe and reverence that the source of this world comes from the ‘heavens’, ie the non-material Godhead. So it can be a confusing subject to consider; it can however be asserted, with no impugnment, that a simple belief in the literal veracity of everything written in the Bible is not necessary, or even desirable in sifting the inner meanings of the collected texts’ authors; for in writing of things which exist ‘outside of’ this world, and the temporal dimensions it exists within, there can be no other way of communicating such matters except by metaphor and allegory – and by writers who in many cases give every indication of having been the recipients of cosmic consciousness from various sources.

(Indeed some narratives of the Bible, when examined closely seem to be written precisely to show the attentive reader that the events of some sections virtually cannot actually have happened, ie hold allegorical significance primarily – a point made by Gurdjieff in considering the revival of someone who has been dead for three days. (Or likewise the deeds of Samson; for example, his carrying the town gateway to the top of the mountain; or pulling down the pillars of the ‘house of the Philistines’ containing 3000 women and men… clearly holding symbolic meaning primarily). Quite often the usual answer in biblical circles of debate is that ‘God can do anything’ – something which is true, and yet a limiting belief also perhaps).
And this perspective regarding the biblical uses of allegory to communicate spiritual truths is not a strictly modern interpretation; in his book ‘The Secret Power of Music’ David Tame relates on p.208 the perspective of some of the early Church fathers in this respect;

“Only from the fifth century Ad did the Creation stories of Genesis begin to be taken as literal historical records; this occurring as knowledge of the ancient wisdom within the Christian movement deteriorated or was forced underground. Before this, we find Gregory of Nyssa (c.Ad 390) describing the Genesis Creation as ‘ideas in the form of a story’. The other prominent churchmen of the time also accepted the Creation stories as allegorical”.

(Tame then goes on to place the origins of the Genesis creation stories within the context of the Middle and Near East, particularly the awareness of several religions that the Creation ‘was linked with a form of utterance or sound of God’). Another example of the use of allegory in the Bible regards the depiction of the Garden of Eden’s location, particularly the four rivers mentioned. These have been used to define the whereabouts of Eden by commentators since antiquity – since two of the rivers are identifiable as the two rivers of Mesopotamia, the Euphrates and the Tigris, this – or in broader terms, the Fertile Crescent- is accepted as being a simple geographic description within the book of Genesis…
And yet the other two rivers are unidentifiable, and the text seems to indicate something more than just geographical descriptions. So at Genesis2.10-14 the text is as follows;

“And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads. The name of the first is Pison…which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold…And the gold of that land is good…And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia. And the name of the third river is Hiddekel; that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates”.

We have seen in the Squared Circle section how the symbol (shown left) may be considered to define the meeting point between the heavens (the circle), and the Earth (the square). And from the centre-point of the symbol four rays may be drawn, one towards each corner of the square. This may be regarded as a symbol of the diffusion of the energies of the higher dimensions within the material plane, splitting the unity of the divine source into four equal parts; into ‘four-square’ reality, as sacred number has always characterized the properties of the number four. In some Sumerian stelae the rays are given wave-like edges, indicating they may be interpreted as rivers, as such.
This metaphor from sacred geometry has been the underlying reason for the design of cathedrals, temples and mosques throughout history having a square or rectangular base, and the sphere of a dome for a ceiling. Examples include the Dome on the Rock in Jerusalem at the Temple Mount, St Paul’s cathedral, and many more. The symbolism contained within the verses from Genesis is clear when viewed from this perspective; so the reference to gold may refer therefore to the energies of the heavens, contained within light too, as gold has always been used to symbolize gods in numerous religions. The compass likewise brings in the dimensions of the four points of material reality, North, West, East and South, as unity becomes four different rays, or rivers…
In fact the use of the term ‘the four corners (of the world)” within the Bible, is often aimed at conveying a sense of the completeness of whatever action or event is being referred to, as well, moreover, to refer to the ‘powers of the world’, in contrast to the powers of heaven. Examples of this usage are found at Isaiah11.12; “And He shall gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth”. Also at Job1.19 when he loses all his worldly goods, according to YHVH’s wishes; and at Revelations 20.8; “(Satan) shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle”… and so on.

─

To return to the myths surrounding Samson for example, the connected symbolism of sun, serpent and lion, and their power, is at the heart of his life-story; a ‘matrix’ of associations reinforced elsewhere in the Bible in a more oblique form. Namely that Samson and his parents were of the Tribe of Dan, so that rabbinical texts have linked Samson to the character named ‘Bedan’ (mentioned in 1Samuel12.11) . Further to this is the blessing of Jacob before his death to his twelve sons, the founding fathers of the Twelve Tribes of Israel; in referring to Dan he said (Genesis 49.16-17);

“Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel. Dan shall be a serpent, by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horseman’s heels, so that his rider shall fall backwards” (our italics).

Samson was of the tribe of Dan; he was also the fifteenth and last of Israel’s line of ruling judges. He aligns in this way too with the concept of the judge as ‘shaitan’, or critic/’obstacle in the path of ’/ ’divine prosecutor’ of the accused person or peoples. Much as the symbology concerning Simon Peter links him effectively with Satan in this role, as a ‘stranger’, a ‘divinely appointed’ opponent, or ‘testing angel’. . . also with Job, whose name can mean similarly ‘the opponent’ or ‘adversary’. (And in which the figure of Satan plays a key role in the testing of Job’s inner faith and being). Note too Simon Peter’s words in the first book of Peter, 1Peter5.8;

“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion walketh about, seeking whom he may devour”.

Reflecting the lion and serpent metaphors of antiquity connecting to the powers of the Sun, (within both the world and genetics of various bloodlines); the number of the sun’s energies in the number-symbolism of antiquity was 666, according to John Michell in City of Revelation, and elsewhere. Symbolism confirmed by its usage in the bible being connected with Solomon, gold, and the building of the Temple (at 1Kings10.14).

– the narrative of the tribe of Dan links the myth of Samson to ‘heroic’ figures such as Gilgamesh and Enkidu present in the cultures of antiquity from effectively the beginnings of civilization across the numerous peoples of the Near East; Gilgamesh in one of the oldest (composite) texts of human history was also depicted as defeating and controlling one or more lions from within the middle era of the first Sumerian civilization, circa 3000-2700Bc; as well as being protected by the sun-deity Shamash. And whatever doubts about the historicity of the life of Samson exist, the metaphorical meanings and associations contained within his story are extensive. . .

So how did Sumer, and its ensuing (Eastern Semitic) civilizations of Akkad, Babylon and Assyria in Mesopotamia come to be the source of such longstanding narratives? The cultural records of Sumer and the following cultures state this was the period when the ‘gods’ of the Anunnaki established civilization; ie. created working systems of land reclamation from marshes, systems of irrigation and agriculture, designed and built cities and sacred temples, taught skills of metallurgy and craftsmanship, instituted the many aspects of civilization such as a written language, law courts, education and temples, and in total brought the gifts of civilization ‘from the heavens to earth’. And not only brought civilization to mankind but oversaw the establishment of the first true civilization at first hand; Sumerian deities were responsible for each of the cities and areas of Sumer, and had their personal spaces in the inner areas of the ziggurat temples of their city-state.

This involvement lasted for many centuries, from c.3400Bce onwards, until by the era of c.600 Bce their presence and guidance of events had become far less frequent or direct. By then such relationships as existed were used more to confer authority on the king – for example, around the time of the last king of the Neo-Babylonian empire, Nabonidus in 556Bc in Babylon, (tellingly, considering Nabonidus’ key role as one of the last kings claiming direct divine parentage), his son is portrayed in the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament as Baltasar, or Belshazzar, who is judged and condemned by YHVH at ‘Belshazzar’s Feast’ as being a king without the living divinity’s connection). Nabonidus (incorporating the stem N-B in his name which relates him to the deity Nebo, and Niburu, the celestial planet of the Sumerian deities, something we shall see holds relevance in Moses’ story) stated his ancestry was of the moon god Suen/ Sin, (one of the younger generations) of the Anunnaki. This was ultimately in a failed attempt to restore the fortunes of the failing empire, as Babylon was defeated by Cyrus the Great of the first Persian Empire, in 539Bc; thus bringing about the end of the Babylonian Captivity and the return of the Hebrews from Babylon to Israel and Jerusalem… From various comments made in the books of the Bible, it is possible to discern the feelings of abandonment experienced by the tribes of Israel during the 1st millennium Bce; from the Lord accompanying the tribes of Israel into battle against surrounding tribes/ nations, to instead allowing the Israelites to be defeated, and taken into captivity, for their sins.
This withdrawal matches that of the ‘Anuna’ (as this narrative believes were ‘physically’ present during the eras of the creation of civilization in antiquity, particularly in Sumer, although likewise in Egypt, Lebanon, Israel and so on) who gradually separated themselves from mankind as it grew to self-sufficiency. An example of the abandonment by the Anuna of the Sumerian peoples is the ‘Lament for Sumer and Urim’, from circa 2000Bce, marking a point in Mesopotamian history when the civilization of Sumerians (the third dynasty, or Ur-III) collapsed, and was later replaced by the (Semitic) Akkadian peoples, as well as the Amorites who were precursors of the Babylonians, in more northwards regions of Sumer. To give an example of the extensive Lament;

“To overturn the appointed times, to obliterate the divine plan, the storms gather to strike like a flood.
An, Enlil, Enki and Ninhursag have decided its fate – to overturn the divine powers of Sumer, to lock up the favourable reign in its home, to destroy the city, to destroy the house, to destroy the cattle-pen… after An had frowned upon all the lands, after Enlil had looked favourably on an enemy land, after Nintud had scattered the creatures she had created, after Enki had altered the course of the Tigris and Euphrates, after Shamash had cast his curse on the roads and highways.

An frightened the very dwellings of Sumer, the people were afraid. Enlil blew an evil storm, silence lay upon the city. Nintud bolted the door of the storehouses of the Land. Enki blocked the water in the two rivers. Shamash took away the pronouncement of equity and justice. Inana handed over victory in strife and battle to a rebellious land. Ninjirsu poured Sumer away like milk to the dogs.
Turmoil descended upon the Land, something that no one had ever known, something unseen, which had no name, something that could not be fathomed. The lands were confused in their fear. The god of the city turned away, its shepherd vanished.

The Hebrew book of Lamentations in the Bible concerning the Babylonian defeat of Jerusalem, the sacking of the city and the Temple and the carrying of the Israelites into captivity, is markedly similar… in contrast to other myths and sacred texts from both cultures, God does not speak in any way within the work, marking his/ their absence …

This long-term retreat from being discernibly present as ‘parents of mankind’, guides and protectors, was believed in Israel, (as shown by comments within sacred texts such as the Bible), to be a mark of divine punishment for the Israelites’ failure to follow the laws and rules introduced by the Covenant between YHVH and mankind after the Deluge, and by the Laws given by YHVH to Moses. So for example, in Ezekiel 9.9, the prophet repeats the words of YHVH as they are spoken to him in his visions;
“Then he said unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness: for they say, The LORD hath forsaken the earth, and the LORD seeth not”. It is at the start of the book of Ezekiel, incidentally, set in ‘the land of the Chaldeans’ ie. in the land of the Anuna; Babylon, within Mesopotamia (Eze1.2) that Ezekiel has a vision, seeing a ‘celestial craft’ in the skies (what might be called in effect a UFO); “And I looked, and behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire enfolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire… came the likeness of four living creatures. And their appearance…had the likeness of a man…and they sparkled like the colour of burnished brass”..! (Eze 1.4-7). The vision of four figures he sees is (coincidentally) four-sided, with four faces, akin perhaps to the four gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, represented respectively as a divine man, a winged lion, a winged ox, and an eagle. Ezekiel sees the following;
“And out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance; they had the likeness of a man. And every one had four faces, and every one had four wings… and as for the likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a man, the face of a lion, on the right side; and they four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four had the face of an eagle” (Ezekiel1.5-10).
This passage was presumably a vision of the four Gospels’ authors, although each of the four figures has the same four different faces, apparently, rather than four separate figures…(?). Perhaps meaning they are individuals, as denoting the division of heaven’s energies into four within the world, and yet conjoined within the unity of the higher dimensions…

So while the gods themselves did noticeably gradually retreat from the events of the nations they were concerned with, including Israel, there were still numerous ‘celestial’ beings and related events occurring throughout the 1st millennium Bce, as indeed at all times.

Another noticeable point concerning the retreat of the Anuna is that this later era was one characterized by increasingly prevalent wars, between all the vying nation-states and peoples of the region, as the Age of Aries (Ares/ Mars) progressed, from 2000Bce until the birth of Jesus – perhaps a reflection of the geo-political reality of the time as ‘empires’ grew to such sizes that wars became of greater intensity and duration. This era contrasts with the more personal and ‘meaningful’ early periods of the growth of nations, indicated in stelae of a millennium earlier where the majority of artistic representations were ‘worship’ stelae, depicting the gods alongside mankind, and ones in which the symbolism of different acts depicted, and ‘abstract’ objects was more significant than records of battles and wars. The meanings contained within these stelae, such as the Tablet of Shamash, combining the different deities of the pantheons of the time, alongside humans, and objects linked with celestial forces and meanings, such as angels, rod-and-ring, date-palm trees, marker-stones, sceptres, ball-and-staffs, rayed-planets and stars, and so on, contain incredibly deep and abstract metaphorical associations. For example, the Tree of Life tableaux, with accompanying depictions of the Anunnaki enlightening or guiding mankind, was ubiquitous in various reproductions throughout Mesopotamian culture from the Sumerians on to the Babylonians and Assyrians, from c.2100 – 700Bce… (while similar themes concerning the celestial Tree of Life are to be found in Egyptian, Greek and Indian civilizations, as well as in the Hebrew and Christian religions too…)

But in Mesopotamian stelae, as perhaps in Egyptian artworks, scenes depicting sieges, battles, the numbers of prisoners of war, (and their torture), and the riches and glory of the king became far more prevalent by the 6th century Bce. As noted by Talley Ornand in her 2005 work ‘The Triumph of the Symbol, Pictorial Representations of Deities in Mesopotamia and the Biblical Image Ban’, the Assyrian and Babylonian empires saw a move in artistic stelae from anthropomorphic portrayals of divinities to simply having their own individual symbols, which created more space for representing the kings, and the events of their reigns…

(above left) Assyrian depiction of Ashurnasirpal II, from NW Palace, Nimrud (called Kalhu in the bible) c,884-859Bce, featuring symbols to represent the gods, such as Enlil, Shamash and Inanna (Ishtar/Venus).

(left) Assyrians torturing captives; from Nineveh / Nimrud.
Sir Austen H.Layard,1882.Attribution; Wikimedia/ Public Domain

(below) Assyrian artwork/wall depicting a siege-attack, c.8th century Bce from the British Museum.

Note the high quality of the artwork and artistic design, as well as the presence of perspective, in that there are archers depicted of four or five varying sizes…

To return to the myths of Shamash and Gilgamesh, (and particularly Enkidu, the ‘wild-man’) etc, these had been extant and extensive in the Near East in various forms for at least 1500 years by the time of 1200Bce when Samson is said to have lived. The writing of the narrative of Samson may date from shortly after, or from sometime around the period of the Babylonian Capture, when the religious and political elite of Jerusalem and Israel were taken to Babylon for seventy years or so (from when Nebuchadnezzar II defeated Jerusalem in 603/598Bc until 538Bc when Cyrus released them, a year after defeating and taking Babylon).

It is conjectured that it was at this time in 7th century Bce Babylon that Hebrew compilers/ writers/ editors of existing religious texts, were introduced to the extant conscious stream of Sumerian wisdom – the first civilization of the Anunnaki, and as such stemming from a source of conscious cosmic origin, however much later than the events taking place in Sumer. (ie noting the less direct influence of the Anuna on Babylonian culture, )

(Again it may be helpful to note, to state the Babylonian and wider Near East-influences upon the Hebrew religion is not to denigrate the Old Testament in any way; whether, for example, Samson per se existed or was an archetypal figure, is moot – for these nations will have had many ‘heroic’ men, warriors judges and kings, whose lives bore witness to the truth of his story; or Samson may have existed, and had the Sun-symbolism and mythic/symbolic acts of his story added by the writers of the Bible to make the story more universal and ‘complete’. Possibly as the product of one of the mystery-schools of the Near East linked to the Hebrew civilization. Also noticeable is the innovative high standard of the biblical language and narrative, in comparison to other texts of that period from around 600 Bce, which has stood the test of time extremely well with its sophisticated metaphors, sub-texts, encodings, language and spiritual and psychological insights; making it much like Gilgamesh, quite clearly a product of higher – or cosmic – consciousness).

All of which leads us to the central subject of this first section, which centres upon the narrative created by the civilization of Sumer; the literal link between gods and men; what Anunnaki texts called the ‘granting of ‘kingship’ to men’ – and the life-time story of David, one which encapsulates the inner tensions of the narrative of antiquity that can be encapsulated as GODS : KINGS : MEN.

As already seen, the Anunnaki introduced kingship (in the extensive period before the Deluge according to the Sumerian King Lists), as a way of creating a (genetic) link between themselves, and ‘mankind’, a link which would enable the correct transmission of cosmic guidance by bridging the gap between the two. Also making rulership of mankind more sympathetic, and reducing friction, as kings could clarify the people’s wishes to the ‘gods’, and the ‘gods’ wishes to the people, the rulers having effectively a foot in both camps. So, the institute of ‘kingship’, was designed consciously as potentially the best way to guide the development of human society in a harmonious and firm manner – the absence of (political) leadership and stability being likely to result in societal conflict and destruction.

Moreover, this class was to fulfil its function precisely when the ‘gods’/’celestial beings’ had finished their initial agenda of creating homo sapiens, and civilization, and accordingly (at some inevitable point) stepped away from day-to-day direction of the affairs of mankind – so that, as mentioned, the Babylonians, Assyrians, and Hebrews all lamented the loss of guidance in person from their Lord. This is reflected in the Psalms of the Old Testament in many examples linking the absence of YHVH to the defeats and humiliations of the six or so centuries before Christ.

For these reasons the institute of kingship was created as the best long-term intermediary for cosmic influence and way of passing sovereignty to mankind itself. The long-term strengths were also the long-term problems of kingship, though – and the genetic drawbacks of the kings’ ‘heroic’ genetic stream, were part of the reality, and thus a part of the experience of life…
So, (lines of) kings and queens were made ‘more godlike’ than ‘ordinary humans, containing a higher proportion of ‘celestial’ genetics, in order to enable there to be a separate, ‘connecting’ level between the two.
In the earliest society of Sumer, Gilgamesh was the first mythical ‘king’ of the city of Erech, fulfilling this intermediary role; although his father Lugalbanda, was one of the line of Shepherd/priest-kings, stated to have lived for 1200 years in the Sumerian King List (written on tablets circa 2100 Bce in the Ur-III dynasty of Sumer – which arose confusingly sometime after the fall of the Akkadian dynasty which arose from the earliest Sumerian ones! – and also the lists from the Early Babylonian period also from around 2100 Bce).

As Tally Ornan writes in the introduction to the article Godlike Kings in Mesopotamian Art, published in ‘Critical Approaches to Ancient Near East Art’, (ed. Brown and Feldman, 2013);

“Standing at the head of the social hierarchy, the Mesopotamian king had a close relationship with the gods, and was considered a mediator between the earthly and divine spheres. The interaction between kings and gods had a supreme role in ensuring social welfare and a vital function in the empowerment of the ruler.
The paramount indicator of divine royal status was the addition of the cuneiform sign dingir, denoting god in Sumerian, as a classifier preceding the name of a king. This process began in the reign of Naram-Sin, king of Akkad 2254 – 2218Bce…
Indirect means of deification are expressed in a variety of literary genres such as royal inscriptions, myths and epics, or titular formulas. They can be traced in notions such as the divine pedigree of a king, the resemblance of the king to divine images, godlike stature and superhuman traits, quasi-divine royal accomplishments, or the intimate relationship of the king with the divine as manifested by sexual and parent-and-child metaphors…”

And in studying the links between sovereign figures within Sumerian culture and that described in the Bible, it is clear that not only kings and queens but individuals at the centre of events in the Bible had links to figures depicted in Sumerian works of art and literature. Or in other words, reflected the narratives of human: gods interactions found within works such as the Epic of Gilgamesh, among many other Mesopotamian stories and myths;

Wise-women in the Bible such as Rahab, and figures from Sumerian & Babylonian mythology/ society.

There are some female characters in the Old Testament who are called ‘harlots’, such as the woman Rahab living in Jericho (Joshua 2.1- 6.25) who gave the Israelites information as they sought to view and then conquer the land of Canaan promised by the Lord.
Yet the role of the woman Rahab, who co-operates because she has heard of the Lord’s helping of the Israelites with miracles to escape Egypt, as well as defeat Canaanite tribes, indicates she is a ‘powerful’ and connected woman; wise-women play an important role in many of the events in the Old Testament, as in Gilgamesh. As such the term ‘harlot’ may have been an application taken from the Sumerian role of the ‘temple Hierodule’, as featured in the Epic of Gilgamesh – the ‘sacred prostitute’ who served as such for the temple in the city, and may have been involved with the ‘divine’ roles of providing help to others at crucial times; and possibly performing some sort of informal ‘initiation’ of young men through their passage-of-rites into sexual adulthood. The hierodule named Shamhat in the early chapters upon the instruction of the gods and Gilgamesh changes Enkidu the ‘wild-man’, (who cannot read, and who drinks water at the water-hole with the deer and gazelles), humanizing him through sex and one-to-one intimacy, and teaches him how to eat, dress, and relate with people;

For six days and nights Enkidu stayed aroused,
and had intercourse with the harlot
until he was sated with her charms.
But when he turned his attentions to his animals
the gazelles saw Enkidu and darted off.
Enkidu. . .his utterly depleted body
his knees that wanted to go off with his animals went rigid;
Enkidu was diminished, his running was not as before.
But then he drew himself up, for his understanding had broadened.
Turning around, he sat down at the harlot’s feet,
The harlot said to Enkidu,
‘You are beautiful’, Enkidu, you are become like a god.
Why do you gallop around the wilderness with the wild beasts?
Come, let me bring you into Erech-Haven,
to the Holy Temple, the residence of Anu and Ishtar,
the place of Gilgamesh, who is wise to perfection.

Enkidu, you who do not know how to live,
I will show you Gilgamesh, a man of extreme feelings,
he has strength mightier than you
without sleeping day or night
Enkidu, it is your wrong thoughts you must change!
It is Gilgamesh Shamhat loves,
And Anu, Enlil have enlarged his mind,
Even before you came from the mountain.

The representations, from Sumer, to Hebrew, to Greek myths of ‘pythonesses’, depicted such ‘wise-women’ as representing the subconscious aspects of the human being, hidden ‘lunar’ energies rather than the solar, rational mind. The female innkeeper Siduri helps Gilgamesh to recuperate after his exhaustive travails, and then introduces him to the boatman Urshanabi, who can aid him in his quest to meet Utnapishtim, (the ‘Noah-figure’ of the epic), who resides ‘at the confluence of the rivers’, in the ‘faraway’; as Utnapishtim is granted eternal life by Enlil, as he recounts in his tale of the Flood, the setting indicated may thus be a celestial one. As indeed the Bible talks of the ‘waters of the heavens’ in Genesis1.2; using the word ‘tehomot’, the ‘waters of the deep’, or the ‘salt waters’.
This role of women is reflected in the fact that some commentators in the past termed Rahab as an innkeeper, rather than say she was a ‘prostitute’, while in Gilgamesh the innkeeper Siduri is referred to by the epithet of ‘The Replenisher’, a clear association with celestial processes of life and fertility, etcetera. So the character Rahab who is portrayed as being of some significance in the early stages of Israel’s foundation may well be a subtle reference to the ‘sacred’ roles of such influential women in the Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Near Eastern and Hebrew societies of the era.
As the Sumerian/ Babylonian goddess Tiamat, mother of the gods in the first verses of the Enuma Elish, is representative of the primal forces of the ‘depths’, or ‘abyss’…a force which is creative, but also chaotic and destructive in potential. The closest parallel to Tiamat in Hebrew mythology is from Isaiah30.6/51.9, Job26.12, and Psalm89.10, namely the ‘celestial-serpent’ Rahab, which as noted is also the name of the ‘pagan wise-woman’ at Jericho. In fact some writers have noted that as Siduri the ‘innkeeper’ in Gilgamesh lives in a ‘walled-in’ city dedicated to the moon-deity Sin, this narrative may be the source for Rahab the ‘harlot’ living by the wall of Jericho (Joshua6.17/23). Especially as Jericho means the ‘City of the Moon (God)’, from Yeriho/ Yereah respectively in Hebrew.

There is though some deeper issue here, in that the prophet Isaiah called the sea-monster/ cosmic being (in Isaiah 51.9-10) Rahab, using this word rather than Tanniym, Leviathan or Tiamat (all meaning ‘sea-serpent’) as others did;

“Was it not you (the ‘Lord’) who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced that monster through? Was it not you who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep, who made a road in the depths of the sea so that the redeemed might cross over?”

Job also uses the name in this way; “God will not withdraw his anger; The helpers of Rahab do stoop under him” (Job9.13). Likewise “He stirreth up the sea with his power, And by his understanding he smiteth through Rahab” (Job26.12). Psalm 87.4 links Rahab with Babylon, Philistia, Tyre and Ethiopia, saying; ‘this man was born there’. As this section shows, these places are associated closely with the negative bloodlines of the (Sumerian) Nephilim.

Both Isaiah and Job providing in this way several semantic connections to the (serpent/ waters-related deity) Enki, Lord of the Ap-su, the subterranean depths of water comparable to the subterranean underworld/aquifers, the depths of the seas, the subconscious/instinctive centres of the body, and of the ‘abyss’ /space. (hence the proverb of Solomon, in Ecclesiastes 10.8, noted elsewhere in this section; ‘He that diggeth a pit shall fall into it; and whoso breaketh an hedge, a serpent (nahash) shall bite him’, indicating the divisions existing between conscious and subconscious parts of the human mind ; and as we see in the Etymology section, the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root for serpent was ‘s-nego’, from which came the word ‘nagas’. This stem was the source for words in many languages connected with ‘snake’, ‘neuron’, ‘nerve’ and ‘sinew’).

In the meaning Rahab contains in Hebrew of ‘arrogance’ or ‘blusterer’/’storm’, it is said to symbolize both Egypt in its treatment of the Israelites, as well as Babylon similarly later. Zecharia Sitchin relates Rahab the sea-monster to the Babylonian myth of Marduk and Tiamat, whereby the planet Marduk smashed a planet which had ‘invaded’ the solar system, a planet as such ‘without a destiny’ (ie, ordered path around the sun); Tiamat/ Rahab. In this telling the collision created the asteroid belt as we know it, and possibly at the same time created the planet-wide ‘dent’ which is now the Pacific region of our planet, according to some theorists. In Psalm 89.10 is apparent support for this celestial or planetary meaning; “Though hast broken Rahab in pieces, as one that is slain; thou hast scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm”. So in this interpretation the words of Isaiah etcetera relate not to the seas of Earth, but to the ‘waters’ of the solar system, and of space; a metaphorical duality which was in use from the Sumerian myths/ Epic of Gilgamesh onwards). That Tiamat means ‘the salt waters’ is reflected in the Hebrew word
‘tehomot’ for the ‘waters of the deep’, while the name Miriam, as Moses’ sister was called, means likewise the ‘bitter waters’, or the ‘salt waters’… In the image of Marduk shown here, from a 9th century Bce Babylonian cylinder seal, he stands with his foot on the ‘mushussu’ (the ‘celestial dragon’/ ‘distinguished servant’), above the waters (of the abyss) – thus showing his victory, and subjugation of its energies to his sovereignty…
The use of Rahab by Isaiah may be in reference somehow therefore, to the aspect of female energies of chaos – as Lilith, the deity of the night in many cultures of the Near East in antiquity was similarly represented/ regarded. In this sense Isaiah may have been linking excessive or unrestrained aspects of female sexuality within societies to the negative energies of chaos existing within the ‘deeps’. A view which may be at the heart of the injunctions of Hebrew law-makers such as Moses to consider women at the time of their monthly menstruation to be ‘unclean’, (Leviticus 12.2, 15.9, 15.20, 15.24, 15.25, 15.33, Ezekiel 22.10, 36.17 etc) and thus avoid intimacy with, as having a degree of negative/‘chaotic’ energies within themselves during that time. (Likewise, the society of men descended into unbridled sexual activities, such as that of Sodom and Gomorrah which was subject to divine punishment and destruction, due maybe to the possibly non-human ‘Nephilim’ origins of such practices, or equally likely, because of the impossibility of positive growth in such an unbalanced society). So guidance of human societies towards sexual restraint, or discernment may be said to be part of the early celestial ‘stewardship’ of mankind in the civilizations of Sumer, etc, and in Hebrew society, part of which was based upon an awareness of the flow of cosmic energies within the male and female human being. Certainly the energies of both male and female may be both positive or negative in character, tending towards the negative when in a state of excess, or imbalance. Moses, like Isaiah and Job, was not noticeably negative in his attitudes to women, indeed was in a loving marriage – so his decrees, like the prophets’ use of the word ‘Rahab’, may be allowed some leeway -although his patriarchal views that would probably be judged as out-moded today…

This semi-divine/ human aspect of his being is at the centre of the epic poem of Gilgamesh, and informs all his behaviours – and likewise in the Bible, especially the Old Testament, where the line of Cain is equated with the line of kings, and as such given protection through a mark of authority; writers (such as Laurence Gardner) have proposed that Cain was not the son of Adam, but rather marks the split in genetics whereby the ‘lines of kings’ were formed; so theorizes that Cain ‘was the son of the Lord’.
This is based on the clue that of his birth Eve says (Gen4.1) ‘I have gotten a man from the LORD’, being a pun on the name Cain, which means ‘to possess’, as well as versions of the story of Eden in Jewish rabbinical and Talmudic texts, which state the same narrative – in short, that whereas Abel was the son of Adam and Eve, Cain was the offspring of the ‘Lord’ and Eve – a hybrid of the genetics of Eve, and the (‘Anunnaki’) serpent; termed in Hebrew texts as Samael, an archangel, (and in later Midrashic texts the leader of the ‘satans’), connecting him with the Book of Enoch and the actions of the Nephilim; the leader of the fallen angels is called Semjaza (1Enoch6.3-5). As virtually all the other angels (eighteen of the first twenty named) have names ending in ‘-el’, meaning ‘of the heavens’, it is not too great a stretch to connect Samael with Semjaza in one sense or another. Furthermore, the serpent in Eden is partly an image or representation of Enki/Oannes, both hybrid serpent/ human beings (depicted with serpent-bodies, or scales, etc) who created humanity originally (in the ‘birthing room’, or ‘creation chamber’/ laboratory). Then also creating civilization, through the sharing of celestial wisdom, as well as initiating the hybrid ‘line(s) of kings’ – thus Cain was genetically different to Abel, in the Old Testament, as this particular hidden narrative of Genesis was connected to the Sumerian creation myths, such as the Myth of Cattle and Grain, set in the Edin, the ‘hill where heaven and earth met’; the Babylonian Enuma Elish ; and the pre-Deluge King Lists.
As Laurence Gardner notes, the Bible states not that Cain was ‘a tiller of the ground’, but instead that he had ‘dominion over the earth’, a subtle difference in meaning indicating the authority of kings. . . one distinction is that Enki created mankind with Ninhursag, the ‘great mother of Earth’ using ‘scientific’ techniques, whereas the Nephilim created lineages through sexual intercourse – one reason why the offspring of the Nephilim were far from perfectly balanced, being the result not of the divine Will, but of the breaking of divine ordinances by the ‘sons of the gods’, as depicted in the Book of Enoch.
This narrative is supported as the true course of events in both 1Enoch, parts of which were found at Qumran in 1948 verifying the version brought back from Abyssinia by James Bruce, as well as the additional ‘apocrypha’ the ‘Book of the Secrets of Enoch’ translated and published in 1896 by William Morfill, and 1924 by Rutherford H.Platt. This work is a variation of the standard Book of Enoch as published by the Rev. R.H. Charles in 1893, which was based on the Ethiopic version of Bruce, with the Slavonic versions being labelled as 2Enoch…
So, The Secrets of Enoch versions were based on Bulgarian, Serbian, Russian, and Slavonic versions which had been extant in those regions since the first centuries of the 1st millennium. And this version said of Adam and Eve;

“(The devil) …understood his condemnation and the sin which he had sinned before, therefore he conceived some thought against Adam, in such form he entered and seduced Eve, but did not touch Adam”. (Ch 31.6)

This does not specify the difference in parenthood between Cain and Seth as the Bible indicates/ specifies to exist for some reason. But the possibility that the line of Cain was that of the Nephilim, the sons of the Anunnaki who mated with human women, is one of the Old Testament’s most significant hidden narratives.

While the primary genetic stream of kings were from the earliest of times viewed as ‘heroes’, and ‘men of renown’, on the downside, if they were not of faultless morality they had the tendency to be unsympathetic, greedy, violent beings ; as the Book of Enoch states of the character of the Nephilim who began the bloodlines,

“And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nonetheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”. (Rev. R.H.Charles version, 15.10).

This conflicting nature of the line(s) of kings is one of the unspoken themes of the Old Testament; for some are seen as ‘the descendants of the gods’ – notions of the ‘divine right of kings’ largely stemmed from this paradigm, of innate highest qualities – and the Bible does take pains to locate Jesus within the bloodline of Jesse, David, and Solomon, stemming ultimately from Adam and Eve, and thus in the image of the godly Creator as he created them;

Genesis 5.1; In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him.

Yet the lineage of Seth from which Noah and thereafter the Hebrew tribes were traced, is so nearly identical with the lineage of Cain that the two may be conflated easily, possibly with this intention by the writer of Genesis. In Genesis 6.4 the story is related;

There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

(which led directly on to the Flood, to ‘eradicate’ the predominance of the corrupted lines of the Nephilim, according to the book of Genesis…but it does not state that they were completely separated from humanity – on the contrary, the great-grandson of Noah is Nimrud, the ‘mighty hunter’ who builds the Tower of Babel, and is unmistakably of the hybrid Sumerian lineages). Indeed, additionally, texts such as the Qumran scrolls revealed the ‘celestial’ genetics of Noah himself, so other-worldly was his appearance when he was born, linking him in the text directly with the ‘sons of the gods’, the Watchers – (The Book of Enoch, ch.106);

“And after some days my son Methuselah took a wife for his son Lamech, and she became pregnant by him and bore a son. And his body was white as snow, and red as the blooming of a rose, and the hair of his head and his long locks were white as wool, and his eyes beautiful. And when he opened his eyes, he lighted up the whole house like the sun, and the whole house was very bright. . . And he arose in the hands of the midwife, and opened his mouth and blessed the Lord of heaven…

And the Bible, like the several pseudepigrapha of Hebrew origin, (as well as Sumerian mythology of gods and demons) does not always indicate clearly which lineage is which – or whether the two are intermixed. There is some confusing overlap between the line of Cain, and the line of Seth which Eve gives birth to once Abel has been murdered… So it may be an intentional fact that the names of the two lines are more than similar – as listed in Genesis4/5, they are effectively the same;

Cain; Enoch – Irad – Mehujael – Methusael – Lamech.
Seth; Enos – Cainan – Mahalaleel – Jared – Enoch – Methuselah – Lamech – Noah*.

That Lamech is the father of Noah, who in the Book of Enoch is born looking not like a human child, but a ‘son of the gods’, is of the greatest significance. As Methuselah says to Enoch when requesting his advice, in 1Enoch ch.105;

“And after some days my son Methuselah took a wife for his son Lamech, and she became pregnant by him and bore a son (Noah). And his body was white as snow, and red as the blooming of a rose, and the hair of his head and his long locks were white as wool, and his eyes beautiful. And when he opened his eyes, he lighted up the whole house like the sun, and the whole house was very bright. . . And he arose in the hands of the midwife, and opened his mouth and blessed the Lord of heaven.
And his father Lamech was afraid of him and fled, and came to his father Methuselah, and said; I have begotten a strange son, diverse from and unlike man, and resembling the sons of the gods of heaven; and his nature is different and he is not like us, and his eyes are as the rays of the sun, and his countenance is glorious. And it seems to me that he is not sprung from me but from the angels, and I fear that in his day a wonder may be wrought upon the earth.”

Alternative words come from the Slavonic version of 1Enoch, where Lamech concludes; “I thought in my heart, that the conception was the work of the Watchers, the pregnancy of the Holy Ones, and that it belonged to the giants (Nephilim); and my heart was upset by this…”

And in fact the writer and academic Amar Annus argues in his work “The Sons of Seth and the South Wind” that the name of Seth was derived from the Mesopotamian/ Akkadian Sutean tribe of mountain-based nomads (“south-dwellers”), who raided the established walled towns of Akkad and Babylon etc during the second millennia Bce; moreover the Suteans were connected to mythologies of the evil-bearing South Wind, in addition to which “…in Babylonian texts the term ‘Sutean’ is not only ethnic, but also a designation of a witch…in the anti-witch-craft series Maqlu 3.77-87 belonging to the Babylonian host of malicious beings. The demoness Lamastu, a precursor of Lilutu, and Lilith most likely, calls herself a Sutean woman (Lamastu2.136);

“I am the daughter of Anu from heaven, I am a Sutean…I am terrifying. I enter the house, I leave the house (as I please) Bring me your sons; I want to suckle them. In the mouths of your daughters I want to place (my breast). Anu heard (this) and wept; the tears of Aruru, Lady of the Gods were flowing; ‘Why should we destroy what we have created, and why should the wind carry away what we have produced? Indeed, take her to the sea, or to the highest outcrop of mountain! Indeed, bind her to a free-standing tamarind, or a lone reed stalk. As a corpse does not have life…may the Daughter-of-Anu like smoke leave town, and never return!” (p11-12.)

He writes further to this, that in the Hebrew Bible the ‘sons of Seth’ were ‘polemically’ changed, and portrayed more positively. One reason he gives is that;
“The name of the land and the deity of the Shasu/ Sutean groups locates them in southern Jordan in the 14-13th centuries Bce. The Shasu/ Sutean population joined the settler groups, which later became Israel. In other words…they formed a part of the genesis of religious identity in the new states of Judah and Israel. According to the written sources, the southern origin of YHWH was still remembered many centuries later. Numerous references in the Hebrew Bible place the origin of YHWH to southern arid regions…(thus explaining) Habbakuk’s words, ‘YHWH came from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Paran’ (Hab3.3).”

(This potentially throws some light on the significance of the origin of one of Job’s three friends, namely Eliphaz the Temanite – the Book of Job is one of the oldest in the Old Testament, according to linguistic analyses of its forms of language, dating it to around the 14th century Bce, and one filled with esoteric and meaningful references which connect to an even earlier period of antiquity in the Near East… And indeed, curiously, in Genesis36.11/15/16 the son of Esau named Eliphaz has a son himself named Teman, along with sons named dukes Zepho (meaning ‘Watcher’), Gatam (home of Goliath and other Rephaim giants), Korah (the name also of the rebel cousin of Moses ‘swallowed up into the earth’ at Num16.32. Significantly, Korah and his followers are described earlier at Num16.2 as ‘two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown’ , closely matching the depiction of the two hundred or so ‘sons of the gods’ in 1Enoch, and Gen6.1-4, who descended to Mount Hermon to begin the lines of the Nephilim by mating with human women), Amalek (related to Sumer possibly) and Kenaz (related to Cain)… the word ‘duke’, used to describe all these sons of Esau and Eliphaz, holds the meaning of ‘to lead’, from both Latin ‘ducere’, to the PIE root of *deuk, meaning the same.
A verse from Job which mentions Teman may be seen to hold some relevance to the dualities apparent within long-term representations of the Suteans/ Sethians; this comes from chapter6, one of Job’s first speeches bewailing the fate that has overtaken him;

“O that my grief were thoroughly weighed, and my calamity laid in the balances together… For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit: the terrors of God do set themselves in array against me. The things that my soul refused to touch are as my sorrowful meat. Oh, that I might have my request; and that God would grant me the thing that I long for! Then should I have comfort; yea, I would harden myself in sorrow… What is my strength, that I should hope? Is my strength the strength of stones? Or is my flesh of brass? My brethren have dealt deceitfully as a brook; and as the stream of brooks they pass away. The paths of their way are turned aside; they go to nothing, and perish. The troops of Tema looked, the companies of Sheba waited for them. They were confounded because they had hoped; they came thither, and were ashamed. For now ye are nothing; ye see my casting down, and are afraid.” (Job6.1-21)…

The entire book of Job, from his name onwards (which means ‘adversary’, or ‘satan’), may well be said to be an extended consideration of the questions raised by God’s punishments of mankind, as individuals, of the good as well as the sinful; while some emphasis is given to those who have ‘compromised’ moralities, for whatever reason, be that of tribe, hereditary, or personal choice. The mention of Sheba is curious; the symbolism of armies and warriors raises associations of the war-like Nephilim, and lines of Cain, as well as the divisions created by the hybrid dualities; something present in the description of the Shulamite at Song6.13, as we shall see shortly.

Similarly curious is that the Queen of Sheba, one of the non-Jewish women that king Solomon consorts with, is called by Jesus the ‘Queen of the South’. This reflects upon her coming from Ethiopia (or Abyssinia), and Sudan…while Teman means explicitly ‘South’ also – both connect in many ways to the Sumerian concepts attached to Enki, the ‘Lord of the South’, on various metaphorical levels, including the ‘ab-zu’, the underground reservoirs of the waters which feed life, (which gave rise to the word the ‘abyss’), and its counterpart in the human body concerned with matters of survival, physiology, instinct, and the appetites; the stomach, and the reptilian centres of the brain. (As Sheba represents lunar, subconscious energies, joined in marriage with the solar/ intellectual nature of Solomon).
The deity Enki/ Ea/ Oannes was the serpent or fish ‘hybrid’ deity/man, who gave wisdom to mankind, and the skills of civilization; particularly metal-work. This relates Enki closely to the Nehash (or Nehushtan), the ‘brasen serpent’ made by Moses in the wilderness (Numbers21.6-9), as well as to Tubal-Cain, the ‘father of all those who work in metals’… And concurrent with all these references are themes within Jewish mythology and religion of the ‘wicked’, or sinful who are judged by YHWH accordingly; something the words of Job appear to be referring to likewise.

As we shall see later, the life of Solomon, son and successor to king David, is marked by both his numerous ‘foreign’ or ‘strange’ wives, and accordingly his failure to follow the ordinances of YHVH, causing him to receive divine punishment. His romance with Sheba, the Queen of the South has many links to ‘cosmic energies’ including the Sun and Moon, as well as to djinn, or demons. So the number of 666 is present within their story, used to describe weights of gold (symbol of the sun) brought from Ophir. And in the many retold versions of the couple to be found throughout history, in the Bible, Coptic (Egyptian), Hebrew, Ethiopian, Islamic and other versions these themes have subtly found expression, in ways that, for example, Jesus and Mary Magdalene’ story, certainly hasn’t undergone. So, from the Qur’an 27.23-24;

“I found there a woman ruling them, and she has been given of all things, and she has a great throne. I found that she and her people bow to the sun instead of God. Satan has made their deeds seem right to them and has turned them away from the right path, so they cannot find their way”.

Likewise in the Qabalah Sheba was considered one of the queens of the demons, and sometimes identified with Lilith, the demonic, negative, or possibly ‘night’ aspect of the feminine within the Near East. The associations existing between the South, and evil, and female deities/ cosmic-beings (such as Lilith /Lilutu, and Sheba) appear, therefore, to have been part of Near Eastern religion and myth from the earliest of times.

*To return to the lineages of Seth and Cain within Genesis in the Bible, as we have seen, Noah is implied to be the offspring of the ‘Watchers’ in the Books of Enoch/ Noah. And the answer of Enoch to Methuselah’s enquiry as to the truth of the matter is highly ambiguous. This is another example of an anomaly existing within sacred texts which points to implied narratives, whose meanings are hidden for the most part.

Not only are the two name lists virtually identical, providing a (metaphoric) clue that the two lineages are inter-twined in some way, but there is also some interesting synchronous detail in the lineage lists; in Cain’s list Lamech has three sons, and in Seth’s Noah has three sons, who people the world after surviving the Deluge, so that they are called the ‘fathers of the nations’. Cain’s sons are the representatives individually of; Jabal, ‘the father of those such as dwell in tents and of such as who have cattle. Jubal, ‘was the father of all such as handle the harp and organ’ – and Tubal-Cain ‘an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron’ (Gen4.22). Noah’s sons were each assigned as follows; Japhet peopled Europe, Ham peopled Africa, and Shem peopled Asia, between them creating the ‘toledot; the’ seventy nations of the world’…

And it may be possible to compare or conjoin the two lineages, of Cain, and Seth; so Europe became the continent where the nations (of Tubal-Cain) were skilled in the craftsmanship of brass and iron ie, metal-work, technology, war. Africa became peopled by those such as dwell in tents and have cattle; predominantly rural in nature – and Asia became where those who handle such as ‘the harp and the organ’ were located.

This last description requires a bit of clarification, necessitating as such a diversion into the subject of music, of great importance within the Bible, within religion, and throughout the history of mankind; in the Vesica section we see how the Bible describes when the Ark of the Covenant was brought into the Temple of Jerusalem/Solomon; the number of musicians and singers symbolically
represents the cosmic# values of 120 and 288. The number 288 is said to be a value of the ‘pulse-beat’ of the Earth and the universe by several writers, such as Ernest Maclain, in his (1976) work ‘The Myth of Invariance’.
When the Ark, symbol of divine power is placed within the (cubic proportioned) Holy-of-Holies, the room then fills with a cloud, the ‘Glory of God’. The number of Levites ‘skilled in singing to the Lord’ (as the Seraphim do in heaven) were 288. (1Chron25.7), while in 2Chron 5.12 there are 120 priests who were trumpeters. (- see the destruction of the Walls of Jericho, by use of the Law of Seven, and accompanying sound, of the voice, drums and trumpets) Both numbers are cosmic# related, in the geometric harmonics related to 288, 144, and 72 as well as to 432 and 360, relating to the frequencies of the universe as the ‘rachaph’ (the spirit of the Lord) ‘hovers (vibrates) over the waters’ (of space-time). In other words, it is a harmonic of the primordial vibrational frequency of the universe. In biblical terms this is the ‘Word of God’ – the Logos – ‘creative force of reality’ in this way.
So frequencies and harmonics are at the heart of music – and the universe, at the level of the atom –reflected by the philosophy/religion of Pythagoras and his school in the 6th century Bce, in the concept of the ‘music of the spheres’… Strachan relates the values of 72,144 and 288 to octave intervals within the proportions of the Temple of Solomon, built to be a place on earth whose proportions in the three sections (courtyard, main temple, and Holy-of-Holies) reflect those of the universe, numerically having ratios of the unison – fourth – and fifth intervals within the octave. The cubic ratio (1:1:1) of the Holy-of Holies at 20 x 20 x 20 cubits reflects the note of the full length (open) string of an instrument which is called the fundamental; the 1:1 note of the octave which happens to contain all the vibrations of the other musical intervals of the octave within its overtones, and as such contains ‘all the consonances of the universe’. Hence the unison, fourth and fifths are called perfect consonances, because they are invariable notes which cannot be changed into major or minor key. Moreover the Holy-of-Holies, itself with a geometric centre-point from which the voice of the Lord was heard, and the chamber filled with a dense smoke at the temple’s inauguration ceremony (2Chronicles5.12-14), was located directly over the place on the Temple Mount said to be the ‘centre of the world’, and as such a ‘higher dimensional gateway’ point; making the entire narrative one of cosmic consciousness and part of a long-term tradition older than any religion or civilization .

The science writer Brian Green writes in his book ‘Elegant Universe’;

“String theory proclaims, for instance, that the observed particle properties are a reflection of the various ways in which a string can vibrate. Just as the strings on a violin or a piano have resonant frequencies at which they prefer to vibrate… the same holds true for the loops of string theory. But we will see that rather than producing musical notes, each of the preferred patterns of vibration of a string in string theory appears as a particle whose mass and force charges are determined by the string’s oscillatory pattern. The electron is a string vibrating one way, the up-quark is a string vibrating another way, and so on. Far from being a collection of chaotic experimental facts, particle properties in string theory are the manifestation of one and the same physical feature; the resonant patterns of vibration – the music, so to speak – of fundamental loops of string” (within the smallest sub-units of the atom, such as the quark) … (p.15-16) Again, he writes;

“(Similarly) strings on a violin, for example… can undergo an infinite number of different vibrational patterns known as resonances. These are wave patterns whose peaks and troughs are evenly spaced and fit perfectly between the string’s two fixed end points. Our ears sense these different resonant vibrational patterns as different musical notes. The strings in string theory have similar properties. There are resonant vibrational patterns that the string can support by virtue of their evenly spaced peaks and troughs (ie their wavelength, or number of vibrations per second) exactly fitting along its special extent. According to string theory, the properties of an ‘elementary particle’ – its mass and various force changes – are determined by the precise resonant pattern of vibration that its string executes”.

This shows the essential link between cosmic # and sacred architecture, which is based upon the harmonic ratios of notes found within the octave, whereby various divisions of the octave, such as fifths, thirds, etc produce series of notes based upon concordant frequencies found within a string over an octave’s range. As highlighted by Pythagoras; a vibrating string will give different notes/ frequencies/ overtones/ harmonics at mathematical divisions of the open string, a characteristic which is to be found at the heart of the Chinese stringed instrument the gu-qin.
The harmonics and timbre of the playing styles taught since at least the 5th century Bce make the gu-qin one of the most ethereal and sophisticated musical instruments known to mankind, a fact reflected in the music made by it being included on the golden records carried by the two NASA spacecraft Voyager One and Two in 1977. Among other information (such as the sound of the sea, wind and storms, as well as fifty or so spoken languages) this record contains the highest expressions of music and art as representative of humanity’s achievements throughout history, as it travels further from the solar system than any man-made object ever has before. (At present, having passed the limits of the solar system in 2013 at around 10 billion miles distance, the probe is estimated to be 15 or so billion miles (154 AU or Earth:Sun distance) from Earth. It still has enough power to transmit periodic messages of scientific data taken weekly twice a year back to earth, which take over 20 hours travel at the speed of light to reach us, The probe is expected to have enough power left to do so for another two or three years yet… and travelling at 60,000 mph with no atmospheric impedance, is expected to continue travelling outwards for thousands of years further).

So the ‘physics’ of the stringed instruments considered point in this way to the foundations of reality upon a harmonious basis of vibrational rates or frequencies. As Gurdjieff taught, energy becomes halved in vibrational rate over one octave, and correspondingly more ‘material’, on what is a continuum effectively from the realms of pure energy down to the densest matter within the universe – thus making the octave a central way of studying energy-matter interactions. With awareness of the concordances of reality within its deepest levels, subjects such as the classical architecture and music of various epochs likewise arose as some of the best ways of communicating such understanding. For example, the Gothic cathedrals, and European music from 1300-1800 were likewise based upon the underlying tenets of this ‘creative harmony’ of the cosmos and reality.

The universal basic ‘note’ of the atoms within material reality may be related to the hydrogen atom, according to the works of Ouspensky and Gurdjieff (please post any corrections to this!), as a ‘building block’ of reality at the level of the atom, which has a standard (universe-wide) frequency of vibration.

And in relation to the human being, the ear and its ability to process information from reality means that the organ of perception, and hearing in particular, are tuned to the energies of the cosmos and their vibrational patterns or frequencies. This includes light as well as sound; we are tuned through millions of years of evolution to the informational networks pervading all levels of the universe. As we examine in the Great Pyramid section, it is possible therefore that the Pi-related values of 5.5, 11, 14, 22, 28, 44 and so on are reflected in the human ear’s mathematical sensitivities; for within the inner ear the sound vibrations we receive from external sources enter a spiral channel for sorting and processing before being encoded by hairs within a ‘water’ filled space into electrical signals fired along the nervous system to the brain; as most animals (particularly mammals) similarly have. The number of turns of the spiral determines what frequencies the ear is able to perceive, meaning different animals have different number of turns, and sensitivities to higher or lower frequencies. Within humans the number of turns of the spiral is exactly 2.75, in keeping with the progression of values from 22 to 11 to 5.5 to 2.75 as mentioned. If biological life evolved to be as sensitive as possible to the material energies of life and the world, as both modern science and Gurdjieff maintain to be the case, then we are naturally in tune with the energies of reality as they resonate with Pi and the sphere of the planet (as the energy fields of the planet circle it) – indeed the true extent of the capabilities of the human ear is certainly nowhere near fully known in this respect, particularly as the deeper levels of information derived from sound may be experienced only subconsciously and instinctively, in centres of greatly different nature to the conscious mind. In this music shows the links existing between sound and not only the intellectual centres of the mind, but the emotional areas too, tending very often towards the subconscious as these centres do… a feature supported by the harmonic aspect of music having the ability to affect large groups of people similarly, ie outside of the individual’s choice (This universality, or objective influence occurs not only in humans, but in animals too, particularly mammals, with evolved emotional centres).

Coincidentally (or possibly not) the Standard Tuning Reference note on the piano for the last century has been the A⁴ above Middle C, of the frequency of 440 Hz. The progression of A notes from the lowest octave on the keyboard upwards is 27.5, 55, 110, 220, 440, 880, 1760 and 3520 Hz from A° to A⁷, in a curious synchronicity which puts much of the music in the world in theoretical and actual harmonic relationship with these cosmic proportions of the ear and reality.
It may therefore be with these associations that the continent which is peopled by ‘those skilled in the harp and the organ’ – ie. stringed instruments capable of studying the law of seven via the octave – represents in theory the region where the (conscious) study of such subjects has always been followed; the East, and Asia in general, the continent where all five or six of the major religions on earth began, namely the Hebrew, Christian, Islam, Hindu, Sikh, Jain, and Buddhist faiths. The engraving below by Gustav Dore is an example of the celestial nature of consonance in terms of musical notes, indicating that virtually every reference to music within the Bible is concerned with the higher spheres.

But whatever the linguistic and psychological factors, this is almost so deeply a part of human consciousness as to be unchangeable, and indeed, to be almost therefore un-noticeable! But to conclude, the metaphorical meanings attached to the harp, and stringed instruments within the Bible are almost without exception to the ‘higher spheres’ (or ‘circles’, or ‘spirals’ as the linguistic root of sphere refers to, affirming the significance of these powerful and mysterious forms within music, nature and reality). That the Bible describes the choirs of the Seraphim besides God in the highest heaven may thus be seen to be pointing to the significance of music in relation to reality. Moreover, the many strands of evidence concerning sound, music, and the human ear combine to raise the inescapable conclusion that music, especially sacred music, has the ability to change a person’s consciousness, in ways that visual stimuli struggle to achieve. (And possibly, therefore, on a longer time-frame, may refine a person’s being)… This fact is why music is so important in the places of worship of virtually all religions, in all places and eras – while this point raises another; namely, that as architecture is ‘music set in stone’, being based upon the mathematical proportions of notes within the octave, the places built upon the tenets and practices of sacred geometry likewise exert influence upon the human being – bringing the individual into a state of resonance with the life-giving celestial, or cosmic energies at the heart of reality. Especially when they are sited at points on the Earth’s surface where there are greater higher-dimensional node-points, or energy flows…

(left) The Psalmist king David, by Gustav Dore. Attribution – Wikimedia, Public Domain.

So, to return to the highly curious synchrony between the three sons of Noah (Sethite line), and of Lamech (that of Cain) as can be seen, the two lines are juxtaposed to what may be considered a significant extent allegorically (as these divisions almost certainly are); an unstated fact but one which is potentially highly revealing. The earliest example of the concept of dividing the regions of the world into three came, unsurprisingly, from Sumer, in the division of the skies/ land/ seas (or north/ equator/ south also) to Enlil, Anu and Enki respectively.

The narrative of the Flood is of interest in that it posits the existence of the bloodlines of ‘the gods’ – the creation of mankind deriving from Sumerian myths such as ‘Enki and Ninhursag’, where the gods mixed their own celestial ‘substance’ with the ‘clay of earth’, ie proto-human DNA. As such in the myth the biblical representation of Enki is the role of the serpent which completes the process of making human beings as they are today, creating fully conscious ‘homo sapiens’ with the ‘wisdom of the gods’. This theme is shown in one of antiquity’s most well-known images, that of the Tree of Life, with ‘guardian deities’ standing behind humans who flank the Tree. Most significantly the deity inserts a ‘pine-cone’ symbol towards the back of the human’s head; the ‘Occipital gate’ in eastern philosophy, and towards the ‘pineal gland’ the ‘seat of the soul’ as Descartes described it. So in Tree of Life stela, as in the biblical version, with the fruit of the Tree, the process of the creation of fully complete man and woman, the mixture of celestial and material (‘in the likeness of God made he him. Male and female created he them . . .’ /Genesis 5.1-2) is the result of ‘physical’ intervention to the physiology of the human being. This is the message of the sacred texts of antiquity, with the broader processes of evolution acting upon these significant alterations made at individual moments in the history of the last 75,000 years or so; whether this is true, or provable, is a question for consideration also.

So this is almost certainly a separate process to that of the creation of the hybrid ‘celestial’/human bloodlines as described in Genesis 6.1-4, that of the ‘Nephilim’, which occurs at a later stage. This process described in Genesis is concerned solely with the actions of the younger Anunnaki as happened in Sumer; and this is evidenced by many details within the Old Testament, such as the references to the ‘sons of Anak’, or the ‘Anakim’.
But a contradiction of sorts arises; the Nephilim bloodlines are placed in the era preceding the Deluge, indeed this is the reason given in various texts for YHVH’s actions in allowing the Flood, due to their offspring’s (the giants for example) negative influences and effects upon the world in their oppressive rule of mankind. So it appears that with the Deluge, the problem is ‘solved’ – and yet it isn’t, because not only is the lineage of Enoch and Noah ‘compromised’ with celestial genes (the ‘Watchers’) of indeterminate nature, but the descendants of Noah, in the persons of Nimrod, Abraham, Nahor and Lot etcetera, are linked directly with the bloodlines of Sumer and of Babylon, (of which Nimrod was the ruler at the time the Tower was built). Nimrod is one of the closest links to the ‘mighty men of old’, the Nephilim, in the post Flood era in fact, but not solely. This apparent anomaly of pre- and post-Flood lineages is certainly worthy of examination. Another point to bear in mind is the fact that the stories and narratives of the Bible are in cases such as this allegorical; mankind was never reduced to just a handful of people, or however many the story of Noah posits – meaning the ‘truth’ held within is less easy to obtain. But if the myth indicates a bottle-neck within mankind’s genetic history, this may offer a clearer picture of the spread of celestial genes within various peoples throughout the (Asiatic) world from c.8000 Bce.

The clearest references to the Nephilim bloodlines are when the Old Testament refers to the Rephaim, such as at 1Chronicles 20.4-8 which details the Israelites battles against the Philistine giants of Gath, who were ‘of the born-ones of the ‘rapah’. This narrative is repeated at 2Samuel 21.15-22 again stating the giants of Gath were of the rapah/ Rephaim. (Again, how these clear bloodlines of the Nephilim existing circa 1080 Bce survived the Flood is not explained or referred to). And in Judges 1.20 the text links these Rephaim with the ‘sons of the Anak’; the ‘sons of the gods’ mentioned in Genesis 6.1-4, ie. the ‘sons of the Anunnaki’. And many allegorical details link key characters within the Israelite narrative to these bloodlines ‘of the mighty men of old’.

This complexity is reflected in the meaning of Nehushtan in Hebrew as the ‘knower of secrets’ – this relates to the aspect of Enki as a deity of wisdom, technology and so on. Regarding the multi-‘dimensional’ aspect of the epithets of some of the Anunnaki deities, some critics have asked how the characteristics of ‘wisdom’ ascribed to him can possibly be related to his epithet as the ‘god of mining’, as if the two are contradictory; the truth is they are essentially linked. Both metaphorically, and physically; firstly in the sense of the deepest levels of instinctive wisdom, ie the subconscious deepest levels of the mind. And in outer terms, how could the pyramids, temples, and societies and cities of the early civilization have been built without metal tools? (or nations and empires without weapons? The history of mining and (metallurgy), and of building and civilization, is the history of mankind’s progress, to paraphrase Zecharia Sitchin (The Gods of the Golden Tears chapter, The Lost Realms).* (Though the Bible states at one early point in the Old Testament; “there were no smiths in the land of Israel during those days”, (1Samuel 13.19) this actually lends support to the point – for the rest of the verse says; “for the Philistines had said, Lest the Hebrews make swords or spears”… as at this point in time the Philistines had temporary control over the Hebrew tribes, and thus controlled this key aspect of society. Accordingly they made the Israelites ‘go down to the Philistines to sharpen their plowshares, mattocks, axes and sickles’ (13.20.)

Similar happened during the Babylonian Capture, as related in 2Kings 24:14 –

And he carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valour, ten thousand captives and all the craftsmen and smiths…

And the next verse affirms this use of number symbolism to convey metaphorical themes; in this instance that of the octave raised repeatedly by reference to 7 and 8, as in Ecclesiastes, and 1:7 ratios of warriors to craftsmen here; (2Kings 24.16)

And all the men of might, even seven thousand, and craftsmen and smiths a thousand, all that were strong and apt for war, even them the king brought captive to Babylon.

There is much similarity between the Nahash, or Nehushtan, the ‘Seraphim’, the ‘darting’ or ‘flying’ fiery serpents, and characters in the Bible called Nahash, as well as from Eastern mythology the class of otherworldly serpents called the Nagas. In fact, the connections are so extensive, and meaningful that it can be argued to be intentional, relating the biblical ‘angelic order’ with the celestial beings the Nagas of Buddhist and Hindu mythology.
Nagas itself in India means snake, or cobra; ‘naja naja’ is the genus even today for the Indian royal cobra. In fact etymologists consider the Proto-Indo-European language of India between 4500 and 2500Bce to have been the source of the word ‘s-nego’, from which came words such as; snake; sinew; nerve/ neuron; naga. But it is the original mythological meanings which are significant here; the Nagas, like the Seraphim, were higher dimensional serpents of great intelligence and power, who resided beneath the waters of sacred lakes across the East – much like the ‘serpentine’/hybrid deities Enki/Oannes etc were associated in essence with waters. The Nagas took an interest in helping mankind most often, again like the Near Eastern deities and Seraphim, but could sometimes be indifferent to human-kind’s wishes; much like the Seraphim tormented the Israelites in the desert with their ‘fiery bites’ …(Isaiah 14.29, and Numbers 21.6, itself a cosmic# value as 108 x 2, 432/2, etc, and the diameter of the Moon at 2160 miles).

Side-bar – Angkor Wat, Cambodia, the temple of the Nagas;

One of the most significant, and incredible Eastern temples dedicated and built with the Nagas in mind, is the temple system of Cambodia centred around Angkor Wat. Indeed the name Angkor stems from the Sanskrit ‘nokor’, or ‘naga’ ie royal or celestial cobra.

Angkor Wat temple complex, Cambodia. Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain.

Built between 1113 and 1150Ad in estimate, as part of the wider temple complex of Cambodia (forming a coherent site of many temples) the temple at Angkor Wat is an immense structure; it is formed of approximately 7-10 million sandstone blocks weighing a maximum of 1.5 tons each. These were quarried 25 miles away from the site. The design and cosmology of the original temple were Hindu, and it was dedicated to Vishnu rather than Shiva as had been the custom. The design of the complex is geometric in many essential details. The central temple is in the midpoint of a quincunx, in the middle of a cross or square of 4 outer structures. This is representative of the omphalos nature of mount Meru in Hindu cosmology, the sacred mountain ‘at the centre of the world’. The temple was gradually given to Buddhist orders over the next century or so, where it has remained to this day.
Much of the symbolic number and artwork of the temple structure is astronomically oriented, and symbolic in number. On the equinoxes the sun rises directly over the centre tower of the temple. The number of Nagas sculptures on the Western Causeway entrance bridge to both Angkor Wat and nearby Angkor Thom number 54 or 72, both cosmic # significant. As the photograph shows, the Nagas carvings on the bridge are of a high quality of craftsmanship;

⇦ Seven-headed Nagas deity on the causeway bridge at Angkor Wat. Wikimedia, Public Domain.

Inside one of the main stelae, or reliefs within the Kurushetra Wars relief, (also known as the Mahabharata, or Ramayana Wars), is of the ‘churning of the sea of milk’ by 180 asuras and devas, cosmic beings (similar to ‘angels’ and ‘devils’). The concept is the source for the name of the book studying the stellar associations of the tales and legends of antiquity, ‘Hamlet’s Mill’, by von Dechend and Santillana. The myth of the churning is that the opposing classes of celestial beings pull on the ‘serpent of the cosmos’ creating the ‘milk of ambrosia’, or ‘life creating energy’ by their actions. This may be connected to the gravitational forces which are at the heart of the solar system, and the galaxies of the universe, and the rotational energies created by the planets as they rotate each ‘day’, the orbits of planets around the sun, as well as of billions of stars around the centre of the galaxy… and is thus linked to the Sun’s 25,920 years cycle of Precession by writers such as von Dechend and Santillana, by which cycle the sun completes one orbit around the earth against the backdrop of stars, thus delineating the 12 houses of the zodiac, each taking 2160 years. The site of Angkor Wat, and the wider site is located at a point around the globe which is argued by some to be in ‘geometric’ proportion to other sites around the world such as Giza, and Nazca in Peru, (where immense lines and markings in the desert earth have been made, which are only visible from the air).

Such relationships, if true, unexplained except as coincidental, indicate the builders and designers of these sites may have been guided by, or inspired by the cosmic consciousness’ of such higher dimensional beings as the Nagas; and provide a link to the higher-beings or angels who were ‘given cords that they might go to measure the earth’ or the temple in the ‘city of heaven’, to paraphrase both the Book of 1Enoch (61.1-5) and the Book of Revelations (11.1), as well as many other texts.

Angkor Wat bas-relief of the Churning of the Sea of Milk ⇨
by 180 asuras and devas. Attribution; Wikimedia, CC-by-SA 3.0, MarkAlexander

---

And considering the relationship between serpents, the Nahash, and the Seraphim in the Old Testament, as well as with Sumerian and related civilizations mythologies concerning the ‘gods’ who created their societies, the concept of the Nagas is without doubt of immense significance and meaning, related between such distant civilizations as they have been throughout much of history.
That the bloodlines which are ‘Anunnaki’ or ‘Nephilim’-related, (as shown in their lineages in Sumerian cultural texts such as the King Lists of before the Deluge, and Gilgamesh) are the same as those depicted in the Old Testament begins to look extremely likely.
The curious reality throughout history may be that to some degree the positive and negative aspects of Nagas/ Watchers/ Nephilim bloodlines may appear to be entwined within each other, possibly intentionally. While the serpent in the Garden of Eden is portrayed universally as the cause of all evil, and mankind’s fall from grace, there are still several aspects of the positive serpent gene-stream, following on from Sumerian myths of the wisdom/positive guidance, and mercy/benevolence, of Enki, the serpent-deity of the Anunnaki. This may be hard to understand, so rarely is this theme encountered in western culture, though it is something that has always been easily accepted within eastern religions and philosophy …

(left) Enki with waves/fish coming from his shoulders, indicating an inherent part of him is represented; from the Adda Seal, an Akkadian cylinder seal from c.2300Bce, which is full of allegorical symbolism).
As we see elsewhere, the hybrid nature of Oannes is likewise indicated by the fish/man imagery; the fish symbolism (strange when considered) indicates the reptilian genetics of Enki/the Anunnaki (perhaps in varying degrees, and varying between the separate programmes of ‘the bloodlines’ creation)… these differences are very difficult to separate; history has tended to focus on the negative aspects of the least positive lineages, such as the Nephilim/ lines of Cain, Nimrud and so on.
Yet in the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of mankind’s oldest and most widely disseminated works of artistic and mythic literature, it was Enki who alone of the ‘gods’ refused to accept Enlil’s decree that mankind be destroyed, and warned his righteous servant Utnapishtim of the forthcoming Flood; and provided Noah/ Utnapishtim (‘one born of the place/people of the fish’, ie. ‘piscim’ from PIE ‘peysk’) the blueprint to build the Ark; additionally, the vessel ascribed to Enki was given the dimensions of a cube, rather than a boat… indicating its possible metaphorical/ intellectual/ cosmic number meanings, from 2,800Bce onwards.

So connections exist between the Nagas (the celestial serpent-beings), and the Hebrew Nahash, the ‘brazen serpent’, and link to the ‘fiery Seraphim’, the ‘darting’ or ‘flying’ serpents (who also attend upon YHVH himself in the highest heavens), and some of the bloodlines and characters of the Old Testament; so for example the king Nahash is related in some way to the bloodline of David, and displays all the (confusing) characteristics of the Nagas and the Seraphim. The juxtaposition or inter-changeability of the names of the bloodlines emanating from Seth and Cain, as well as evidence from Talmudic and other texts such as the Books of Enoch, and Noah indicate likewise the possibility that the lineage of Noah was of a hybrid nature.

Many of the most significant characters of the Bible have connections to these bloodlines of varying positivity or potential; Moses, Enoch, Lamech, Noah, King David and his son Solomon, Simon Peter, and so on, to name some of the foremost all have semantic or ‘historical’ links with the Nagas/ Seraphim/ Watchers celestial bloodlines, as we examine shortly.
Likewise the relationship of not just biblical characters such as King David, or Simon Peter to the Nahash/Seraphim, but of other religious figures; such as in the Shi’a branch of Islam, Narjis, the Roman princess who was born of the bloodline of St Peter, who became through her pious efforts the wife of the Eleventh Imam, (Hasan Al-Askari) and mother of the Twelfth, the ‘divine messenger’ the Mahdi. In a link involving cosmic number encoding, the king Nahash who is possibly representative of the Nagas, features at 1Samuel 11.1 – in some symmetry, the 11th generation offspring of Narjis and the 11th Imam in their lineage was the creator of the Naq’shbandi (symbol-makers!) Sufi brotherhood; Baha’uddin Naq’shband.

The Seraphim in the Bible are closely involved in many matters relating to the Sun, indeed their name stems from ‘dry’, or ‘parched’. This includes both outer events, such as the destruction of the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah, and inner characteristics/lineages connected to the solar energies of the heavens.

Yet these ‘negative’ aspects of their being, or characteristics, have tended to be equated with the cursed serpent of the Garden of Eden, condemned for eternity to have ‘dust in its mouth’. In other words, the serpent- lines or beings within the umbrella-term of the Nagas have as a result of this been associated with ‘the old serpent Satan’, as St John terms it in his New Testament book.
And yet, this subject in the Bible is less clear-cut than first impressions would suggest; as well as the links to earlier civilizations deities, and to the bloodlines of characters in the Bible, there are several references in the Bible to ‘servants’ or ‘angels of the Lord’ who are considered to be ‘satans’; there are many examples.
There are nine references to ‘satan’ in the Hebrew bible, five times to people and four times to ‘divine beings’. In the Old Testament /Genesis, there was not an actual concept of ‘the Devil’. So upon a close reading, the serpent in Eden is not called Satan, or ‘a satan’, or devil…it is left to the reader’s inference, or assumption. Additionally, the ‘fall’ of man is linked to the gaining of ‘higher consciousness within humanity, for some unexplained reason.

In the Book of Job, (the) satan can potentially be viewed as ‘a servant of God’s heavenly council’, whose job (no pun intended) as part of that is to be an ‘accuser’, something that was a legal position/duty in ancient Israel (and Mesopotamia according to Shawna Dolansky*) – although the name Job does mean in Hebrew ‘adversary’…thus making the role of satan here central to the book’s themes. (And of all the books of the Old Testament, and their mystical visions and poetic prophecies (Isaiah among many being this in particular) Job contains more encoded references to the many archetypes and narratives of other, older religions of the Near and Middle East than any other book; which makes questions of where and when this work was written very interesting, as indeed, by who?)
In Zechariah Ch.3 likewise, the prophet is stood in front of a heavenly ‘council’ – before him stand a heavenly messenger and a satan, whose task is to ‘resist’ or oppose him (showing Satan as a servant of YHVH, not as an independent force of evil). This accusation is to symbolize earthly political opposition to Zechariah’s elevation to authority – and once the prophet has passed the test, the satan is ‘rebuked’, and Zechariah is given new robes; much how (the) satan and Job are treated at the end of that book – in 3.4/5 they clothe Zechariah in spotless new white robes (symbolizing the perfected ‘spirit’ very possibly).

In 2Samuel 24.1 the text states, ‘the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, Go number Israel and Judah’. In other words YHVH seeks a reason to punish Israel – makes David take a census – and then punishes them for this. He gives David a choice of long or quick punishments, so he chooses a pestilence, as the quickest option. 2Samuel 24.15-16 says ‘…and there died of the people … seventy thousand men. And when the angel stretched out his hand upon Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented him of the evil, and said to the angel, It is enough, stay though now thine hand.” So this is a confusing text in some senses, and does indicate the role of the angel, or ‘satan’ in this passage. (Again, in Revelations, there is, in the complex and intricate structure of events, a juxtaposition of the actions of ‘good angels’, and ‘bad angels’ or ‘satans, which can be extremely hard to decipher). In another version of the same events concerning David, 1Chronicles 21.1 it states that “Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel”… this narrative is chosen by many as proof that the ‘devil’ persuaded David to number Israel thus causing the ‘sin’; but this seems to ignore the first verse of 2Samuel 24.1 which is diametrically opposite, in its outline of the events. So the repetition of the narrative may be a conscious method of presenting alternative interpretations, which can highlight a significant area of meaning. Is it God and the angels who institute (karmic?) events of great scope – or Satan as an independent and opposing force – or ‘satans’ acting as members of the divine host (of the ‘left hand side’) – or is it mankind’s doing to cause such ‘world-changing’ events? A viewpoint might be that as in other parts of the Old Testament, the ‘satan’ does the bidding of the Lord, in events designed to help mankind grow – one which therefore raises many further questions… for example, what process or narrative the ‘satans’ depicted are going through, presuming that angels, satans or any other ‘celestial’ beings may be allowed to evolve or change during the tenure of their existence..?

Dolansky makes the point that it wasn’t until many centuries later, after the last book of the canon was written, that of Daniel circa 162Bce, that the Hebrew canon was closed. For it was some time after that the Hebrew culture saw the development of an opposing force to God, ie evil – and Satan likewise, as an individual representative of that ‘force’. In this view the book of Genesis was thus revised in light of this development in thinking in Israel, and Satan as a ‘destructive force’ more clearly associated with the Serpent, this ‘alteration’ taking place around the 1st and 2nd centuries CE… (so it may be seen that the Eden serpent may possibly have been written originally as a (subtle) characterization of the being, and role/actions of Enki/Ea/Oannes, the genetic source/creator/ ‘enlightener’ of ‘homo sapiens’ – and also therefore, source of ‘The Fall’ as humans ‘lost the innocence of unconsciousness’.
Hence the sexual subtext of the imagery in Genesis subtly points to the Serpent/ Enki, with all the genetics-related creation myths of Sumer and related cultures incorporated into the sub-text. This notion of the hybrid ‘Nephilim’ nature of the line of Cain is not a modern one, for it is a part of Jewish rabbinical literature since at least the Middle Ages, relating to the spread of Qabalism, an esoteric system of understanding). So the growth of the concept of what might be called a Manichean ‘Satan’, opposite to the Lord grew when ‘beliefs in angels, demons and a final apocalyptic battle arose in a divided and turbulent Jewish community” according to Dolansky.
While Dolansky notes* that nowhere in the Bible, even in the New Testament is Satan linked directly to the Eden serpent, it seems somehow inevitable this evolution of the concept of ‘satan’ occurred; and it is clear that modern interpretations of the Bible can see little of the original Hebrew (and perhaps earlier) religious beliefs in this regard. Perhaps because, even by the second century CE, Satan had evolved into an opponent of God’s will who posed a threat to mankind as a ‘deceiver’.

So Satan is seen as leader of forces of darkness/ the enemy of Christ in this sense, rather than as a (willing?) servant of the ‘hosts of heaven’ and the Lord – as the Satan who tempts Jesus on the mountain, may be potentially represented upon close reading.
But the conception of an independent Satan, not actually indicated in the Bible, grew with nascent Christianity in the first centuries Ad through the works of Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Irenaeus, Augustine, etc until by 17th century Milton in ‘Paradise Lost’ was portraying Satan as being the serpent in the Garden of Eden. . .

*Shawna Dolansky -Biblical Archaeology Society; How the Serpent became Satan. (18/4/2021)

Yet even Jesus refers to the positive; ‘be wise as serpents’; and refers to the similarity of his fate to that of the healing serpent on the cross of Moses, the Nahash/Nehushtan, at John 3.14/15… a mysterious artifact created by Moses according to the instructions of YHVH, which healed the bites of the Seraphim, the angelic order of ‘fiery flying serpents’, and which was kept as a totem of healing for several centuries afterwards, until destroyed as being in breach of Hebrew theological laws regarding idolatry.

But if references to the positive or negative aspects of the serpent in the Bible in the history of Western literature are compared, or counted, there are virtually zero positive references or perspectives and interpretations equable to eastern symbols of the serpent.
And the confusing ‘interwoven’ stream/ duality of the positive and the negative ‘gods’ bloodlines, is one of the themes the Bible ‘encodes’, or includes in its narratives without referring to overtly apart from four brief verses in Genesis 6.

Enki/Ea, in his role as a serpent-god in Sumerian, Assyrian and Babylonian religions, is cast as the Devil as such in the Bible, at least under first impressions. See the books of Moses, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Job, the synoptic gospels, St John, Revelations, for references to serpents/ sea-monsters such as Rahab, (the ‘primeval serpent’/ pride, arrogance) Tannin, (‘sea-dragon’), Leviathan- both mentioned in Isaiah 27.1 – and in Job 41.10 etc and so on… and yet Leviathan’s meaning in Hebrew is ‘to join or connect things’, hence the tribe of Levi were the priest ‘caste’ of Israel with no specific area or homeland. As Abarim.com states, it is a ‘verb of building, and a verb that lies at the heart of intelligence and cognition’. Again connecting the serpent of the Garden of Eden to the ‘fall’/increased consciousness that came with eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowing. And as the Sumerian deities particularly Enki/Ea, the water/ serpent ‘god’, created mankind/the first ‘Adam and Eve’ by infusing celestial genetics of the Anunnaki into early humans – thus creating ‘homo sapiens’, or ‘man that knows’ ; so this is a puzzling narrative.
Perhaps a lesson in humility, in that however much wisdom mankind has attained by eating of the Tree of Knowing, it has not been given of the Tree of Immortality- (the key aim of Gilgamesh’s quest, the Plant of Life, and one which he obtains by diving deep into the Apsu – the abyss – and then loses, it being promptly stolen by the ‘lion of the ground’, the snake…)

This subject, labyrinthine and profound, is at the heart of the numerous meanings and references to the ‘serpent’, and the ‘devil’, and the ‘Nahash’/’Nehushtan’ (brazen, copper serpent affixed to a pole) the serpent of healing* made by Moses. It is a clear theme of the Bible that positive aspects of the ‘serpent’, especially in its complex symbolism, are entwined with more obviously negative references and characteristics, to confuse and even mis-direct the unquestioning reader. . .
*the Nahash created specifically for healing serpent-bites of the Seraphim – if so, this may be Moses indicating the value of the Nehushtan to those with higher levels of the reptilian lineage within their blood! In effect the existence of a path, or remedy, for healing the ‘sins’ and imbalances of such bloodline(s) !
And in keeping with the theme of metaphorical meanings relating to higher dimensions, the Nehushtan can be seen to resemble a sine-wave upon an x and y axis turned vertically; and additionally, has many connotations relating (coincidentally?) to medicine and healing, something which probably originated within Sumerian and Egyptian culture and from there to the Hebrew, Greek, and on to modernity;

a. Sine-wave upon an x- and y- axis
b. Religious picture of Moses and the Nehushtan, the Brazen (brass) Serpent.
c. The Caduceus, a Greek and then Roman inspired symbol, of commerce, nationhood etcetera.
d. The Rod of Asclepius, also Greco-Roman, used nowadays to signify medical matters.

All pictures from Wikimedia, Public Domain.

(The winged caduceus is a Greek symbol of Mercury also from antiquity, and is separate but similar to the Rod of Asclepius, which has medical connotations; but their usage in modern medicine symbology is largely the same, as the fourth symbol shows the Rod of Asclepius as depicted widely on ambulances in modern life).
The poet William Blake painted Jacob’s Ladder, in 1804, in which the ladder to heaven bears some resemblance with a logarithmic spiral, something which was first drawn in 1525 by the incredible artist Albrecht Durer – it is a ‘self-similar’ spiral incorporating in its geometric progression the harmonic ratios of phi as it grows, and was called by Durer an ‘eternal line’. (Durer also painted the famous work ‘Melencolia’ in1514, featuring an angel, ladder to heaven, and various mathematics and geometer’s tools, showing his ability to combine understanding with artistic talent. Indeed, Durer wrote Four Books on Measurement, and Four Books on Human Proportion examining such questions). The painting by Blake of a helical spiral shows he too may well have had some awareness of the importance of the (sacred) geometries (centred around Phi) within nature and reality, such as the shape of DNA in its double-helix, in many forms of life such as plants, sea-shells etc, even in the shape of galaxies – particularly as Jacob’s Ladder is a central concept of the Bible in depicting the places on earth which are ‘gateways’ for higher-dimensional energies. Something we examine in part II of this Bible section, Sacred Sites.

a. William Blake; Jacobs Ladder, 1804. Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain.
b. Albrecht Durer; Melancholia, 1514.c. Albrecht Durer; study of the symmetries and proportions of the body, 1557;
d. his sketch of the geometries of sine-waves, 1525 – which closely resembles the squared circle as studied in the Geometry section.

The metaphorical meanings related to the serpent from so many related cultures of the Near East in antiquity may offer some explanation for why Michelangelo depicted Moses in his famous sculpture (in the Church of St Peter-in-Chains, in Rome), with horns upon his head, in contrast to explanations proposing that the convention of the middle ages in this regard stemmed from a linguistic mis-interpretation of the biblical words used in the passage when Moses came down from Mt Sinai…from the Latin Vulgate version of the Bible it was read as ‘his face was horned with light from conversation with the Lord’, from which the convention stemmed.

The word in question (‘qaran’) concerns Moses’ face ‘shining like the Sun’ when he came down Mt Sinai from seeing the Lord; and yet some perspective can be found in studying the Dead Sea Scrolls found in eleven caves at Qumran from 1947 – 56. Among the 984 texts found of biblical scriptures etcetera were copies in several caves of the deuterocanonical Book of Jubilees, the Book of Noah, the Book of Giants, all of which are parallel in part to 1Enoch, showing the question of the celestial/hybrid lineages was not unconsidered in Hebrew religious groups. Experts such as Paul Sumner in ‘The Divine Council…’ consider that the book of 1Enoch dates back to at least the 3rd century Bce, and held a significant place in the culture’s understanding of the heavens, angels that helped mankind, the Divine Council, the ‘sons-of-the-gods’ and so on.
A full copy of 1Enoch did not surface in the ‘West’ until 1778 when James Bruce brought three copies back to England and France from Ethiopia, after nearly a decade of exploration. In this text Noah was born ‘a strange son, diverse from and unlike man, and resembling the sons of the god of heaven‘ with skin, and hair ‘as white as wool and as red as a rose’, and a ‘face which shone like the Sun’ and eyes that ‘lit up the whole house’ (ch.106) prompting his father Lamech (!) to ask whether he was in fact not his, but the ‘child of a Watcher’. As the Slavonic version of 2Enoch, states, Noah’s father Lamech concludes; “I thought in my heart, that the conception was the work of the Watchers, the pregnancy of the Holy Ones, and that it belonged to the giants (Nephilim); and my heart was upset by this…”
The answer of Enoch is actually a masterpiece of ambiguity and misdirection… So the fact of Moses’ shining face being an explanation for the horns is actually only confirmation of the same narrative contained within the historical texts… a question we examine in more depth in part 5 of this section.

(left) Shamash from Assyrian stela of the Tree of Life at the British Museum, with horned head-dress used to signify divinity in Mesopotamia and the ancient Near East.

Additionally, the 20th century and the archeological discoveries in Sumer, Akkad, and the related civilizations of Iraq/Mesopotamia brought the antique depictions of the Anunnaki (as divine beings who created mankind, and the ensuing civilizations); the clearest identifying feature of this tribe, across thousands of years of portrayals, was their head-dresses depicted with the ‘horns of cattle’, as described by custom; thus linking Moses with the divine tribe, ie. as one of the offspring of the ‘sons of the gods’; likewise through the preponderance of unusual serpent-imagery in the life-story of Moses, and his brother Aaron, with Enki/Ea and thereafter the Nagas also. But it is in fact possibly fair to consider that the ‘horned’ head-dresses of the Anunnaki may actually be – snakes ! See for example firstly the example above from the Tree of Life stelae, where one of the Seven Sages (possibly Shamash the solar ‘god’) wears the divine head-dress; plus armbands which are representations of serpents in many versions. Likewise the Tablet of Shamash and the four-rivers star or planetary symbol, from the ancient Sumerian city of Sippar circa 900 Bce, when it was under Babylonian rule.

Notice also the serpent arm and wrist bracelets worn by Shamash in the Assyrian stela. The photographs of representations of Oannes from Babylon, and a winged deity from the Assyrian civilization, both on page 8 likewise show the use of the forms of headwear for indicating the celestial nature of such beings. This custom spread throughout the Near East in antiquity, across thousands of years, despite various alterations and a change of understanding of their inner meaning with time, perhaps.

(below) The Tablet of Shamash, from Sippar 900Bce. Wikimedia, G.Todd.

And in related manner, there is the depiction of the gods of Egypt, likewise the creators of mankind, and civilization, with head-wear that is surmounted by a serpent. This was called the Uraeus, a word stemming (like Orion/Ur-anna) from ‘Ur-‘ or ‘Or‘, the original word in Sumer meaning the ‘light of the heavens’, or ‘the light of the Sun’; later passed on to the Hebrew language, for example the word used by Isaiah for ‘light’ is ‘Or’, connecting to later words centred upon meanings linked with gold, light, and order. (See the Notes and Numbers section for more on this).
One reason perhaps why it was a common artistic custom in Egypt to show the rays of the sun as serpents is this link, or metaphor, between solar energies and serpents, also present within the Sumerian civilizations.

(left) Seti I offering to the Goddess of Truth, Temple of Abydos,
from John Ward, 1902. Attribution; Wikimedia, IABi.

So Michelangelo’s sculpture contained some of the meaning from antiquity of the ‘horns’ of the divine as represented by the Anunnaki, and the Egyptian gods, while being guided by the Latin wording of St Jerome to represent Moses with ‘horns’ as written.
And one logical conclusion which may be drawn from this analysis is that the gods of Sumer, and of Egypt were signified artistically by head-dresses which represented the light of the heavens, rather than the horns of cattle… this may be related to the pathways the sun’s energy takes through the earth as ‘dragon-lines’ or serpent-lines, as well as the wider set of symbolism linking the serpent and the sun…

In the Old Testament, the negative aspects of kingship are often left unstated, or not directly referred to (as in the epic of Gilgamesh) – and yet this is an essential part of the narrative of the first full King of Israel, David, considered as such to be the founding father of the nation of Israel – as we shall now see.

4. KING DAVID; the first king of Judah and Israel:

DAVID, introduced in 1Kings16.18 as a callow youth with many inherent virtues, is the youngest of eight brothers on what is a homestead and farm, rather than a position of power and wealth in the cities of Hebron or Jerusalem. So this (easily overlooked) youth, born circa 1050Bce according to time-lines derived from the Bible, is chosen by God to replace Saul, the first ‘anointed’ king of Israel, as the ruler of the Hebrew nation, becoming as such the first shepherd-king of the nation of Israel.
As such, he had to be both ‘everyman’, representative of all, and yet unique – one of the people, and at the same time ‘one in a million’… a point represented, incidentally, by the fact he is the only ‘David’ in the entire Bible…
And it is this conflict, representative of the opposing demands placed upon the ‘bloodlines of Kings’, as well as their inner contradictions, which the life of David symbolizes and explores more than any other character in the entire Old Testament.

David held the kingship of Israel from circa 1035- 970 Bce, according to the estimates of biblical scholars and archaeologists.
In the extensive sections of the Old Testament concerning David’s life, (particularly 1 and 2Samuel), a life packed with drama, incident and historic events, he rules as a popular and revered king of the Hebrews; after Saul’s short and incomplete reign, David is the first true king of Israel and Judah following on from the era of the judges. It is David who establishes the base of the nation of Israel, securing the land against hostile tribes/ nations, forming diplomatic alliances with others, doing the ‘will of the Lord’ as directed by YHVH and the chief priests Samuel, and Zadok, and establishing the capital city in Jerusalem, commencing many building works, customs and reforms during his reign, (traces of which are believed by archaeologists to have been discovered in the strata of Jerusalem uncovered in the last century or so).

The narrative of King David is equally significant in that it contains in essence the history of all kings – and queens; and the growth of the nation, or the kingdom (for good or bad) from early tribes and races.

As we have seen, the Hebrew civilization in Israel initially had leaders who were community or tribal leaders who were also divinely ‘ordained’ messengers; people such as Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Enoch, Elijah, Joshua and so on.
After some period, the ‘shofet’ or Judges assumed the authority of rulership. They were men of authority chosen from the various twelve tribes of Israel in random manner, coming to the fore in times of emergency in particular to unify the tribes militarily. As such they occupied the position of ‘final authority’ across the tribes, thus providing leadership, and justice. This period lies between the first conquering of the land of Canaan by Joshua in the years after the death of Moses, c.1350Bc, to the formation of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel c.1025Bc. There were seventeen or so different judges, ruling for on average for twenty or so years. These are described in the Book of Judges, the First Book of Samuel, and 1 & 2Chronicles. The first judge was called Othniel, (although Moses was described as a ‘shofet’ over Israel…delegating cases of justice in accordance with the advice of his father-in-law Jethro (Exodus13.18-26) The last judge was Samson, who ruled as a judge, despite his isolated and unruly or chaotic lifestyle, for twenty years .

It was after the judges that Israel inaugurated the reign of kings – Saul was the ‘first’ king of Israel, chosen by the Lord, but after disobeying the priest Samuel’s instructions (from YHVH) to completely destroy the Amalekite tribe (1Sam15.31-3), he was judged by YHVH to be an unworthy king; after this, he later died in battle against the Philistines – and the young shepherd-boy turned courtier and soldier, David, ‘chosen by the Lord’, became the first full king of Judah and Israel, around the 11th century Bce.

The institute of kingship filled initially by Saul was requested of YHVH by the people of Israel at the end of the period of the ‘judges’; and as the narrative shows in the Old Testament, YHVH (through the head-priest Samuel) warns the people of Israel of the dangers of kingship; (1Samuel 8.11-18);

And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you; he will take your sons, and appoint them for himself,
for his chariots, and to be his horsemen…
And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks and to be bakers. And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your olive yards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants.
He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants.
And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye
shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day…

And so on – but possibly the demands made of the people of establishing the nascent state led to their asking YHVH for a king; from fleeing the captivity of Egypt, and the military forces of the Pharaoh, to crossing the wilderness for forty years ; to the wresting of the land of Israel through battle from the Canaanites and various occupying tribes and peoples; and then building the nation. (And likewise were punished comprehensively for allowing their faith in YHVH to be affected by reverence for other peoples’ ‘gods’). Perhaps they were envious of the gains of war achieved by other Near Eastern ‘nations’ led by kings, such as the powerful empire of the Egyptians. So they chose to be ruled and led by a king according to the Old Testament. From 1Samuel8.20; ‘That we also may be like the other nations; and our king judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles’.

At the time of his first appearance, from 1Samuel16.1-13 when YHVH tells the priest Samuel to visiting the family’s home and farm to find and anoint ‘the future king of Israel’ from among the sons of Jesse, David is the most normal of youths, a shepherd-boy most often found up in the hills looking after his charges. . . indeed when the priest arrives, telling of his ‘mission’, his father only presents his seven eldest sons for the priest to pick from; after which they call for the youngest, David. And yet YHVH tells Samuel, the highest priest in the land, that this boy will play a central role in God’s plans for the nation. At 16.13 it states “Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his brethren; and the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day forward”; thus establishing the gradual accession of the first king of Israel and Judah.

(Later books from the end of Solomon’s life detail the arc of the state of Israel, a fluctuating series of rulers /dynasties etcetera from 940Bce onwards – the splits between the twelve tribes immediately after Solomon’s death into ten northern and two southern states of Israel and Judah, until 738Bce and the Assyrian defeat and exile of the tribes of Israel to the cities of Mesopotamia. Likewise their return and rebuilding of society, plus the longstanding period of captivity from 603 – 539 Bce in Babylon, the return again, and the lengthy period of instability and upheaval between then and the coming of the predicted Messiah Jesus, in what is known as the Second Temple period.
Much of the religious writing of the Old Testament, etc from this period is distressed in nature, such as Lamentations, or visionary/ prophecy/ concerned with YHVH ‘s punishment of the people of Israel for their shortcomings/breaches of the Divine Covenant. The prophets of the later ages of Hebrew civilization Ezekiel/ Isaiah/ Daniel/etc from circa 900 – 200BC. foretell the political and military upheavals to be faced by the nation in the centuries preceding the coming of the messiah, the putative saviour of Israel.
From this arrival then begins the New Testament and the ‘era of Christ’ – at a time when the Roman empire has replaced the various invading empires (or self-rule). While traditionally political and religious power were kept separate in Israel, (as detailed in the many conflicts between the prophets/ ‘men of God and various rulers, kings, and counsellors of the royal court across the Old and New Testaments) for obvious reasons, in the time of the Roman occupation performing political functions, the religious leaders assumed some power because of their religious authority; a situation which exacerbated the conflict between Jesus and the Sanhedrin.
Whatever the intricacies, it is in these circumstances that the beginnings of Christianity are based, with the birth of the infant Jesus, in a time and place characterized by a sense of dislocation and uncertainty, through the demands of politics and empire….)

To return to the encoding of Cos# themes within the imagery of the life stories being considered – the Bible doesn’t ever straightforwardly say that David was partially of the ‘gods’ bloodline. The only mention of the ‘sons of the gods’ mating with human women is Genesis 6.1-4, given as a reason for YHVH’s sending the Flood to clear the Earth of the destructive results ensuing. Although after the Flood are many other references to ‘giants’, and other semantic clues as to the ‘celestial’ lineages of predominantly Sumer and Assyria and Babylon; as we shall see, the Deluge only cleared away the most visible of the lines of the Nephilim, let alone what other ‘celestial’ bloodlines existed within the Near East and Levant, as well as within the tribes of Israel also. For as we examine elsewhere, as Genesis11.1-11 outlines, the first ten generations of the Hebrew tribe, and Abraham, as the first post-Flood lineages, came from Shem/ Shinar, or Sumer. This fact from within the book of Genesis cannot be stressed enough in understanding the significance of these ‘celestial’ lineages from the Sumerian civilization onwards.

To return to the story of Israel’s ‘shepherd-king’, David was an unknown and lowly shepherd of an ordinary family of the tribe of when first discovered; indeed so completely normal and unnoticeable was he, being the youngest son of eight, that his father didn’t even think to put him forward when Samuel asked him to present his sons, the Lord having told him the next King of Israel would be found among them…(1Samuel 7.11/ 1Samuel 16.10-11);
Again, Jesse made seven of his sons to pass before Samuel. And Samuel said unto Jesse, The Lord hath not chosen these. And Samuel said… Are here all thy children? And Jesse said There remaineth yet the youngest, and behold, he keepeth the sheep.
And Samuel said, Send and fetch for him, for we will not sit down till he come hither.

When David is presented to Elijah the prophet anoints his head with oil, in recognition of his worthiness as future king – after which David has the ‘spirit of the Lord with him’ from that day (16.13). In contrast the next verse (16.14) states;
But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

His servants look for ways to assuage his emotional ‘state’, and devise the idea of using pleasant music to sooth him. Upon which one of the servants says (1Samuel16.18);
Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite, that is cunning in playing, and a mighty valiant man, and a man of war, and prudent in matters, and a comely person, and the LORD is with him.

There are several things to note from this section of the book of Samuel, indeed the narrative described may be seen to encapsulate several of the most important themes in Cosmic#. And fittingly, David’s character, which is blessed in the sense of being harmonious, is described here fully for the first time at Samuel 16.18, the value of the ‘golden section’, Phi (ie. 1.618, etc)

---

SIDE-BAR; COSMIC-NUMBER IN DAVID’S LIFE AND THE BIBLE.

So the context of the verse at 1Samuel16.18, particularly the use of music to change human moods, (and consciousness) for the better, is an important theme in virtually all religions and cultures; especially as music so neatly personifies the importance of the Octave, the use of string lengths to calculate vibration rates (and vice-versa, as in ancient China), harmonic ratios within the dimensions of reality, and so on… so (sacred) architecture has been termed as being ‘music set in stone’. Note here the fraction 7/ 8 as related to the notes of the Octave, and thus the creation of new forms of energies. Related perhaps, in Ecclesiastes (the wisdom of David’s son, Solomon, according to tradition), the attention is brought to the significance of the proportion of 7 and 8, possibly meaning the 7 notes of the octave, and the 8th, the same as the first but of a new octave (Ecclesiastes11.1-2);

‘Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days. Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth’.

(ie, what consequences actions will initiate – or how events will unfold in the long-term). Related to this, in Cos# the following significant numbers – 864 and 432 (numbers central to the material reality of the Sun and Moon and the Earth, the Square and Circle, the Vesica Piscis and the √3/2, etc); and 123.456789 and 987.654321 – (as 10²/9² = 1.23456, the √1.23456 therefore equals 1.111, as 10/9 = 1.111) – these are all significant values which appear in many subjects within cos#.
So – 864/ 7 = 123.456789 ( x 8 = 987.654321)

And considering the theory that the source of much of the content of Sumerian, Babylonian and Hebrew cultures was based on ‘cosmic#’ in content, it is of relevance that there are hidden references to the key numbers – Pi, Phi, 3.456, 864 and 111, 2.22, 1.23 etc within significant verses within the Bible. . .
– and indeed, there are many further examples of hidden ‘encoded’ cosmic numbers in terms of metaphors – such as 7, 77 and 777 within narratives, often related to ‘sin’, through the words of Lamech regarding ‘If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold’ (Gen4.24). (Echoed by the words of Jesus and Simon Peter at Matthew 18.21-22). The associations of ‘sin’ to the ‘powers of the sun’ may relate to the solar harmonic as follows; 864 / 1.1111 = 7.777, a point of some interest, as antiquity viewed the ‘lineages of the sinful’ to be ‘celestial’ and solar in nature. Hence the name of Cain’s sister Awen/ Aven in the Book of Jubilees, relating to the Egyptian name of Awn/ An/ On, for the city known by the Greeks as Heliopolis. Number codes are also placed within the Bible in chapter/verse placings, as we shall examine shortly in a later section.

The blessing of sovereigns/bloodlines by ‘the Lord’ is likewise raised in this story of Saul and David’s personalities at the cross-over point of their ‘destinies’, which are dependent upon their behaviours deriving from their essential selves. . . as Saul is unable to rise above his base instincts David replaces him as the leader of the Israelites, according to YHVH’s judgement. Also a feature is the use by the Lord of ‘an evil spirit’ – a ‘satan’, or ‘adversary’ – to test the worthiness of a person’s character, such as Saul. . . the significant point being it is ‘an evil spirit sent by the Lord’, as stated in 1Samuel16.14.

There is more clear encoding of cosmic# wisdom in David’s life; the name of David’s wife Bethsheba means Beth (house of) Sheba (seven). As seen also in Beer-sheba, the Well of Seven, in Kings 16.12 etc.) Both names are explained in terms of ‘oath’, as in ‘seven seals’ etc, by many commentators, rather than in terms of relating to the Law of Seven and the octave – yet if the Bible uses allegory, in addition to historical narratives, this may be something the use of Sheba/ ’Seven’ connects to in terms of purely abstract processes as noted concerning the octave.
And immediately after David’s reign comes that of his son, Solomon; who most famously meets with his paramour – the Queen of Sheba.
So, amazingly, she too is named ‘Seven’, just like his father David’s wife Bethsheba (with the name also meaning ‘the South’ as the people of her southern region towards Ethiopia (Abyssinia) and Sudan were known as the Sabeans. The queen of Sheba (1Kings10) is stated to be an Ethiopian queen according to academics, and the Kebra Nagast, (an Ethiopian religious text dating from the 12th century Ad approximately). Kebra Nagast, (reminiscent of the Indian name for the royal cobra, ‘nagas nagas’), means ‘the glory of kings’.
She is also referred to by Jesus when he talks of the ‘queen of the south who came from the ends of the earth to hear Solomon’s wisdom’, (Matt.12.42, Luke11.31). In his words Jesus shows his understanding of the metaphoric meanings contained within the Solomon/ Sheba narrative; for the land she came from, Ethiopia is not particularly ‘the ends of the earth’; but in the sense of South referred to from Sumerian times onwards, it refers to the symbolism of the ‘Ap-su’ – as the Sumerian deity Enki was ‘lord of the Ap-su’- the abyss which is the subterranean reservoir of waters from which all life comes. In metaphoric terms it is the ‘deeper’ (lunar, feminine, subconscious) areas of the instinctive, stomach centre, in contrast to the other two, the emotional, and intellectual centres, as Enki was in contrast to his brother Enlil and their father Anu.
This came from a conceptual ‘tri-partite division’ of the world, noted by various academics* in Sumerian mythology, between Anu, the ‘father of the heavens’, and his two sons Enlil (the ‘Lord of Command’ of the Earth), and Enki (the ‘Lord of the Apsu’, or ‘subterranean waters) *(for example, from Aino Hatinen’s 2021 book ‘The Moon God Sin …’, p.136, citing Galter1983). Concomitantly the night-skies were divided into three ‘Ways’, or ‘bands’ (‘harranu’) in works such as Old Babylonian astronomical treatises of the stars.
(Indeed, in Genesis28.10-19 the Hebrew patriarch Jacob is told by his mother to travel to Haran, an area of northern Mesopotamia linking the family of Abraham to the Akkadians as well as ‘Ur of the Chaldees’, stated to be the birthplace of Abram and his wife Sarai, to go to the family of her father, Bethuel to find a wife from their Semitic/ Hebrew lineages arising there after the Deluge (Gen11.1-10). Bethuel means ‘the house of God’, while Haran the town means ‘the road’ or ‘crossroad’, and is cognate to the Babylonian ‘haranu’ meaning the same).
These bands or ‘Ways’ were used, says Hatinen, “to describe the motion of celestial objects during the year and to identify the location of celestial objects… these paths run between the eastern and western horizons… Among other sources these celestial paths are found in the Mesopotamian astrolabes, as well as at the beginning of the MUL.APIN” (op.cit, p.136, citing Horowitz, 2011/14, etc). Likewise found in various Babylonian prayers, as well as works of astrology, the ‘Ways’ were those of Enlil (from the North Pole > 17°N), of Anu (from there to 17°S, thus meaning his zone encompassed the Equator), and Enki, (the South, from 17°S to the southern Pole).
The balancing role of Anu as the ‘father of the heavens’, and as father of the two brothers, may have been why the middle band of the Equator was ascribed to him. Likewise that Enlil was given the Northern way, plus considered the ‘lord of the Earth’ indicates his (celestial) role as overseer of the ‘destiny’ of the planet and mankind. His ‘sphere of influence’ was the Earth, but the highest aspects of it, therefore, while Enki in both formulations of the concept was responsible for the ‘waters’, and the ‘subterranean’ sphere. In conceptual terms Enlil may have represented the mind, and intellect, Anu the heart and emotions, and Enki the body, the concerns of the self, and instinctive intelligence and intuition.

The Etymology section looks at that of South /Sud in Ab-zu / Ap-su, as in Ziusud-ra, in these terms; the Deluge stories of Utnapishtim, Ziusudra, Atra-hasis, and Noah etc are all filled with the symbolism of the instinctive centre – the subconscious, ‘subterranean’ centre – which directs survival of the self, and the instinctive sensing of reality. Thus including within Enki/Ea’s epithet ‘lord of the South’ all the symbolic aspects to the ‘Ap-su’, the subterranean founts of all water, and fertility within the land, as well as having metaphoric meanings such as the ‘underworld’, mines, and so on. As we have seen, the Epic of Gilgamesh located the Plant of Life, or Eternal Youth within the depths of the Ab-zu. Concepts stemming from this metaphor of the South include; the (evil) South Wind in the myth of Adapa; the Suteans in Sumerian and Akkadian myths; Lamastu the (Sutean) female ‘demoness’; the Sabeans (in Job1.15, Joel3.8, Ezekiel23.42, and so on); and of course, Sheba, the Queen of the South.

Likewise the Temple of Solomon was situated at the navel-point of the earth where the waters of the abyss drained at the end of the Deluge, and from there brought vitality to the visible world – a clear continuation of the Sumerian myths of the Ap-su. (Additionally, as with so many Sumerian and biblical figures, such as Rahab and Tiamat etcetera, the multi-level and symbolic meanings contained within the (cosmic consciousness of) epithets such as Enki ‘s ‘Lord of the Ap-su’ may relate the ‘depths’ to other contexts, be that of the consciousness, or space itself. . . a narrative at the centre of the mythologies of the Anunnaki, and their creation of humankind and civilization).
So biblical concepts of sea-monsters ‘of the depths’, such as Rahab, Tiamat and Leviathan are all related to the serpent; and potentially to aspects of the self such as the ‘reptilian centre’ of the stomach level of physiology – a parallel which points to the coherence of the Sumerian and biblical narratives. So this is a highly complex epithet ‘Queen of the South’, casually inserted into the narrative by Jesus in its meanings and associations.
Related to these concepts of the ap-su, the word tebah (Ark, or box) is used only twice in the entire bible; once to refer to the Ark of Noah, and once to the box Moses is floated on the Nile in as a baby, pointing to the nature of the Ark as being able to withstand the pressures of ‘the waters’ when in flood, on a personal level also; and both characters are indeed indicated to be connected to the celestial Sumerian bloodlines, a point which is of some relevance.
And incidentally, the only character named Tebah in the bible is the (Sumerian) son of Nahor, the brother of Abraham, as mentioned in Genesis 22.22 ! As we shall see, Abraham and his relatives provide many links with Sumer, and the bloodlines of the Anunnaki, which are subtly indicated within the details of their – and other’s – lives.

And this is at the heart in one respect of the tale of Solomon and Sheba, with the metaphoric layers of meaning contained within it. The non-personal aspects of the mythic story indicate its links with abstract knowledge – and thus potentially with ‘esoteric’ consciousness found within the mystery schools of Hebrew and Near East societies. So Sheba visits – exchanges gifts with – and then bonds with / ’marries’ King Solomon – thus forming a narrative of the conjoining of cosmic male and female energies – solar and lunar – perhaps the clearest in the Bible..! (2Chronicles 9/ 1Kings 10.1) This repeats the (Nagas) theme of male/female lovers (or ‘energies’) often depicted as positive/negative energy lines or serpents which intertwine.

Illustrations; DNA intertwining double-helix; FuHsi and NuKua from China,Tang dynasty 651Ad; Hindu stela of male and female Nagas deities at Belur. Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain.

And it is at this point in the Bible, in listing the gifts that the queen gave to king Solomon that the first mention in the Bible of the number 666 is made (the number of solar energy, as stated by John Michell in his work ‘City of Revelation’) – and this is of talents (a weight) of gold, which has been the metal representative of the sun throughout history; Sheba gifts him 120 talents of gold at 1Kings 10.10; and mention is made four verses later at 1Kings 10.14 of the amount brought in a year from ‘Ophir’, namely 666 talents of gold. The number 120 has cosmic# significance too, being 1/3 of 360, as well as being the product of 1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5; in this way it can indicate the presence of one of the thirds of +/-/= in the Law of Three. (It may also be viewed as holding cos# meanings related to the number five – linking at as such to nature, growth, and Phi; indeed, in esoteric numerology five is the number of ‘man’ – and a pentagon holds ratios of Phi within its internal measures, as does every human. The number of phi proportions within the human body (and why they exist there) is too extensive to list here.

So here it may indicate Sheba brings female energy (-) to the marriage, and Solomon male energy (+). Most importantly in this regard is the understanding (from Gurdjieff’s exposition of the Law of Three) that the conjunction of positive and negative forces is not enough to create significant energies – it is in their combining to create the third force, that of ‘reconciling’, or equilibrium energy (or ‘Holy Ghost’/ ’Holy Reconciling’ as Gurdjieff termed it), that cosmic events are enabled. From this come further energies in a continuance of the processes in question. So in other words something separate to either male or female energy is created by the ‘alchemical marriage’ as symbolized by the narrative of Solomon and Sheba.
This value of 120 was extant in the (cos#) works of art of antiquity from c.2500Bce onwards; when the Epic of Gilgamesh used it as a metaphor (in the number of poles Gilgamesh had to cut to propel the ship to the ‘far away’ (ie, space) where the figure granted eternal life by Enlil after the Flood, Utnapishtim (Noah) was to be found – showing in this way its relation to cosmic matters. This punting (muscle power) was unfortunately made necessary because Gilgamesh had ‘broken the stone things’ and ‘picked all the urnu snakes’ in the forest prior to travel. These mysterious items are metaphors for higher energies, (referring perhaps to things such as minerals, crystals, energy-lines and so on; both ‘urnu’ and ‘snakes’ can refer to both ‘place’, and to ‘light’ in the symbolism of antiquity such as of Sumer and Egypt) – something we examine in more detail in the Gilgamesh section.

---

A key text in widening the western world’s awareness of the biblical themes around the ‘sons of the gods’ (of Sumer), and the Nephilim was the Book of 1Enoch, thought to date back to the first century, and brought back from Ethiopia/ Abyssinia to Britain by the explorer Sir James Bruce in 1773. In fact it was Bruce who brought to the West and the modern world therefore not one classic and significant text (the Kebra Nagast) but the Book of Enoch too..! (see image left of a page of the Book of Enoch). Bruce also brought to the modern world some of the most significant writings of the Gnostics from around the first and second centuries CE; along with the Askew Codex, the Bruce Codex formed some of the most complete records from these writings, such as the Pistis Sophia, until the finding of the Nag Hammadi library (The Gnostic Gospels) in Egypt in 1945…
While the book of Enoch dates most certainly to the 2nd or 3rd century Bce, (as portions of the Dead Sea Scrolls showed its existence from then at least) and the Kebra Nagast to the 13/14th century, it must be presumed the books Bruce was given were indeed more recent copies)…

(left) Page of the Book of Enoch, from the Ethiopic manuscript, donated by James Bruce in 1778 to the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Attribution; Wikimedia Public Domain

The Book of 1Enoch was possibly the first Hebrew sacred text to deal with the narrative of the Nephilim, the ‘fallen ones’, known also as the Watchers. In 1Enoch7 the ‘sons of the gods’, led by the ‘chief of the wicked’ Samyaza, agree to descend to mount Hermon in Lebanon, in order to ‘commingle’ with human women. (As well as teach mankind, or their own descendants, the skills of civilization, or ‘heavenly arts’ – what they pass on may be less meaningful than the genuine ‘heavenly wisdom’ taught to Enoch by the angels in the higher heavens later in the work.
The actions of the two hundred ‘princes’ lead to the creation of the Nephilim, hybrid bloodlines (like Cain’s), which become are ‘celestial’ in nature, as well as ‘human’, as they become described as ‘giants in the earth’. These are far stronger than of ordinary humans, and become leaders who eventually take advantage of the ‘mass’ of mankind… showing strong characteristics of negativity within the proposed lineages. There are links, as with the narrative of Cain, to the lines of kings – in Sumerian mythology, the kings were genetically different to normal people, having received larger amounts of ‘celestial’ genetics of the gods. As exemplified by the ‘heroic’ yet rapacious Gilgamesh. The Nephilim have similar characteristics, as Nimrod in Gen10 is a ‘great hunter before the Lord’ and the Nephilim are ‘mighty (‘gibborim’) men which were of old, men of renown’ (Gen6.1-4)… Among a long list of possible meanings of the ‘Mark of Cain’ is the theory that it was a ‘badge of sovereignty’ or ‘kingship’, granted in order to protect the descendants in their positions of elite power, according to divine purposes however difficult these may be to fathom.

And yet, in another perplexing possibility, the (pre-Deluge) line of Enoch, and Lamech and Noah (and his post-Deluge lineages which people the world) is seen to be possibly of the ‘celestial’ bloodlines too – though whether negative, positive or something of both, is not clear. So the Books of Enoch, Noah and Giants, etc, thought to have been the source for the Bible’s references to the Watchers) describe the other-worldly appearance of the infant Noah when he is born; of ‘brilliant aspect’, with shining eyes, bright hair and skin, and so on, as we have already noted.

There are numerous semantic signposts to the influence of these sorts of genetics within the life of David and his relatives and sons. David’s lust for Bathsheba when she is still married to another man, and the ensuing murder of her husband leads to a child being born – who dies after living for just seven days, this showing the result of David’s breaking of spiritual or moral laws…(2Sam12.14-20). The next child conceived and born to them is Solomon (Peace/God, also meaning Sun in the Egyptian names of On, and Amun, as well as the name ‘Sol’ which may have links to the sun in pre-Latin languages). When David’s son Absalom – as we examine in more depth in a while – attempts a coup from the Jerusalem palace while David is out of the city, he is eventually killed; in rabbinic commentaries David’s counsellor Hushai comforts him that the circumstances of the boy’s conception, as his mother was a captive, meant he was always bound for a troubled life and end.

So at the start of David’s life within the royal court there is a fundamental shift from the (house of) the existing king, Saul, to that of David; 1Samuel16.14;
But the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

His servants, noting this, decide to seek out ‘a man who is a cunning player on a harp, so that when Saul is troubled , the music shall make him well. . .’

And the answer to their inquiries is the youth David, the unobtrusive sheep-herd and youngest of the eight sons of Jesse. After this follows his life’s story in becoming an attendant to Saul, and following his defeat of the giant Goliath, a trusted soldier; then after many trials and tribulations, eventually the king of Israel, and his long-term gradual journey from ‘everyman’ and nation-builder, to powerful sovereign … no character in the Bible (across the two books each of Samuel, and Chronicles, and Kings) receives as much attention as David – other than Moses in the Old Testament and Jesus in the New Testament.
From chapter16 of 1Samuel Saul greatly favours David, who in turn is a loyal servant;

And David came to Saul, and stood before him; and he loved him greatly; and he became his armourbearer.
And Saul sent to Jesse, saying, Let David, I pray thee, stand before me; for he hath found favour in my sight” (16.21-22)

But the fact of YHVH’s removal of divine blessings from Saul makes things inevitably complicated. While at first, it states, “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand; so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him” (16.23). The next chapter deals with David’s famous victory over the giant of the Philistines, Goliath (17.1-58). And as the following chapter shows, it is the popularity the youth David wins among the men and women of the cities of Israel that sours Saul’s attitude; “And the women answered one another as they played, and said, Saul hath slain his thousands, but David his ten thousands. And Saul was very wroth, and the saying displeased him; and he said… and what can he have more but the kingdom? And Saul eyed David from that day and forward. And it came to pass on the morrow, that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul, and he prophesied in the midst of the house; and David played with his hand, as at other times; and there was a javelin in Saul’s hand. And Saul cast the javelin, for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. And David avoided out of his presence twice. And Saul was afraid of David, because the Lord was with him, and was departed from Saul” (17.7-12).
After this the king becomes increasingly antagonistic towards the loyal youth David, devising ways of causing David’s death; “And Saul said unto David, Behold my elder daughter Merab, her will I give thee to wife; only be thou valiant for me, and fight the Lord’s battles. For Saul said, Let not mine hand be upon him, but let the hand of the Philistines be upon him” (17.17).

This strategy is a significant one, for as David becomes king of Israel and Judah in 2Samuel1, he deploys a similar ruse to remove a man whose wife he covets; Bathsheba. In fact there are similar ploys and manoeuvres throughout David’s life-story, and the wider Bible; For while David’s first wife was Michal, (1Sam18.20-28), the daughter of king Saul, (‘the Lord’s anointed’) and his wife Ahinoam, (daughter of Ahimaaz – see Shallum etc), his second wife was Abigail, who when she first appears in the Bible, at 1Samuel25.3, is married to a man named Nabal. The meaning of this name is; ‘foolish’, ‘wicked’, or ‘fading away’..! He is presented as such, and as an unworthy husband for Abigail. As1Sam25.25 states; “…regard not this man of Belial, even Nabal; for as his name is, so is he”…with Belial, although meaning literally ‘worthless’, over time in Hebrew society attaining the meaning of ‘chief of the wicked’, or ‘Satan’. Although David wishes to kill the worthless Nabal, in fact it is the Lord who ‘strikes him dead’, at 1Sam25.38, leaving David and Abigail thus able to marry. And significantly, in considering the ‘lineage’ or ‘essence’ of Nabal, (as the N-B stem of Sumerian Niburu, and related deities such as Nabu, are negatively depicted throughout the Bible), he is of the house of Caleb; a name which means, simply, ‘dog’, or ‘abject servant’ !
Similarly the grand-father of Bathsheba is the unprincipled counsellor Ahithophel, who advises the son of David (2Samuel 16.21-17.4) in his rebellion to sleep with his father’s wives and concubines, and to pursue and destroy David and his men outside of Jerusalem. His advice is described thus, “And the counsel of Ahithophel. . .was as if a man had inquired at the oracle of God”: so was all the counsel of Ahithophel both with David and with Absalom”. The ramifications of which, (concerning the lineages of ‘semi-divine’ kings, etc) are clear; similarly the name includes the stem of the Greek word ‘ophis’/ ‘ophel’, meaning ‘serpent’..! (while the Hebrew meaning of is name is assessed by biblical dictionaries to mean ‘brother of tastelessness’, or ‘brother of folly’, signifying him therefore to be similarly ‘corrupted’ in character. This ‘Judas’-like advisor, who betrays his king David, for no real reason, is shown to be empty of substance; when Absalom ignores his advice in favour of Hushai the Archite’s regarding pursuing David’s forces, Ahithophel goes home and hangs himself…(2Samuel17.23). But the most important fact of all this may be the blood-relationship Ahithophel has to Bathsheba, his grand-daughter, (via Eliam; 2Sam11.3/23.34) – and therefore as great-grandfather of her son Solomon. In this may Solomon’s predispositions to hundreds of wives and concubines (in Nephilim manner perhaps) be partly explained, particularly as they are largely foreign/ ‘strange’ women, thus leading Solomon and Israel into pagan worship, idolatry and sacrifices.

Narratives surrounding the ‘royal wives’ show the significance of continuing the ‘royal bloodlines of the anointed’ – David is said to have married a woman named Ahinoam (2Sam2.2). This is stated immediately after the depiction of the death of Saul, in 2Sam1-27, as if to imply that David ‘inherits’ Ahinoam the wife of his predecessor Saul. As the counsellor Ahithophel advises Absalom, “Go in unto thy father’s concubines, which he hath left to keep the house…” (2Sam16.21), this is apparently in order to humiliate his father. But when the significance of the narrative of the ‘celestial lines’ of Sumer is taken into consideration, the motives for such assumptions of other’s ‘royal wives’ may have been more than simply symbolic.

The remaining 14 chapters of 1Samuel relate the events taking place between the ruling king Saul, and the young man David, who is forced into fighting a ‘guerrilla’ campaign, leading his relatives and supporters through the deserts and mountains of the wilds. This continues until (24.1-22) when Saul enters a cave where David and his men are taking shelter, and sleeps there unaware; David cuts off the corner of his robe, and when Saul leaves the cave, David speaks to him showing he had the opportunity to kill Saul, but could never kill the ‘Lord’s anointed’… upon which they are reconciled. Again though Saul’s advisers tell him in chapter 26 that ‘doth not David hide himself in the hill of Hachilah” (26.1); taking three thousand men Saul seeks David; but again David has an opportunity to kill Saul and refrains, after which Saul blesses David, naming him as his successor. Soon after these events, Saul dies in a battle with the Philistines (1Sam31.1-6).
Following on from this, in 2Samuel1, David still laments the death of ‘the Lord’s anointed, Saul’, and his son Jonathon, ‘whose love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women” (2Sam1.26). And how David becomes king of a united Israel and Judah after this is depicted in a complicated series of events.
At the start of 2Samuel, David is crowned king of Judah (2Sam1.7), while the son of Saul, named Ish-bosheth (which means ‘man of shame’) is crowned king of Israel by Abner, the captain of Saul’s host (1.8-9). After a few years of this situation, Abner and some of the house of Saul travel from their hometown to that of Gibeon (meaning ‘mighty’, or ‘high’). And here they are met by Joab, the cousin of David (as one of the ‘sons of Zeruiah’), the captain of his forces. The two groups face each other across the ‘pool at Gibeon’, (potentially a significant metaphor), from which twelve young men from each side commence to fight (2.17). The men of David win, and Abner flees on foot (2.18). The brother of Joab and Abishai, named Asahel, being ‘fleet of foot’ pursues Abner, who tells him to leave him alone… as Asahel ignores the warnings, he is killed by Abner (2.19-23) who puts a spear ‘under his fifth rib’… Joab and Abishai pursue and catch up with him that night, but Abner says to Joab, ‘Shall the sword devour forever? Knowest thou not that it will be bitterness in the last end?’ (2.24). When they return to Hebron and David they are twenty men less than before; whereas the Israelites under Abner lose 360 of their men. After returning home the king of Israel, Ish-bosheth accuses Abner of ‘going in to his father’s concubine’ (2Sam3.7); the familiar theme… an accusation which causes Abner to declare to David he can persuade all the peoples of Israel to change their allegiance to David instead of Saul’s son (3.12-21); and attend a feast in Hebron where he speaks with David. (3.22). Just after this visit, Joab and his men return to Hebron, and are told of Abner’s presence – upon which Joab accuses him of seeking to deceive David. He arranges to meet Abner, bringing him back from the ‘well of Sirah’, (meaning ‘rebellion’, or ‘stubborn resistance’, or ‘turning aside’ from the Hebrew verbs ‘sarar’ and ’sur’) without telling David; “And when Abner was returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside in the gate to speak with him quietly, and smote him there under the fifth rib, that he died, for the blood, of Asahel his brother”… (3.27). When David hears of this, he disavows himself of any connection with the killing, saying words which hold significance in regard to the bloodline of which David is himself part of; “And I am this day weak, though anointed king; and these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me; the LORD shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness” (2Sam3.39).
In the next chapter Saul’s son who reigns over Israel, Ish-bosheth, is killed by two men who are captains of bands within the nation; Rechab and Baanah. The name Rechab means ‘driver’ or ‘controller’, while Baanah means ‘son of distress’ or ‘affliction’, (or to ‘afflict, oppress or humble’ – Abarim.com); (giving these two killers some similarity to the two weapons used in battle by the Canaanite storm-god Adad, named ‘Driver’ and ‘Chaser’ – or the two (war/ battle associated) ‘kinsmen’ attendants of the storm-god Adad in Gilgamesh, called Shullat and Hanish). They bring the head of Ish-bosheth* to the court of David at Hebron, expecting a high reward. But as with his execution of the servant of Saul who ended the dying king’s suffering (2Sam1.11-15), David is shocked again by someone’s disregard for the ‘Lord’s anointed’ or his family (2Sam4.8-12), and executes them.
It is from this point that David is crowned king of all Israel and Judah, reigning from the age of thirty for forty years, according to 2Sam5.4; seven in Hebron as king of Judah, followed by thirty-three years in Jerusalem, as king of unified Israel.

one example similar in concept as the ‘celestial source of a lineage of men’ comes from the group of names in the Bible of men with the N-B stems relating to Niburu, Nebo, Nabunaid names etc of the Anunnaki deities or kings of Sumer and Babylon… 2Samuel21.16 relates the war David has with the Philistines after the deaths of Saul and Jonathon; “And Ishbi-benob, which was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear weighed three hundred shekels of brass in weight, he being girded with a new sword thought to have slain David”. The prefix ‘Ishbi-‘ means ‘the son of ’, while the Benob name may likewise be composed of the N-B stem, plus the prefix ‘be(n), meaning again, ‘the son of-‘. The prefix of ‘Ish’ has also been noted by academics in works such as the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, concerned with the life of the semi-divine king, whose mother is an Anuna goddess, and father a human man, who is a pre-Deluge king. So both Gilgamesh, and the ‘Guardian of the Cedar Forest’, the monstrous Humbaba/ Hobabish, possess names including the prefix, to indicate essentially that they are men, but of a semi-divine lineage, stemming from celestial origins…
In his work “The Antediluvian Origin of Evil in the Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions” Amar Annus writes on p.22 ; “The ritual texts (of Mesopotamia) describe the same three groups of seven sages – one group of fish-man hybrids, one of bird-man hybrids, and one of fully anthropomorphic figures (Wiggerman,1994;224). In comparison, different versions of the Jewish Book of Giants depict some giants as bird-men. Mahawai has wings and flies in the air in the Qumran fragments (Milik,1976). The giants ‘Ohyah and Hahyah could have been birdmen too, as the Persian version refers to an activity ‘in their nest’. Milik has argued too that Azazel in the Book of Giants also was a hybrid of goat-like and man-like features. The final ending -is in the names like glgmys (Gilgamesh) and hwbbs (Humbaba/Hobabish) may reflect the partially human composition of these figures, by a play with Hebrew -is “man” (Milik, 1976)”

It is possible, in following the closely detailed twists and turns of fate and circumstance which characterize the entire life of David, to see them as an allegory of the institution of Kingship through the Bible, and in wider terms, through history.
So David is crowned king, on a triumphant day in Jerusalem. His kingship is born in great positivity, of establishing the ‘divinely approved’ nation, to create the ‘righteous kingdom’ of Heaven on Earth – his hope is of being a representative of all the people, before the LORD. But a scene from his coronation day perfectly encapsulates the conflicting pressures history has exerted upon virtually all kings and queens. This is when the people of Jerusalem welcome their new king into (the public space of) the centre of Jerusalem, at 2Samuel 6.15-23;

So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet.
And as the ark of the Lord came into the city of David, Michal Saul’s daughter
(David’s wife) looked through a window, and saw king David leaping and dancing before the Lord; and she despised him in her heart. . .
And he dealt among all the people, even among the whole multitude of Israel, as well to the women as men, to every one a cake of bread, and a good piece of flesh, and a flagon of wine. So all the people departed every one to his house. Then David returned to bless his household. And Michal the daughter of Saul came out to meet David, and said, How glorious was the king of Israel today, who uncovered himself today in the eyes of the handmaids of his servants, as one of the vain fellows shamelessly uncovereth himself!
And David said unto Michal, It was before the Lord, which chose me before thy father, and before all his house, to appoint me ruler over the people of the Lord, over Israel; therefore will I play before the Lord.

Therefore Michal the daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death.

This establishes the early sense of his decency and openness, in contrast to later years, when the King is secure, and complacent in his power…indeed ‘absorbs’ the vitality and warmth of a young woman, Abishag, by her presence besides him in his bed as a dying old man, in what appears symbolic of his ‘kingliness’ (1Kings1.1-4). (So that this episode may be considered as ‘resonant’, or ‘symbolic’ of similarities between king David, and the ‘sons of the gods’, the Nephilim, who descended to mount Hermon in 1Enoch to ‘avail’ themselves of the ‘daughters of men’…) It may be a comment on YHVH’s words, noted previously, at 1Samuel 8.11-18, on ‘what manner of king shall rule thee’.

In fact, though, almost from the start the reality is less than perfect.
The Bible narrates small acts of avarice, malice, Machiavellian practices (sending the husband of a married woman (Bathsheba) he desires off to be killed in war) and in broad terms, becoming compromised by circumstances -perhaps the politics of the ‘world’;
so that towards the end of his life he is largely distanced from the concerns and hearts of the ordinary people who constitute his kingdom’s people. His final years, therefore, include divine judgement; infirmity; depending on other’s energies and efforts; acts of vengeance (breaking promises of forgiveness); and establishment of inherited, rather than earned or deserved kingship; something which while traditional to matters of personal possessions and inheritance, may not have been so in matters related to the sovereignty of the land.

• so the story of David becomes one of the dangers of ‘worldly power’, in its gradual divergence from the moral ‘north’ of the priests and ‘shepherd-kings’ of early eras – even with the best of intentions, due to the constant demands of needing to achieve security/ fight wars/ promote unity/ assimilate or stifle conflicts within the ‘elite’/ resist any of the temptations of power and wealth, and so on. The events of David’s reign may stand therefore, possibly, as a metaphor of the tendency of life to steer the individual away from attentiveness to spiritual matters of the self, in particular where the individual’s spiritual self is not fully developed.

And Israel in turn learnt the inherent problems and contradictions of the political dynamics of ruling a ‘nation-state’ which few foretold when asking YHVH for a king to lead and protect them.
The story of David certainly highlights these dynamics; and is also possibly an allegory concerning either; the ‘corrupting nature of power’ – or the ‘corrupting nature of powerful genes’. . .) – which reminds of the constant references by Lamech and others, to ‘guilt’, or a ‘burden’, expressed in Lamech’s words; “If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold’ (Gen4.24).
And Jesus refers to this theme, in saying to Peter ‘not seven but seventy times should you forgive your brother if he sins against you’; for in this way he is referring to (the line of) Cain in particular, and the long-term (inevitable, and predictable) effect of ‘negative’ genes upon the self. Perhaps even the need to continually work to avoid being subsumed by them).

DAVID and the BLOODLINES OF THE ANUNNAKI / NAGAS.

The argument that the (serpent-based) wisdom of Sumer, and the ‘gods’, the Anuna, is present in the Bible, in continuation of Sumerian, Babylonian and Egyptian cultures’ mythologies, is to some degree supported by the presence of themes of the celestial lineages of certain characters, as well as cosmic-number references embedded deeply within the story of King David, (as well as his wife Bathsheba, his son Solomon, and his paramour the Queen of Sheba) And further to this, much support may be interpreted in many facets of family, tribe, places and name… all of which can convey some meaning of inner essence by the structure of the word(s) used in the original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. For example, Jesus himself names Simon ‘Peter’, or ‘cephas’ (in Greek) as he will be the ‘rock upon which the church is built’ as the texts say. The name of Jerusalem likewise means ‘foundation of peace’, or ‘completeness’ / wholeness’…and so on; indeed, as we shall see, place and character names contain an immense amount of information relating to their most significant essential characteristics.

As we have seen, the imperative for David to be ‘one of the people’, as well as the ‘highest representative’ of them, or one in a million is a sign-post to the midpoint between god(s) and men he was expected to inhabit.
It can almost be said to be the key to the story of David, and his son Solomon – ie the ensuing ‘bloodline of kings’, (which culminates in Jesus, although he did not seek political power in any way particularly).

And in one of the Old Testament’s most significant metaphors or allegorical themes, the Nahash (or Nehushtan) is the brazen serpent which Moses makes (among a great deal of serpent imagery and metaphor in the life-story of Moses and his brother Aaron) to provide a form of healing from the bites of the ‘fiery flying serpents’, the Seraphim for the people of Israel, (during their travails in the deserts after fleeing Egypt). (Numbers21.6-9). Quite how this action, constructing a bronze serpent which is attached to a pole in the ground, in the mountain camp of the Israelites provides healing to them, is unexplained. But it is clear that there are a slew of metaphorical meanings and references attached to such a construction at that time, leading all the way back to the serpent-god of Sumer; Enki. So the Nahash is a thread which runs beyond the limits of the Israelites, and is a symbol of that enduring line-of-transmission which the Hebrew civilization continued as it found its own identity.

So, if we posit the connection between the Nahash, and between the kings of Sumer etc and the Hebrew kings, it is of interest that the two references to people called Nahash in the Old Testament both serve in their symbolism to link King David to the ‘celestial lineages’, (in what appear to be both intentional, as well as indirect references).

Nahash – the parent of Abigail who was sister to David, and Zeruiah, at 2Samuel 17.25. (Some rabbis maintain Nahash is another name for David’s father, Jesse; others that it is the name of a prior wife to Jesse, before David’s mother. . . although strangely the mother of David is never named in any of the many chapters devoted to David’s life. (While in 2Samuel10.2 David shows kindness to “Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father shewed kindness unto me”, indicating again some unspecified history or relationship between them, one which biblical scholars are unable to pinpoint)…
But regarding the parent of David’s sister Abigail, we are forced either way to confront the connection between Nahash and David in close genetic terms. Further emphasis is brought to bear in several passages where David reprimands excessive violence/bloodthirstiness in his captains (and three cousins, Joab, Abishai, and Asahel) by calling them the ‘sons of Zeruiah’ (ie children of Nahash? as her mother is never named, while her father is Jesse) in what becomes a short-hand epithet for ‘men of violence’; as we have noted already, David says of his cousins at 2Samuel 3.39;

And I am this day weak, though anointed king. And these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me; The Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness.

To examine these themes more closely in a significant period of David’s reign, it is worth giving a quick glossary of the Name meanings of the people and places in 2Samuel, as we take a detailed look at the insurrection of David’s sovereignty by his eldest son Absalom – as well as the highly significant events taking place at the end of King David’s life, and the succession of his favoured son Solomon, connected as they are in the narrative, and to the themes of this section.

Side-bar.

Mahanaim- meaning – settle down/select camp (the competing bloodlines of the Houses of Saul/ David?)
Abishai – ‘my father Yah exists’ – perhaps emphasizing ‘heroic’/ celestial aspect of the ‘sons of Zeruiah’.
Absalom – the father is peace (not my-father is peace – abishalom)
Ahithophel – ah; brother of – tapal; tasteless; foolish. See also- from Greek; Ophites/ Ophelites; a serpent-worshipping group (which relates to his position/advice/fate.)
Joab – the father is lord (abb. of Yahweh + ab; father) – “obedient servant”?
Shobi – to turn/transition point / captive !
Ephraim – to be fruitful, or wealthy; to be depleted. . .
Rabbah – city of Ammon/Nehash; connected with the giant Og and the Rephaim – possibly in battling/ defeating them. Also to become many, or great/multitude; root of ‘rabbi’. This ties in with Ammon/ Nahash bloodline(s)… also; to shoot (arrows).
Maacah – oppression, pressure.
Barzillai – associate of the son of Nahash. Means ‘iron bar’ (of the Lord) in keeping with king Nahash’s severity/ ‘cruelty’. . .
Zeruiah – neck – bind – adversary – rock !!
Abiathar- (priest line of Eli) – remnant/ what remains/ a cord which ties.
Bahurim – choice, youth, chosen one.
Zadok – justice, righteousness.
Ahimaaz – son of Zadok, helps warn David, possibly a deputy of Solomon later. The root of ‘ma’az’ not used in Hebrew, but related arabic; ‘to console’- also to hurry, hasten, to be light-footed.
Archite – a Canaanite tribe said to be near to Anathoth, Bethel and Luz – all relevant to the themes of this section. There is the sense contained within the word of ‘long’, high/ ‘arch’ etc.
Talmai – ‘furrow’; the first Talmai of the Bible is the son of Anak, Num13.22/33, ie. the Anakim, defined by commentators as the Nephilim (Numbers13.33), and the Rephaim (Deut2.10) – while a later Talmai is the father of Maacah, who is David’s wife and the grandmother of the wife of Solomon’s son Rehoboam (!), thus raising yet again the significance of some of the lineages within the Old Testament. (2Sam3.3/13.37).

Nahash – close link to Nahash/ Nehushtan the brazen serpent of Moses (symbol of; metallurgy, societal/ religious tools and implements, ‘technology’, knowing, secrets, alloys, alchemy, wisdom, healing, DNA; the Nagas, hybrid beings/bloodlines)… Additionally represents as such – ‘knower of secrets’/ oracles/ instinctive reptilian centres of stomach/ brain. The Bronze Age (c.3000Bc-1000Bc), was replaced by the technological refinements of the Iron Age c1200Bce.
Nahash is the king of Ammon who lays siege to the people of Jabesh-Gilead, in Gibeah (1Samuel 11.1-11!). As shown, Gibeon (‘mighty’ or ‘high place’), relates to ‘mighty men of old’/ ‘giants in the earth’/ pagan hill-top sites which Gibeon was, linked in this sense to king Solomon the night before his coronation, when YHVH ‘tempts’ and blesses him (1Ki3.1-15)…so the connections are extensive here, especially as Nahash behaves in what appears to be a ‘Nephilim’ manner, perhaps to peoples who are of the same blood-lines. . .
Later Nahash appears to be held in high regard by David for some unspecified aid or act of mercy (2Sam10.2). The most relevant reason for David’s gratitude to king Nahash however appears to be one of kinship. This occurs where an unidentified person called Nahash is shown to be a blood-relation of David through his sister Abigail. So to look at possible explanations that have been offered as to this uncertainty, the Unger’s Biblical Dictionary states; “Nahash (meaning ‘serpent’) is a person mentioned only once (2Sam17.25), in stating the parentage of Amasa, the commander in chief of Absalom’s army. Amasa is said to have been the son of a certain Ithra by Abigail “the daughter of Nahash, sister to Zeruiah” By the genealogy of 1Chron2.16 it appears that Zeruiah and Abigail were sisters of David and the other children of Jesse. The question then arises How could Abigail have been at the same time daughter of Nahash and sister to the children of Jesse? To this three answers may be given: a) The universal tradition of the rabbis, that Nahash and Jesse were identical. (b) that Nahash was the king of the Ammonites and that the same woman had first been his wife or concubine – in which capacity she gave birth to Abigail and Zeruiah – and afterwards wife to Jesse and the mother of his children. (c) A third possible explanation is that Nahash was the name not of Jesse, nor of a former husband of his wife, but of his wife herself. (Smith, Bib.Dict.,s.v) “
It is clearly possible (especially taken in conjunction with all the other evidence of this section), that this anomaly or confusion is a sign-post to a significant reality, meaning essentially Zeruiah, David etc are ‘of the line’ of the Nehushtan/Nagas/ king Nahash – hence the epithet David coins, ‘ye sons of Zeruiah’ meaning mighty, harsh, cruel, and who are described as ‘adversaries’, (satans), by David at 2Samuel19.22. . .(as indeed is David himself called by the Philistines at 1Sam29.4) – and the word used for ‘mighty’, ‘gibborim’ is also used for the ‘mighty men of old’ – ‘the giants’ borne of the Watchers and women in Genesis 6.1-4.
As can be inferred regarding David and Nahash, whichever explanation is believed, the familial bloodline of David is directly related to Nahash as representative of the ‘serpent’ lineages (of Sumer); and bearing in mind the ‘brazen serpent’ made by Moses, used to heal the Israelites bitten by the Seraphim, the links to king Nahash, and the Ammonite tribe, (descended from Abraham’s nephew Lot and his daughter after they left the home region of Sumer to settle in Israel) appear to hold essential significance, as indeed the long-term lineage of the Israelites within Sumer, through the eleven generations from Shem (Gen6.10) until Abraham, is taken into account. The Seraphim, the ‘fiery flying serpents’ who are an angelic order according to Isaiah and in Revelations, are ‘celestial-beings’ concerned with the rectification of sins or errors committed by the Hebrews, as well as the destruction and punishment of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, etc; an event highly similar in several respects to God’s destruction (via the Flood) of the results of the rapine and excesses of the Nephilim bloodlines (Gen6.4-6). It may be this intrinsic role which motivates the Ammonite king Nahash to ask of the besieged inhabitants of Jabesh-Gilead an eye if he is to be their king. Much as Jesus said ‘If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out”, ie. as an extreme corrective towards spiritual principles away from worldly self-interest, and associated sin. So from all these intricate relationships of family, and of meaning, it is possible to draw some startling conclusions about the bloodlines of David, indeed of the Israelites, without necessarily reaching a conclusion about the nature of the lineages’ essence…

Ammon – the place ruled by king Nahash, ie. the tribe of the Ammonites (traced from the highly concentrated ‘Watchers’-connected line of Lot and his daughter (who got him drunk to impregnate herself after the Sodom and Gomorrah cataclysm), close relatives of Noah, Lamech, Enoch, Abraham (Lot’s uncle, being his father Nahor’s brother) and so on. . .in conjunction with Nahash / Nehash/ Nagas, it seems highly possible this tribe is representative of such bloodlines. In the Bible used to mean ‘inclusive’/ comprehensive; keeping secrets or information within the limited circle of the group. . .
It is of interest that Alexander the Great was depicted on his coins as having ram’s horns (the ‘Horns of Ammon’), after he was ‘deified’ during his journey to the temple of Amun-Ra in 332Bce, in the desert oasis/ centre of Siwa when conquering Egypt. It was during this ‘initiation’ by the Egyptian priests that he was told of his ‘divine lineage’, after which he believed himself to be the true son of Zeus-Ammon, thus being depicted thereafter with the ‘horns of Ammon’… (Helen Strudwick,2006). And curiously, the horns, in their spiral shape closely mirror the shape of fossilised ammonites; in fact it was the Greek philosopher Pliny the Elder who noting the close resemblance named the fossils after the horns of Ammon. Alexander’s similarity to Moses is highlighted by several texts; in particular in the Holy Qur’an, in which he is referred to as ‘Dhul Qarnayn’ – the ‘two-horned one’, using the tri-consonantal root of ‘q-r-n’. (Further etymological meanings centred around this word ‘qaran’, and similar stems are examined in the Notes and Numbers section). There are clues from the earliest books of the Bible after the events of Sodom and Gomorrah that connections exist between the bloodlines of Abraham (the Hebrews) and the Ammonites… for example when Moses is warned by YHVH to not make war upon the Ammonites; at Deuteronomy2.19 YHVH says he will not give Israel the land of the children of Ammon, ‘because I have given it unto the children of Lot for a possession’ – the Ammonite tribe being descendants of Lot and his daughter soon after they escaped the conflagration with the angels’ help. This bears some similarity to the ‘mark of Cain’ perhaps.

Ammon, by the way, means ‘ a people’ or ‘a great people’, while also meaning those who make, or are included ‘in a secret’ (Abarim.com*), pointing possibly to the ‘great men, men of renown’ aspect which Genesis6 describes the offspring of the ‘sons of the gods’ and human women, the Nephilim; and possibly to the ‘secret’ being the ‘affliction’ which caused both Enoch and David such unhappiness, and from which Noah offered some measure of ‘respite’, ie some mercy from the constant pressures imposed by the inherited genetics.
While in Talmudic literature Naamah, the daughter of king Nahash is praised for her righteousness, (such as Babba Kamma 38b, whose account states Moses is told by YHVH to not take the land of the Ammonites as the worthy Naamah was to descend from the lineage. Other Talmudic texts, such as Abba b.Kahana state that Naamah was the wife of Noah, and was so named because her conduct was ‘pleasing’ to YHVH. This interpretation is rejected by other commentators, who say ‘she sang pleasant songs to her pagan gods”… highlighting again the dualities at the heart of such myths, and lineages…

These strands of meaning and history combine within one of the Bible’s best known, and dramatic events, the destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by the Lord. For these events – and the bloodline of Abraham, the patriarch of the Hebrew, Christian, and Islamic religion ─ result in the creation of the biblical peoples the Ammonites, shown repeatedly to be of ‘violent’, unbalanced, Cainite, or Nephilim nature.

The events surrounding the rape of David and Maacah’s daughter Tamar, by her step-brother Amnon, followed by the revenge killing of Amnon by her brother Absalom is an extensive part of the narrative of David’s reign, from chapters 2Samuel 3 to 18. This is a packed narrative; it is worth recalling that the name Tamar means ‘dark’, as in the ‘tamarind/date-tree’, and was a symbol in Sumer and the Near East of the (as such unknowable/ mysterious) gods. So the date-palm tree from the earliest era was used in artworks to represent the gods, sovereignty, as well as fertility and the land, as such representing the Tree of Life.
And there are more than one women named Tamar in the Old Testament who are impregnated or raped by relatives! (Gen 38.6-30). The patriarch Judah has a son named Er, who is married to Tamar (Gen38.6). When Er dies, Tamar arranges to disguise herself, and entices Judah to sleep with her (Gen38.13-16). She gets his signet ring and bracelet as a pledge of payment of a kid a week later, but does not go back; several months later, Judah’s kinsmen tell him as follows; “And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot, and also, behold, she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, bring her forth, and let her be burnt” (Gen38.24). Of course, Tamar then shows Judah his signet and bracelet, saying “by the man whose these are, am I with child”… so he acknowledges his failure to give her a husband from the family when Er died. As well as being a commentary on male hypocrisy, this narrative points subtly to the themes associated with Tamar under consideration. David’s daughter Tamar may be seen to represent therefore these hybrid/ celestial lines; as does her brother Amnon (who acts according to type with the Nephilim traits of unbridled sexuality and callous cruelty). The ending of the story sees her brother Absalom (who soon after leads the rebellion against his father David) killing Amnon some two years after the (incestuous) rape, to avenge her honour… and as we shall see shortly, king Talmai of Geshur, their mother Maacah’s father is one of the most important leads within the Old Testament of the ‘celestial’ lineages as they unfolded (from Sumer) within ancient Israel.

---

2SAMUEL 12

The chapter here raises issues several ostensibly unrelated issues connected to the themes under consideration. So the chapter starts with YHVH telling Nathan, the foremost prophet of Israel, to tell David he has sinned in his creating circumstances to kill Uriah and ‘steal’ his wife Bathsheba – something Nathan does by means of a puzzle, or allegory, of ‘two men in a city, one rich and one poor’; whereas the rich man had many flocks of sheep, the poor man had just one ewe, which he ‘nourished’ like a child…But the rich man stole the ewe to feed a guest, rather than take from his own herd… (12.1-4). When David’s anger is ‘kindled against the man’, and that the man who ‘hath done this thing shall surely die’, Nathan says to him “Thou art the man…” (12.5-7). He then relays YHVH’s words telling David of the sin he has committed, after receiving everything he could have wished for from YHVH. As such, David is told that “the sword will never depart from thine house…Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbour, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of the sun”. (2Sam12.10-11). David admits his sin, and Nathan tells him ‘the Lord hath put away your sin; thou shalt not die”. However, ‘the child that is born to thee shall surely die’…whereupon the child born to Bathsheba is taken ill.
How David reacts is greatly telling of details of his character, in the narrative of just eight verses, from 2Sam12.16-24. So his first reaction is that ‘David therefore besought God for the child; and David fasted, and went in, and lay all night upon the earth’. As the elders of the court go to him to raise him up from the earth, he refuses, and will not eat bread either (12.16-17). After seven days of this, the child dies. And the servants of David are scared to tell him, because he has refused to listen to their words; ‘how will he then vex himself, if we tell him that the child is dead?’ David sees them whispering, and realizes the child is dead, asking them if this is so. When told the news, however, David simply gets up and enters his house, where he washes, anoints himself, puts on clean clothes, and then eats some food. This perplexes the people, who ask ‘what is this thing that thou hast done?’ (12.21). David replies pragmatically, “When the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, Who can tell whether God will be gracious to me, that the child may live? But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me” (12.23)’. The next verse states that he goes into Bathsheba that night, and she becomes pregnant with a son; Solomon, whom ‘the Lord loved’…

The following section, from 12.25 to the end of the chapter at 12.31, is taken up with the battle with the Ammonites. Following Hanun’s humiliation of David’s men in 2Sam10, he had sent Joab to begin attack on their capital city of Rabbah. Joab and his forces take half of the city, (another metaphor of division, or duality, similar to the shaving of David’s men’s hair and faces, and cutting in half of their clothes at 10.1-5). Joab sends message to David, saying “therefore gather the rest of the people together and encamp against the city; lest I take the city, and it be called after my name” (12.28). David arrives with reinforcements, and the rest of the city is taken. The first act is, obviously, to take the ‘crown of gold’ from their king’s head, and put it on his own, as well as bringing ‘forth the great spoil of the city’ (12.30). After this, events take a dark turn…

---

To briefly provide some overview, the Ammonites are a significant tribe to the Israelites in several ways. They were a tribe neighbouring Israel who worshipped the ‘abominations’, or pagan deities, of Ashtoreth, Molech and so forth, during the time when Solomon married ‘strange wives’ from tribes including these. King Nahash, the ‘friend’ and possible relative of king David, was the king of the Ammonites (1Sam11.1-11), and the ruler who asked the Israelites in Jabesh-Gilead to each give up an eye if he was to be their king…! His son Hanun, meanwhile, is shown to be the cause of the present conflict.
The war against the Ammonites takes place, moreover, within a wider context of battle against the various surrounding pagan tribes of Canaan. When David and his men defeat the Philistines at the city of Gath, home of the Rephaim, and then the Moabites at 2Samuel8.1-2, he “measured them with a line, casting them down to the ground; even with two lines measured he to put to death, and with one full line to keep alive. And so the Moabites became David’s servants” – indicating a connection between the Moabites and the ‘giants’ of the Nephilim and Rephaim – while 2Samuel21.15-22 meanwhile relates the war between David’s forces and the Philistines towards the end of David’s life in which three brothers or relatives of Goliath – Ishbi-benob, Saph, and ‘the brother of Goliath’ ** are killed, by several warriors of David. Both the Moabites, and the Ammonite tribes are notably descended from the lineage of Abraham’s (Sumerian) nephew Lot, and his two daughters, who plied him with alcohol after the conflagration of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen19.31-38).

Strangely perhaps, regarding the ‘sons of Anak’ and the Rephaim, in Deuteronomy2.9-11, the above passage of David measuring the height of the Moabite tribesmen means the Moabites, like the Ammonites, are clearly linked with the Nephilim lineages within Canaan. YHVH tells the Israelites in the wilderness with Moses c.1400Bce to “distress not the Moabites…because I have given Ar unto the children of Lot for a possession. The Emims dwelt therein in times past, a people great, and many, and tall, as the Anakims. Which were also accounted giants, as the Anakims; but the Moabites call them Emims”…

** textual differences between this and 1Chron20.5 are believed to indicate Goliath was said originally to have been killed by not David, but the Bethlehemite Elhanan; academics propose the original c.700Bce narrative of Elhanan killing Goliath at 2Sam21 was changed in favour of David when 1Chron20 was written c.400Bce to indicate he killed ‘Lahmi, the brother of Goliath’, with Lahmi being composed of the second half of the name Bethlehemite. The c.1600 King James Version of the Bible adopted the ‘brother’ narrative into 2Sam21, although the original Hebrew version does not contain those words… this revision is believed to possibly be part of the ‘Deuteronomic history’ – a ‘broader school’ responsible for the production of the books of Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings; however, as the events of the battle of Gob in 1Chron20 and 2Sam21 take place just before the end of David’s life, this may indicate that the Goliath killed by Elhanan was a descendant or namesake of the giant of the Philistine lineages.
An other point of note to take from the narrative of David’s life concerning the ‘giants’ of the Philistines, and related ‘Rephaim’ lineages, is that when he is forced by the forces of Saul to flee Israel in 1Sam27.1-3, he and his men and all their ‘households’ took refuge with king Achish and the Philistines, at Gath (from where Goliath and his brothers hailed!). A strange turn of events, which may well hold metaphorical meanings.

---

The events which transpire once the city has been taken, however, as related in 2Sam12.30-31, show an aspect of David’s character that is both shocking, and possibly an indication of the hidden themes linking the Ammonites to David. Verse31 details how after taking the Ammonite king’s crown of gold to place on his own head, David;

“brought forth the people that were therein, and put them under saws, and under harrows of iron, and under axes of iron, and made them pass through the brick-kiln; and thus did he unto all the cities of Ammon” (12.31).

This passage is so shocking that some biblical commentators and dictionaries, and even Bible versions (!) interpret the words to mean David put the prisoners to work using saws, threshing tools of iron, axes of iron, and at the kilns making bricks…(New International Version/ New Living Translation/ English Standard Version/ New King James Version, Benson’s /Clarke’s Bible Commentary, etc etc.). More realistic commentators such as Matthew Poole’s/ Ellicott’s/ Barnes’ (and other) Commentaries acknowledge that the text does state David’s orders ensured the prisoners were sawed to death, killed with the sharp-bladed harrows used to break up earth, or with axes, or thrown into the brick-kilns to be burned to death…
The similarity to Solomon’s following the practices of the Moabites and Ammonites in putting ‘children through the fire’, in human sacrifices to Molech, is clear, and finds some confirmation in Hebrew Bible texts, where the name of Malcem/ Malchen is used in the margin-notes of Masoretic versions of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) for 2Sam12.31; thus implying the brick-kiln was also a place where children were sacrificed to Molech. Due to this some commentators depict this execution of the Ammonite tribes-people as ‘righteous punishment’ for their tribe’s barbarous practices of child sacrifice; others as understandable, but not justifiable behaviour by David, ie in breach of God’s moral laws regarding mercy and humaneness. It would not be inaccurate to describe the role of ‘satans’ within the Hebrew Bible to be those ‘lower celestial’ beings who are required to perform highly punitive actions of divine punishment… pointing in this way to potential interpretations of the nature of David as a ‘satan’, (as he is called by several characters during his life’s narrative). This may provide a similar interpretation to the story of David’s ‘numbering’ of the tribes of Israel towards the end of his life, (at YHVH’s insistence), which thus angers YHVH enough to decree that the Israelites suffer a plague brought by ‘an angel of the Lord’ – one which kills 70,000 people (2Sam24).

(One other example of putting wrong-doers to death by fire comes from the significant narrative of Tamar and Judah, when she tricks her father-in-law to force him to keep his word to give her another husband from his sons; when Er dies, Tamar arranges to disguise herself, and entices Judah to sleep with her (Gen38.13-16). She gets his signet ring and bracelet as a pledge of payment of a kid a week later, but does not go back; several months later, Judah’s kinsmen tell him as follows; “And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot, and also, behold, she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, bring her forth, and let her be burnt” (Gen38.24); indicating that this form of punishment was known within Hebrew practices, although rarely used.

But whatever the inner truth of the matter of David and his punishment of the citizens of Rabbah, it is a set of actions rarely mentioned in considerations of David’s character. The verses of chapter12 preceding 12.31 may hold connotations of some form of not only sin, or sinful behaviour within David’s heart, (as evidenced by the killing of Uriah through ‘Machiavellian’ manoeuvrings), but also emotional negativity caused by YHVH’s ‘disavowal’ of David’s ‘house’ and kingship, the immediate illness and death of his child, during which David sits on the ground fasting for a week, and then the timely defeat of the ‘repulsive’ or ‘sinful’ Ammonites, who had humiliated his emissaries – all of which taken together happen to unlock his cruelty. As such this chapter presents a narrative of potential character traits of some of the ‘celestial lineages’, as well as ways in which circumstances can combine to create acts of horrific cruelty, in all humans, within minds and hearts suffering emotional disturbance…reflecting on a wider scale wars between neighbouring groups or nations across centuries which become cycles of revenge, atrocities and genocide. But the genetic ties shown to exist between David and king Nahash, and Abigail and Zeruiah to their parent named Nahash, as well as Solomon’s marriage to Naamah the Ammonite princess (and name of Tubal-Cain’s sister), all point to a significant hidden narrative in the Hebrew Bible.

---

Shortly after this, in keeping with YHVH’s judgement and punishment of David in 2Samuel12, events take a dramatic turn at the royal court in Jerusalem (2Samuel chs 14-20), starting with David forgiving his son Absalom, allowing him to return from exile at his mother Maacah’s home court of Geshur; immediately upon his return to Jerusalem Absalom builds a power-base which enables him to declare a rebellion aimed at removing David as king of Israel. There are so significant and salient points and themes concerned with the nature of kingship, the royal court, and questions of politics and such, contained in this key period of David’s life and reign that it is worth both taking an in-depth look at these seven or so chapters, as well as summarising them as follows;

Chapter 14 – Joab, the son of Zeruiah’ and ‘mighty man of Israel’ sees that David loves and favours his exiled son Absalom, so through an old woman manipulates David to forgive Absalom, and end his exile from Jerusalem. David sees through the woman’s ruse and identifies Joab’s role in her petition, but still grants Absalom forgiveness. The actions of Joab eventually bring about Absalom’s rebellion, the suicide of Ahithophel, Joab’s killing of Absalom, and ultimately his own death under David’s orders, painting a potent narrative concerning political manoeuvring perhaps.

Chapter 15 – Absalom returns, and makes himself available for all disputes, ‘standing at the gates of Jerusalem’, where all who came to the capital seeking the advice or decision of David were dealt with helpfully by him, and thus ‘stole the hearts of the men of Israel. Absalom asks that he might visit Hebron, (the capital of the kingdom, where kings of Israel were anointed’ such as David) to fulfil a vow he made in exile; but when he reaches there, he sends out messengers to all the tribes of Israel, asserting that ‘Absalom reigneth in Hebron’; David flees Jerusalem, in fear of his life along with many different groups of supporters. David sends back Zadok the priest, the Levites, and the Ark of the Covenant from the desert, described as ‘a place far off’, back to Jerusalem, saying he will wait in the wilderness until Zadok – and YHVH – recall him to Jerusalem. David is told his chief advisor Ahithophel (‘brother of folly’/ -‘the serpent’) is ‘among the conspirators with Absalom’, while the other counsellor, Hushai the Archite repeats his pledge of loyalty. David sends him back to Jerusalem, to try and become a trusted advisor of Absalom, to help David.

Chapter 16 – the servant of Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathon ‘who David loved more than any man’ delivers several asses carrying food, and wine to David, and pledges his loyalty. He says that his master has remained in Jerusalem in order to retain his kingdom as the grandson of Saul, once David and Absalom ruin each other…David grants all the belongings of his master to Ziba, struck by the treachery of his best friend’s son. But as 2Sam19 shows, this message from Ziba is a cunning lie…
Next in the desert place David and his men pass by a man of the house of Saul, called Shimei. This man casts dust and stones at the men, and insults at David, calling him a ‘man of Belial’, with the ‘blood of Saul’ on his hands. The ‘sons of Zeruiah’ ask to ‘cut off this man’s head like a dead dog’, but David acts with humility, saying Shimei’s words are at the prompting of YHVH, and to allow him to speak. Back at the court, Absalom asks his father’s chief advisor Ahithophel why he has not gone with David and his forces; Ahithophel answers he is loyal to he who the Lord, and the people of Israel have chosen as king, and declares himself for Absalom. He then recommends that they ‘put a tent over the roof of the palace’, and take his father’s concubines as wives, to complete his rebellion and assert himself symbolically as king, etc. This is done, in a tent upon the palace roof, ‘in the sight of all Israel’.

Chapter 17 – The two advisors Ahithophel and Hushai offer different plans of action to Absalom. Ahithophel counsels him to let him and 12,000 men pursue David then and there, to destroy him completely. Hushai, David’s secret ally, recommends they wait for a gathering of all the men of Israel before attempting such a risky policy, as David and his men ‘be like a bear robbed of her whelps in a field’, etcetera. Also for Absalom himself to then lead the forces which will defeat David and his men, a point which ultimately ends in his death. Hushai tells the priests Zadok and Abiathar the advice that he and Ahithophel have offered, and to therefore send warning to David to not ‘lodge not this night in the plains of the wilderness, but speedily pass over, lest the king and his people are swallowed up’. Two youths hurry to where David and his men are secluded, and warn of the dangers. A ‘lad’ sees them in the wilderness and ‘tells Absalom’, who sends out men looking for the messengers – but a ‘wise-woman’ at Bahurim hides them in a well in the courtyard of the house, and diverts the soldiers of Absalom. Back in Jerusalem, the men of the court, and Absalom, support the advice of Hushai over that of Ahithophel, at which the treacherous counsellor saddles his ass (symbol of wilfulness and stubbornness in the face of God’s word throughout the Bible), returns to his home, puts his affairs in order, and hangs himself. Thus presaging the death of the traitor Judas in the New Testament.

Chapter 18 – the forces of David and Absalom meet, in a woods in Ephraim. David tells his men beforehand to not ‘harm a hair on Absalom’s head’, as he loves him above all his children, and plans to forgive him. It states over 20,000 men died in the battle that day, and the ‘wood devoured more people that day than the sword’. Absalom, riding upon a mule, has his head caught between the branches of a great oak tree… a man tells Joab, saying he did not dare harm the rebellious son of David. Joab hurries there, and strikes three javelins into his chest, and killing him with the aid of ten of his men. They throw Absalom’s body into a great pit (symbol of earth, and the underworld), and cover it over with branches and stones. Zadok’s son Ahimaaz asks to run and bear the day’s tidings to David, who his supporters asked to remain away from the battle, but Zadok refuses this request, obviously because of the death of David’s son – so Joab tells another young man to run ahead with the tidings. David receives the news of his victory, and the death of Absalom, which he mourns in words and tears.

Chapter 19 – David’s upset turns the day of victory to one of mourning. Joab says to him it appears that it would have ‘pleased thee well’ if his ‘princes and servants had died this day, and Absalom had lived…’ He continues that he swears, if David does not go out and speak to his men and women at the gate, ‘there will not tarry one with you this night’. David acquiesces, and also sends word to Zadok and Hushai asking them to speak with the elders of Judah, so that the united tribes may invite David to be king again. The men of Judah concur, and ask him to return; he goes to Jordan, and Gilgal, where the men of Judah meet him, and carry him across the river. There the man who threw insults at David in the wilderness, Shimei, meets him, and asks for the forgiveness of the king, asking for that which he said ‘perversely that day’ not be ‘taken to heart’. Abishai the ‘son of Zeruiah’ again asks to kill this man who ‘cursed the Lord’s anointed’, and again David denies him, asking him why he should be a ‘satan’ to him – as no man is to be put to death on the day he is crowned king over Israel. David swears to Shimei ‘Thou shalt not die’. (A vow he later ‘breaks’ by dint of instructions he gives to Solomon to be completed after his death…) Next, he confronts Mephibosheth the son of Saul, asking him why he didn’t travel out of Jerusalem with David and his men. Mephibosheth tells him that he did send his servant Ziba with supplies, as occurred, but that Ziba slandered him with his lies, as he had intended to ride out on the ass because he was lame, but was dissuaded by Ziba. David answers it matters not, and that as he told Ziba, his land is to be divided between the two… Lastly, the men of Judah conduct the king into Gilgal on his day of being (re)crowned king of Israel and Judah; while the men of Israel take umbrage at this. They explain David is of their kin, and furthermore, they have taken no gift from David, etcetera. The men of Israel answer ‘we have ten parts in the king, and we also have more right in David than ye’… ending the day with shadows of conflict between Israel and Judah, this division being how the nation splits apart after the death of Solomon…

Chapter 20 – this factor immediately occurs when a man named Sheba, a ‘son of Belial’, (ie ‘Satan’) calls Israel to rebel against the renewed king David, basing his rebellion upon the claim that ‘We have no share in David, nor an inheritance in the son of Jesse’, thus undermining David’s lineage, and claim to kingship of a united Israel. He calls ‘every man to his tents’, ie to set out upon a path of rebellion against the established sovereignty of king David. Sheba succeeds in drawing Israel away from supporting David, indicating their argument with the men of Judah was more about their own glory, rather than David’s. David begins in Jerusalem by firstly putting away the ten concubines who kept his house into seclusion, so that they are shut away as in widowhood until the end of their lives, as tainted by Absalom’s actions. He asks Amasa, the former general of Absalom to marshal some forces from the men of Judah, and return within three days. He takes longer than this, however, causing David to doubt his loyalty. David then sends his royal guard to pursue Sheba, as being a greater danger than Absalom, ‘lest he find for himself fortified cities’, putting Abishai in overall charge of his men, with his brother (and ‘son of Zeruiah’) Joab as ‘captain of the mighty men’. When the forces reach Gibeon (meaning ‘mighty’, as the Nephilim were ‘gibborim’ or ‘mighty men’), Amasa and his men meet them there. Joab steps into the road to greet him, ‘taking him by the beard to kiss him’, and then stabs him with his sword, killing him… they move to go and pursue Sheba, but everyone stands still, being shocked and amazed by the killing. Joab drags Amasa’s body out of the road, putting him in the field beside it, after which they travel on. Sheba runs to all the towns of Israel seeking a base, until reaching beth-Maacah. Joab’s forces go to besiege the town, so a ‘wise-woman’ comes to the gateway, where she asks them why they would destroy their kinfolk and town, and ‘swallow up the inheritance of Israel’. Joab says he has no wish to destroy the town, only to find Sheba; the woman goes back inside, and soon after Sheba’s head is thrown over the wall, thus ending the rebellion.

Further strange and incredible events occur between the end of this chapter and the end of David’s reign and life at 2Sam24, such as battles whereby several ‘sons of the giants’ of the Philistines are killed in battle (in 2Samuel21), David sings an incredible and lyrical song of the Lord’s deliverance of him from out of the hand of Saul, and other dangers…(2Sam22). The next chapter, 2Sam23, is of ‘the last words of David’ and again form a song or poem which recounts the blessings of YHVH during the events of his life. Chapter24 is of great significance, in its relating of the events whereby because the ‘anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel’, YHVH asks David to ‘number all the tribes of Israel and Judah’. David tells Joab to do this, at which he resists, saying ‘why doth my lord the king delight in this thing?’. Joab and his men compile a record of the numbers of each tribe, as requested, whereupon ‘David’s heart smote him after that he had numbered the people… And David said unto the Lord, I have sinned greatly in that I have done…’ YHVH offers David three choices as penance for his sin; seven years of famine; or three months of being pursued by his enemies; or three days pestilence in the land. David chooses the latter, during which 70,000 people die, at the hands of an angel of the Lord, after which YHVH ‘repents him of the evil’ and orders the angel to stop ! David is instructed by YHVH to buy a ‘threshing floor’ of a Jebusite to build an altar to the Lord, which he does, and thus ending the punishment of YHVH and the plague. What this all means, why or how this relates to YHVH’s ‘anger with Israel’, and the instruction to number of the peoples, followed by the anger and punishment, is unexplained, by any biblical authorities.
And chapter 25deals with the last months of David’s life, particularly relevant in the actions of David, which reveal a character quite clearly different to that of the youth who was introduced at 1Samuel16.18;
Go in unto thy father’s concubines

And secondly of interest in terms of how the succession of his favoured son Solomon is depicted, in terms of the manoeuvrings of both his relatives, advisors, courtiers, and so forth, all of which appear to support YHVH’s words to the Israelites when they first asked for a king, when ruled by prophets and judges…

2SAMUEL 13/14:

Concerning the questions arising from the relatives of King David, his son Absalom having killed Amnon and fled to Talmai (2Sam13.37), having started a coup against his father (2Samuel 15) had pursued the forces of David to battle at a woods in Ephraim riding a mule; “from where the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth” (2Samuel 18.9) – symbolic of the hybrid bloodlines again, quite probably. . . and his fate in this ‘world tree’, the oak, is to be speared by the cousin of David, the violent captain of his men, Joab (one of the three ‘sons of Zeruiah’, (with meanings related to; ‘neck’, ‘confine or bind’, ‘sharp’, ‘cleave’ or ‘cleft’ in Syriac and Chaldean, or ‘rock’ – and so on. Much as Simon, called ‘satan’ by Jesus, is named by him Cephas, ‘rock’, and shown to be rash and violent, divided within himself, and capable of cruelty).

And to return to examining the effects of the potentially ‘celestial genes’ contained within the family of David at the court in Jerusalem, the children of Maacah and David certainly had problems; her daughter was Tamar, who we have already met in her (unfortunate) role as symbol of the ‘dark’ bloodlines…as well as victim of Amnon’s rape.

The name Maacah, (the daughter of Talmai, the mother of Tamar and likewise of Absalom) means; ‘oppression’, or pressure. The woman Maacah is also said to be the mother of Hanan, a ‘mighty’ man of Israel – relating to the Nephilim ‘mighty men of old’ description, as seen many times (1Chron.11.43). Additionally we have seen that the country or town of Maacah was ruled by Og, one of the last rulers of the giant Rephaim in Canaan… (Joshua12.5) linking to the Nephilim bloodlines again, as well as semantically by the meaning ‘oppression’, or ‘pressure’ …

Of course, it can be said that Absalom’s rebellion/ coup attempt stemmed from the rape of his sister Tamar by David’s first-born son Amnon, who was born to his first wife; for king David did nothing to redeem the honour of Tamar, or to punish Amnon – he was just told to leave the capital for a year or two, thus breeding lingering discontent in Maacah and her children.
Yet another indication of the sense in the Bible of the women of the ‘dark bloodlines’ being used for their reproductive powers comes from the name of David’s first wife; for Ahinoam as she was called was also the name of the first king of Israel’s wife – Saul’s wife, Ahinoam daughter of Ahimaaz (1Sam.14). There is no stated link between the two, and yet they are often considered to be the same woman. So David deposed/ succeeded Saul, and his first wife may have been Saul’s widow. The subtextual message being that bloodline women were kept for purposes of ensuring genetic ‘purity’ within the bloodlines as they evolved over time. (And as we have just seen, Ahiman was the name of one of the three sons of Anak (Numbers 13.22/33), and one of the gate-keepers along with Shallum, Talmai, and Akkub) (1Chronicles 9.17), and the son of Zadok at 2Samuel15.27, entrusted with care of the Ark of the Covenant. Certainly possibly a case of a popular name, or alternatively, an ‘keyword’/ indicator of significant lineages. . .

2SAMUEL 15:

Two verses after Shimei’s actions, plotters discuss plans for the coup centred on David’s son Absalom (so that from 2Samuel 15.10-14 onwards Absalom is building a power-base within both Jerusalem, and Hebron, causing David to flee Jerusalem (15.14-37). Absalom takes advice of the foremost counsellors of Israel; Ahithophel and Hushai. Ahithophel counsels that David’s flight from Jerusalem (2Samuel 16.21-17.4) may enable him to –

Go in unto thy father’s concubines, which he hath left to keep the house; and all Israel shall hear that thou art abhorred of thy father; then shall the hands of all that are with thee be strong.
So they spread Absalom a tent upon the top of the house; and Absalom went in unto his father’s concubines in the sight of all Israel.

And the counsel of Ahithophel. . .was as if a man
had inquired at the oracle of God: so was all the counsel of Ahithophel both with David and with Absalom.

Moreover, Ahithophel said unto Absalom, Let me now choose out twelve thousand men, and I will arise and pursue after David this night;
And I will come upon him while he is weary and weak-handed, and will make him afraid: and all the people that are with him shall flee; and I will smite the king only. And the saying pleased Absalom well, and all the elders of Israel.

But regarding the pursuit his father and his men, Absalom chooses the advice of Hushai the Archite, who counsels a gathering of all the warriors of the tribes before challenging David and his forces. (17.7-14). At which (inexplicably) Ahithophel returns to his home, and hangs himself. . .

This has close parallels with the actions and personality of Judas in the New Testament; in the betrayal of David by one of his closest counsellors, for no discernible reason except further influence, or money – or as a survival strategy. A narrative highlighting the political world of the sovereign’s court; the intrigue and fast changing alliances in the centres of power of the state.
The term ‘ophel’ is highly significant in the Old Testament narrative of the establishment and building of the Hebrew capital Jerusalem. Indeed, it was Solomon himself who extended the small area (re)captured by David from the Jebusites – the ‘city of David’ on mount Zion – northwards to the area called thereafter Ophel, (itself just south of Mount Moriah, the sacred hill-top where the Jerusalem Temple and later Temple Mount edifices were built).
While in Hebrew ‘ophel’ has no fully determined meaning, but can mean ‘swelling’, or ‘fortified place’, from Greek comes the meaning for ‘ophel’ or ‘ophis’ of serpent, a widely used stem, so that rock formations serpentine in nature are called ‘ophiolites’. In Hebrew texts mount Moriah was considered to have a pillar of fire reaching from heaven to earth; potentially therefore signifying a central site at which the various ‘serpent’ energy paths of the world (carrying solar and cosmic energies) converge. Much as the angels in Gideon and in the story of Samson strike a rock (besides an oak-tree) and send a pillar of fire skywards. And much as the Sphinx, the ‘lion of the ground’ looks eastwards along the 30th Parallel North, towards the rising sun. For the term was originally used as an epithet for the serpent which steals the Plant of Life from Gilgamesh; which he obtained from the Ab-zu, the ‘abyss’; the underground depths or waters which are the source of all life, thus linking the epithet to geodetic ‘serpent-lines’. The man Ahithophel is incidentally the grandfather of David’s wife Bathsheba, from whose marriage Solomon is the result. Likewise the grand-daughter of Maacah becomes the wife of Solomon’s son Rehoboam, linked as we have seen to the city of Rehoboth-Ir in Assyria, built by (the Nephilim) Nimrod (Gen10.11); and character Rahab who is both a ‘wise-woman’, and whose name is also used (inexplicably) as a name for the ‘sea-serpent’ of the ‘depths’ within the Bible, known as the ‘tanniyn’, the ‘destroyer’ (Isaiah 30.7/51.9, Job9.13/26.12). So the associations are extensive and categorical…

And further support comes from the book of Nehemiah (an alternative name for Ezra, according to some authorities). In Nehemiah2.13 the returning prophet writes that he visits one night the ‘dragon’s well’ besides the gate of Jerusalem. The word used for this well, never mentioned by any other book of the Bible, is that for the ‘serpent’/’destroyer’, the ‘tanniyn’. Some biblical encyclopaedias, such as Easton’s BD, have suggested the well was the Pool of Gihon. And coincidentally, this pool was situated directly besides the eastern wall of Ophel in the old city of Jerusalem. (see left; map of ancient Jerusalem during David’s reign c.970Bce, from Biblestudy.org). Indeed Nehemiah2.13 states it was by ‘the gate of the valley’, pointing to its location besides the Kidron valley as shown.

That Ezra/ Nehemiah is concerned completely with the return of the Israelites from Babylon after the seventy years of the Captivity, and their introduction of Sumerian genetics into the bloodlines of Israel through marriage and children, is of some relevance too, as shall be looked at in some detail shortly. For from Enki onwards, some of the deities of Sumer were depicted as serpent or fish/ human hybrids; similarly these ’celestial genetics’ were stated to be the source of the ‘line of Cain’ in Hebrew religion, and the Nephilim too… as the ‘semi-divine’ Gilgamesh embodied, they were genetics which created humans who were heroic, wise, and yet imbalanced and potentially cruel. Something each recipient of which had to cope with according to their spirit. Lastly on the subject, the well or pool may be viewed in allegory as a symbol of precisely that, a gene pool, or lineage; much as the ‘vine of grapes’ metaphor does. Some references the rebellious, or ‘wicked’ in the Bible may be interpreted in this way. For example, in one of Moses’ last speeches to the Israelites, at Deuteronomy 32.32-33; “For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter. Their wine is the poison of dragons (‘tanniym’), and the cruel venom of asps”…

From the works of William Shakespeare, in the tragedy Hamlet the character of Ophelia gains enhanced meanings from the Greek stem, placing her at the centre of the Court and the ‘royal bloodlines’ narrative… her inner conflict (of the powerful but unbalanced solar and celestial genetics), present within so many of the characters in the Bible, overwhelms her before she is able to make progress.

2SAMUEL16:

In one of the most interesting passages of the life of David (among many), the following events occur; when King David is threatened with being ‘usurped’ by a faction led by his own son, Absalom, indeed appears defeated, he and his men/ band of soldiers pass through a valley, out in the hills and mountains, in a place of little shelter or comfort; a man they pass by (Shimei – ‘he who hears’) recognises them as the men who ‘killed’ (replaced as king) his blood-relative, Saul.
2Samuel 16.5-13;

“And when David came to Bahurim, behold, thence came out a man of the house of Saul, whose name was Shimei…; he came forth, and cursed still as he came.
And he cast stones at David and at all the servants of King David; and all the mighty men were on his right hand and on his left.
And thus said Shimei when he cursed, Come out, come out, thou bloody man, and thou man of Belial. (Satan) The LORD hath returned upon thee all the blood of the house of Saul, in whose stead thou hast reigned; and the LORD hath delivered the kingdom into the hand of Absalom thy son; and behold, thou art taken in thy mischief, because thou art a bloody man,
Then said Abishai the son of Zeruiah unto the king, Why should this dead dog curse my lord the king? let me go over, I pray thee, and take off his head.
And the king said, What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah? So let him curse, because the LORD hath said unto him, Curse David. Who shall then say, Wherefore hast thou done so? …let him alone, and let him curse; for the LORD hath bidden him.

It may be that the LORD will look on mine affliction, and that the LORD will requite me good for his cursing this day.

And as David and his men went by the way, Shimei went along on the hill’s side over against him, and cursed as he went, and cast stones at him, and cast dust”.

---

This is a strange and telling passage ! And one which raises two immediate points; as well as the number of semantic clues relating David to aspects of the negative lines – the use of the name Belial (Satan), the casting of stones, dust, curses, etc – what precisely is the affliction David refers to? the situation of being challenged by his son Absalom; or in his day of humiliation, forced out of Jerusalem to the middle of nowhere, where he is insulted by a small, ‘powerless’ man, in front of his men – or the affliction of the ‘curse’ of his kingly bloodline, rather like the emotion of Lamech, of despair at the imbalances of the bloodlines of the Nephilim/Cain etc..? (Hence Lamech’s comment regarding the culpability of his bloodline; ‘for if Cain shall be avenged (punished) sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold’ (Gen4.24) – possibly also meaning forgiveness will take a longer time too). And it is the same with Moses, with his wife saying to him the same thing, “thou art a bloody man”; a defining characteristic of the ‘dark’ bloodlines equable to Cain. (Exodus4.25)
From this question, we find that the Hebrew stem of David – dawa – means to be ill! Specifically to do with the ‘having the flows’ ie of inner ‘fluids’; but also possibly indicating the ‘lineage’ (or ‘stream’) of the ‘seed’ of the ‘gods’, in this way providing signposts of the inner nature of David’s bloodline. (as the Sumerian Creation myth of ‘Enki and Ninkhursag; the Creation of Dilmun’ states; “upon Ninhursag he caused to flow the ‘water of the heart’, She received the ‘water of the heart’, the water of Enki ”. The name Moses meaning ‘from the waters he was drawn’ (actually stated as such by the biblical text, at Exodus 2.10) resonates in this way to the epithets applied to Enki/Ea in Sumer and following civilizations, the ‘Lord of the Waters’ /Ab-zu or ‘Deeps’).

This ‘affliction’ may thus be why Noah is so named, meaning ‘respite’ – argued by some to be from the oppressions of the Nephilim and their offspring – or possibly from the punishments of YHVH on mankind – or potentially perhaps meaning ‘respite’ from the weight of the affliction of being in the bloodline of the ‘(sons of) gods’, ie. as a recipient of God’s mercy as well as ‘punishment’. . . hence the whole narrative of the events surrounding the birth of Noah depicted in the books of Noah, Jubilees, Enoch and so on, greatly significant texts in the non-canonical scriptures of antiquity. Namely in their providing support to the ‘conundrum’ that Noah is a ‘son of the Watchers’ ie a celestial/human hybrid, as evidenced by the nature of his skin, eyes, hair, chest, and so forth, who is one of the few humans allowed to survive the Flood – a cataclysm created because of the growth of the aberrant Nephilim’s control over mankind….
So, indeed the night the two heavenly beings come to take Enoch (the great-grandfather of Noah, in the line Enoch – Methuselah – Lamech – Noah) up through the heavens to receive God’s blessings, he describes in the first-person account the events preceding the celestial visit. (The Book of the Secrets of Enoch, translated from Slavonic versions of Enoch by Rutherford H.Platt, 1928);

“I was alone in the house. I was in great trouble, weeping with my eyes, and was resting, and fell asleep on my couch. And there appeared to me two men, exceedingly tall, such as I have never seen on Earth. Their faces shone like the Sun, their eyes were like a burning light, and fire was coming out of their mouths…their arms were like golden wings. They stood at the head of my couch, and called me by my name.”

No reason is given for his emotional state, this being left to the reader’s discernment. And secondly, the description of the celestial beings closely matches the known characteristics of the Seraphim, as described in the various books of the Bible and apocrypha such as Noah, Jubilees, and so on – not just ‘beings of light’, but of ‘fire’ too, who are concerned with punishing the guilty, such as the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Further to this, it is a possibility that the Seraphim (perhaps like the ‘cruel’ Nagas) are concerned with applying divine punishments in order to ultimately enable the forgiveness of those who have erred upon their paths – this may be an explanation for the phrase ‘the left-hand choirs of the heavenly host’ – a view conceptually more akin really to the understandings of Buddhist, and eastern philosophies, than of western Christianity. So this entire narrative, which runs deeply contradictory to instinctive beliefs, may well prove to be a fertile area of research within the Bible and related subjects; and may be a clue that the Bible – being the work of genuine ‘cosmic consciousness’ – is more complex than common-sense dictates.

2SAMUEL 17:

Incidentally, after Absalom takes the advice of Hushai, the elder then hurries to speak with Zadok, the priest of Israel (at 2Samuel 17.14-16) – in order that he might “send therefore quickly, and tell David, saying, Lodge not this night in the plains of the wilderness, but speedily pass over; lest the king be swallowed up, and all the people that are with him”. (Raising the image of Korah, the cousin of Moses who at Numbers ch.16.31-32 was ‘swallowed up into the earth’ for his rebellion against the leadership of Moses and Aaron; and continuing the theme of separating the things of the earth from those of heaven).
Zadok sends Ahimaaz (his son) and Jonathon (son of Abiathar) to warn David; they are forced to hide (with a village woman’s help) in the well at Bahurim, surviving in the process. (2Samuel 17.18) – further emphasizing the positive symbolic aspects of wells and water used throughout the Bible. In contrast perhaps, the son of Ahitophel becomes one of the ‘mighty men’ of David (2Sam23.34), the same formulation used for the Nephilim in Genesis 6.4…

The next chapter, 2Samuel 17, depicts the further course of the coup attempt, and support for the plotters and for David. At 2Samuel 17.28 Shobi, the son of Nahash, (meaning; to turn/ transition point! shabat; rest/ shebiya; captive) of Rabbah of the children of Ammon, (and another man) bring;

. . .wheat and barley, and flour, and parched corn and beans, and
lentils and parched pulse. And honey, and butter, and sheep, and
cheese of kine, for David, and for the people that were with him,
to eat: for they said, The people is hungry, and weary, and thirsty,
in the wilderness.

There is a certain anomalous message contained within this narrative, in that it comes only a few chapters after the mentioned defeat of Rabah and the Ammonites by Joab, David and the army of the Israelites, after which David executed a great many of not just the leaders, but the ordinary tribespeople, by ‘putting them under the saw, the harrow, axes of iron, and through the brick-kiln’… (2Sam12.31). Perhaps, considering the dualistic characters of both Nahash, and his son Hanun, as well as the Ammonites in general, the name of Shobi is meant to indicate his turning from a lower to a higher moral ground as signified by his helping and being associated with the Israelites, and the people close to king David…while also indicating the long-term links which are shown to have existed between David, and Nahash, the king of the Ammonites, from an unspecified time or place.

It is apposite, or of interest, that the name also is interpreted by several biblical dictionaries etc, to mean ‘captive’, from the word ‘shaba’, supporting the metaphorical theme (as applied to those born into the lineages under consideration) within the Bible. And this point finds support in that the only other character named Shobai within the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament is the ancestor of a group of gate-keeping Levites who return from the Babylonian exile together with Zerubbabel (meaning ‘Seed of Babylon’!), at Ezra2.42/ Nehemiah7.43… indeed, these are ; “The children of the porters; the children of Shallum, the children of Ater, the children of Talmon, the children of Akkub, the children of Hatita, the children of Shobai”….the very names already assessed as being related in allegorical manner to the ‘sons of the giants’/ ‘children of Anak’ referred to in Numbers13.22/33.

2SAMUEL 18:

And the next chapter is the battle in the coup attempt, in the fields and woods around Ephraim (18.6), where Absalom meets his fate, at 2Samuel 18.9;

And Absalom met the servants of David. And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth; and the mule that was under him was taken away.

The captain of David’s forces, Joab the son of Zeruiah is told of Absalom’s position; the messenger is reluctant to kill or harm the son of King David, obeying David’s orders to his men in this. Joab has no such fears, and taking 3 darts (javelins) thrusts them through Absalom as he hangs in the boughs of the tree. David receives the news back in Jerusalem, although is not told the details of his son’s death, causing him to weep and exclaim of the son who attempted to kill him; “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom. Would God I had died for thee, O Absalom my son, my son” (2Samuel 18.18).

After this the coup is over, and David rides through Israel and Judah to see the people and tribes and restore the unity of the nation.

When Absalom rides into the woods of Ephraim and into the branches of an oak tree where his head/neck is caught he then hangs, caught helplessly – in metaphor of his blood-line potentially. It bears relevance he is caught in a oak tree, as this is a symbol of the cosmic world-tree, the heaven/earth axis, within antiquity, and within the Old Testament; rather as the Norse ‘deity’ Odin was caught in the branches of the world-tree Yggdrasil, the axis mundi for nine days in a spiritual test of his being. (see Etymology pages for more on Oak/Ox/Axis/Octave/Oss, all with meanings of strength or foundation, stemming from Proto-Indian-European roots, and possibly elsewhere).

(below) the testing of Odin on the world-tree Yggdrasil, (akin to druidic rites of passage) by Lorenz Frolich,1895 (wikimedia/ PD). The druids viewed the oak tree with great reverence, for unknown reasons.

Absalom dies in the tree, after a period, when he is speared to death by David’s cousin and captain of soldiers, Joab, as noted. Rabbinic literature makes clear the sense of tainted blood(line), in the advice of Hushai the Archite, David’s servant’, who counsels him in his grief that the fate of the son was sealed before birth, when David married the mother, Maacah¹, a captive – a disobedient and rebellious son being the inevitable outcome of such a union..! This is because she was a non-Jewish woman who was a captive from a war Judah under David’s early rule had with neighbouring Geshur, or was given by her royal father Talmai* to David as a ‘diplomatic’ gesture or policy … (*to whom Absalom fled when he killed Amnon in revenge for the rape; 2Sam.13.37-8.

The significance of this comes from the fact that a Talmai is named as one of the three sons of the gargantuan Anak in Numbers 13.22/33, the three sons of Anak being Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai. For in another possible ‘encoding’ of hidden narratives/meaning, is the following list; in 1Chronicles 9.17 is a very long section of names and lineages of sons etcetera of those who returned to Israel and Jerusalem from the Babylonian Captivity, when the elite were carried away to Babylon for seventy years following the sack of Jerusalem. The text states that the ‘first inhabitants that dwelt in their possessions in their cities, were the Israelites, the priests, Levites“, (1Chr 9.2). A Levite gatekeeper, a religious functionary therefore concerned with overseeing the Temple’s day-to-day activities, is stated to be Ahiman; with him are named three relatives; Akkub, Shallum and Talmon); 1Chronicles 9.17;

“(Of the Levites)… the porters were, Shallum, and Akkub, and Talmon, and Ahiman, and their brethren. Shallum was the chief; Who hitherto waited in the king’s gate eastward; they were the porters in the companies of the children of Levi. And Shallum the son of Kore . . . of the house of his father, the Korahites, were over the work of the service, keepers of the gates of the tabernacle; and their fathers, being over the host of the Lord, were keepers of the entry”.

Thus indicating metaphoric or otherwise links between the two sets of names, a narrative device already noted to be a strongly possible form of ‘encoding’ within the texts of the Bible, and indicative of the stated associations these names hold to either Nephilim or the ‘celestial’ lineages of Sumer; lineages stated to have existed from the earliest of times before the Flood, within the Sumerian roots of the Hebrews in the first generations after Noah, and in the mixed, or hybrid lineages shown to have returned to Israel at the end of the Babylonian Captivity…

1Chronicles 9.31-2 mentions the first-born of Shallum, Matthithiah who oversaw the ‘shewbread’ in the temple; and other Levite religious functionaries; then 1Chron9.35 states; “And in Gibeon dwelt the father of Gibeon, Jehiel, whose wife’s name was Maacah; And his firstborn son Abdon, then Zur, and Kish, and Baal, and Ner, and Nadab”, and so on. This is a list of virtually all names associated with the Philistines, the Rephaim, the Nephilim, and Sumer before then; and as we have seen repeatedly, Gibeah the home of the Gibeonites means hill (from mighty, or high or tall) linking to all the pagan hilltop sites , and the ‘giants’ of Canaan – as well as the Cedars of Lebanon in similar sense) – confirming the connection to them in Genesis 6.1-4.
Finally Abdon is a close match to the name in the Book of Revelation 9.11 of Abaddon; the ‘angel of the bottomless pit’, mentioning also the Greek version Apollyon (Apollo), meaning in essence, ‘destroyer’. Abdon meanwhile means ‘one who works’, either as a slave or as a hired worker etc, according to Abarim.com, stemming from the Hebrew root ‘abad’/‘ebed’, ‘to serve‘ or ‘ work’. And yet the stem ‘abad’ also is used (as in Abaddon) to indicate to die, or disintegrate; (a certain duality of the same stem, with a differing last Hebrew letter). But either way the name holds connotations of servitude, and sacrifice of the self’s needs, as signified by the ‘forced’ or ‘conscripted’ labour of the Israelites and Phoenicians needed to build the Temple of Solomon (1Kings4.6/9.22).

Incidentally, regarding Zadok the priest who sends his son Ahimaaz, and Jonathon with provisions to help David during the rebellion against him, has some kind of lineage links to these figures. Likewise of the Levite tribe, Zadok was the son of Ahitub, and the father of Ahimaaz. (1Chron6.8). Two verses, and several generations later, an Ahitub has a son Zadok, who has a son Shallum; whose great-great-grandson was taken into captivity to Babylon (1Chron6.11-15). But it is curious how the names of the three sons of Akkub, or Anak are Ahiman, Shallum and Talmai more than once. So while these lists are incredibly complicated and confusing, some possibility exists the lineage of the high-priest Zadok is shown to be related to that of the bloodlines which (later) came back from the Babylon Captivity infused with the celestial genetics. And while the Captivity was in 598Bce, the lineages of the ‘sons of the gods’, or the ‘mighty men’ of Babylon such as Nimrod (great-grandson of Noah) existed directly after the Deluge; so Zadok, like David and Solomon, may be shown himself, through this narrative, to be related to them in some way prior to the Babylonian Capture – and yet as the Bible states, he is one of the most virtuous men in Israel in God’s eyes, who had the Ark of the Covenant placed in his protection by David during the rebellion. His steadfastness is shown likewise by his sending his son Ahimaaz with Jonathon to warn David of events at court in Jerusalem (2Samuel17.18); moreover, he was one of the ancestors of Jesus Christ himself, according to the genealogy of Matthew (Mt1.14). So this is either a more positive bloodline of the ‘gods of Sumer’, or the virtue of some characters, such as Enoch, Moses, Abraham, Zadok and David, was strong enough to enable them to benefit from the bloodlines’ strengths, while rising above their weaknesses. Possibly similar to the narrative to Simon Peter, as the essay on him examines later in this section.

And yet in the Book of Ezra, a central book in its description of how the ‘celestial bloodlines’ of Sumer and Babylon infused the existing nation of Israel, through the widespread taking of foreign, or ‘strange’ wives by Hebrew men while in the Babylon Captivity, the following list is mentioned (and repeated in Nehemiah7.6/45, Nehemiah being reckoned to be a second name for Ezra in some rabbinical texts of Judaism, according to Louis Ginzburg’s Legends of the Jews, 1909).
Ezra 2.1; Now these are the children of the province that went up out of the captivity, of those which had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away unto Babylon, and came again unto Jerusalem and Judah, every one unto his city; . . .
Ezra 2.42; The children of the porters; the children of Shallum, the children of Ater, the children of Talmon, the children of Akkub, the children of Hatita . . . in all an hundred and thirty nine.

As Ezra 2.62 states, of those children of the priests who were born to a foreign mother; These sought their register among those that were reckoned by genealogy, but they were not found; therefore were they, as polluted, put from the priesthood.

It is more than coincidental, it would appear, that a man called Nebo is named at Ezra2.29/ Neh7.33 as one of the returning captives. For the stem N-B was derived from the Sumerian/ Akkadian name for the planet Nibru, and the Babylonian deity Nabu, (as mentioned at Isaiah46.1 as Nebo) – the text states he was a man who had fifty two descendants who returned with Zerubbabel from Babylon, of whom seven put away their foreign (‘strange’) wives (Ezra10.43). Mount Nebo, the mountain on which Moses is taken to look over Israel just before he dies (Deut34.5-6) likewise is said to be by the ‘field of Zophim’ at Numbers23.14, which again in its meaning of ‘Watchers’ gives reference to the Sumerian lineages originating with the Anuna deities and/or the Nephilim. And indeed, this significance is highlighted by the name of Zerubbabel, the leader of the second great wave of returnees from the Babylonian captivity (Ezra2.2), meaning as it does simply ‘the seed of Babylon’…

Having noted the relevance of the ‘dark bloodlines’ to the numbers 7, 77, and 777 etc, as well as the reference to symbols (such as the date-palm) of the same lineages in the Song of Solomon 7.7, (and its links to women named Tamar who represent the ‘dark’ lines of the ‘unknowable gods’), thus pointing to the possible nature of the female narrator of this mysterious and poetic book, the only mention of the people known as ‘Shulamites’ is in the Song, at 6.13, the last verse before chapter 7. In the voice of the male protagonist it refers to the female narrator as follows;

Return, return, O Shulamite; return, return, that we may
look upon thee. What will ye see in the Shulamite?
As it were the company of two armies.

What does this mean? It may be inferred to be a reference to the returning peoples of Israel from Babylon, many of who were now of the ‘strangers’ celestial or hybrid bloodline. Quite frankly an incredible connection to be found within the Song of Solomon, and one which may relate to the female character Tamar, whose appearance (two different characters) are to do with preserving the ‘seed of the celestial lineages’, with the name stemming from the tamarind date-palm, a symbol within Sumer of fertility, and the ‘darkness’, or the ‘depths’ from which celestial wisdom came). Tamar may also relate to tehom in Genesis1.2, where it is precisely used to indicate the (feminine) ‘depths’ from which the universe was created, as such the ‘matrix’ of the observable universe. And which was a reflection, as such, of the Sumerian/ Babylonian goddess Tiamat, representative of the primal forces of the ‘depths’, or ‘abyss’…creative, but also chaotic and destructive in potential.
And another possibility arises here – as the Hebrew tribes stemmed from Abraham, the patriarchal father of the Israelites and ‘many nations of the world’, and Abraham and his lineage were from Ur of the Chaldees (ancient Sumer) from the nine generations between him and Noah’s son Shem (meaning ‘Sumer’), then the Shulamite (like all the Hebrews in the Babylonian Captivity) may be said to returning to their original ‘homeland’ in this way – especially significant if, as is also suggested, the bloodlines of the Sumerians contained something unique; the genes of the gods, the Anunnaki…

Indeed, one of the only references to the name Shullam in the Near Eastern mythology of the first millennium Bce comes from; Sumer, where the Anunnaki celestial tribe had two minor deities, named Shullat and Hanish; these were believed to be basically attendants of the storm-god Adad, as well as being closely associated with military events! An omen text portrays them marching alongside troops… (cited by Schwemer, 2001), indeed some scholars such as I.Gelb assess their names were derived from the Akkadian sullatum despoil, and hanisum submission… this could hardly be a better description of the nature of the lineages of ‘Cain’ or ‘Nephilim’ as they spread through the world as described in Genesis 6.1-4; and as their lineages survived the Deluge as shown thereafter in the Bible. And as Son6.10 states of the Shulamite; “Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?”.
The first point is that some instances of pairs of characters being usually referred to or portrayed together in antiquity served the purpose of indicating they were lesser beings or humans, rather than deities, not possessing the ‘singularity’, or unity of the ‘gods’. The basic change from monad to dyad is likewise indicative of division, applicable in many different ways… Secondly, as an example of the compromised ‘celestial’ nature of the peoples punished by YHVH, are those listed in 1Kings 11.1; ”But king Solomon loved many strange women, together with the daughter of Pharaoh, women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites”; all warlike peoples and nations, while the Edomites were the ancestral tribe of the Idumeans, the tribe of the extensive bloodline of Herod. The Zidonians, like the place Sidon, are named after those who are ‘hunters’, or ‘fishers’; as the Nephilim were described, and as Nimrod was a ‘great hunter before the Lord’ in Babel. And the word ‘stranger’ is used as a code for the bloodlines by Simon Peter in particular (the ‘fisher of men’), and by Moses also, as we shall see later on…

Another verse from the Song of Solomon bears relevance here, in Son8.11-2 ;
“Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-Hamon; he let out the vineyard unto keepers; every one for the fruit thereof was to bring a thousand pieces of silver. My vineyard, which is mine, is before me; thou, O Solomon, must have a thousand, and those that keep the fruit thereof two hundred”.

The reference to Solomon holds similarities to the number of ‘strange wives’ he took from other (‘pagan’) regions and religions, as quoted at 1Kings11.3;
“And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines; and his wives turned away his heart”.

There are resonances from this, meanwhile, to the Book of Enoch, in its description of the two hundred ‘Nephilim’ (‘fallen ones’)/ ‘sons of the gods’ who descended to earth to mate with human women, thus creating the races of ‘giants’, and Rephaim/ line of Cain, etc in the Old Testament. This is described in 1Enoch (Laurence version, 1883), chapter VII;
“After the sons of men had multiplied in those days, that daughters were born to them, elegant and beautiful. And when, the angels, the sons of heaven beheld them, they became enamoured of them…Then their leader Semjaza said to them; I fear that you may perhaps be indisposed to the performance of this enterprise: and that I alone shall suffer for such a crime. But they answered him and said; We all swear; And bind ourselves by mutual execrations…Their whole number was two hundred, who descended upon Ardis, which is the top of mount Armon. That mountain was therefore called Armon, because they had sworn upon it, and bound themselves by mutual execrations” (chapter vii, vs 1-8).

In other words, the Song of Solomon, as implied by 8.11-12, the Shulamite name and other metaphors etc, appears to be closely concerned with the celestial lineages which were part of the Near Eastern and Hebrew hereditary and experience, throughout antiquity.

And indeed, to return to Shullat and Hanish, in more clear-cut associations, the Canaanite god (Ba’al-) Hadad had two weapons of war, called ‘Driver’ and ‘Chaser’; these in turn (!) may well have been derived from the two ‘heralds’ of the storm-god Adad who appear in the Epic of Gilgamesh, at a key time ─ the onset of the Flood (Tablet XI, l.99-);

“Shamash had set a stated time:
‘In the morning I will let loaves of bread shower down,
and in the evening a rain of wheat!*
Go inside the boat, seal the entry!’

The stated time had arrived. . .

I watched the appearance of the weather–
the weather was frightful to behold!
Just as dawn began to glow
there arose from the horizon a black cloud
Adad rumbled inside of it
before him went Shullat and Hanish,
heralds going over mountain and land.

The Anunnaki lifted up the torches,
setting the land ablaze with their flare,
Stunned shock over Adad’s deeds overtook the heavens,
and turned to blackness all that had been light.
The . . . land shattered like a. . .pot
All day long the South Wind blew. . .
blowing fast, submerging the mountain in water,
overwhelming the people like an attack.

*(on a side-note, meaning perhaps divine consciousness/’manna’, as the Deluge symbolizes a flood of the chaotic life-giving ‘waters’ issuing from ‘omphalos’ points/ higher-dimensional gateways across the region and world? – as we see in the Sumer section, bread plays an important metaphorical role in Utnapishtim’s ‘testing’ of Gilgamesh in the last Tablet, and likewise in an even more incredible number of events throughout the course of the Bible. So as the flood of the ‘waters’ may well be viewed as containing multiple meanings, the two ‘forces’ of ‘fire’ and ‘water’ were used to symbolize the cosmic energies which power the rational and the subconscious minds respectively throughout antiquity, which needed to be kept in perfect balance for fertility to flourish. In society, a surfeit of the energies of rationality – as represented by the Pharaoh, sovereigns such as the Assyrians/ Babylonians in the Old Testament etc, and perhaps even by figures such as Simon Peter – led to sterile rule-bound reliance on outer forms, and authoritarianism, while of the waters to excessive change, imbalance, dissolution of social structures, and ultimately, anarchy…)

So it is by no means impossible that the reference by the narrator to the name of the Shulamite in the song of Solomon, and to two armies, would have raised such long established, even deep-rooted mythological associations stemming from Sumer… it may actually be interpreted further to this, as a subtle indicator of the ‘conflicted’ aspect of the celestial bloodlines, which increases towards the most unbalanced Nephilim lineages. This inner conflict comes from the inherent dualities of these celestial bloodlines, being both ‘heroic’ and ‘destructive’ – powerful and yet incomplete, and unable to conjoin harmoniously within the individual most often… hence explaining the words of Jesus; “A house divided against itself will not stand” (Matthew 12.25) – indeed, most relevantly, a synonym of ‘divided’ is ‘estranged’ ..!
So it is this inner conflict which king David appears to be referring to, as mentioned, at 2Samuel 3.39;

And I am this day weak, though anointed king. And these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me;
The Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness.

Likewise the fact that his name ‘dawa’ itself means ‘illness’ or such…with particular reference to the ‘inner waters’…what these symbolize is questionable, while it is noteworthy that David says in the Song he sings in 2Samuel22, that “He (YHVH) sent from above, he took me; he drew me out of many waters” (22.17). Relating, as with Moses, to the many associations stemming from Sumerian mythology of the deity Enki/Ea, he ‘who loved the waters’, and was the Lord of the South, or the Apsu. Many texts, for example the creation-myth of ‘Enki and Ninkhursag’ referred to the ‘waters of the heart of Enki’ as being the source of celestial lineages, as well as when his seed is placed in the ground, essential plants within the ’Eden’ of ‘Dilmun’, pointing to the significant genetic role of the deity. It can thus be inferred that David’s name, like that of Moses possibly indicates the ‘lineage’ (or ‘stream’) of the ‘seed’ of the ‘gods’, particularly with relation to Enki/Ea.

In depictions throughout Mesopotamian civilizations, Enki was shown as a deity essentially linked with the (celestial) waters, as a fish/human hybrid (as Oannes, who swam up from the Persia Gulf to give the arts of civilization to mankind), or as a serpent/human hybrid in early Sumerian cylinder-seals. These links are echoed in the nature of Moses, ‘he who was drawn from the waters’, as well as the links the stem ‘m-s-y’ has meaning the ‘son of’ in Egyptian and Hebrew. Putting Moses in the lineages of the gods, as were the pharaohs Thuthmose (‘son of Thoth’), and Ramesses (‘son of Ra’), a narrative supported by his being given a place in the highest echelons of Egypt from birth onwards; as Acts7.22 states, ‘And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians’…

Like the ‘two armies’ of the Shulamite, the concurrent weakness and strength of David on the day he is crowned king of Israel may refer also to the reality by which those of such hybrid nature are condemned to experience a psychic state of continual ‘civil war’… exemplified by the character of such ‘heroes’ as Samson (strongly associated with the dualistic powers of the Sun, as already seen), who ‘rang like a bell, going this way and then that’ as Ginzburg notes rabbinical literature described him; and something the strongest characters, such as Enoch, and Noah, Abraham, Moses, King David, Solomon, St Peter(?) and so on, appear to be able to usually balance, and perhaps to some extent eventually resolve within themselves. (In this may be the difference existing in many of the works of antiquity between ‘destiny’ and ‘fate’; thus in Greek mythology Oedipus was unable to resist the impulses which led to death and disaster, even having been forewarned of them). The weaker aspects of David’s character are shown to be often related to women, for example his pursuit of Bathsheba by killing her husband Uriah (through a devious ruse), or perhaps his frailty at the end of his life which the courtiers treat by having a young woman ‘give her warmth’ to the aging king… other ‘weak’ aspects of David’s personality, such as his mourning the killing of his rebellious son Absalom, to Joab’s disgust, are entirely human, and can be interpreted as such. Many other instances of David’s strength and fearlessness indicate that the weakness he talks about is not an ordinary part of his character.

An excellent piece of supporting evidence for this theory of ‘inner duality’ comes from 2Samuel10, and features the king of the Ammonites, Hanun (very similar in name to Hanish, the partner of Shullat in Gilgamesh). So who is this king? As the first verse of 2Samuel10 states, he is the son of king Nahash, who in 1Samuel11.1 who was offered kingship by the inhabitants of Jabesh-Gilead, but demanded of each inhabitant one of their eyes – for reasons which may be symbolic, as we consider later. We know the two kings are father and son because 2.Sam10.1 states so. The next verse recounts the close link between David, and the ‘tyrannical’ king Nahash; “Then said David, I will shew kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father shewed kindness unto me. And David sent to comfort him by the hand of his servants for his father”.

But Hanun’s advisers and princes convince him that David is sending his servants to the city to ‘spy it out, and to overthrow it”. So Hanun acts as follows; (2Sam10.4) “Wherefore Hanun took David’s servants, and shaved off the one half of their beards, and cut off their garments in the middle, even to their buttocks, and sent them away” – a clearer symbolism regarding the divided self could hardly be found… The next verses, at 2Sam10.6 note the actions of the tribe of Ammon when the servants are returned to David in this state; “And when the children of Ammon saw that they stank before David, (they) sent and hired the Syrians of Beth-rehob, and the Syrians of Zoba,… and of king Maacah a thousand men, and of Ish-tob twelve thousand men”.

As we have already seen, Maacah means ‘oppression’, or ‘pressure’ and is linked to David through his wife Maacah; the name Rehob is one connected to Rahab, who is the tanniyn, the primeval sea-serpent of the depths, or ‘chaos’, mentioned in Isaiah30.7/ 51.9 and Job9.13/ 26.12, as well as being linked to Rehoboam, the only named son of Solomon. Rehoboam himself marries another Maacah, (named after her grandmother in fact, the mother of her father Absalom); 2Chronicles11.20, and does inherit Solomon’s crown, of Israel and Judah, but cannot prevent the division of the twelve tribes… Zoba is believed to be a non-Hebrew word, perhaps with links to Arabic. Abarim.com state that a “Hebrew audience would probably have linked the name Zobah to the word ‘saba’ meaning division or army (!), or ‘sabi’ meaning beauty or honour”… The last name, Ish-Tob is generally accepted to mean ‘good’, ‘pleasant’ or ‘sustainable’. Reasons for the meaning of this inclusion, in allegorical terms, can only be speculated on. There is the Philistine descendant of the giant Goliath, called Ishbi-benob, whose name includes the N-B stem related to Nebo and Niburu. The word ‘Ish’ itself means ‘men’, ie.’men of Tob’, which may therefore be focussing attention on the mixture of both human and ‘celestial’ aspects within the tribe(s) mentioned. This aspect has a curious parallel in Sumerian mythology. Supporting evidence comes from the work “The Antediluvian Origin of Evil in the Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions” by Amar Annus. On p.22 he writes; “The ritual texts (of Mesopotamia) describe the same three groups of seven sages – one group of fish-man hybrids, one of bird-man hybrids, and one of fully anthropomorphic figures (Wiggerman,1994;224). In comparison, different versions of the Jewish Book of Giants depict some giants as bird-men. Mahawai has wings and flies in the air in the Qumran fragments (Milik,1976). The giants ‘Ohyah and Hahyah could have been birdmen too, as the Persian version refers to an activity ‘in their nest’. Milik has argued too that Azazel in the Book of Giants also was a hybrid of goat-like and man-like features. The final ending -is in the names like glgmys (Gilgamesh) and hwbbs (Humbaba/Hobabish) may reflect the partially human composition of these figures, by a play with Hebrew -is “man” (Milik, 1976)”… as may be inferred, a point of the clearest relevance. Noting that Maacah means ‘pressure, or ‘oppression’, it is worth briefly recalling the Book of Enoch’s description of the Nephilim;

“And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nonetheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”. (Rev. R.H.Charles version, 15.10).

It has been noted by some that it is strange that the king of Maacah can only bring 1000 men, while a town that is kingless can provide 12,000 men to the Ammonites and Hanun. What this might mean allegorically may be speculated. But overall, the tribes and peoples who contribute to supporting the war-like actions of the king Hanun can be seen to be closely related to questions of these very lineages, stemming from Sumer, then Akkad, Assyria and Babylon, in particular. Likewise, the word ‘stank’ at 2Sam10.6 may be related to the concept of ‘slime’, used as that is is to indicate something ‘loathsome’ in the circumstances it appears at. This word is shown as holding together the ark of Moses (Exodus2.3), as well as the slime of the ‘morter of the Tower of Babel’ (Gen11.3), and the ‘slime-pits’ of the vale of Siddim’ (Gen14.10), with Siddim meaning ‘division’, or ‘demons’, ‘fields’ or ‘furrows’, as Adam means ‘field’, or ‘earth’, providing a sense of bloodline, as the ‘vine’ does likewise. (And related to 1Samuel11.1 as it refers to the ‘strange’ wives of Solomon including the Zidonians…). And lastly in Ezekiel 22.28 in confirmation of this, it is used metaphorically by the prophet speaking God’s words; “And her (Israel’s) prophets have daubed them with untempered morter, seeing vanity; and divining lies unto them, saying, Thus saith the Lord God, when the Lord hath not spoken”…

In all uses indicating potentially matters of the lineages of the celestial genetics, including the Nephilim, whether on a personal or societal level. And one last detail, it is Joab, one of David’s ‘mighty men’, and one of the ‘sons of Zeruiah’ who leads Israel’s forces against the Ammonites, (2Sam10.9), as it is one of the sons of Zeruiah – Joab’s brother Abishai – who slays the giant Ishbi-benob (2Sam21.18-22). Joab, as we see, is ordered killed by his nephew Solomon on his accession to the throne, for his acts of violence as David’s captain of forces, particularly the killing of David’s (and Maacah’s) son Absalom caught in the branches of the oak tree.

Incidentally, David’s mourning of the death of his son leading the rebellion against him leads Joab to say; “Thou hast shamed this day the faces of all thy servants, which this day hath saved thy life, and the lives of thy sons and of thy daughters, and the lives of thy wives, and the lives of thy concubines. In that thou lovest thine enemies, and hatest thy friends… for this day I perceive, if Absalom had lived, and all we had died this day, then it had pleased thee well” (2Samuel19.5-6).

Regarding the Shulamite narrator of the Song of Solomon, as the stories of Tamar, Maacah, and the wife/sister of Cain; Awen/ Avve indicate, there is equally emphasis on the female progenitors of the ‘celestial’ lineages, for some reason. Awen, (the sister and wife of Cain) is linked by name to the Egyptian ‘city of the sun’, Awen or Awn, or On,`(Heliopolis in Greek) where the Sun (as Amun-Ra) was worshipped; pointing in the woman’s name to the solar, celestial genetics of the Nephilim, lines of Cain, and perhaps, possibly, to the source of the name Anunnaki too, where ‘An(u) ‘, who was the chief ruler of the tribe of the heavenly planet, gives his name to ‘the heavens’. (As ‘Anunnaki’ thus means ‘those who came from the heavens to the Earth’).

Chapter 7.4 of the Song of Solomon also mentions the snow-capped mountains of Lebanon, and Damascus; the mountains are seen to be closely linked with both the Cedars of Lebanon throughout the mythology of both the Bible and the Near East, as in the Epic of Gilgamesh Tablet V, the site of the gods at the Cedar Forest and Mt Hermon ─ a location thus very likely the same as the Nephilim’s Mount Armon in 1Enoch, and Baal-Hamon in Son8.12 / and source of the name of Solomon’s palace the ‘House of the Cedars of Lebanon’ (1Kings7.1-12/ and the already noted immense Temple of Baal-Jupiter at Baalbeck in the Beqaa valley nearby.
Within the New Testament Mount Hermon is commonly believed by scholars to be where the Transfiguration of Christ took place.

The work already cited, by Amar Annus comparing Mesopotamian and Hebrew mythologies notes the many associations between the mountains of Syria and Lebanon, and the gods, and giants of both civilizations (p.23);

“In addition, some Manichean fragments of the book (of Giants) call the giants explicitly with the word that primarily means ‘demons’…Humbaba, in particular is a demonic creature in the Mesopotamian mythology, who exercises authority over other demons. He is the guardian of the cedar forest in Lebanon, and his domicile in the Cedar Mountains is a locality also associated with Watchers. According to 1Enoch13.9, the penitent Watchers and their progeny assembled at Ubelsayel, a locality placed ‘between Lebanon and Senir’ … which is to be identified with Hermon. In an Old Babylonian fragment of Gilgamesh the Cedar Mountain is identified as ‘Hermon and Lebanon’, an interesting coincidence of identity. The association of watchers’ sons with a cedar forest is also at work in the Damascus Document, where they are tall as cedar trees (3000 or 300 cubits), and with bodies like mountains”…

Associations of the cedars to the gods, and to the mighty men, and ‘giants’ of the Old Testament serve to link Solomon more closely to these themes, linked as he is to these via his temple, his palace (named after the Cedars of Lebanon), his foreign wives, and the hill-top pagan sites he was swayed to worship the gods of, (such as the Phoenician/ Philistine god Ba’al, meaning ‘Lord’, etc). That these were all associated with the celestial bloodlines containing the ‘powers of the sun’ is one reason why so much solar imagery is included within the story of Solomon’s life additionally to his name. We have seen how the name Tamar is linked to the tamarind date-palm, with one meaning of the word being ‘darkness’. Likewise the ch.7.7 reference in the Song to the date-palm holds many resonances to the divine; for as Tom von Bakel notes in his paper ‘The magical meaning of cedars and palm trees depicted on cylinder seals’, both the cedar tree, and the date-palm were symbols closely associated in Sumerian poetry/mythology to the gods, the Anuna, from the first Sumerian civilization onwards in Mesopotamia, and across the Near East. According to von Bakel ‘palm-frond’ meant ‘womb’ and hence ‘new-born’ (p.4); in other examples, the chief female goddess Inanna, the ‘Queen of Heaven’, later known in various places as Ishtar/ Astarte/ Esther/ Aphrodite, and associated with Venus, was linked often with cedars and cedar-oil (In one poem, “Everybody hastens towards Inanna. . .In the pure places of the plain, at its good places, on the rooftops, in the sanctuaries of mankind, incense offerings like a forest of aromatic cedars are transmitted to her” (p.7,op.cit). Likewise many depictions on stelae and cylinder seals, and in poems connecting the Anuna with date palms and cedars existed throughout the first Sumerian civilization, and no doubt in the related Akkadian, Babylonian and Assyrian societies, which were successively leading nations throughout the entire region.

(Indeed, it is possible to speculate that the shape of the date palm, in both its leaves patterns, and of the date, resembles both the Vesica Piscis, the ecliptic of the Milky Way, and the female yoni – hence their association to life, fertility, and creation, in its feminine aspect; as indeed the solar system was ‘born’ from the galactic centre, as the arms of the galaxy spiral outwards, and is still linked gravitationally to it).
Likewise the Sumerian Tree of Life, although many academics assess that this symbol possessed characteristics equated by the Sumerians as male aspects of fertility..! (the word ‘-gish’ as in Ningishzida the ‘Lord of the Good Tree’ referring to the male’s organ as well as ‘tree’.) Perhaps considering the celestial nature of the symbol, like that of the Vesica, it is fair to ascribe both male and female meanings of fertility to them among others, in the symbolic combination of male and female constituting as such the alchemy of cosmic energies – an esoteric concept emphasized in the Bible most noticeably in the ‘marriage’ of king Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (‘of seven’, pointing to the relevance of the Octave in understanding the processes of the marriage of matter and energy, of male and female, of the Sun and the Moon, and so on – and perhaps in the narrative of the Song of Solomon, which has been compared to Sufi texts written to describe the soul’s yearning to be united with the Creator).

REHOBOAM; as a side-bar, the name of Solomon’s son who is nominated by him to be his successor, Rehoboam (from 1Kings11.43 /1Chron3.10), has links to the essential stem of ‘rahab’, which is the name of the pagan ‘wise-woman’ / ‘prostitute’ living in Jericho (Joshua2.1/ 6.17-25), who helps the Israelites enter and defeat the city. This meaning ties her to wise-women, who in antiquity were called ‘pythonesses’ (as at the Delphic Oracle), women whose wisdom comes from their deepest instinctive consciousness.
This was a concept which can be traced back to the Sumerian civilization(s), for example in the Epic of Gilgamesh, where the ‘sacred prostitute’ Shamhat civilizes the wild-man Enkidu through sexual intimacy… (as Adam and Eve gain awareness and ‘knowing’ through eating the fruit of the tree suggested by the serpent). We have seen how Judah threatened to burn his daughter-in-law Tamar for ‘playing the harlot’ and becoming pregnant after her husband Er died (Gen38.6-24), until she produced proof it was Judah himself who impregnated her (without knowing her identity); a narrative which is rare in the Bible in highlighting the hypocrisy of men in sexual matters.

The fact that there are two women named Tamar who are shown to be pursued sexually by near relatives, as well as the name Tamar links these women conceptually to the importance of lineages related to the ‘gods’. These were symbolized from Sumer onwards by the tamarind date-palm tree; as Tom von Bakkel notes in his paper ‘The magical meaning of cedars and palm trees depicted on cylinder seals’, both the cedar tree, and the date-palm were symbols closely associated in Sumerian poetry/mythology to the gods, the Anuna, from the first Sumerian civilization onwards in Mesopotamia, and across the Near East. According to von Bakel ‘palm-frond’ meant ‘womb’ and hence ‘new-born’ (p.4); Inanna, too was linked to aspects of the cedar tree, and the date-palm as symbols of fertility, as well as to concepts of the underworld, and divinity; and Dumuzid/ Tammuz the shepherd-deity, who was the Anuna deity likewise associated with the palm in terms of its life-supporting properties, and its productiveness. This was complemented as well by his guarding the doors to the celestial palace of Anu along with Ningishzida (‘The Tree of Good’), in the myth of Adapa and the South Wind, (dating from at least 1400Bce) according to Ludek Vacin in ‘Gudea and Ningishzida; a Ruler and his God’; furthermore, “they both also appear as deities of the Netherworld in the Death of Gilgames, in the version from Meturan relating that the words of dead Gilgames shall be as weighty as those of Ningiszida and Dumuzi once the hero becomes a governor of the Netherworld entitled to pass judgements and render verdicts…”

(The tale of Adapa, the fisherman, is curiously one of the earliest precursors to Grail quests of the 12th century in Europe, in that the ‘hero’s’ actions either ensure the land’s fertility or condemn it – and him – to sickness and mortality. In this way Adapa misses the opportunity to eat the ‘food of life’, and the ‘water of life’ because he listens to the advice of his deity, Ea/ Enki. It is in Adapa also that the South Wind is depicted as being antagonistic to his efforts, as such being representative of negative or inimical celestial ‘forces’). As we examine elsewhere, Adapa is considered to be one of the earliest examples of the ‘apkallus’, or ‘(seven) sages’; in other words ‘those who saw the deep’, as Gilgamesh is likewise described in the epic work – linking again the Sumerian concepts of the hybrid fish/ serpent/ human ‘celestial beings’, and the Ab-zu, or ‘place of the south’, the ‘abyss’ or (celestial) waters, to the energies of life and wisdom. How the depictions of wise-women such as Rahab relate to the ‘serpents of the deep’ as in Isaiah51.9 and Psalm89.10 is, the more it is considered therefore, a question of some complexity.

These themes and links carried on into the Hebrew civilization, as many different references to the palm-tree in the Bible confirm, a theory supported by the extensive metaphoric references, particularly in chapters7 and 8 of the Song of Solomon, to the themes of the celestial lineages. As an example, the female in this mysterious and multi-levelled work, named the Shulamite, (who says “I am dark, but comely”), is also at one point compared to the (tamarind) date-palm. (In this way raising such long-term associations, as well possibly to Tamar), in Son7.7-8; “This thy stature is like to a palm-tree, and thy breasts to clusters of grapes…” An apparently innocuous metaphor, and yet one considerably related to the themes from earlier civilizations we have mentioned, including the tall stature of the ‘giants’ called the Nephilim, as well as the associations to the gods of Sumer, and to fertility.

The work “The Antediluvian Origin of Evil in the Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions” by Amar Annus comparing Mesopotamian and Hebrew mythologies confirms the many associations between the mountains of Syria and Lebanon, and the gods, and giants of both civilizations (p.23);

“In addition, some Manichean fragments of the book (of Giants) call the giants explicitly with the word that primarily means ‘demons’…Humbaba, in particular is a demonic creature in the Mesopotamian mythology, who exercises authority over other demons. He is the guardian of the cedar forest in Lebanon, and his domicile in the Cedar Mountains is a locality also associated with Watchers. According to 1Enoch13.9, the penitent Watchers and their progeny assembled at Ubelsayel, a locality placed ‘between Lebanon and Senir’ … which is to be identified with Hermon. In an Old Babylonian fragment of Gilgamesh the Cedar Mountain is identified as ‘Hermon and Lebanon’, an interesting coincidence of identity. The association of watchers’ sons with a cedar forest is also at work in the Damascus Document, where they are tall as cedar trees (3000 or 300 cubits), and with bodies like mountains”…

Associations of the cedars to the gods, and to the mighty men, and ‘giants’ of the Old Testament serve to likewise link Solomon more closely to these themes, associated as he is to these via his temple, his palace (the House of the Cedars/ Forests of Lebanon), his foreign wives, and the hill-top pagan sites he was swayed to worship the gods of, (such as the Phoenician/ Philistine god Ba’al, the Ammonite god Molech, and the Moabite god Chemosh, etc 1Kings11.1-11; with the latter two stemming from tribes founded by (the Sumerian) Abraham’s nephew Lot and his daughters, shortly after the destruction of the sinful towns of Sodom and Gomorrah with the ‘powers of the sun’; Gen.19.30). Why the symbolism of the Cedar tree may be so important, in terms of the themes under consideration, comes from the nature of the tree, namely it is of the class of ‘evergreens’… so the many Sumerian and Hebrew narratives involving extended life-spans, the search for the ‘Fountain of Eternal Youth’ (as Gilgamesh attains the Plant of Youth from the depths of the Ap-su, and as Alexander seeks in the 10th century Persian writer Firdausi’s ‘Book of Kings’), and the attainment of immortality or spirit throughout the Near Eastern civilizations, may be associated with this metaphor. In the Qur’an 18.65-82 the figure of Al-Khidr is a celestial being and/or ‘adversary’ (very similar to the non-human ‘Apkallus’ of Sumer and following civilizations); as one with secret knowledge, one who has ‘seen the deeps’, and is a divine servant, he is depicted guiding the prophet Moses in (celestial) matters of consciousness and karma…

The Queen of Sheba, (or Sabea, meaning ‘South’), hence the ‘Queen of the South’ as Jesus calls her, is the best-known of Solomon’s foreign female partners. It is a matter of some interest that at 1Kings11.1-11, YHVH passes judgement of punishment on Solomon, especially for his relationships and marriages with ‘strange women’ of pagan tribes (11.1-5) – the familiar tribes we have seen in many instances; the daughters of Pharaoh, the Moabites, the Ammonites, (both descended from Abraham’s nephew Lot, and his two daughters), Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites. So it states he “went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom (Molech) the abomination of the Ammonites” (1Kings11.4), and “did build an high place for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites” (1Kings11.7).

It is therefore not only relevant to the characters of the two, but also well-known that both Solomon and Sheba have been linked with demons and djinns in the mythologies of many religions of the Near East, including Hebrew, Christian, Islamic, Gnostic, Coptic, Syriac and so forth, pointing in this way to something ‘compromised’ within their selves. An example comes from the Qur’an 27.23-24;

“I found there a woman ruling them, and she has been given of all things, and she has a great throne. I found that she and her people bow to the sun instead of God. Satan has made their deeds seem right to them and has turned them away from the right path, so they cannot find their way”.

As regards Sheba’s name and title, the ‘South’ (like the Negev desert) is an allegorical reference to both the celestial lineages from Enki onwards, to the celestial energies of the sun, as well as the effects these produce in the relevant lineages. The ‘dark’ aspects of these lineages links to the subterranean sense of the Ap-su, (‘waters of the deep’), or ‘abyss’, the source of the ‘waters of life’ which sustain all life on earth. This multi-levelled metaphor resulted from the three main male gods of Sumer being considered as Lords of the Air / North (Enlil), the Earth /Equator (Anu), and the Waters / South (Enki). This is related to his close association with waters, and representations as either a fish, or serpent/ human hybrid being. The Ap-su, as subterranean reservoir of the waters of the world which enabled life to grow, was passed on to Hebrew civilization too, as in Genesis1.20, where it states “And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life”. Furthermore, in the words of the Hebrew Qabalah text the Zohar; “The world was not created until God took a stone called the Even haShetiyah and threw it into the depths where it was fixed from above till below, and from it the world expanded. It is the centre point of the world and on this spot stood the Holy of Holies”. (This site is beneath the Temple Rock in Jerusalem, of course, constituting as such the ‘navel of the world’). But the point being that as with the creation of the universe from the ‘tehomot’, the ‘waters of the deep’ in Genesis1.2, these subterranean forces were linked closely with (female) energies of fecundity and wisdom.
The waters of the Flood were believed to have receded back into the earth at the site of Jerusalem, where the Earth had been born, as well as Adam and Eve. The Temple of Solomon was built over this ‘navel-point’ of the world, and marked the point on earth where the energies of the heavens ‘pooled’ through into the material plane. It is perceivable in both Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian, and Hebrew mythology that the different metaphoric levels of the ‘world’ may also be applied to the human being… locating the waters, the ‘deeps’, within the innermost stomach-based instinctive centres, which are particularly ‘open’ to female ‘lunar’ consciousness.
It is a fact, additionally, that the Sumerian/ Akkadian ‘ap-su’ has passed down through history from the earliest civilization in Sumer to many today as the word for the South, ie Sud… It is curious in this respect that the region where the Queen of Sheba came from, around Ethiopia, is near to Sudan, and was previously called Abyssinia ! The word ‘ap-su’ is believed to have given rise to the name for the deity of the Moon, Su-en, which later became Sin. As such linking the ‘ap-su’ and its waters to the lunar powers of the moon. In the story of Solomon and Sheba he obviously personifies male ‘solar’ energies, while she represents female ‘lunar’ energies, the marriage of which create an ‘alchemical wedding’; this being one instance of the inner cosmology of the Hebrews, and preceding civilizations.

It is this sense of the deep waters and the abyss, whether on a cosmic or planetary or personal scale, that the various females in antiquity’s myths represented the subconscious/ instinctive centres from which ‘pythonesses’ and ‘wise-women’ gained their insight… as well perhaps as containing something of the darkness of such wisdom, as encapsulated by the negative aspects of divine femininity such as Lamastu/ Lilutu/ Lilith in Akkadian, and Hebrew mythology.
Lamastu, for example, a ‘daughter-of-Anu’ and a demonic entity was stated in myths such as Lamastu(2.136) to be from the Sutean region, meaning in other words from the ‘wilderness of the South’; “I am the daughter of Anu from heaven, I am a Sutean….I am terrifying. I enter the house, I leave the house (as I please). Bring me your sons; I want to suckle them. In the mouths of your daughters I want to place (my breast). Anu heard (this) and wept, the tears of Aruru, Lady of the Gods were flowing; ‘Why should we destroy what we have created, and why should the wind carry away what we have produced? Indeed, take her to the sea, or to the highest outcrop of mountain! Indeed, bind her to a free-standing tamarisk, or a lone reed stalk. As a corpse does not have life… may the Daughter-of-Anu like smoke leave town, and never return!”
Lilutu was a similar Akkadian female ‘demon’, as in the myth of ‘Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the Netherworld’, who looks likely to have been the source of the Hebrew character of Lilith.
This association of concepts such as the Suteans, as well as the South Wind with ‘evil’, found its source in Sumerian myths, possibly reflecting the serpent-deity Enki’s role as Lord of the South, or Ap-su, ie subterranean depths. The Bible likewise associates the South with both celestial matters, and ‘evil occurrences’; for example in Job1.15, his family, servants and wealth are destroyed, by the agency of Satan; “And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee”… (In Job1.17 the Chaldeans (Babylonians) do likewise to his camels, and servants, and in 1.19 there comes a ‘great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men” – linking back to the associations raised stemming from primarily Sumerian mythology).

So, a whole complex of semantic meanings linked to wise-women, pythonesses, and what were ‘hierodules’ or ‘temple prostitutes’ in Mesopotamian society is linked to the biblical women depicted as ‘harlots’. This may be one reason why Mary Magdalene was thus characterized as formerly being a ‘harlot’ by the church elders from the 6th century onwards, who conflated Mary Magdalene with Mary of Bethany (Luke10.39), and with the ‘sinful’ woman who washed Jesus’ feet with perfume in Luke7.37-9. An interpretation which might have some degree of validity, if biblical references to ‘sinful women’ were connected to Sumerian ‘hierodules’, and biblical ‘wise-women’… Certainly in her relationship with Jesus they represented the marriage of sacred male and female energies, as with Solomon and Sheba in the Old Testament.

The biblical association of concepts such as the Queen of Sheba/ the South, the Negev as a ‘desert in the south’ where the Seraphim, the ‘flying fiery serpents’ dwelled (Isaiah30.6) may well have been derived from the Sumerian and Akkadian mythologies of the Suteans, as well as the South Wind with ‘evil’. And these possibly reflected the serpent-deity Enki’s role as Lord of the South, or Ap-su, ie the subterranean depths. Lilutu was an Akkadian female ‘night-demon’ who looks likely to have been the source of the Hebrew character of Lilith. This sense of the South may be seen in modern languages having ‘Sud’ as their word for south. It is curious in this respect that the region where the Queen of Sheba came from, around Ethiopia, is near to Sudan, and was previously called Abyssinia ! So a whole complex of semantic meanings linked to wise-women, pythonesses, and what were ‘hierodules’ in Mesopotamian society is linked to the biblical women depicted as ‘harlots’. This may be one reason why Mary Magdalene was thus characterized. Certainly in her relationship with Jesus they represented the marriage of sacred male and female energies, as did Solomon and Sheba in the Old Testament.

Rahab is also used as a key word to describe the Leviathan, or sea-serpent of the deeps/ the abyss, for example at Psalm 89.10; ‘Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces, as one that is slain; thou hast scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm’, or Isaiah51.9;
“Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord; awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of old. Art thou not it that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon?”. Some researchers have thus compared Rahab to Tiamat in the Babylonian epic the Enuma Elish, who while is a mother of the gods, is also a chaotic and negative being who later threatens the divine order, and is thus destroyed by Marduk, (the principal Anuna deity of the era), and ‘scattered into pieces’ – while also noting the original role of Tiamat as the ‘waters of creation’ is much the same in syntax and meaning as ‘tehom’/’tehomot’ in the book of Genesis, thus indicating where the Hebrew myth obtained the word.

So while in its broadest or simplest meaning Rahab means ‘to be wide’, and in Isaiah and Job is used to denote the prideful arrogance of the Egyptian pharaohs and kings, references contain allegorical meanings which refer to other matters also, as the Isaiah quote shows… The word is also linked to Rehoboth-Ir, a town in Assyria built by Nimrod (Gen10.11), the great-grandson of Noah, and first post-Flood symbol of the celestial Sumerian lineages and the Nephilim. The ninth generation from Noah is of course Abraham, whose entire lineage between Noah’s son Shem and himself is rooted in Sumer. And the names and links between the son of Solomon, who sees the kingdoms and tribes of Israel and Judah disintegrate under his (pagan) rule (2Chron12.1), are extensively linked to many aspects of the celestial lines, as described in the Old Testament…

The New Testament gospels state that Rahab/ Rachab is within the genealogy of Christ (Matthew1.5), by her marriage to the great-grandfather of David, named Salmon (Ruth4.20), which led onwards to Boaz – Obed – Jesse – David. (The name Tamar crops up within these pages too, at Ruth4.12, as a symbol of devotion and loyalty; she was believed by Judah to be a prostitute, when in fact she was the wife of his deceased son, who covered her face to have relations with her father-in-law; at Genesis38.6-29. Tamar gives birth to Perez/Pharez and Zerah, the former of whom is also an ancestor of Christ, at Matthew1.3, and Luke3.33).
So, the first wife of Rehoboam, mentioned at 2Chronicles11.18, is Mahalath. This name has various words associated with it; so Abarim.com state the name means either; ‘sickness’ or disease (from mahaleh)– or some form of ‘sad’ or ‘profane’ song (from ‘mahalth’)– or ‘dancing’/ ‘writhing’ (from ‘mehola’). The song/ music related meaning calls to mind the significant female Naamah, whose name as ‘pleasant’ was interpreted by some rabbinical commentators to mean ‘she sang pleasant songs to her pagan gods’ ! Additionally the verb ‘halal’ means to pierce, which makes something ‘common’, or ‘profane’…All these linguistic aspects of her name have meanings connected to the conflicted nature of the celestial/ Cainite lineages, it might be theorized.
Mahalath was the daughter of Jerimoth (2Chronicles11.18) by the way; this means ‘elevation’, or ‘high places’ (similar to Gibeah, the town of hilltop pagan groves, which has meanings linked with ‘mighty’ stemming from a description of the Nephilim at Genesis6.1-4 onwards). The ‘rum’ part of Jerimoth means to be high, or at the apex, while derived nouns such as ‘rum’, or ‘rama’ describe height or power; something we consider relevant, as a descriptor of rulers or kingdoms which have ‘celestial’ powers, while not receiving them directly from YHVH – as the Egyptians in particular are described throughout the Bible. That the father of Moses is named Amram (1Chron23.13) holds significance in pointing to his celestial lineage, we argue, in the Moses section later on – particularly the deity Ammon-Ra, as well as the tribe of the Ammonites…While the ‘moth’ part of Jerimoth stems, or has links to, words associated with ‘death’; as were the words ‘mut’ in Hebrew, ‘mort’ in Latin, and so on. The word can indicate ‘man’ as such, particularly one who is a soldier, or is capable of inflicting death.

To return to Rehoboam, Hebrew society was polygamous in the Biblical era, in fact this is still allowed, if rarely practiced, in some Jewish denominations. Rehoboam then married another woman (2Chron11.20); and who did he marry? Another Maacah ! As we have seen, this name, meaning ‘pressure’, or ‘oppression’ is closely bound up in the events and life of king David, being the daughter of Talmai who David marries (2Sam3.3), producing the children Absalom, and Tamar (!) So in fact, this Maacah is the daughter of Absalom, bearing her grandmother’s name, therefore. A woman named Maacah during David’s reign is also said to be the mother of Hanan (1Chron.11.43), who is a ‘mighty’ man of Israel – the trope relating to the Nephilim ‘mighty men of old’ description, as seen many times – also linking to the Sumerian storm-deity’s attendants Hanish and Shullat, as we considered earlier, as well as potentially to king Nahash’s son Hanun (1Chron19).
From much earlier times, when the Israelites entered what became Israel, the town Maacah was ruled by Og, one of the last rulers descended from the Rephaim (Joshua12.4-5) – a point or association of no small significance. The king Og is further linked to the rulers Gog and Magog, who represent the Nephilim lines throughout the Bible, so that John writes of their leading the forces of darkness at the Apocalypse (Revelations 20.8); in fact he says they are ‘the nations which are in the four corners of the earth”. Magog is a grandson of Noah too, at Genesis10.2.

We consider also the events at Beth-Maacah, where the soldiers of David, and his captain Joab, his cousin and one of the ‘sons of Zeruiah’ pursues the rebel Sheba, described as ‘a man of Belial’ (2Samuel20). This word stems from ‘Bela’, meaning ‘worthlessness’, from the verb ‘bala’, ‘to wear-out’, ‘use until worthless’; it plays a part in the narrative of Abraham’s nephew Lot, and the events immediately after the destruction of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah etcetera (Genesis19). (One of the Bible’s earliest characters called Jerimoth, of perhaps eight so named, is the son of Bela, the eldest son of Benjamin, at 1Chronicles7.7. It was a gradual evolution of the word/ name as used that Belial eventually became the personification of the ‘forces of darkness’ by the Second Temple period of history.

The salient point here (at 2Samuel20.14) is that the forces of David led by Joab pursue Sheba to the town of Beth-Maacah, at which point they threaten the town for harbouring him; a ‘wise-woman’ speaks to them at the town-gate, and helps resolve the problem without battle or destruction (2Sam20.16-22). In what might be a subtle reference to the nature of the Nephilim, she asks Joab, the ‘son of Zeruiah’ “Thou seekest to a city and a mother in Israel: why wilt thou swallow up the inheritance of the Lord?” (2Sam2019-20). This echoes the fate of the cousin of Moses and his associates who rebel against Moses and Aaron leadership of the Israelites in the wilderness, Korah, who is ‘swallowed into the earth’ at Numbers16.2-32; as well as descriptions of the Nephilim from numerous works of antiquity. For example, from chapter 15 of 1Enoch, source of virtually all Hebrew myths of the ‘fallen sons of the gods’; “And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle, and work destruction in the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nevertheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”…

In terms of what she represents as a wise-woman, and being someone of authority who ‘guards the gateway’ of the city, she is clearly linked to the woman Rahab who lets the Israelites into the city of Jericho…

The two wives of Rehoboth (as well as sixteen others, and sixty concubines!) produce several children to him. Maacah gives him the child Abijah, meaning ‘Yah is my father’ (!), who the narrative states at 2Chron11.22 ‘Rehoboam made Abijah…to be ruler among his brethren; for he thought to make him king”. Apparently Jeroboam, the opponent of Rehoboam as Israel and Judah separate in conflict, has a son called Abijah too… this Abijah is the first of the family of Jeroboam to die, as God sweeps them away ‘like one would sweep away dung’ (1Kings14.1-18, esp.14.10). Rehoboam’s son Abijah, at 1Kings14.31 (it is confusing!), is listed in the genealogy of Christ, though his name is spelled Abia (Matt1.7 and Luke1.5)…

Jeroboam meanwhile, is the son of a man called Nebat, the only time this name occurs in the Bible, who is married to Zeruah. Both names have close associations with the lineages under discussion; Nebat because it has the stem N-B, (meaning ‘prophet’ in Semitic), linked as such with Mt Nebo where Moses dies; the stem originated from the Sumerian, Akkadian and Babylonian roots which gave the names of the planet Niburu, and the deity Nabu. Nebat is considered in biblical dictionaries to mean ‘look’, or ‘regard’ – in other words pertains, or has mythic associations to; the Watchers…
Zeruah meanwhile is stated to stem from the verb‘sara’ meaning duplicitious, or from ‘sara’at’, meaning skin-disease, ‘to have patches of different coloured skin’ (Abarim.com), or one possible meaning which is ‘hornet’, from ‘sirah’. All are highly descriptive in the sense of the line of Cain, which rabbinical sources averred resulted from a mating between Eve and Samael, as was named the upright, walking serpent of Eden (although the Serpent of Eden is never referred to anywhere in the Bible as ‘Satan’; perhaps as the serpent-god of Sumer, Enki/ Oannes, who brought wisdom from the ‘heavens’, and created mankind, and civilization was never considered demonic…) The similar name Zeruiah, as relating to the ‘mighty men’, the ‘sons of Zeruiah’ who are David’s cousins, has a great many possible meanings, the most obvious of which have possible relevance; ‘sarar’ (I) means to bind, or secure, the verb ‘sara’ (II) to show hostility, while the noun ‘sar’ means adversary. The denominative verb ‘sara’ means to suffer distress. The verb ‘sarar’ (III) means to be sharp, with the related noun ‘sur’ meaning ‘rock’ and is the equivalent to the Greek noun ‘petra’, from which comes the name Peter. As we shall see in the Simon Peter section, there are many semantic associations created by this name given by Jesus to Simon which are predominantly concerned with ‘rocky ground’, deserts, and the ‘satan’-related meanings of ‘the adversary’ – ties of meaning which indicate that of all the apostles Simon Peter was essentially different to the others, as well as to the other early fathers of the church, such as Paul of Tarsus. The Hebrew word ‘zera’, meaning ‘seed’, as used in Genesis4.25-6, and Luke8.4-15 regarding the seed falling on rocky ground, is not considered to relate to either Zeruiah or Zeruah, due to different initial letters.

Of great coincidence is the fact stated at 1Kings14.21/31, that the son of Solomon under consideration, Rehoboam, is the son of Naamah the Ammonitess*; this is the only one of Solomon’s sons where the mother of the child is named. As noted, her name, and tribe are associated with Abraham, Lot and Moses, and king Nahash, (who shares his name with the Brazen Serpent), while most essentially, the narrative of Cain after his killing of Abel states, at Genesis4.22; “And the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah”; thus indicating the origins of the name very early within the Cainite lineage, indeed within the Bible, as Naamah is only the fourth woman named in the Bible.
In Talmudic literature Naamah, the daughter of king Nahash is praised for her righteousness, (such as Babba Kamma 38b, whose account states Moses is told by YHVH to not take the land of the Ammonites as the worthy Naamah was to descend from the lineage. (Other Talmudic texts, such as Abba b.Kahana state that Naamah was the wife of Noah, and was so named because her conduct was ‘pleasing’ to YHVH. This interpretation is rejected by other commentators, who say ‘she sang pleasant songs to her pagan gods”… highlighting again the dualities at the heart of such myths, and lineages…)
Perhaps the most amazing point is the indicated relation of the bloodlines of David (Solomon- Rehoboth), and king Nahash of the Ammonites, (who at 1Sam11.1-11 offers to rule the Hebrew towns-people if they each give up an eye..!) Hence David’s words at 2Sam10.11; “Then said David, I will shew kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father shewed kindness unto me. And David sent to comfort him by the hand of his servants for his father. And David’s servants came into the land of the children of Ammon”…
Incredibly, tied to this (through the cosmic number relevant 1.111 etc), is the chapter of 1Kings11.1-11, which relates the word of YHVH in his passing judgement of punishment on Solomon, in particular his relationships and marriages with ‘strange women’ of pagan tribes (11.1) – the familiar tribes we have seen in many instances; the daughters of Pharaoh, the Moabites, the Ammonites, (both descended from Abraham’s nephew Lot, and his two daughters), Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites…
It would not be an overstatement to say that Nahash is representative of so many themes of the Bible under consideration in this article, sharing the name as he does with the Brazen (bronze) Serpent (the Nehushtan) created by Moses in the wilderness to heal those of the Israelites bitten by the ‘flying fiery serpents’, the Seraphim (Num21.6-9/ Isaiah6.1-8/30.6), as well as the Eastern serpent deities, the Nagas. So this may be an appropriate point at which to end this closely-detailed ‘detour’ regarding some of the inner meanings, contained within the Bible, of the son of Solomon, Rehoboam, and his wives and their families.

To return to the Hebrew histories described in the Bible, the texts apparently state those returning from Babylon with ‘mixed’ genetic lineages were not put from the tribes of Israel, but only from the priesthood; thus providing a theoretical route for the lines in question to become another part of the nation’s heredity, due to the practical difficulties of separating a gene-stream (which had thousands of individuals from over seventy previous years of conjoining) priorly established in the tribes of Israel. And we get to the crux of the matter, namely the introduction of ‘celestial’, or maybe ‘Nephilim’ genetics into post-Deluge Hebrew bloodlines – in the chapters following on from the lists of the men who went into captivity in Babylon – in Ezra ch.10, which is entirely about the foreign wives some of the Israelites have married;

“… the people wept very sore… and Shechaniah said unto Ezra, We have trespassed against our God, and have taken strange wives of the people of the land” (Ezra10.1-2). In reply, “Ezra the priest stood up, and said unto them, Ye have transgressed and have taken strange wives, to increase the trespass of Israel. Now therefore make confession unto the Lord God of your fathers,, and do his pleasure; and separate yourselves from the people of the land, and from the strange wives”. (Ezra 10-10).
But in a detail which indicates the significance of the events described, the text continues;

“And then all the congregation answered and said with a loud voice, As thou hast said, so must we do. But the people are many, and it is a time of much rain, and we are not able to stand without, neither is this a work of one day or two; for we are many that have transgressed in this thing” (Ezra 10.12-13)..!

And while a Shallum is listed in Ezra 10.24 as ‘divorcing’ his wife, as many of the other men do, no mention is made of any children. In fact all the book says is that they ‘put away their wives’ (Ezra 10.19), (and offered a ram for their trespass, ie for a not particularly serious offense). No narrative exists of whether the many men, women and children so concerned were separated from the tribes of Israel, while Nehemiah ch.7 lists over 20,000 children who are presumably to be separated from the tribes, or perhaps just disallowed high (religious) office, as Nehemiah 7.64 implies. And again, this does not include any children grown to adulthood during the 70 years of potential bloodline-related marriages within Babylon. So the books of Ezra and Nehemiah may be inferred to confirm the inner-narrative, without actually resolving it.
So this synchronicity of names, of a father and three sons, would appear to be a subtle way of drawing attention to the connections of such gene-streams within the tribes of the Israelites circa 540 Bce. . . and likewise linking the lineages to Babylon (and thus the Sumerian ‘celestial’ lineages) where the Israelites had been captives for 70 years. Akkub incidentally, means ‘lowest’ or ‘cunning’, as such being descriptive of ‘the sons of Anak’. And curiously, the period of the Babylonian Capture from 603-538Bce was the moment when the scribes and compilers of the Hebrew scriptural texts were introduced ‘fully’ to the Sumerian traditional lines of cosmic consciousness, given by the celestial beings the Anunnaki to their cities and religious groups – and likely when many of the allegories and metaphors within the Old Testament concerning these lineages were devised and introduced… be they positive or otherwise in tone.

---

Indeed, the narrative of Shallum holds quite some further interest; as seen, he is a Korahite Levite chief gate-keeper at the eastern King’s Gate, who returns to Jerusalem from Babylon some time after 539Bce. We have seen within the multiplicity of metaphors for the sun those linking it essentially to the East where it rises each day; a state of affairs which prevails even upto today with many Eastern nations’ flags…
The passage, we have already seen, is at 1Chronicles 9.17-19; “And the porters were, Shallum, and Akkub, and Talmon and Ahiman, and their brethren. Shallum was the chief. Who hitherto waited in the king’s gate eastward: they were porters in the companies of the children of Levi.”
So considering his potential role as a link to the Sumerian ‘celestial’ bloodlines, that of gatekeeper is a perfect metaphor; much as the person of Noah and his small family can be said to have occupied the same role. And interestingly, the Babylonian deity Oannes, a version of the Sumerian /Anunnaki deity Enki was later turned into Janus in Roman mythology, the ‘janitor’ or ‘gatekeeper’ who keeps the doorway of the winter solstice, at the mid-point between the old year and the new. And this ‘janitorial’ concept of Janus is how Rene Guenon describes him in Sacred Symbols, 1962. As we note elsewhere in this section, this role links him to both Sumerian, and biblical characters such as Ningiszida and Dumuzi, (as the two angels who descend to earth in the Akkadian ‘Myth of Adapa and the South Wind’ to take him to the heavens) – associated likewise by some writers, such as Hallo and Simpson, with the two angels who take Enoch to the highest heaven to receive the blessing of God and immortality. Both deities are also connected with the underworld, (as in Inanna’s Descent into the Underworld) also, relating them to aspects of the afterlife, as well as fertility; (while Dumuzi is closely associated with the date-palm, symbol of the gods, unknowable darkness and the womb).
In one basic sense they represent or belong to the class of ‘celestial beings’ who ‘incarnate’ or descend into the material world or dimensions, thus connecting the two, while experiencing loss or ‘death’ themselves through their actions . . . as Jesus says of the wheat seed which must first ‘die’ and be buried before it can begin new life. In the Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh this theme is very skilfully portrayed by the trauma the gods and goddesses experience when they escape the Deluge in their ‘celestial ships’, thus rising above the cataclysm (in Tablet XI). They weep for the loss of mankind, experience thirst and hunger for the first time, and repent of their acquiescence with Enlil’s plan for the destruction of the earth and its first civilization, which they helped create and oversaw. In the New Testament Simon Peter clearly fulfils the (Oannes/Janus) role of gatekeeper (hence the Keys of St Peter), with his nature being partly celestial, partly earthly, a facet made clear in numerous ways, such as repeated linguistic phrases mentioning both the ‘heavens’ and the ‘earth’ (Matthew 16.18, and 18.18, etc)… and the many links of Peter with metaphors of rock, or stone; as well as fishing, (from which comes episcopal as in the first Bishop of Rome, etcetera), which fits neatly with the depiction shown earlier of Oannes as hybrid man and fish.
So Shallum as a gatekeeper, both celestial and human, fits this theme very adequately in his occupation. St Peter refers to the eight people who survived the Deluge in the Ark of Noah, pointing to the significance of this ‘bottleneck’ in human history. Further details point to the same metaphorical meanings; he is at the King’s gate – kings being a symbol of ‘heavenly’, as well as ‘earthly power’, as we have seen made to be a mid-point between the gods and humanity in genetic terms. And the seemingly insignificant role of a city gatekeeper is shown to be something a little more important in other verses;
“And Shallum. . . and his brethren, of the house of his father, the Korahites, were over the work of the service, keepers of the gates of the tabernacle: and their fathers, being over the host of the LORD, were keepers of the entry” (1Chr 9.19).
This verse itself is of great interest; it details the significance of their role, and links the entire lineage/ family with the ‘host of the Lord’. This phrase is used in other books of the bible to refer to the ‘sons of god’, or ‘celestial’ orders, such as the Seraphim.
The lineage of the Korahites too has some significance – in Numbers 16.1-33, Korah the cousin of Moses and Aaron claims that as he is a great-grandson of Levi, he too should be a leader of the Israelites in the wilderness. But YHVH tells Moses to stand firm against the base challengers to his authority. By verse 32 they are punished;

“And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods. They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them; and they perished from among the congregation” (Numbers 16. 31-33).

This rebellion is mentioned by St Jude in the New Testament, at Jude 1.11 – ‘Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core’. . . incidentally, this aspect of Korah’s story, of being swallowed into the earth, raises the concept of levels of the self and the psyche which are stratified, or contained within the other – the deepest level is the ‘stomach’, which represents the instinctive functions of the body and brain, and is linked by the term the ‘reptilian’ centre – thus these concepts of the lowest level of being are tied in metaphorically to many biblical narratives. For example, from Ecclesiastes 3.21;
”Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast which goeth downward into the earth?”

And in final confirmation of these deeper links of the bloodline, the first description in this chapter includes that they were ‘two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown’ (Numbers 16.2) – in fact the same words used to describe the Nephilim themselves in Genesis 6.1-4. Likewise, Enoch in his eponymous book described the descent of the two hundred ‘sons of the gods’ to earth following their decision to take human wives to themselves.

Another passage indicates the position of the family of Shallum is towards the higher levels of society than initially implied;
“And Mattithiah, one of the Levites, who was the firstborn of Shallum the Korahite, had the set office over the. . . shewbread, to prepare it every sabbath” (1Chron 9.31-2)
The shewbread was an important part of Hebrew religious rites in the Bible, representing in twelve pieces the Twelve tribes
of Israel; also the ‘bread’ of heaven that was given to the Israelites in the wilderness during the escape from Egypt, ‘manna’. Indeed bread is used innumerable times in the Bible to represent the ‘wisdom of God’ as he gives it to the blessed. Hence the use of bread in the Last Supper by Jesus, in the wafer in Holy Communion services, and so on. And of course, bread was used in the Epic of Gilgamesh long before this, by Utnapishtim (Noah) in a similar metaphorical role as Gilgamesh is tested spiritually, as the Sumer section relates.

Quite strangely again, after the verses describing the role performed by Mattithiah, in 9.31-32, it states at 9.34;
These chief fathers of the Levites were chief throughout their generations; these dwelt at Jerusalem.

35. And in Gibeon dwelt the father of Gibeon, Jehiel, whose wife’s name was Maachah.

Thus leading full circle back to the ‘mighty’ men of Gibeah, a hill-top pagan site, and a woman named Maachah.

One more piece of this complex (!) jigsaw is to be found in Genesis 36, which lists the generations of Esau, who ‘sold his birthright to his brother Jacob for a mess of pottage’, in continuance of the Cain and Abel duality of bloodlines, repeated several times in the Old Testament. So at Genesis 36.15 the narrative states;

“These were the dukes of the sons of Esau: the sons of Eliphaz the firstborn son of Esau: duke Teman, duke Omar,
duke Zepho, duke Kenaz, Duke Korah, duke Gatam, and duke Amalek: these are the dukes that came of Eliphaz in the
land of Edom”.

Obviously a different person to Korah of Numbers 16.1, and yet the link is meaningful. As has been seen, firstly, the giants of Philistine (Rephaim, or Nephilim) were from Gath, most famously Goliath, although he has several brothers and relatives of similar stature. In Genesis 6.4, one of the bible’s only clear statements about the Nephilim it states “There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of god came in unto the daughters of men”. Likewise Amalek is a term for the ‘Anunnaki’, or rather, those descended from them; so the prophet Balaam says in Numbers 24.20 ‘Amalek was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he perish forever’, ie the biblical narrative of the Anunnaki and the Sumerians, as with Korah; so the passage links Korah unequivocally with these hybrid celestial blood-lines from Sumer, Babylon and Assyria. . . it is unsurprising therefore that such lineages produce the Edomites, from whom came the line of Herod, containing many rulers and despots with the blood of men on their hands*. The theme, in other words, of the negative aspects of some lineages in particular, from Cain, Tubal-Cain, Nimrod etcetera onwards. For a study of the narrative concerning Balaam and the angel, and Balak (the son of Zippor), king of the Moabites, see the section later on Moses, for there are many points of overlap between the themes of this passage, and the life of Moses. . . in particular the hill-top pagan site of Pisgah, overlooking the field of Zophim, where Moses dies and is buried (Deuteronomy 34.5-6); the latter name of which translates simply as ‘Watchers’. The word ‘adama’, and likewise ‘edom’, is related in Hebrew to ‘field’ itself (or the earth’s dust, or soil or clay, which was gathered and had life breathed into as a man by the Lord in Genesis), ie. can be viewed as meaning bloodline also, from Adam onwards.
The conjunction of the rare names Eliphaz and Teman holds related significance too in the book of Job, ‘the adversary’, where one of his four friends who talk with him is called ‘Eliphaz the Temanite’…similarly meaningful is the name of another of Job’s friends, Zophar the Naamathite, whose name stems from the same root as ‘Zippor(ah)’, (Moses’ wife’s name), meaning ‘bird’, ‘pierce’, or ‘doom’…while Naamah is a close relative of Cain, being Lamech and Zillah’s daughter, as well as being an Ammonite princess who is one of king Solomon’s ‘strange wives’…!

*(perhaps why both David, and Moses have someone in their life say to them; “Thou art a bloody man”… indicating a lineage connection which both men benefit from (as being of a ‘celestial’ hybrid line), yet must ‘guard against’, and are partially compromised by at occasional junctures, hence the limited blessings from YHVH toward the end of their lives. . .) And incidentally, considering the (unstated) importance that the Old Testament places on bloodlines – for reasons now a little clearer – the original Korah in Numbers 16.1-33 was a cousin of Moses and Aaron. Likewise Talmai (the meaning of which is ‘my furrow’) was a royal king in Geshur (2Samuel13.37) and the father of David’s wife Maacah, the mother of David’s children Absalom and Tamar.
So, as we have also seen, in Jude1.11 he mentions three names as sinners; Cain, Balaam, and Core (Korah). It is fitting somehow therefore that St Jude is the patron saint of lost causes; for as David, Solomon, Moses, Enoch, Simon Peter and others show, there is always a way to seek redemption.

So this one small section of the Bible concerning Shallum, at 1Chronicles 9.17-19, points to one of the ways in which the Sumerian genes of the Nephilim – and perhaps the Anunnaki – entered into the Hebrew bloodlines, during the period of the Babylonian Captivity.

---

Side-bar; ISRAEL and the ASSYRIAN invasion of 722Bce;

Another possible route for the mixing of Hebrew and Mesopotamian gene-streams within the events of the Bible comes from the recounting of some of the invasions, sieges, exiles and enforced migrations of certain tribes and peoples, in relation to Israel and Judah within the Old Testament. (Although not in the sense of ‘mass migrations’ caused by environmental catastrophes etcetera, of which history has several examples…)
So for example, in 722 Bce, the Assyrian king Shalmaneser V overthrew Samaria, in Israel in the north, after a three year siege. Several of Israel’s tribes were taken into captivity, and taken back to Assyria.(2Kings17.5-6).As verse 18 notes, this was in punishment for the Israelites failure to follow YHVH’s statutes, commandments, and so forth, which led to divine displeasure;
“And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God, and they built high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city” (2Kings17.9).
Furthermore, “The Lord was angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight. None was left but the tribe of Judah only.” Many thousands were taken into captivity by the Assyrians. And incidentally, the bible then states that the Assyrians populated Israel with their own people, (2Kings17.18) – of significance because like the Akkadians and the Babylonians, the Assyrians were of the ‘celestial’ bloodlines of the Sumerians, as evidenced by their cities such as Nineveh being established with temples dedicated to Ninurta, the Anuna deity of Sumer later associated with Nimrud, the great-grandson of Noah who was a ‘mighty hunter before the Lord’, in Genesis10.8).
Likewise, 2Kings17.24 states; “And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthath, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and lived in its cities” . . .
Thus leading to them being called ‘Cuthites’ in Talmudic tradition. This was part of the Samaritan heritage from then on, meaning that by the era of the New Testament, the Samaritans were looked upon by the Israelites as an ‘unclean’ people. However, debate exists as to this narrative, with the alternative view being that the Samaritans were descended mainly from the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh who remained in Israel after the Assyrian conquest; in support of this 2Chronicles 30.1 seems to imply the same, which Samaritans have always claimed since then, to be genuine tribespeople of Israel.
Moreover, 2Kings 17.25-33 states that because of the circumstances related to the repopulation by Assyrians, the new settlers worshipped both the gods of the land, and of the lands from which they hailed; versions of the Anunnaki in other words, as the names given imply.
This is clear from the names; Avva meaning ‘to ruin’, or overturn, is very similar to the mythic ‘mother of the line of Cain’ (from the Book of Jubilees, etc) – Awan, the purported sister of Cain, there being so few people on earth at that point in the Bible (Gen4.17). Awan means ‘iniquity’, or to ruin, to overturn; a very good description of the innate nature of the lines of Cain. Awen was also the name of ‘On’, or ‘An’, the Egyptian name for the significant city called ‘Heliopolis’ by the Greeks, in all languages meaning the ‘city of the Sun’. Curiously another name for Awan is ‘Aclima’ in Islamic writings; it may connect directly to Ashima, which also means ‘offence’, mentioned in 2Kings17.30, when listing the pagan gods the incoming peoples worshipped at Samaria;“…and the men of Hamath made Ashima” – additionally, the name also may mean ‘a lion, a symbol of the sun’…
The Sepharvaim were a people brought in to the town after the Assyrian re-population; and they worshipped the deities Addramelech and Anammelech, to whom they sacrificed children in the fire – as ‘melech’ in Hebrew means (celestial) messenger or being, the name may mean ‘the lord is King or Prince’; and is also readable as the lord (Addra) Molech, as the passage 1Kings11.7 directly names; one of the worst pagan deities of antiquity in the Near East. The prefix ‘Ana’ gives the name the meaning ‘Anu is Lord/ or King’… another (again negative) reference in the Old Testament linking to the Sumerian deities the Anunnaki.

One point with relevance that is raised by some commentators, such as ‘studylight.org’ is that ‘there is no evidence in any cuneiform literature of Mesopotamia that would point to the presence of human sacrifice, by fire or otherwise, as part of the ritual”; the predominant societies or cultures which did practice such rites were in the Levant, in the region of Phoenicia/ Lebanon, Canaan and Syria, thus causing some writers to look to links between there and the Assyrians; after decline from c.1050Bce for two or three centuries, it was during the period of the Neo-Assyrian empire’s re-growth under Tiglath-Pileser III, from 745-727Bce that the empire achieved control of the Levant all the way to the Egyptian border. Likewise Babylon was conquered in 729Bce… Thus the practices mentioned, while nominally Assyrian may actually have been Syrian in origin..! Indeed, the predominant deity associated with these rituals, Moloch, or Milcom, was a deity of the Canaanite religion in the Levant from the 2nd millennium Bce through to the first centuries Ad.

The debate as to the nature of the Samaritans by the time of the New Testament may imply some ‘inter-mixing’ of the Assyrian and Hebrew cultures, or indeed peoples, took place. Or alternatively that the tribespeople remaining after the exile to Assyria were the forefathers of the Samaritans. (Nevertheless, by the time Jesus lived the name of the Samaritans was particularly low, and was used as a ‘racial’ insult, hence the Tale of the Good Samaritan confounding expectations…) Immediately after the return of the Israelites from Assyrian captivity in Israel, the Samaritans did play a part in the new life of the nation; partaking in Temple repairs (2Chronicles 34.9), worshipping in the house of YHVH (Jeremiah 41.5), and so on. Modern commentaries such as the Encyclopaedia Judaica give credence to the assertions of the Samaritans in this respect, such as their being of the lineage of Ephraim and Manasseh, and until the 17th century a high priesthood was believed to exist descending directly from Aaron through Eleazar and Phinehas. (EJ, vol 14, col.727). Curiously the name Phinehas contains the stem of ‘nahash’, from the same root as the Nehushtan, the Brazen Serpent created by Moses at YHVH’s bequest (Numbers21.6-9)…

In the New Testament the longest conversation Jesus has with any individual is that with the Samaritan woman at the well; a narrative again centred around questions of marriages, and the establishment of bloodlines. (This is at John 4.1-42). This meeting took place incidentally at ‘Sichar’ – also known as Sichem, or Shechem (meaning ‘shoulder’, or spine/ backbone). This is the site where Abraham reached the ‘Great tree of Moreh’ in Genesis12.6-8, the same tree presumably as the oak where Joshua assembled the Israelites to make them choose between YHVH and foreign gods they had begun to also worship. Thus a new covenant was affirmed here with God, highlighting the higher-dimensional’ nature of the site. Hence the name Shechem, or backbone, as a symbol of the heaven-earth axis existing there. Shechem is also the site of Jacob’s Well, where he first met the girl in ‘the land of the people of the east’ (Gen29.1) of Abraham’s lineage; because despite travelling hundreds of miles back towards Haran, Rachel was the daughter of his mother’s brother (Gen 29.10).

(Another point of note is that at this well the mouth of the well is covered by a stone, which Jacob rolls away; this is parallel to the Eben Shettiyah in the foundation of the Temple of Jerusalem, the stone placed over the ‘waters of the abyss’ to keep them in abeyance; thus Jacob’s action at Gen 29.10 in rolling the stone away is to allow a flood of the waters of fertility…symbolic in both personal, and wider terms). Curiously, in antiquity Egypt the hieroglyph spelt ‘sekem’ meant ‘vitality’ or life, a meaning which has been applied since then in usages connected to agriculture programmes etc; giving indication again of the links existing between ancient Egypt and Israel at the highest levels of wisdom.

---

2SAM19:

So this incredible, complex and meaningful section of 2Samuel, (which can be quite easily overlooked, as just a few of the many events of king David’s life), appears to be an in-depth examination of the choices and paths people situated toward the centre of power take in their journeys through life, as well as the variations of the effects the bloodline(s) of the “mighty men of old” have upon them. This is encoded into the narrative in subtle and detailed ways. Also it may be viewed as being a description/ commentary upon the manoeuvring which has characterized political power-plays throughout history. Few other sections of the Bible feature such stark political narratives…

In continuance of a related story, when David visits Judah (2Samuel 19.16) the man Shimei ‘hasted and came to meet king David’; and begs forgiveness, for “that which thy servant did perversely the day that my lord the king went out of Jerusalem”. ie. his cursing David and his men on the side of the hill as they passed through the deserted landscape…Again Abishai requests that Shimei be put to death, for cursing ‘the Lord’s anointed’ (2Samuel 19.21).
But (19.22) David refuses to put any man to death on the day of his reaffirmation as Israel’s king, and also of Absalom’s death.

2Sam19.23; Therefore David said unto Shimei, thou shalt not die. And the king sware unto him.

This shows a very human, forgiving, wise side of king David, indicating the fine balances at work in David’s life, and inner being. . . but later, on his death-bed, he reminds his (anointed) successor, his son Solomon, that this guarantee of mercy expires with him..! He further says to Solomon (1Kings2.8-9, which follows on from 2Samuel) –

And behold, thou hast Shimei. . . which cursed me with a grievious curse, in the day when I went Mahanaim. . . but I sware to him by the Lord, saying, I will not put thee to death with the sword.
Now therefore, hold him not guiltless; for thou art a wise man, and knowest what thou ought to do unto him; but his hoar head bring thou down to the grave with blood.

The very next verse is of the death of David, making these King David’s last words. Thus, kingship has been established in Israel. (see 2Samuel 23 for alternative last words.)

---

2SAM20:

Related to these narratives is the depiction of what might be termed one of the wise-women of the Jewish society. In Delphos, Greece, the Pythia, or ‘pythonesses’ relayed the prophecies of the Oracle at the Temple of Apollo, and were symbols of the deep powers of the subconscious sensing of reality. The Old Testament has similar women associated with feminine ‘instinctive’ wisdom, who also often play a pivotal role in key events – one of whom in the Old Testament who is a ‘wise woman’ consulted for her wisdom at the town of Abel-beth-Maacah.
She appears immediately after the events of Absalom’s attempted coup, in what is an amazing chapter, 2Samuel.20. Put succinctly, a man called Sheba then starts a revolution in Israel against David’s rule. He is named as David’s wife and Solomon’s paramour the Queen of Sheba are, although the spelling of ‘sheba’ varies in the ‘Queen -‘ instance, and some other examples by a single Hebrew letter, aleph instead of ayin. This may alter the meaning from ‘seven’ or ‘oath’, ie ‘to swear upon seven bonds, or seals’, etc, to also possibly mean ’man’ or ‘captive’ at the same time. There is some sense of aptness here in the sense that the negative bloodlines are portrayed as seen numerous times throughout the Bible, as a form of ‘captivity’, or slavery, tying in here with Sheba in 2Samuel20 where he is also described as ‘a man of Belial’ (‘worthlessness’/ the ‘devil’)…

To follow the events of 2Samuel20, they begin; “And there happened to be a man of Belial (Satan) whose name was Sheba. . . who said. We have no part in David, neither have we inheritance of the son of Jesse: every man to his tents, O Israel”. (2Sam 20.1)

Highlighting perhaps the impossibility of making all the members of the tribes happy as a ruler of Israel as David progressed in his reign. This is another Sheba associated with the lives of David and his family, for what must be a specific purpose of meaning; and there is more complex politics contained within the narrative here. After the rebellion of Absalom David knows the new insurrection must be dealt with quickly; having appointed his nephew Amasa as the new captain of his forces – unusual in that Amasa had been Absalom’s captain of forces, so perhaps David appoints him as a sign of reconciliation and healing (2Sam19.13)* – he sends for him to come to Jerusalem to organise an expedition. But when he doesn’t arrive at Jerusalem within three days, David fears the loyalty of Amasa may have swung to the new insurrection of Sheba. So he appoints a new commander, Abishai (likewise one of the three ‘sons of Zeruiah’) to instead lead the counter-strike.
*(just after David has mourned demonstrably over the death of his son, Absalom, thus causing Joab to say to David ‘thou lovest thine enemies, and hatest thy friends’ (2Sam19.5-6).

So Abishai, the ‘mighty men of David’ and his brother Joab set off towards the north-west; after six or so miles they meet Amasa and his forces, again at Gibeon, at “the great stone, which is in Gibeon” (related clearly in name to the ‘mighty men’ of the Nephilim bloodlines, and pagan hill-top sites, as noted already). Here Joab goes to embrace Amasa, David’s new ‘captain’ but as they clasp plunges a sword, again beneath his opponent’s fifth rib(!), killing him! (2Sam20.10) The reasons for his doing so are not made clear; it may be in revenge for having been replaced by him as David’s ‘chief of forces’! It may have been because Amasa had fought for Absalom – or possibly in case Amasa was now loyal to Sheba – but this latter choice seems unlikely…

When all the people see that Amasa “wallowed in blood in the midst of the highway. . . and stood still”, this leads Joab to drag Amasa out of the road into a field, and cover him with a cloth. Upon which all the men watching choose to follow Joab ‘to pursue after Sheba’ (20.13). Sheba, who in fleeing the men of David ‘went through all the tribes of Israel’ seeking shelter, finally arrives ‘unto Abel of Beth-Maacah’, and the tribe of the ‘Berites’ – ‘and they cast up a bank against the city, and it stood in the trench; and all the people that were with Joab battered the wall, to throw it down” (20.15). Joab and his men surround the town, and plan to lay siege and hence destroy it if the towns-people shelter the fugitive Sheba. Then a ‘wise-woman cried out of the city’ to speak with Joab. The verse begins;

“Then she spake, saying, They were wont to speak in old time, saying, They shall surely ask counsel at Abel: and so they ended the matter. I am one of them that are peaceable and faithful in Israel; thou seekest to destroy a city and a mother in Israel; why wilt thou swallow up the inheritance of the LORD?
And Joab answered and said, Far be it from me, that I should swallow up or destroy. The matter is not so; but a man of mount Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, hath lifted up his hand against the king, even against David. Deliver only him, and I will depart from the city. And the woman said unto Joab, Behold, his head shall be thrown to thee over the wall.
Then the woman went unto all the people in her wisdom. And they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bichri, and cast it out to Joab. And he blew a trumpet, and they retired from the city, every man to his tent. And Joab returned unto Jerusalem unto the king” (2Sam20.18-22).

In speaking to the bloodthirsty, or highly violent Joab, the ‘mighty man’ of Israel, (as the Nephilim were ‘mighty men of old, men of renown’, at Gen6.1-4), the wise-woman at the gate raises connotations of the proclivities of the Nephilim in her words; “why wilt thou swallow up the inheritance of the LORD?”, as the Nephilim are described in the First Book of Enoch;

“And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nonetheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”. (Rev. R.H.Charles version, 15.10).

And there are additional connotations attached to the woman’s words; namely the fate of the rebellious Korah and ‘two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly’ in Numbers16 (remarkably similar to the two hundred ‘sons of the gods’ who descended to Earth at mount Hermon’ to ‘commingle with’ human women in 1Enoch7… Korah was the cousin of Moses who rebelled against the authority of Moses and Aaron; in Numbers16.32;

“And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods. They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them; and they perished from among the congregation” (Numbers 16. 31-33).

In this way thus becoming a by-word for the rebellious and sinful, as at Jude1.11. Korah is also relevant as an ancestor in the lineages of those returning from Babylon and overseeing the Temple, (1Chr 9.17);

“(Of the Levites)… the porters were, Shallum, and Akkub, and Talmon, and Ahiman, and their brethren. Shallum was the chief; Who hitherto waited in the king’s gate eastward; they were the porters in the companies of the children of Levi. And Shallum the son of Kore . . . of the house of his father, the Korahites, were over the work of the service, keepers of the gates of the tabernacle; and their fathers, being over the host of the Lord, were keepers of the entry”.

It is coincidental that Talmai is named as one of the three sons of the gargantuan Anak in Numbers 13.22/33, the three sons of Anak being Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai. The name Akkub incidentally holds meanings of ‘lowest’, or ‘cunning’…

These words sting Joab to straightforward denial. And indeed, most of 2Sam20 does appear to be concerned with the character of the ‘captain of David’s forces’ more than anything else…

1KINGS1/2 – THE SUCCESSION OF SOLOMON:

(Although the line of David and Solomon was not destined to last long; following the death of Solomon the twelve tribes of Israel and Judah gathered at Shechem (the ‘heaven-earth’ axis point, as we shall see shortly), and rejected Rehoboam the eldest son of Solomon as leader of the united tribes. Ten of the twelve tribes chose instead Jeroboam , a ‘mighty man’ of the tribe of Manasseh, splitting the tribes thereafter as Judah and Benjamin ruled themselves in the south staying loyal to the descendants of David and Solomon. The ten northern tribes of Israel were ruled from c.960Bce by the dynasties of Jeroboam until 732Bce, when (as mentioned) the Assyrians invaded and laid siege for three years, after which they took the peoples into captivity in Assyria, as well as populating Israel with their own peoples).
And in the story of the proposed succession, and rejection by the tribes of Solomon’s son, there is further evidence supporting the themes being looked at; for in proposing the kingly lineages of Israel as represented by David and Solomon to be of the Sumerian ‘celestial’ bloodlines of the Anunnaki as they spread throughout the Near East from c.3,200Bce onwards, Solomon’s son’s name bears great relevance.
So the son who the tribes reject as king because of his sinful nature, is called Rehoboam (1Kings11.43); in 1Kings12 he shows this by rejecting the morally sound advice of the tribe’s elders (12.8) in favour of the young men he has grown up with.
But the primary reason his name supports the idea of the Sumerian lineages of kings (among other lines) is that in Genesis 10.11 Rehoboth-Ir is a city in Assyria which was built by none other than Nimrod, one of the proposed links between the lines of Sumer and the Israelites. Rehoboth-ir lays between Nineveh and Calah/Kalhu, (another name for the ancient town of Nimrud…). In additional support, when the names are examined closely, it can be seen they are composed of the stem ‘rahab’; as mentioned, Rahab is used by Isaiah to describe the ‘dragon of the deep’ which Isaiah and Job say God cut to pieces (ie. in the line of the Babylonian myths of Marduk destroying the ’sea-serpent’ Tiamat. In this sense the name indicates the forces of chaos within the ‘abyss’ which threaten order within the Creation. Rahab is also interpreted widely as representing Egypt, and as such represents human pride, and arrogance. It is also assessed by some as having meanings related to ‘violence’ (NOBSE Bible Name List), for reasons which become clear, representing the unbalanced celestial lineages of Sumer as it does…

Indeed, as 1Kings 2.12 – shows, the first actions of King Solomon are not to do with celebration, or an affirmation of the kingdom and the people, but with the ‘settling of scores’, or the establishing of his authority (in connection with those who challenged his father and his succession). . . in fact, the entire narrative of the end of David’s sovereignty and the establishment of Solomon’s is an unedifying montage of intrigue, political scheming, ambition, squabbling, venality, violence, the breaking of family bonds and ties, and bloody reprisals. . . a commentary on the by-products of kingship, perhaps.

Thus the first verses of Solomon’s reign describe; dealing with his brother Adonijah – being the elder brother Adonijah had attempted to gain the support of the priests and tribe leaders of the elite for his claim to inherit/take the kingdom. Once Solomon’s right to rule was affirmed by the dying David, and he was crowned, Adonijah then asked Beersheba, he and Solomon’s mother, to ask Solomon to give him the hand of the attractive girl Abishag who gave David her vitality/comfort in his last days…! Solomon refuses, saying ‘let him ask for the kingdom too’ (because of Adonijah’s actions) – and sending one of the ‘sons of Jehoiada’, Benaiah, has Adonijah killed (1Kings 2.22-5).
Next, (1Kings2.26), he banishes the high priest of the Lord, ie the chief priest of Jerusalem/Israel – Abiathar – for supporting the ‘coup’ attempt of Adonijah, telling him that for his actions ‘thou art worthy of death’…but because he bore the Ark of the Covenant before David, and shared all the sufferings of his father over the years, he is instead banished to his home area, Anathoth.

And after that he hears (1Kings2.28) that one of the ‘sons of Zeruiah’, one of his former captains, Joab, who lent his arms to Adonijah’s recent attempt at the throne, and who killed Absalom, has taken refuge in the sanctuary of the Tabernacle of the Lord, holding onto the altar. . . Solomon is unmoved by this, and sends Benaiah to kill him saying ‘Go, fall upon him’. . . this he does, telling Joab he is to receive no mercy for, in Solomon’s words, the ‘innocent blood which Joab shed, from me, and from the house of my father‘. (1Kings2.31-4), after which he is buried alone in the desert (1Kings2.34).

And finally he deals with Shimei; (1Kings 2.36) Sending for Shimei he orders him to build a house in Jerusalem, and live there, and not leave the bounds of the city; on the day he passes across the Kidron brook, he will die; “thy blood shall be upon thine own head”. Shimei agrees, and complies for three years; until two of his servants run away to a neighbouring tribal area; which causes him to ride there to bring them back. . . but King Solomon is told of this, and calls Shimei to him again;1Kings2.42 . . .

Did I not make thee to swear by the LORD, and protested unto thee, saying, Know for a certain, on the day thou goest out, and walkest abroad any whither, that thou shalt surely die? And thou saidst unto me, The word that I have heard is good.
Why then hast thou not kept the oath of the LORD, and the commandment that I have charged thee with?
The king said moreover to Shimei, Thou knowest all the wickedness which thine heart is privy to, that thou didst to David my father: therefore the LORD shall return thy wickedness upon thine own head; And King Solomon shall be blessed, and the throne of David shall be established before the LORD forever. So the king commanded Benaiah. . . which went out and fell upon him, that he died. And the kingdom was established in the hand of Solomon.

Showing a storyline which is finely nuanced. This entire narrative serves in this way to focus upon the contradictory aspects of the ‘kingly’ bloodline; the genetic ‘kingliness’ flows through the veins of David – (‘and I am this day weak’, ie. essentially conflicted, compromised) – and his relatives, and has its effects upon the actions, and thoughts of them all.

KING NAHASH.

One of the most bizarre, and significant passages of the Old Testament regarding the nature of kingship perhaps is the Nahash who was the king of Ammon at start of Saul’s reign, whose forces attacked the town of Jabesh-Gilead, laying siege to it; the surrounded inhabitants sued for peace, whereby he gave them one week to consider his terms; these included the demand that – every occupant give up one of their eyes..! a strong implication of the worst aspects of the bloodline, perhaps.

This occurs in the first book of Samuel – in fact it is 1Samuel11.1–11(!);

Then Nahash the Ammonite came up and encamped against Jabesh-Gilead; and all the men of Jabesh said unto Nahash, Make a covenant with us, and we will serve thee. And Nahash the Ammonite answered them, On this condition… that I may thrust out all your right eyes, and lay it for a reproach upon all Israel.

(Upon which the elders asked for seven days to think it over (as you would!), during which time rescue arrived in the form of Saul, Israel’s first king!) – of note here, the rescuing tribes are said to have numbered 330,000, a cosmic #; the ‘children of Israel were three hundred thousand, and the men of Judah thirty thousand’ (1Samuel11.8), ie 10:1 ratio making 11 x 3, potentially highlighting the 11th harmonic, as it might be termed.

This cosmic# ratio/ value is also present in the numbers of workers who were building The Temple of Solomon; in 1Kings15-16 it relates that there were 70,000 men ‘that bare burdens’, and 80,000 ‘hewers in the mountains’ – and overseeing these workers were ‘three thousand and three hundred (3,300) which ruled over the people that wrought the work’. It is notable that the value is shown to be active at the higher directive level(s) where material reality is created; as the workers create the Temple under higher (harmonic) direction.

And their 7:8 proportion is also relevant – it is raised by Solomon in the proverbs of Ecclesiastes, as mentioned earlier, saying in Ecclesiastes 11.1 and 11.2; to “give. . . unto 7 and 8. . . for thou knowest not what shall be in the world”.
Possibly in reference to the seven notes of the octave, or the 8 notes including the initial note doubled, as a new octave starts. . . likewise David is the eighth son of Jesse, contrasted with the other seven.

As would be expected of values related to the king Solomon, this # is moreover closely connected to the Sun;
the (gravitational) mass of the sun: earth = 330,000:1.

So these values have cos# meanings as well as material significance in terms of the Sun
and the Earth. This is reflected in the (encoded) number of 1Samuel 11.8 –

√5/2 = 1.118 (+.5=ϕ, ie 1.618); further, √5³ = 11.18033 – and similarly, the escape velocity of earth is exactly 11.18 km/s.

As well as 330,000 there is association in the Bible of the number 333(000) – for example –

864,000 / 333,000 = 2.6181 (ϕ²)

• and in fact, ϕ x √ϕ (1.6181 x 1.272) = 3.33.

which connects 333 and phi (ϕ) with the Sun’s diameter.
The 11 and 3 ratios are linked to the planets also, within the ‘Sun – Earth – Moon’ harmonics as we have termed it in section 2. So, for example, the ratio of the Earth’s (equatorial) diameter to that of the Moon’s is 7920:2160 miles, or 3.66:1; in other words 11:3
proportions berween the two planets. So this 11:3 ratio gives both the length of the Earth’s sidereal year, (366 days), and additionally the Moon’s diameter proportion to the Earth’s (1:3.66). This is also expressable as 27.32% – the same figure as the Moon’s orbital period of one lunar month, at 27.32 days, a ‘synchronicity’ for which there is no apparent reason. The relations of the Earth and the Moon to the Sun are likewise indicated in certain measurements, such as, ‘one day’ of 24 hours is 86,400 seconds, while the Sun’s diameter is 864,000 miles…. indeed further ‘inexplicable’ harmonics of time, space and matter exist between the three planets – so finely in tune with each other for aeons that they are the only system which has produced visible organic life (on the Earth’s surface) within the known universe. Something we examine in a little more depth in the Geometry and Cosmic# section)…all potential reasons, by the way, why the proportions are encoded into the numbers given in the Bible for the armies of Israel and Judah in relation to the siege of Nahash, and the Ammonites. As we shall see, the figures given are apparently excessive for any armies existing in the 10th century Bce in the Near East, by a considerable factor.

That there are links to the Sun, Earth and Moon in the numeric ‘code’ of 330/333 finds strong support in the Book of Deuteronomy – one of the key sections of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, traditionally ascribed to Moses. This is where he is nearing completion of his life’s work, of bringing the Israelites out of Egypt into the land of Canaan under the Lord’s guidance, and indeed, is nearing the end of his life; at this time he gathers the tribes of Israel, to bless his twelve sons and the people; Deut 33.1-3;
And this is the blessing, wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the Children of Israel before his death. And he said, The LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints; from his right hand went a fiery law for them. Yea, he loved the people; all his saints are in thy hand: and they sat down at thy feet; everyone shall receive of thy words.

In verse 33.2 the sun, and the LORD are identified metaphorically; ‘. . .came from (behind) the mountain of Sinai, rose up from Seir, shined from mount Paran‘, brought the blessings of the light, ‘in a fiery law (the divine order) for them’.
This is the clearest equating of the Sun with the (blessings of) the Lord. . . as verse 33.3 likewise states. In fact the Hebrew word used in this verse is ‘habab’ – it is used only once in the entire Bible (Abarim.com) and means love, in the sense of the love that God feels for his people. . . an apt description for the sense conveyed in these verses.
(Incidentally, this short phrase ‘the LORD cometh with his ten thousands of saints’ is ascribed in Jude 1.14-15 to the patriarch Enoch, providing some authentication of the Book of 1Enoch existing in the 2nd or 3rd centuries Bce; indeed there are an extensive number of phrases used in 1Enoch which were then used also in later New Testament writings. Some academics consider there to be up to a hundred examples of such phrases, etc).
Another coincidence comes from Exodus 25, when YHVH gives the Israelites the dimensions for the Ark of the Covenant to be built; 2.5 cubits by 1.5 x .5 cubits. This makes its length: width and height ratio 1.6666 ;1. The harmonics of the hexagram, and the Vesica as we have seen; and incidentally half as it is of 3.333 : 1. This is curious considering the cosmic energies which the Ark seems to not only represent, but contain within its frame; it is used in the destruction of the Walls of Jericho along with the many repetitions of the law of seven (Joshua6.1-27); it is captured by the Philistines who then use it to hopefully defeat the Israelites (1Samuel5.8). This is at Gath, home of the giant Goliath and his relatives; but causes the Philistines to develop ‘emerods in their secret parts’ (5.9) – this may be a metaphor for the ambitious nature of the giants, and ‘mighty men of old’ (as in the Tower of Babylon), who want the energies of the heavens for their earthly ambitions and desires. But the Philistines are made ill though across the seven months they hold it, as noted; so they beg to return it to the Israelites. They are so scared of it though they let the two cows who are pulling it decide where to take it! (1Samuel6.8-9). Incidentally, the two ‘milch kine’ journey to Beth-shemesh, ‘whereon they set down the ark of the Lord’ (6.18) – this meaning ‘the house of Shamash’, the Sumerian deity of the sun. Not only is this confirmation of the cosmic energies of the Ark, for the next verse relates of YHVH, “And he smote the men of Beth-shemesh, because they had looked into the ark of the LORD, even he smote fifty thousand and threescore and ten men”! (6.19)
.
The word for light in Hebrew is ‘Or’, coming from the Sumerian ‘Ur’, meaning the same. From Sumer to the Babylonian era, Orion was called Ur-Annu, meaning the Light of the Heavens, the second half stemming from Anu, father of the Anunnaki, whose name means simply ‘heavens’. (So as Ki- in Sumerian was the word for Earth, this made the Anunnaki ‘those who from Heaven to Earth came’… thus making the conjunction of matter and energy the essence of their name).
It is from this root word for divine order and light that the Roman word ’origere’ meaning arise/ originate stemmed.
From these sources our language today uses the same meaning for words such as; order, orchestrate, origin, organ, orientation – ie. those concerned with the harmonic functioning of celestial systems; the correct metabolism of the body; and so on. The French use the stem word Or to mean gold, the metal that represents and resembles the Sun. An example of a concept embodying this and several other cos# matters is that of the Ouroboros, the Greek version of a serpent curled around the world with its tail in its mouth. This symbol, from at least c.1340Bce in Egypt onwards was used to symbolize the circle of ‘eternity’ in esoteric and alchemical matters, and has occupied a place in virtually every civilization since then; for example in the Rosicrucian and alchemical treatise Atalanta Fugiens ( – fleeing), published by Michael Maier in Germany in Ad1617-1618, a text containing fifty or so abstract images alongside epigrams, prose, and musical pieces, is a depiction of the same symbol.

(left) the first known depiction of the Ouroboros, from the Tomb of Tutankhamun, the 18th dynasty Pharaoh (circa 1330 Bce) in the Valley of the Kings at Thebes, the sacred site at Luxor. Wikimedia.CC-by-SA 4.0. (right) from an alchemical text dating to 1478 in Europe. (Wikimedia, PD)

As the symbol of the light of the heavens as they interact with the sphere of the earth and the material world the ‘ouroboros’ has definite connections with the gaze of the Sphinx at the Giza complex; the ‘lion of the ground’ as it has been called looks directly east towards the rising sun along the 30th Parallel, on what is thus one of the earth’s major geometric division lines. It is apposite that the lion/ serpent figure placed within the Pyramid complex at the geometric centre of the world’s land-masses looks along a ‘dragon/ serpent-line’ (containing the ‘lion/serpent’ energies of the sun and the cosmos) as they travel through the earth’s surface on a path running from where the Sun rises each day, in a line which circles the entire globe. Moreover, the Great Pyramid at Giza had several features built into its design pointing to the constellation of Orion, which was representative of the Egyptian deity Osiris during antiquity. So the entire site, and the cosmic consciousness contained within its design and construction, would appear to have some essential connection to the energies of light and the higher dimensions as they vitalize the world. The central point being the organisation of the world’s systems of life in opposition to the forces of chaos, and entropy.

The family of Abraham, the father of the nation of Israel, came from Sumer, his birthplace being called the ‘land of Ur’, providing another link in the interwoven layers of connections in the Bible. Incidentally, Abraham’s grandfather in Ur was called Nahor; (close in pronunciation to ‘nahash’). He was the ninth in descent from Noah according to the Book of Genesis, making Abraham, the ‘father of nations,’ (Gen.26.4) eleventh – again, a significant value, or harmonic in cosmic #.
And in keeping with the Seraphim linked meanings of so many significant characters (see section iv), Nahor means ‘scorched’ (as well as nostril, or snort), much as sarap means ‘parched’. The entire family of Lot are linked to this meaning, as are the Angels of the Lord who destroy Sodom and Gomorrah with the powers of the Sun (Genesis.19) – Abraham being coincidentally Lot’s uncle. Lot’s wife for instance, who looks back at the cataclysm is turned to a pillar of salt, in part a symbol of the desert, salinisation, and the powers of the sun taken to excess. The Ammonites of whom Nahash was the ruler came from the lineage of Lot and his daughters, linking the two again on multiple level – Lot’s daughters plied their father with wine in the cave on a hill soon after the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and conceived by him, fearing ‘there is not a man in the world to come in unto us’ or such… (Gen19.31). Ammon was the son who came from the younger sister, while the elder gave birth to Moab (Gen.19.38); each respectively creating the lineages or tribes of the Ammonites and the Moabites. Both have many connections to the Sumerian celestial bloodlines, akin potentially to the Nephilim or such; for example, when describing the actions of Solomon in worshipping the pagan gods of his foreign wives (at 1Kings11.1-14), it lists several. These include Ashtoreth, goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the ‘abomination of Moab, and Milcom/ Molech, the ’abomination of the Ammonites’ (11.5/7). And indeed, it was to this pagan deity that the Israelites fell to sacrificing their own children to, as the Bible puts it, by ‘putting them through the fire’…(Leviticus18.21/ 2Ki17.17/ 2Ki21.6/ Eze16.21).
It is at 1Kings11.11 that YHVH says “Forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes…I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant”. Incidentally, or perhaps not, it is at 11.14 that “The Lord stirred up an adversary unto Solomon, Hadad the Edomite; he was of the king’s seed in Edom”. The name Hadad is closely tied to Mesopotamian and Near Eastern names for the Anunnaki’s storm-god, called Adad, (or Hadad in Canaan, Lebanon and the wider Levant). This is approximately the sixth time the word ‘satan’ is used in the Old Testament in the sense of an ‘adversary’, or (divinely inspired) opponent.. The word ‘satan’ is likewise used to describe Solomon’s father David (!), at 1Samuel29.4, when the Philistines use it of David as he has ‘slewn his ten thousands’ of them… And incredibly it is next used after that to describe Abishai, one of the three ‘sons of Zeruiah’, at 2Samuel19.22, again when Shimei is before the king, on the day of David’s re-affirmation as king after Absalom’s failed insurrection; “And David said, What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should be this day adversaries unto me”… quite conclusive proof overall of the themes of this section. We will consider additional themes related to this later in the section.

SIDE-BAR;

The size of the army in the Nahash passage of 1Samuel11.8 is far greater than any other time or biblical reference, making it possibly as much a metaphorical figure as a real one. Another illustrative example is in 1Chronicles 21.5 David counts his army as 1,570,000 ! Most scholars concur this is very unlikely*, and as such may instead be symbolic; and indeed, noting the cos# associations already found, it is noteworthy that Pi/ 2 = 1.57 08, as we have seen a key value in the octave between 1 and 2.

antiquity Israel would have been unlikely to be able to support population figures in the millions (no archeological sites support such figures either), leaving the possibility the figures given are allegorical or used for other reasons.
At the Battle of Kadesh in 1275Bc between the Egyptians and the Hittites, (two of the foremost empires of the era), in one of the major battles of the time, each army numbered around 20,000 men each; a much more realistic figure for the 2nd millennium Bce.
The biblical confusion may stem from a dual-meaning of the Hebrew word eleph; used as a word for ‘thousands’ it has the alternative meaning of ‘a person’s clan’, ie part of a tribe…so 330 clans would equal around 10-15,000 men fit to fight.

There are some interesting connections within the short passages of 1Kings11.1, and 1Samuel11.1 – firstly, the encoding of the cosmic# 111.1/ 1.111 (√1.23456), and 111.8 (√5/2, or 2.236/2).
Secondly the link of the king’s name to David’s relative, or bloodline, as well as the Nehash – the Healing Serpent which Moses raised on a cross in the desert. And further, connects this to the Nagas, which this book estimates to be the source of all the following uses across cultures in antiquity; and the etymological source, then and now, of the word ‘snake’; from PIE (s-)nego. This is still used in India today for the Indian cobra (nagas nagas )! And origin of the words for nerve (via Greek, neuros), neuron, sinew (PIE; s-neu, snake-like) and so on . . !
We discuss in the Etymology section how leylines/energy-lines across the earth are considered in antiquity to be ‘serpents of the ground’, indeed that the word Sion / Zion derives from cognates of sinew (sionu), an enabling, connecting concept where energy and matter conjoin (words connected to the PIE term for serpent, ‘s-nego’; *(s)neu – tendon, sinew, source of Sanskrit ‘snavan’ ; band, or sinew. Proto-italic / Greek – (s)neuros – a sinew, tendon, nerve, muscle, vigour, force, power, energy, strength… a cord string bow or wire).

It is possible to theorize that a). the Nagas are closely linked to the Anunnaki, (as implied possibly by the terms Nahash the Ammonite/ Anakim etc, and b). that the Nagas operate according to a higher, or cosmic agenda, not from the perspective of human affairs – in other words they are somehow associated with the ‘angelic orders’ such as the Seraphim, as featured in the books of Isaiah, etc.

This may be a possible explanation of the outrageous demand made by the king Nahash of the Israelites. . . for it is only three verses earlier when Samuel (via the Lord) warns the people that in requesting a king instead of a prophet to rule them, ‘to be like the other nations’, they will end up giving their wealth, their children, even their lives, to their worldly rulers.(1Samuel 8.11-22)… yet they refuse to reconsider upon which YHVH has Samuel appoint earthly Saul to be their first king.

It may be that the demand of Nahash was an (ironic) comment upon the choices made, and an example of both a sovereign’s cruelty, as well as the ‘callous impartiality’ of the Nagas – something the Sumerian deity Enlil appeared to possess in great quantity .
when condemning mankind to be destroyed in the carnage of the Flood in Gilgamesh.
Related is the saying of Jesus, in the New Testament; ‘If thine eye offends thee, pluck it out’, (Matthew 18.9) ie. the demands of heaven are higher than those of the world. But the people of Israel were not prepared to ‘pluck their own eye out’, and thus began the path that (inevitably?) led to their inconstancy before YHVH – who punished them with the Assyrian exile, the Babylonian Capture, and the centuries of instability up to the Roman occupation around the time of Jesus.

So this short section of the book of Samuel shows the great depths of meaning contained within the Bible – in particular;

• the nature of ‘imbalanced’ bloodlines, like that of Cain and Lamech, or Gilgamesh and Enki
• the effects of the bloodlines are hard to separate from the negative consequences… and people such as David show the ongoing battle within such individuals between the varying aspects of their natures. . . all of which lends some support to this section’s focus on the antique civilizations’ emphasis within their myths and religious texts and artworks of the ‘contradictions’ and ambiguities of the vitalizing energies mankind receives from the ‘heavens’, particularly certain significant lineages of people, such as many of the Hebrew patriarchs, and the kings of the Old Testament. That the many lineages and off-shoots of the Old Testament form so many different expressions of the ‘celestial-lineages’ of Sumer, and Babylon etcetera, may be seen to be indications of the potential differences contained within the broader concept; something which is itself hard to comprehend or define…

iii. SACRED PLACES in the BIBLE.

Concepts of a HEAVEN-EARTH LADDER within the Bible and the building of (sacred) places of worship at such sites.

Wells/Rivers/Stones/Oaks/Ladders/Angels/Heaven.

We saw in the Squared Circle and Vesica Piscis sections how the conjunction, or ‘meeting-point’ of the higher energies of the celestial sphere with the lower dimensional aspects of ‘material earth’ is portrayed in the Bible as the four rivers of the Garden of Eden flowing outwards from the (higher energetic) centre. A symbol found within the famous Mesopotamian ‘Tablet of Shamash’ (left) from c.855Bce in the ancient city of Sippar, one of the oldest sacred cities of Sumer.

“And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads. The name of the first is Pison; that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold” (Genesis 2.10-11).

(left) The four-rays/rivers ‘planetary’ symbol from the (highly symbolic) Tablet of Shamash at Sippar, Mesopotamia c.870Bce. Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain

In geometric terms of the 360° of the circle we therefore find 4 quarters of 90° each, whereby cosmic energy is now ‘oriented’ harmonically to the world, and dimension(s) we materially exist within. This is very often the underlying concern when the Bible makes reference to ‘the four points of the compass’; in much the same way as the ‘angels who measure with their cords’ are described in the Book of 1Enoch, and in Sumerian myths such as Gilgamesh, and many of the most relevant books of the Bible, such as in Job, Isaiah, and Revelations. What they appear to be measuring are the dimensions of the earth, and significant points on its surface. . . and considering the frequent references to North, South, East and West in the Bible, even in the oldest books such as Genesis, thought to have been written at some time between 500 and 1000 Bce, presumably the compass existed by such times…

As we have seen, there are many symbols of the Squared Circle as representative of this meeting of heavenly and earthly energies; including the Knights of Malta/ Maltese Cross, where each quadrant’s ray touches where the circle and the square meet, at 8 points on the symbol, so if a square is drawn outwards from the inward points of the four rays this completes the square and equal circle design. Similarly the representation of Jesus at Chartres cathedral with a four rayed star and circle behind his head; (see G.Strachan’s book on Chartres Cathedral and Gothic architecture p.31 & 71 for more on this);

(left) Jesus with four-rayed star within circle behind his head, within the shape of the Vesica Piscis, at the West Portal of Chartres Cathedral, built between 1190 -1220 Ad.
Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain

Indeed, this four-rayed symbol, which effectively places square and circle of equal circumference together, predates the 1st millennium Bce; see the photograph of the stela of king Shamsi-Adad V from Nimrud in Assyria, dating to circa 814Bce (shown below). The British Museum states simply that the symbol in the centre of his chest is that of the sun-god Shamash, as seen in Sumer and the Epic of Gilgamesh, (hence the king’s theophonic name, along with Adad, god of thunder and storms) and as such, again indicates the symbol is of the energies of the sun and its light as they bring life to the earth. Indeed the four rayed star symbol within the Tablet of Shamash is clearly the forerunner or predecessor of the concept of the four rivers of the Garden of Eden in Genesis, considering the influence of the Sumerian traditions of wisdom within Hebrew civilization, a ‘line-of-transmission’ which occurred during the Babylonian Capture, most notably).

This is primarily a conceptual view of the ‘four rivers of Eden’ within the Bible having been written to contain complex metaphors within seemingly apparent facts; one reason why there is no academic consensus on the sitings of the four named rivers. In other words, the text has ‘encodings’ of meaning concerning allegorical matters not directly referred to. This would indicate also, as Gurdjieff and Ouspensky etcetera maintained, the Bible, (like all sacred texts) contains throughout its diverse books the ‘esoteric language’ of symbols and metaphors, to communicate meanings of higher consciousness; meanings which are potentially beyond the power of words to effectively or adequately describe). This perspective or question, of the ultimate ‘veracity’ of the information given within the books of the Bible, one which to some (but not all) people lays at the heart of debates about ‘biblical wisdom’, is not simply a development of modern scriptural exegesis; in his book ‘The Secret Power of Music’ David Tame relates (p.208) the writings of some of the early Church fathers in this respect;
“Only from the fifth century Ad did the Creation stories of Genesis begin to be taken as literal historical records; this occurring as knowledge of the ancient wisdom within the Christian movement deteriorated or was forced underground. Before this, we find Gregory of Nyssa (c.Ad 390) describing the Genesis Creation as ‘ideas in the form of a story’. The other prominent churchmen of the time also accepted the Creation stories as allegorical”.

(The tendency to interpret every detail of ancient texts such as Gilgamesh only in literal terms is the source of many misunderstandings and misguided conclusions; metaphors, such as the Ark built by Utnapishtim measuring 60 x 60 x 60 cubits (ie cube-shaped) clearly contain more meaning when understood as encoded higher wisdom concerning the (sacred) geometric forms energy assumes in its material expression, rather than simple physical description. For example, connecting the Ark to the concepts of the Cube, as in the Temple of Jerusalem’s Holy-of-Holies, the (cubic!) Heavenly City as described by St. John in the esoteric/Gnostic text the Book of Revelations, the sacred Islamic site of the Kaaba at Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and so on; also, to the concepts of the ‘box’ (tebar), as the word used only twice in the Bible, for the Ark of the Covenant, and the basket Moses was floated in. Which may, accordingly, be seen to contain metaphoric significances pertaining to different levels of reality, for example to the metaphor of the body as an ‘ark’, or temple).

The ubiquity of the cross within the circle in civilizations such as the Assyrian one following in the footsteps of Sumer, is a good example of the conscious use of symbols designed to convey abstract concepts whatever the language spoken, and indeed, variations of this symbol have existed for much of the history of civilization, across all times and places.

So the widespread concepts, often more ‘abstract’, or deeper than initially may seem, throughout antiquity of how the heavens’ energies reached and disseminated through the Earth may be seen to be one of the key subjects of the Bible, and other sacred texts and artworks.

And this section therefore will begin with what is a short, quite often overlooked narrative within the (packed) events of the Old Testament, namely the passage describing how Jacob slept at a well one night, and dreamt repeatedly that a ladder stretched up from where he lay to the heavens. Being terrified throughout the night, by this ‘celestial’ experience, in the morning Jacob awoke
and remarked; ‘How dreadful this place is’, marking the site of the well with a stone, to honour it as the ‘gate of heaven’. As a quick note, the name Babylon stemmed from Bab-ili, meaning ‘gateway of the gods’, which could be reference to the city itself, or to the lands of Mesopotamia around it, as homelands of the Anunnaki for several millennia.

It is this inter-dimensional character of many special places upon the Earth’s surface, and the network of (sacred) buildings humanity has erected at them from (broadly speaking) the Neolithic era of the 4th millennium Bce onwards which this section will look into, providing as it does a link between ‘cosmic number’ and the various metaphors of antiquity concerned with the pathways between the ‘heavens’ and the world, or between energy and matter, ie. ‘gateways’ to the higher dimensions.

There are several further linked passages in the Bible which refer via allegory to what are (effectively) sacred sites, at points where the world axis/ ‘heavens gates’ are located (at crossover nodes within the earth’s energy-lines and fields) – and as we shall see, this clarity is signified by very often by the presence of water – both in the myths, and the actual sites said to be ‘gateways’ to the higher dimensions. The list of such revered ‘higher-dimensional’ sites includes in Britain places such as Stonehenge, Glastonbury Tor, Avebury circle, Holy Isle Lindisfarne just off the coast of Northumbria, Newgrange in N.Ireland, Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands, St Michael’s Mount in Cornwall, Avebury Henge, Silbury Hill, the West Kennett long barrow and ‘the Sanctuary’, Holy Isle Lindisfarne, and many others… And world-wide, such places as Jerusalem, Lhasa (the capital of Tibet), Angkor Wat, Mount Mandara in India, in America Mount Shasta in California, and Mt. Denali in Alaska, in South America historic sites such as Macchu Piccu, Teotihuacan, Cuzco, Tenochtitlan, Ollyantambo, Nazca and so on; the Easter Islands and other sites in the Pacific; in Australia Ayers Rock, and more. All have been considered to be special places for centuries if not longer, and it is theorized that the world-wide energy grid(s) equivalent to the Earth’s energetic bodies link many of these sites, having significant node-points between different energy-lines or fields precisely where these sacred sites have been located since antiquity. (And thus enabling the network to function efficiently by preventing (over-)building taking place at these sites). This may indicate why the point on the spine at the base of the head named in TCMA as ‘the occipital gateway’ is so important, as it links the head/ brain (energy) with the body (matter). It was this exact point that was shown to have some inner significance in the many versions of the ‘Tree of Life’ stelae created throughout Sumerian and subsequent civilizations of Mesopotamia.

So to look at the passage describing the experience of Jacob, at Genesis 28.10; Jacob has just taken the birth right of his elder brother Esau from their father Isaac, by dint of taking advantage of the elderly Isaac’s lack of sight and impersonating his elder brother. After this he leaves home to travel to Mesopotamia, to avoid his angered brother for a period of time, as a tricked and dispossessed Esau states a wish to kill his brother (Gen 27.41). So Jacob’s mother tells him to go to Haran, in northern Mesopotamia, making it part of the Old Assyrian Empire in 2000Bce, (which grew just after the Akkadian civilization, the Eastern-Semitic Mesopotamian culture following on from the Sumerian one) where her family are situated; her brother Laban, and her father Bethuel (28.2), the son of Abraham’s brother Nahor. The name Bethuel means the ‘House of the Lord’. . . linking another central character of the Hebrew religion to Sumer and the ‘divine’ or ‘celestial’ bloodlines which originated there. But on his journey he stops overnight at a well in the desert, at Beer-Sheba, the ‘Well of Seven’.

GENESIS 28.10-19:

And Jacob went out from Beer-Sheba, and went towards Haran.
And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night… and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep.

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. And behold, the LORD stood above it, and said, I AM the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land where thou liest, to thee will I give it, and thy seed.
And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south; and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
And behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places wither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land.
And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not.

And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it.
And he called that place Beth-el; but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.

Indeed, the first point of interest is that his mother told him to travel to Haran, and Padam-aram (both being areas of northern Mesopotamia linking the family of Abraham to the Akkadians as well as ‘Ur of the Chaldees’ stated to be the birthplace of Abram and his wife Sarai), to go to the family of her father, Bethuel. Haran the town means ‘the road’ or ‘crossroad’, and is cognate to the Babylonian ‘haranu’ meaning the same, while in Babylonian astronomy the night-skies were divided up into three ‘Ways’ or ‘Bands’, (‘harranu’) of Enlil, Anu and Enki, the three leading male deities of the Anuna, according to Aino Hatinen in her book ‘The Moon God Sin…’, 2021). These bands were used, says Hatinen, “to describe the motion of celestial objects during the year and to identify the location of celestial objects… these paths run between the eastern and western horizons… Among other sources these celestial paths are found in the Mesopotamian astrolabes, as well as at the beginning of the MUL.APIN” (op.cit, p.136, citing Horowitz, 2011/14, etc). Likewise found in various Babylonian prayers, as well as works of astrology, the ‘Ways’ were those of Enlil (from the North Pole > 17°N), of Anu (from there to 17°S, thus meaning his zone encompassed the Equator), and Enki, (the South, from 17°S to the southern Pole). That these ‘Ways’ and their spatial organisation contained esoteric or conceptual meanings also is highly likely, as Anu, Enlil and Enki were considered the lords of the ‘heavens’, ‘earth’, and ‘subterranean regions’ respectively. This tri-partite division of the world is mirrored in the Bible by Noah’s three sons Shem, Japheth and Ham being considered as ‘patriarchs’ of the three main regions of the ancient world, Asia, Europe and Africa respectively, at Genesis9.18-19/10.1-32).
Haran is also said in the Bible to be one of the Neo-Assyrian empire’s conquests in the 8th century Bce (2Kings 19.12, Isaiah 37.12) and a trading partner later with the Phoenician city of Tyre (in Ezekiel 27.23).
So as we have seen already, the number of ties and links of the Hebrew Patriarchs and their families to regions of Sumer, Akkad, Babylon and Assyria are complex, and extensive, something which shows the (unstated) significance of these areas, (and their gene-streams too) in relation to the many other Near Eastern cultures existing during these periods.

So to note briefly, Abraham, the common Patriarch of three world faiths, the Hebrew, Christian and Muslim religions, came from ‘Ur of the Chaldees’, in southern Iraq, ie. Sumer, born into a highborn wealthy family in Haran, led to Canaan by YHVH where he established the nation of Israel, at Shechem (Gen12.6-8), then pitching his tent just east of Bethel.
(One metaphorical significance of this action as a mark of the establishment of Israel is that the site of Bethel is a heaven-earth axis; or ladder, or foundation, or ‘world-tree’. And the Oak of Shechem is an example of such a ‘tree’ joining the heavens and earth. So in this world-axis meaning, firstly Shechem as ‘shoulder’ looks to be indicative of the spine, as the foundation or ‘support’ of the human body; and the mention of the tent likewise points possibly to the necessity of the supporting framework of the tent-poles as such). And indeed, in Egyptian hieroglyphs, ‘sekem’ had the meaning of ‘vitality’ or ‘life’, effectively exactly the same meaning as the metaphor of Shechem in the Bible.
So, as we shall soon see, Shechem and Bethel are key sacred sites in Israel, from this point onwards, and have many metaphorical and linguistic details associated with this aspect of their nature. Later in his life famine forced Abraham to move to Egypt, seeking food for himself and his family. In keeping with his powerful high-born social position and nature, when in Egypt he immediately had meetings with the Pharaoh, with the Israelites being given many resources; though following the strange story of him telling his wife to tell the Pharaoh they were brother and sister, to avoid Abram being killed by a lustful Pharaoh, they were asked to leave Egypt; from there going back to Canaan and Shechem. Isaac (sent by his father Abraham to Sumer to marry one of their relatives still living in the family homeland there – meeting and marrying the Sumerian Hebrew girl, Rebekah); Jacob, the son of Isaac, likewise sent to Sumer to marry a tribal relative – Rachel. He moved to Egypt as an old man, when his son Joseph provided for his family in famine/ and during his lifetime fathered the twelve sons who began the tribes of Israel); Joseph (Jacob’s son, Isaac’s grandson, and Abraham’s great-grandson, was born in Sumer – Haran – then moved to Canaan when six years old/ as a youth sold in slavery to Egypt; becomes advisor to Pharaoh, rescues land during seven years famine/he and family become trusted servants of the Pharaoh)- and so on.
So the scene of the narrative during these four or five generations of the line of Abraham continually moves back and forth between Canaan/Israel, and Sumer (Ur of the Chaldees/Haran/N.Iraq) and Egypt, (particularly to the city Joseph came to in slavery before rising to the high role of Vizier, in the mentioned city of On/An/Awn (Heliopolis in the Greek language), linked to celestial and solar meanings, and linked as such to Anu, the father of the Sumerian gods).
The lineage is Shem (meaning ‘Sumer’) – Nahor – Terah – Abraham (and brothers Haran/ Nahor younger) – Isaac –
Jacob – the twelve sons/ tribes of Israel, and so on. Abraham’s brother Haran had family in Ur including Lot, who joined Abraham in journeying to Canaan on the word of Abraham’s father Terah. (There are arguments that Abraham’s claim to the lands of Canaan as promised by YHVH was kept within the Hebrew tribe by his son Isaac marrying one of the Hebrew clan from Haran, rather than a Canaanite woman; and the narrative of Abraham is one centred much upon questions of land settlement, patriarchy of the tribes of Israel, and so on).

It is during this journey back to his ancestral homeland in Sumer therefore that Jacob has this ‘mystical’ or ‘higher-dimensional’ experience, thus naming the site Bethel, the ‘House of God’ (28.19) – as well as in the same period of time marrying two of his kin-folk Laban’s daughters, Rachel and Leah, in Sumer (29.16-35), meeting with ‘the angels of God’ (Gen32.1), and being given the name of Israel by a celestial being in what are again, strange and unusual circumstances; the text says Jacob met a man and fell to ‘wrestling with a man throughout the course of a night (Gen32.24-30), after which the mysterious man (or angel) says “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. . . And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved” (Gen32.28-30). So the text quite clearly links both the site, and the bloodline with the higher dimensional connections existing within the narrative.

Also of note is the meaning of the name Beer-Sheba, which translates as the ‘well of seven’ – thus indicating the connection of the site to the (law of the) Octave which governs the doubling (or halving) of energies/ frequencies. This is at the heart of describing how energies ‘reduce’ in frequency/ vibrational rates, as they become ensconced in matter – or vice-versa as energies develop from matter towards the higher-dimensions, with each new octave being a discrete phase of the processes of change and balance. And an essential aspect of the sacred sites being discussed, as well as in wider terms the forces of life within reality, and the energies of the self.
The use of a stone to signify the site in this way joins the energies of the heavens with the physical materials of the Earth, and signposts how sacred sites’ and their buildings the world over – the temples, monasteries, cathedrals and stone structures etcetera – differ in energetic terms to ‘ordinary’ buildings. So the passage describing Jacob’s experiences is effectively the source-history of all sacred sites and churches and temples, the world over, in its depiction of places where energies ascend and descend through the octaves of evolution and involution, with an increased clarity and force.

There is another reference to sacred ground, at Joshua5.12-15, Joshua being one of Israel’s earliest prophets, and a head-priest of the nation;

And (that day) the manna ceased; neither had the children of Israel manna anymore; but they did eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year.
And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand; and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?
And he said, Nay, but as captain of the host of the LORD am I now come*. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his servant?
And the captain of the LORD’S host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy.

*(showing the difference in agenda from the cosmic/ higher-dimensional visitor to that of men).
It is a curious coincidence between the two passages, that Beersheba means ‘well of seven’, and the story of the destruction of the walls of Jericho, (Joshua 6.1-5) as instructed to by an angel of the Lord, requires the Israelites to circle the walls of the city for seven days, then on the seventh day seven priests direct the people to shout and blow seven rams horns so that the walls fall down; this is descriptive of the powers of sound and frequencies in the creation and destruction of matter..! And connects them with the cosmic frequencies at the heart of the Creation, and material reality, as described metaphorically in the New Testament Book of St John; ‘In the beginning was the Word’, ie the downward reaching energies of the cosmos which effectively create the world and visible reality.

With regard to the narrative of Joshua5.12 and the appearance of the Lord’s angel by the oak tree, the angel tells Joshua to ‘Loose thy shoe. . .’; in Eastern cultures the foot, and the shoe are seen as symbolic of the ‘lowest’ aspect of the material body, covered in the dust of the world. Similar symbolism exists within the Old Testament, such as in the Book of Daniel, when his ‘patron’ King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon dreams of a statue made of gold at the head, then silver in the chest, bronze in the stomach, and has feet made of clay (Daniel 2). So in Joshua it is bringing attention to the sacred nature of the site – in much the same way that some religions require a person to wash their feet before entering a church, and leaving their shoes at the door.

The act of Jacob in setting a stone as a marker of the site’s special nature is likewise an act which describes the history of sacred architecture, indicated also by his anointing the stone with oil. (Gen31.13 mentions the ‘anointed pillar’ at the sacred site – interestingly, this is also the Longitude of the Great Pyramid and the site of Giza, at 31.13°E, one of the oldest, and most important/ central sacred architectural sites in the world, from earliest antiquity onwards..!

Genesis 28.22 also refers to the ‘pillar’;

And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house; and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.

The reference to the tithing of a tenth is interesting, as the tetractys symbol shows – as does the Qabalah, positing ten levels of reality which emanate from the highest energetic spheres down to the material universe – the connection of the numeral ten to the material level of reality. In the tetractys the levels of the ‘pyramid’ are 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10,
thus leading to the saying that ‘from 4 comes 10’, as all the levels of reality are obtainable from these four numbers; with four additionally representing the ‘four-square’ reality of the world, as shown in the compass, the clock and so on.

Another coincidence is that we have seen the importance of Pi and Phi related harmonics; 5.5,7,11,14,22,28,44 etc in the Great Pyramid, and the squared circle. So 28/ 22 = 1.272 7, effectively the square root of Phi – √ϕ – and the relationship of the circle to the square of equal diameter, or 4/π (thus 28/7 : 22/7). That this relates to proportions found to be significant within the Great Pyramid in particular shows some relevance to the content of the verse. . .
The importance of these central themes is reflected immediately in the very next verse, and chapter, (Genesis 29.1-3) where he travels to the ‘land of the east’ and sees a well which they have a stone set over – they then feed the three flocks of sheep, and replace the stone. These are all capable of being interpreted metaphorically; the well as the fount of divine energy/ love; the stone as protecting the integrity of the well in the dust of the land; and the sheep as the faithful of the Lord who are fed by the shepherds and the Lord. And as we see later, the Temple of Solomon was said in rabbinical sources to have a stone (the Eben Shettiyah) set over the well in the foundations of the building which was centred over the ‘waters of the abyss’ – in exact replication of the above passage on a different scale, and indeed is an exact conceptual match for Greek descriptions of ‘omphalos-points’ such as at The Temple of Apollo at Delphi. This was said by them to have been identified by Zeus himself in antiquity as the navel-point of the world. (And where subterranean forces emanating from other dimensions were considered to be constantly welling up from caves and fissures around the site.)

Following on from the first mention of Bethel, the ‘House of the Lord’, there is more at Genesis 32.24, as well as Gen35.4 -15, in which its original name of Luz is also used;

And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods. . . and all their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem.
And they journeyed. . . and the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them.
So Jacob came to Luz. . . which is in Canaan.*
And he built there an altar and called the place El-Beth-el; because there God appeared unto him.
But Deborah Rebekah’s nurse died, and she was buried beneath Beth-el under an oak; and the name of it was Allon-baccuth. (meaning; the Oak of weeping/ remembrance).
And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob; thy name shall not be any more called Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name; and he called his name Israel.
And God said unto him, I am God Almighty; be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee.
And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him, even a pillar of stone; and he poured a drink offering thereon; and he poured oil thereon.
And Jacob called the name of the place where God spake with him, Bethel (house of God).

in support of the theme of the sacred heaven/ earth axis – is the meaning of the word Luz – defined as – ‘a small bone in the human spinal column, believed in the Muslim and Jewish traditions to be the indestructible bone from which the body will be rebuilt at the time of the resurrection (yourdictionary.com). And from the words of the Lord it may be equated with a ‘fount of divine blessings’, as he promises Jacob he shall be the father of Israel, and nations of multitudes.
Likewise, Shechem in Hebrew means ‘shoulder’, relating to the spine/ body again, and the strength ‘which carries the load’. If we look at the Sumerian /Assyrian stela of the Tree of Life, and the gods giving wisdom to mankind (by inserting it into the back of the man’s neck, at the occiput), it can be seen that the deity Shamash is pointing or inserting a pine-cone (from which stems the name the ‘pineal gland’; a Phi symbol with the spirals within the cone, possibly; or a subtle incorporation of the tetractys pyramid which describes the higher-lower dimensional links) into the spine of the man at the point of the neck where the brain and the body meet. And indeed, the pineal gland – the ‘seat of the soul’ as described by Rene Descartes, or the ‘third eye’ in Eastern philosophy – is located at the rear of the head, just above the brainstem, in proximity to the rear occipital region of the skull. ‘Occiput’ itself stems from the ox/oak/axis/ cognates within PIE, Babylonian/Assyrian, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, English French and other languages, relating it perfectly to the ‘world tree’/ spine/ axis themes being considered within this section . . . and points to the universality of the metaphors so used, within ‘reality’, and within the human frame.

Bas-relief stela of deity inserting ‘pine-cone’ into the neck of a man besides the (geometrical) ‘Tree of Life’. One of antiquities key images for more than 1000 years, containing several widely used symbols. Reproduced innumerable times from Sumer, to Akkad, Babylon, Assyria and elsewhere. (Note the similarity of the headwear /ribbon of the man to the shape of the spinal column leading from the brainstem and location of ‘the third eye’, the pineal gland). See the Sumer & Gilgamesh section for more on this artwork’s complex symbolism.
Attribution; cos# contributor; photograph, from the British Museum, 2022.

So present within myths such as this, or related metaphors, is a symbolism of the ‘temple of the body’, or how the body is made in the ‘image of ‘God’, or the Cosmos. A basic tenet of cosmic wisdom in antiquity, which the cultures involved stated stemmed from ‘divine’ sources. Or put alternatively, the like nature of key aspects of the world to the human body and the cosmos, in a very straightforward example of the hermetic adage ‘As above, so below’.

We see again in this passage regarding the burial of Deborah, the ‘matriarchal’ figure of the early Hebrews, the special character of the place; this is confirmed by the oak tree, (again) used as symbol of the heavens-earth axis (or cosmic World Tree); and the stone and the oil also again, fulfilling the purpose of sanctifying the site. Debora is buried under the ‘house of god’ beneath the oak, (which also means ‘protection of spirit’ according to some interpretations). This is related to its associations to strength/ the spine, and the heaven-earth axis… in fact the meaning of name Allon in Old German, and Hebrew is ‘oak’ and/also ‘precious’, supporting this point. A further reference to an oak tree confirms its symbolic significance: Joshua24.24-6;

“And the people said unto Joshua, The LORD our God will we serve, and his voice we will obey. So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem. And Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God, and took a great stone, and set it up there under an oak, that was by the sanctuary of the Lord”.

Our italics; and a passage with virtually the same emphasis in all points to prior ones – a sacred event (the covenant, to symbolize or enshrine God’s plan for mankind); the placing of a stone in precise spot to mark the event/place; which is placed beneath an oak, (symbol of the cosmic axis/ spine/ world tree); to be a connecting point between man and God; and again this is at Shechem, the ‘place of the shoulder’. In fact having noted axis/oak/ox/octave all stem from this shared meaning – it is possible even the word ‘bone’ itself, (from the Latin oss); with all effectively meaning strength/ foundation/ supporting framework / connection between heaven and earth.

More support of this theme of the oak tree, comes from a passage in the excellent book ‘Hamlet’s Mill’;

“The first ark was built by Utnapishtim in the Sumerian myth; one learns. . . it was a cube, measuring 60 x 60 x 60 fathoms, which represents the unit in the sexagesimal system where 60 is written as 1. In another version, there is no ark, just a cubic stone upon which rests a pillar which reached from Earth to Heaven. The stone. . . is lying under a cedar or an oak, ready to let loose a flood, without obvious reasons.” (p.219)

The cubic nature of the stone links it to the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Jerusalem, the Ark of the Covenant, the City of Heaven in Revelations, and the Kaaba in the religion of Islam, as well as the hexagon and the cube, as we explore in the Geometry section . This importance is for reasons unknown, but perhaps related to the unity of the proportions in both geometry, and in music terms, within the ratios of 1:2 which constitute the doubling of an octave. If an open string is halved in length it doubles the frequency of the note, and as such increases itself by one octave; something explored in great depth by Pythagoras and his school in the 6th century Bce, the Chinese philosophers of the same time, and others. If it is open, ie. 1:1, the tone of ‘unity’ is considered to hold within itself all the other notes of the octave as overtones, which resonate in harmonic proportions to the note, and can be derived by dividing the length of the string in discrete mathematical fractions. So likewise harmonic musical proportions, of unity, fourths and fifths in particular, are used in the sacred architecture of related civilizations such as the Egyptians, the Hebrews (particularly in the Temple of Jerusalem), the Greeks in much of their architecture, and in Islamic mosques and buildings which, again, are highly conscious in their use of maths and geometry within their religious symbolism.
So the cube – and the hexagon, which is a two-dimensional version of a cube – is one of the most important proportions in cosmic-number. Santillera and von Dechend continue;

“In Jewish legends/rabbinical texts it is told that ‘since the Ark disappeared there was a stone in its place. . . which was called ‘Foundation Stone’. It was called foundation stone ‘because from it the world was founded’. And it is said to lie above the waters that are below the holy of holies.”

(ie. stone as symbol of material reality/ the ‘cube of time and space’/ the atom?) Similarly John Michell writes; “The Ark may be identified as a symbol with the cube of the New Jerusalem (Heavenly City), and both refer to the foundation rock at Jerusalem, placed at the centre of the world to keep down the waters of the abyss” (p.44); with ‘waters’ being as much interpretable as cosmic energies as simply water per se.

The ground-breaking English writer John Michell spends some time in his book ‘City of Revelation’ on the cosmic number meanings and concepts contained within the measures of the sacred sites of the Heavenly City in Revelation, Jerusalem, Glastonbury, Stonehenge and so on. Of the Temple Mount and the Eben Shettiyah he writes;

“The numbers so far examined (864, 666, 144, 7920, etc) are predominantly solar in character, identifying Jerusalem as the rock on which the institutions of the nation are founded, the centre of its. . . life. According to Jewish legend, the waters of the Flood vanished into the cleft in the rock on the site of the Temple, and the Foundation Stone was placed above to press them down. On this stone is built the temple. One day, it is said, the waters will rise up again, thrust aside the rock, and pour out another great flood to destroy all civilization” (p.46)

The Foundation Stone (shown right, from 1915) was also the point from which God had created the material world, as a pearl grows from around a speck of dust; or perhaps as planets and stars accumulate around a central point of rock or metal; the basic metaphor however is of the embryo growing from the umbilical cord, something contained within the belief that the world was built from around the foundation stone of the temple mount at Jerusalem, making it the ‘navel-point’ of the entire world.
As such this is clearly metaphorical in nature; so where did this concept arise from? Well, this is essentially identical to the definition of Enki/Ea, as ‘he whose home was water’, and as Lord of the South’ or the Ab-zu/Ap-su (the ‘abyss/depths of water beneath the earth/to the ‘south’) which gave life-force to the earth and all life on it.

⇦ Omphalos (navel/ umbilical) marker stone from the Temple at Delphos, Greece.

The Ap-su, or ‘abyss’ represented the ‘subterranean water which fed the earth’s rivers and therefore all animals, and crops. While later versions of this ‘underworld’, like versions of the ‘abyss’ became slightly negative or fearful of the concept, associating it with death and the underworld as in Greek mythology, the original Sumerian etc Ap-su was the source of all life, hence one reason why its deity, Enki/Ea was ‘he who loved waters’, and the architect of the Sumerian civilizations field-systems of canals , ‘reservoirs’ and pools, irrigation channels and so on that made agriculture, and thus civilization possible. . . Sumerian creation myths also stated that the mankind was created from ‘the waters of the father’, Enki. In the ‘Myth of Enki and Ninhursag; The Creation of Dilmun and other Travails’, (Dilmun being the original ‘garden of Eden’), it describes where the first humans, domesticated crops and farm stock were all created, and gradually developed into the agricultural bases of civilization. For an example of the potential narrative of the genetic creation of all these central aspects of later civilization, the domesticated plants came from one relatively small area of the Anatolian and Armenian highlands in the north of the Fertile Crescent. (It can be no coincidence that Sumerian and Hebrew myths aligned in placing the site of the beginning of the New World after the Flood in this area near Mt Ararat, mirroring the emergence of these crops etc in c.8000Bce, after a Flood estimated to have wiped out all previous civilizations in c10,800Bce). The Myth (briefly) reads as follows;

“Pure is Dilmun land (Eden). Virginal is Dilmun land. Virginal is Dilmun land. Pristine is Dilmun land”.

“. . .upon Ninhursag he caused to flow the ‘water of the heart’, She received the ‘water of the heart’, the water of Enki”.

So the myth combines sexual conjunction of male and female, with the notion of virginal ‘birth’, something which is clearly significant, and containing inner meaning. And in the multi-faceted or -levelled nature of the deities of the Anunnaki’s roles, Enki’s as ‘Lord of the Abzu’ was correspondingly of the instinctive centres of the human being, at the level of the stomach; in wider terms the instinctive brain concerned with physiological matters, of survival, reproduction, and so on.

The ‘abyss’ beneath the Temple of Jerusalem takes on a deeper metaphysical role as well as merely ‘water reservoir’ or source for the city, as the mythology concerning the Deluge indicates is so. Michell quotes Dr Ralph Patai, who writes in his book, Man and the Temple;

“Nor was the cosmic significance of the Temple exhausted with the light that emanated from it. In the middle of the Temple, and constituting the floor of the Holy-of-Holies, was a huge native rock which was adorned with Jewish legends with the peculiar features of an omphalos, a Navel of Earth. This Stone of Foundation was the first solid thing created, and was placed by God amidst the as-yet boundless fluids of the primeval waters. Legend has it that just as the body of an embryo is built up from its mother’s womb from its navel, so God built up the Earth concentrically around this Stone, the Navel of the Earth. And just as the body of the embryo receives its nourishment from the navel, so the whole earth too receives the waters that nourish it from this navel” (Michell, City of Revelation, p.31-32)

This mythology clearly connects the Hebrew consciousness concerning sacred sites with that of the Sumerians as displayed by the concept of the Ap-su, and Enki. And as with him, the waters referred to may be seen as being physical, energetic upon the material plane, or alternatively, energies within the human psyche; in this sense they are the waters of the subconscious which nourish the self, preventing the person from becoming starved of the ‘waters of life’ and condemned to a life of intellectual and emotional sterility. . . any intellectual system of rational thought can be made to appear the best way of interpreting reality, and the best course of action – witness communism in the 19th century. As Michell states on p46, “The great fanatics, as Chesterton remarked, are also great rationalists” But objective truth belongs to a deeper level, which requires an openness to the forces of life as they ebb and flow. So it is this sense that the Anunnaki and Enki related the subterranean waters of the Ap-su. Hence these waters are where Utnapishtim, the Sumerian Noah tells Gilgamesh to descend to the bottom of, to find the Plant of Life.
Yet like the deepest aspects of the human subconscious, the Ab-zu, or Ap-su is a place of universal energies with little form or structure which can therefore take expression in varying ways; Sumerian and related cultures developed the mythology of the Anzu-bird for instance, which characterized the negative aspects of the ‘abyss’. In the main myth concerning this being the Anzu bird steals the Tablet of Destinies from Enlil’s sanctuary, and is pursued by Ninurta, the Wild Bull of Heaven (see image, taken from Austen Henry Layard’s 1853 survey of his dig at the monuments of Nineveh; the plate (V) reads ‘bas relief at a small temple at Nimroud’ (now in the British Museum);
Some sources consider the subject of the relief to be Marduk chasing and killing Tiamat, the ‘serpent of the deep’ as related by Babylonian mythology in particular, whereas others believe it is probably Anzu and Ninurta (Black and Green, Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia). But either way the Anzu bird appears clearly to represent chaos, disharmony and evil. In this may be found the connection in the Bible to the ‘serpents of the Deep’, Rahab, Leviathan, Tiamat (as named in Babylon), Tanniym and so on – and presumably the New Testament reference in Revelations12.7-9;

“And there was war in heaven; Michael and his angels* fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels. / And prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven. / And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent called Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him”…

This begs the question though, of the positive aspects of the serpent portrayed in the Bible, for example the Seraphim, the Nehushtan, the Brass Serpent made by Moses to heal the Israelites, the two staffs of Moses and Aaron creating different serpents at the Egyptian court of the pharaoh, and so on; perhaps as indicators of the potentials of the energies of the abyss… similarly it is the ‘urnu-snakes’ in Gilgamesh which enable the craft of Urshanabi and Gilgamesh to travel to the ‘far-away’ (the celestial place) where the survivor of the Flood, Utnapishtim resides, after being granted immortality by Enlil after the Flood had receded.

*(As we see in the Ley-lines of England section, the presence of lines of churches dedicated to St Michael upon ‘dragon-lines’ of energy traversing the lands of Britain, and across Europe to Israel is related by some to this relationship, not necessarily in this case of ‘war’, but of balancing and control of the primal energies of life).

So the abyss, and its waters have not only had different meanings in different cultures, but were viewed in dualistic terms also, as the waters ‘of life’, as well as of ‘death’, or evil…the Tablet of Destiny stolen by the Abzu-bird and taken to the abyss represents the usurpation of celestial order and the introduction of chaos into the orderly divine aegis.
(The duality of the energies of the abyss is reminiscent of the view in antiquity in Sumer, Egypt and elsewhere of that of the energies of the Sun; shown to be life-giving, and yet elemental and capable of causing destructive and unbalanced behaviour in certain individuals; as we see in the story of Samson, for example. Gilgamesh likewise is presented with deeply ‘contradictory’ aspects resulting from his ‘celestial’ inheritance, aspects of self related to the unresolved dynamics of genetics, and the subconscious…)

But the waters of the Flood, already seen to be the constituent parts of the Abyss ‘present’ beneath the Temple of Jerusalem are therefore the ‘waters of life’, in a non-physical sense too, which nourish the world. The Deluge was a massive excess of them, destroying much of life and humankind, in what is clearly, in both Sumerian and Hebrew versions, a purgative event allowed to wash away the accumulated impurities of life on earth. (Introducing the possibility that the ‘Deluge’ was not a simple excess of physical waters, but combination of various types of higher pressure…a narrative supported by the conjunction of the Flood with the return of the heavenly planet Niburu to the solar system circa 10,800Bce, on its 3,600 yearly cycle).

And so in keeping with the original source of the concept, (the Sumerian gods of Niburu the Anunnaki), the waters of the abyss, as described at Jerusalem within antiquity, are not simply destructive. As John Michell states on p.46;

“Yet these waters are not merely a destructive force, they are a necessary element in fertility. The eastern garden has a fountain at the centre from which waters flow along channels to irrigate the plants. If the fountain dries up, the garden dies; if it flows with too great force, the garden is washed away. The same is true of the symbolic fountain that penetrates the surface of the conscious, intellectual mind, and fertilises it with the waters from the deep chasm of the unconscious. Order, discipline, the rock of faith, the intellectual law, the rule of Caesar, all these are required by human nature, which demands an organised society. But however perfectly laid out the garden is, without water it is sterile…”

He goes on to interpret Plato’s concept that periodically civilizations are destroyed by either fire or water, with the two polarities of the human nature; intellectual or rational organisation, and subconscious tides of vital energy. This concept is repeated in both myths related to Egypt and Giza, and to Enoch, in their need to create safe places to store cosmic wisdom for the well-being of mankind in a form resistant to both fire and flood.

In “Hamlet’s Mill’ the book quotes the legends of King David, the Temple in Jerusalem, and the sacred stone in the foundations which covers and restrains the abyss, the Eben Shetiyyah; (referenced by Santilla from L.Ginzburg’s ‘The Legends of the Jews’,1954).
In considering Jerusalem and other sites termed through history as ‘omphalos’ ie navel-points to the higher dimensions, it is curious to note that when Gilgamesh is directed to the bottom of the Apsu – he attaches weights to his ankles in order to sink down far enough to gain it; only to then have a serpent steal it the same night; this serpent is called ‘the lion of the ground’ in the poem, thus linking it to lung mei – dragon-lines, or telluric energy-pathways, along which the forces of life are spread throughout the Earth.

See the highly meaningful Book of Job for related verses; Job 38.30-3; “The waters are hid as with a stone; and the face of the deep is frozen. Canst thou bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?/ Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven? Canst thou set the dominion there of in the earth?”

As a last point for consideration, the use of the concept of the ‘waters of the abyss’ held beneath the key ‘omphalos’ points of the world such as Jerusalem, in this way ensured the fertility of the land. Much as Sumerian cities such as Ur, and Nippur likewise held sacred status in their mythology, as being essentially ‘higher-dimensional’ in their location, due to the gods’ placing of them according to the ‘Ap-kallu’, or ‘seven sages (of the Deep)’.

So as we see in the section on Sumer and the Epic of Gilgamesh, the poem, written in its first version around 2,800 Bce as far as estimated, is the first, and oldest example of a Grail Quest in the history of mankind. It is in this sense that Gilgamesh and Enkidu endeavour to travel across mountains and deserts, to the Cedar Forest of the Gods in Lebanon to defeat the terrible Guardian of the Forest, Humbaba in a fight to the death. After that, they battle and kill the ‘Wild Bull of Heaven’, set upon them by the scorned goddess, Inanna; the Bull is possibly a metaphor for the Anunnaki deity Ninurta, incidentally the probable inspiration for the biblical character Nimrud, ‘mighty man’ of Babylon who was ‘mighty before the Lord’ as a hunter. This event followed swiftly by the death of Enkidu by the order of the gods, Gilgamesh journeys further through exhausting and otherworldly experiences to travel to ‘the Faraway’, (possibly outside of the limits of the Earth), to meet Utnapishtim, the survivor of the Deluge. He was granted (with his wife) residence in the ‘faraway’ ie cosmos, by the (noticeably impersonal but ‘just’) ‘Lord of the Command’ (of the Earth), Enlil. After this story of the Flood is related by Utnapishtim, Gilgamesh then fails in his test to be granted eternal life, and returns the way he came to his city of Uruk-haven. But the real Grail Quest is shown to be that achieved by Utnapishtim and his wife, whereby the prize granted to them is eternal life (perhaps as representatives of the sacred marriage of male and female energies within both the cosmos, and humans).
And beyond that, as in the Arthurian grail cycles, the fertility of the land is shown to be dependent upon the spiritual virtues and success of the candidate – thus as in the Bible (with Noah and his relatives, and the Ark of all living creatures), the success of the Grail quest results in a new era of fertility and life in the land, (and failure results in the opposite). Thus in this way connections can be seen to exist between the Sumerian, the Biblical, and the Arthurian ‘grail’ works of literature in terms of the spirit, and the energies of life within the land and the self – clearly as important within Grail quests as the more obvious adventures they are often associated with.

                                      *                             *                                *                                        *

More biblical examples of the different nature of Bethel exist; (at Judges 20.26) it relates how ‘the Ark of the Covenant’ was sited at Bethel, likewise indicating the manifestation of Divine power at the sacred site. . . and 2Kings 2:2-3(!) says Elijah visited Bethel, ‘and the sons of the prophets were resident there’. In Judges 20:18/20.26 the people of Israel travel up to Bethel in their distress to ‘ask the counsel of God’.

The presence of underground water sources being strong indicators/ factors of sacred sites has already been discussed; so for example, beneath the ‘navel-point’ of Chartres Cathedral. Santillera comments upon the Temple in Jerusalem, as being built above a subterranean water course also, then mentions a similar feature pertaining to the Muslim holy site of the Kaaba, the monolithic ‘cube’, designed to reflect cosmic harmonies and geometries within the material world. Thus Santillera writes that the Kaaba is built directly over a well, which in early Islamic times was used to give refreshment to the pilgrims visiting the site… (Hamlet’s Mill, p221.)

All of which metaphors, stories, and images are closely related to the cosmic# themes raised in (this chapter’s study of) the Bible; themes concerning heaven-earth gates/energy field nodes; sacred stones or pillars/sacred architecture; subterranean water-courses and their energies; and further to this, the abyss/ the atom, telluric and cosmic energetic ‘waters’. . .

As mentioned, the etymology of oak/ox/octave/axis/octave, etc, relating to heaven/earth axes or gateways, is fundamentally related to the axis of the ‘spine’/ ladder/’world tree’. And from this comes a potential key to the meaning of the name Enoch. It will be remembered that the name of the key Sumerian deity Enki stems from two words; En Ki – Lord of the Earth.
So correspondingly it can be seen that En-Och divides into the stem-words for ‘Lord of the Axis’ (or Octave) , meaning the Heaven-Earth ladder, placing Enoch as a connecting point between them. A very apt description of both the role of Enoch in transmitting to mankind the wisdom of the heavens when he returned from his celestial journey with the angels, and indeed, of the journey he takes which ‘ascends the cosmic tree’ (or ‘heaven-earth’ axis/ladder), rising progressively through the ten levels of the heavens, from the lowest to the highest.

Another group of linked symbols used in the Bible and indeed widely throughout antiquity are the fountain / eye / well-spring – these are used as metaphors for omphalos points through many cultures of the Near East in antiquity; so in the bible gives metaphorical meaning to incidents such as when YHVH himself breaks open the rocks to bring forth a spring of water for Samson. This could potentially be applied via analogy to the splitting of the atom, (if it is accepted that the consciousness (individually or otherwise) which created the books of the Bible was cosmic in nature). Examples of ‘divine energy’ also are represented as ‘shoots of flames or fire which rise upwards from the ground, as we examine in a while. Again, in these examples the angels ‘strike the rock’ with their staffs, thus bringing energy from matter, as the splitting of the atom does.

There are metaphorical links in these concepts which connect both place, temple and human ‘axial ladders’; so, for example, the philosopher and writer Schwaller de Lubicz wrote in “The Temple in Man” (1949) in some detail on the physiological parallels concerned with human perception and wisdom, in the ground-plans, proportions and structures of many Egyptian edifices, particularly the Temple of Luxor. So he equates many architectural details with aspects of the human body, and brain; in particular from our perspective, he writes of the spine as follows;

“The pharaonic teaching shows us Man composed of three beings; the sexual being, the corporeal being,
and the spiritual being. Each has its own body and organs. These three beings are interdependent, in the
flux of juices and the nervous influx; the spinal marrow is the column of ‘fire’ that connects the whole.
The being properly called ‘corporeal’ is the body – the chest and abdomen, where the organs for the assimilation
of solids, liquids and air are located.
The head is the container of the spiritual being, where the blood, built up in the body, comes to be spiritualized
in order to nourish the nervous flux and prepare the ‘ferments’ of the blood and the ‘seed’”.

A conceptualization which echoes Ouspensky’s description of Gurdjieff’s Food Octave, in which the energies of food are refined within the body. And de Lubizc goes on to assess the significance of the ‘pineal’ gland, or ‘eye’, the organ of the brain Descartes called the ‘seat of the soul’. De Lubizc mentions the belief of Galen, from circa 131Ad, that the pineal gland served as a ‘sluice for the amount of spirit necessary for the maintenance of psychic equilibrium’ (The Temple in Man, p.107).

The backbone/axis metaphor thus illustrates the role fulfilled by the sacred sites situated at crossover/harmonic points in the world’s energy fields – from Jerusalem to Lhasa, to Angkor Wat, Cuzco, Tiahuanaco, Tenochtitlan, Glastonbury, Stonehenge, Cuzco, Ollyamtambo, Nazca, Macchu Piccu, Petra, Mount Shasta, the Grand Tetons, the Easter Islands, and so on. These areas are thus seen as sacred energy-centres/ gate-ways which enable the free flow, and refinement of all the cosmic energies which constitute the earth’s energy fields and processes – in this way constituting a continual process of transformation within the Earth of the inner (energy) octaves of the planets, the Sun, the Milky Way and so on…

---

In the Epic of Gilgamesh from around 2800Bce, from early to mid-Sumer civilization onwards the first verse is concerned with the same themes being considered;

He built. . . the wall which gleams like copper. . .
Take hold of the threshold stone, from ancient times
Examine its foundation, inspect its brickwork thoroughly…
did not the seven sages themselves lay out its plans?

There is one other (short) reference to the place where Jacob slept and had fearful visions, at what was effectively the sacred site/navel-point in the land; and this is from Judges1.23; again the previous but no longer used name is mentioned, a rare emphasis, but which serves to give context to the metaphor, (Luz being an ancient word for a (sacred) part of the spine, connecting the individual with the higher dimensions).
Although the general view is that Luz means ‘turn aside’, or ‘crookedness’ (or ‘almond tree’), the meaning of it as ‘bone, particularly one in the spine’ is also accepted – ie. at biblestudytools.com, citing Lagarde (backbone), Winkler (sanctuary), and Cheyne (strong)…. though at the same time misinterpreting the ‘bone’ meaning for a ‘rocky height resembling a bone’.

Judges1.23; And the house of Joseph sent to de-scry (spy out) Beth-el. (Now the name of the city before was Luz).

The next verse says that the local man who helped the forces of Israel into the city went with his family to the ‘land of the Hittites (N.Iraq/ Assyria), and; ‘built a city, and called the name thereof Luz; which is the name thereof unto this day’….

The prophet Gideon likewise has a higher-dimensional experience; again, an angel of the Lord visits him beneath an oak tree, to direct him as a servant (or prophet) of the people of Israel, at Judges 6.7;

And it came to pass, when the children of Israel cried unto the Lord because of the Midianites,
That the Lord sent a prophet unto the children of Israel, which said unto them, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I brought you up from Egypt, and brought you forth out of the house of bondage; And I said unto you, I am the Lord your God. . . but ye have not obeyed my voice. And there came an angel of the Lord, and sat under an oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash….and his son Gideon. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour.

Gideon asks of the angel (6.13-14); If the Lord be with us, why then has this all befallen us? And the Lord looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites.

Gideon takes his (cosmic) visitor as a ‘man of god’; as a mark of respect, like Samson’s father when visited (by an angel), asks his guest to wait while he prepares some meat and broth for him. He also professes doubt that he can lead Israel to victory in battle, and asks for a sign ‘from heaven’.

Having made the meat and broth, he ‘brought it to him under the oak‘. The angel then instructs him at Judges 6.20;

“And the angel of the Lord said unto him, Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes (bread), and lay them upon this rock. Then the angel of the Lord put forth the end of his staff that was in his hand, and touched the flesh and the cakes; and there rose up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh and the cakes. Then the angel of the Lord departed, out of his sight.
And Gideon said, Alas, O Lord God! for because I have seen an angel of the Lord face to face. Then Gideon built an altar there unto the Lord, and called it Jehovah-shalom”.

As with the angelic visitor to Samson’s parents, the angel that ‘descends’ from the realms of pure energy to the level of the earth does not eat any of the offerings of respect; and displays virtually identical powers, at Judges13.19;

“So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering, and offered it upon a rock unto the LORD; and the angel did wondrously. . . For it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the angel of the LORD ascended in the flame of the altar….”

As the highlights/italics of Gideon’s experience show, this short passage exemplifies several of the highly significant themes raised in this study;
Firstly, the meat and broth, representative of matter and the flesh, are placed on the (sacred) stone, (sacred site) under the oak, (symbolic of the World Tree/heaven-earth axis) – and then the angel touches it with his staff; symbol of divine power (or possibly representative of the axial relationship between heaven and earth, or energy and matter, as the spine connects the two; (see the Etymology section for the shared stem for cause/ course/ corridor/ chord/ cord / cors etc, as well as that for oak/ ox/ axis/ occiput / octave/ oss, etc).
Also the fire which rises up, (here and elsewhere) thus is symbolic of a. the power of cosmic energy especially at such connecting points upon the earth’s surface, and b. within the body, as energy ascends (and descends) the spine, in both everyday life, and when enlightenment is achieved – see examples such as those concerning the (Hindu) idea of the Kundalini fire ascending the spine and illuminating the inner energy centres, the chakras. Coincidentally, considering the name the ‘well of seven’ (Beer-sheba) and all the seven-related symbolism encoded into the Bible, in Eastern ‘philosophy’ there are seven chakras (energy-centres), from the seat of the groin to the crown of the head, as well as seven notes in the octave into which transformational energies are divided. Thus adding meaning to the etymology/semantic understanding of the word chord, and chordata; the body-form of vertebrates centred around the spine which life has favoured for around 540-20 million years, since the Cambrian Explosion, for creatures of the sea, land and air, including of course humans.

And as we have seen in the chapter on the Vesica Piscis and sacred sites, there is a strong connection throughout history between the oak, underground water-courses, sacred sites, and lightning. This in addition to the meanings ascribed to the oak tree, regarding strength, protection, the World Tree, and so on. Many sacred sites are also situated directly above such subterranean water-courses. Chartres Cathedral is a great example, Glastonbury Tor has its famous well for visitors at the base of the hill, and Hamlet’s Mill states that the Kaaba is sited over a well.
Many wells and rivers and streams were accorded sacred status in antiquity, across the world, from the Near East, to India, to Europe and Great Britain. Sir Norman Lockyer, the Victorian academic who helped found the field of archeo-astronomy (as well as discovering and naming helium through spectroscopy!) studied this phenomenon, including religious ceremonies and practices such as tying ribbons in trees overlooking the watercourses, in the groves and streams of antiquity and history.

Straight after the end of the provision of manna to the Israelites (as they ‘settle’ into everyday reality after the intense reality of the trials of the wilderness), and the visit of the ‘captain of the host of the Lord’ in Joshua 5, in Joshua 6.1 the story continues with the destruction of the walls of Jericho. Of all the various strands we have considered in this book concerning the cosmic# implications of 7, and 7.77 etc, there have been connections highlighted to the geometries of the Great Pyramid, those of the harmonics of Pi and Phi in the squared circle, the Law of Seven and the Octave.

And one of our study’s central characters, the son of Cain who laments that avengement for his guilt of his lineage will be ‘not seven but seventy sevenfold’ is Lamech. Thus in a descriptive way including the message that the burden of both his punishment and possible redemption, as well as of his genetic inheritance, will most certainly unfold according to objective laws. In this way making the experience he and countless others undergo, across all eras, to be a universal spiritual process, or ‘pathway’… this is another example of the conjoining of artistic, personal and ‘scientific’ aspects which appear to characterize the Bible’s depictions of the highest/ most significant events of people’s lives and the spirit – reflecting that cosmic consciousness (of higher beings), and God, are omniscient in nature (including, therefore, mathematics and physics and so on among the myriad aspects of the Truth).

In Genesis 5.28 we are told that Lamech (of the Sethite line), the son of Methuselah and grandson of Enoch, and the father of Noah, lived for exactly 777 years!
Whether this Lamech is the same as Cain’s son or the Lamech of the ‘opposing’ Sethite line is a question that is almost moot, so intertwined are the two lines, or ‘connected to the gods’ of Sumer, a theme constantly referred to in oblique terms throughout the pages of the Bible.

So the following chapter in Joshua 6 provides some insight into the awareness of the writers of the Bible regarding the centrality of the octave in all physics – of frequencies of light, and sound- in the chemistry of the Periodic Table of Elements, and so on. The octave in other words, is central to how the world is created and shaped by energy; a fact implied within the strange and incredible story of the Walls of Jericho, at Joshua6.1;

Now Jericho was straitly shut up because of the children of Israel; none went out, and none came in.
And the Lord said unto Joshua, See, I have given into thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour.
And ye shall compass the city, all ye men of war, and go around about the city once. Thus shalt thou do six days.
And seven priests shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of rams horns; and the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times; and the priests shall blow with the trumpets . . .
And it shall come to pass, that when they make a long blast with the ram’s horn, and when ye hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout; and the wall of the city shall fall down flat.

The mysterious Ark of the Covenant, containing the Tablets of the Ten Commandments that YHVH gave to Moses at the top of Mount Sinai, in its wooden carved container is also involved in the priests’ circuits of the city. We have already seen how the presence of the Ark within the Holy-of-Holies, on the day of the Temple’s dedication caused a great cloud of smoke (‘the Glory of the Lord’; 1Kings8.10-11) to fill the space when the sacred music was performed by the musicians. Thus adding another clear source of ‘divine energy’ to the mix… making this a fascinating story with hidden depths and meanings beyond that of the visible, one with potential symbolic meanings too. Something every story featured in this section has had as a sub-text. For critics of the Bible’s narratives as ‘unbelievable’, it is fair to note that not only is sound and frequency at the heart of the creative principle of the material universe, in consonant patterns of frequencies (harmonics), as shown by the ‘Word’ of the Lord, but sound waves can be dissonant too – and have effects upon buildings, and living beings also. The science of acoustics in this regard can be shown to have been studied in the 6th century Bce within the school of Pythagoras, although many researchers argue that the (widely influential) Egyptians were studying the effects of tonal sound vibrations and frequencies from an earlier date than this.

Virtually all of the highest civilizations of the period equated the Creation with music; reflecting the fact that there are innumerable consonances present within the multi-levelled reality of the energies and matter of the cosmos. Antiquity thus saw the development of cosmological theories of the creation centred around Sound, in all the most advanced civilizations from around 1500Bce; of Israel, Egypt, Greece, India, and China in particular. From the latter came the belief in the Twelve Cosmic Tones, as noted by David Tame in ‘The Secret Power of Music’. So Chinese society’s uses of music, from at least a thousand years before the time of Christ were based around the concept of the primal tone or sound of the universe, as the Indian concept of Aum likewise stated. In China this sound was deemed able to be broken down into twelve Cosmic Tones, or notes, (presumably much like the twelve notes of the octave with seven major and five minor as known today). The Primal Tone was called ‘huang chung’ which translates to ‘Yellow Bell’. Within society the emperor was referred to by the same title, (similar in a way to the 17th century French king Louis XV being called the Sun-king), as the human representative of ‘divine will’.
This group of notes was thus a link between man and the cosmos, especially as man has within his body the structure of the cosmos. A reflection of both man (and woman) being made in the image of the Creator, and of the universal way of the Tao, whereby everything in existence flows from universal principles, into energy, and then matter.
One way this was evidenced was the use by the Chinese court of tuned bells or strings to harmonize the weights and measures used in all Chinese regions, to ensure commercial ‘integrity’, societal trust, and harmony with cosmic values. (Studies of this phenomenon have been written by Joseph Needham, and Robert Temple, among many others). Likewise, the changes between seasons, such as the arrival of Spring were believed to be discernible by use of musical notes/instruments. How these things were achieved is examined in more detail in the ‘Cosmic Wisdom and China’ section.

Sound vibrations are known by science to have both productive and destructive capabilities. From antiquity come many myths and legends of sound being used to build temples and pyramids etcetera, in the space of a day and a night – as well as modern ‘myths’ written by travellers recounting Tibetan monks’ use of sound waves of brass instruments to affect gravitational fields around objects, thus making possible the lifting of very heavy blocks of stone. The Egyptians, among others are believed to have used sound for both building purposes, and for healing medical conditions.

In modernity, science has discovered that sound also possesses the ability to cause damage to matter, and injury to human beings*, whether of frequencies below or above human hearing (infra- and ultra-sound respectively) as the result of modern life, and noise pollution such as traffic/industry, or such. (An example of the dangers of vibrations is found in the practice of armies breaking step when marching over bridges).
The phenomenon known as ‘sick building syndrome’ (see ‘The Boiled Frog Syndrome’, by Thomas Saunders for more detail on this), is also believed by many to result to whatever extent from the dissonant reverberation of soundwaves within the location of the building; rather as neighbouring sea currents can meet regularly at certain points thus causing chaotic conditions, or whirlpools and so on. Large rectilinear buildings appear to be particularly prone to this, for some reason, in this way reflecting the tenet of Chinese feng shui that straight lines (such as roads, or bridges) can cause excessive build ups of negative energies – what is called sha chi. The straight lines affect the ability of positive energy flows to slowly nourish every part of the area, or edifice, or may be said to prevent the dispersion/ absorption of built-up energies. This principle even extends to cities, or wider, so that the ancient Chinese, as well as ancient British/ European Celts designed their environments in minute detail to create a shaped landscape in harmony with the energies of the heavens. Thus making the entire land a ‘temple’ through which the higher energies could flow both unrestricted, and in balance.

The build-up of negative energies under consideration may be compared to the curves of a riverbank which absorb some of the downward momentum of the river with each turn, or similarly on roads such as motorways. This significance of the value of curves and circles, alongside the spherical nature of both time and space, for example in the universe’s spiral galaxies, and circular solar systems, stars, planets and moons, is one reason why Pi is so important – while the linear, straight lines found within reality are affected equivalently by the Golden Section, Phi, so that in conjunction, and relationship, Pi and Phi are two of the most important geometric values in the science of ‘sacred number’.

In addition to the negative consequences of excessive soundwaves, whether audible or not, some nations’ armed forces around the world have experimented with making sonic/infrasound weapons – these can be used to seriously discomfort the targets, (such as rioters or protestors…), or even, in the extreme, seriously injure humans (via the stomach it seems – see Gavreau,1957), as well as damage building structures. A stark reminder of the potentially dual uses of the powerful energies of the universe.

In fact, the infrasound frequencies created by weather systems, particularly extreme events such as storms, tornadoes, tidal waves, earthquakes and so on are now being used by scientists to gain advance notice of such events. This understanding was helped by observing the reaction of animals just before the tidal wave of the Indian Ocean in 2004, when they fled the coastline for no apparent reason in the hour beforehand.

And on a more positive note, ultrasound has been used by scientists for refining numerous technologies of sonic basis, involved in a whole array of fields; structural analysis, range-finding, flow-analysis, cleaning, disintegration, welding (!), chemistry, communications, and so on. It has also been developed by medical scientists as not only a powerful diagnostic imaging tool (ie internal scanner), but also is starting to be applied as a ‘light touch’ form of healing, (as have various forms of light therapy, which appear to operate on a subliminal level, and in ways which are as possibly objective as subjective, ie directly affect positively the energetic systems of the body as much as being ‘placebo based’).

There is also the case of the scientist Nikolai Tesla, the Serbian researcher and inventor credited by many with ‘creating the modern electronic age’ of the 20th century. Tesla experimented with many arcane and abstruse concepts which much later attained a working reality, including the invention of the technology of AC alternating current, oscillators and generators such as the Tesla coil, power-transmission technologies, early X-ray imaging work, a radio-controlled boat and numerous other inventions and developments; one relevant example is the series of experiments he conducted in his New York laboratory researching vibrations;

“I was experimenting with vibrations. I had one of my machines going and I wanted to see if I could get it in tune with the vibration of the building. I put it up notch after notch. There was a peculiar cracking sound. . .I put it up a little higher. Suddenly all the heavy machinery in the place was flying around. I grabbed a hammer and broke the machine. Outside in the street (in Lower Manhattan) there was pandemonium. The police and ambulances arrived. I told my assistants to say nothing. We told the police it was an earthquake. . .”
When asked by a reporter what he would need to destroy the Empire State Building he replied “Vibration will do anything. It would only be necessary to step up the vibrations of the machine to fit the natural vibration of the building and the building would come crashing down. That’s why soldiers break step crossing a bridge”.

So in all, the Bible would appear to be far ahead of its time in asserting the power of sound and frequency to affect the structures of the material world. Let alone convey the frequencies of the cosmos to the human ear through sacred music.

---

PART IV. COSMIC NUMBER CODES IN THE BIBLE.

Leading on from some of the cosmic # related themes and metaphors embedded within the Old Testament /Bible, we can see that many of the most relevant passages are placed at numerically significant points within the framework of the books; in such a way as to indicate a conscious procedure for doing so. . .
In particular we find that the cosmic# s of Pi (3.1415), Phi (1.618), 1.111 (the √1.2345, the proportion found within the Squared Circle, and as 1.118 the value of √5/2 to which + 0.5 = 1.618), and 3.45(6) (a highly significant # related to the √3 (1.732), and to 432/ 864 (a set of related values which crop up everywhere, such as within the squared circle, links between pi and phi, within the measures and proportions of the Gt Pyramid, and so on…) All these numbers can be said to be consciously joined with specific themes or subjects in terms of verse and chapter numbers in both Old and New Testaments, beyond all likelihood of simple coincidence… and if these instances are not coincidental, what does this imply about the consciousness of the minds which wrote the books of the Bible, even at dates stretching back as we have seen with the book of Leviticus shown likely to have originated c.1000 Bce, or in many of the other books of the Old Testament found in the texts called the Dead Sea Scrolls. To devise a system of encoding which has been overlooked – ‘seen’ but not noticed – by virtually every single person to read these holy books, is an incredible fact. Only now are these areas becoming easier to discern, in what is a new era of information dissemination on subjects such as sacred number.

So as we saw with the initial appearance of David in the Old Testament, the use of ‘coding’ with regard to chapter/verse number is potentially used as a form of indicating cosmic(#) significance within the verse ‘highlighted’ in this way.
The following list is a short summary of some of the clearest examples of this form of encoding, with the central point being the importance of the event; each one is at a key moment in the unfolding of events within the Bible, or is at a point where God – YHVH – or Jesus speaks, as this list shows…

COSMIC-NUMBER VERSES in the BIBLE;

GENESIS 2.22 : GOD CREATES EVE.
GENESIS 3.4/5: THE SERPENT TEMPTS EVE.
GENESIS 3.14-15: GOD SPEAKS /CURSES THE SERPENT.
GENESIS 22.2: GOD ‘TESTS’ ABRAHAM, TELLS HIM TO SACRIFICE ISAAC.

EXODUS 3.14-15: GOD SAYS HIS NAME, ‘I AM’, FIRST TIME.
EXODUS 34.5/6: GOD APPEARS ON SINAI, GIVES MOSES THE TEN COMMANDMENTS.
LEVITICUS 22.2: GOD SPEAKS TO MOSES AND SAYS HIS DIVINE NAME, ‘I AM’.
NUMBERS 3.14-15: GOD SPEAKS TO MOSES.
NUMBERS 3.45: GOD SAYS HIS NAME AGAIN TO MOSES; ‘I AM’.
NUMBERS 22.22: FIRST MENTION OF A ‘SATAN’ (ADVERSARY.
DEUTERON. 34.5/6 THE DEATH AND BURIAL OF MOSES.

JOSHUA 3. 3/4/5-9: BY THE ARK of COVENANT/GOD SPEAKS TO JOSHUA.
JUDGES 16.18: DELILAH BETRAYS SAMSON.
1SAMUEL 3.3/4/5: GOD SPEAKS TO SAMUEL AT NIGHT IN TEMPLE –
1SAMUEL 3.14-15: GOD SPEAKS TO SAMUEL AND DISOWNS THE HOUSE OF ELI.
1SAMUEL 11.1; APPEARANCE OF KING NAHASH OF THE TRIBE OF AMMON.
1SAMUEL 16.18: FIRST FULL APPEARANCE OF DAVID.
2SAMUEL 22.2 : DAVID CALLS YHVH HIS ROCK AND FORTRESS.
1CHRON.16.18: GOD PROMISES DAVID ISRAEL/CANAAN.
1KINGS 3.14-15: GOD PROMISES SOLOMON AT START OF HIS REIGN.
1KINGS 11.11: GOD TELLS SOLOMON HE WILL LOSE HIS KINGDOM FOR WORSHIPPING PAGAN GODS.

MARK 3.14-15: DISCIPLES GIVEN POWER TO HEAL ILLNESSES /CAST OUT DEVILS.
MARK 16.18: DISCIPLES GIVEN POWER to take up SERPENTS/ ” ” “
MATTHEW 3.14/15: JESUS ASKS JOHN TO BAPTISE HIM.
MATTHEW 11.11: JESUS SAYS JOHN THE BAPTIST IS GREATEST OF THOSE ‘BORN OF WOMEN’.
MATTHEW 11.12: JESUS SAYS ‘MEN OF VIOLENCE’ TAKE THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN BY FORCE.
MATTHEW 16.18: JESUS ORDAINS PETER.
JOHN 3.14/15: JESUS SPEAKS OF HIS DESTINY/ MOSES/ NEHASH SERPENT.
REVELATION 11.1 THE ANGEL GIVES JOHN A ROD TO MEASURE THE HEAVENLY TEMPLE.
REVELATION 22.2 THE TREE OF LIFE WITHIN THE CITY OF HEAVEN.

GENESIS 2.22 – And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a
woman, and brought her unto the man.

GENESIS 3.4/5 – the serpent speaks to Eve in the Garden of Eden.

And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die.
For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes
shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

GENESIS 3.14/15 – the LORD curses the serpent in Eden.

And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

There does seem to be a discernible intention in these placings to link the serpent, with the ‘transcendental’ value central to the geometries of the circle and spheres, namely Pi (π)– this may be an indication of a potential subject being the serpent/ Ouroboros energy-lines which circle the globe – as we see in the 30th Parallel, which circuits the globe under the gaze of the Sphinx…or as the serpent in Gilgamesh which steals the Plant of Life, and sheds its old skin immediately, in a metaphor of cyclic renewal.

GENESIS 22.2 – YHVH ‘tempts’ or ‘tests’ Abraham as Gen22.1 states, by requiring him to sacrifice his son Isaac:

And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.

EXODUS 2.22 – Moses names his son ‘Gershom’, meaning ‘stranger’.

And she bare him (Moses) a son, and he called his name Gershom,
for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land.

EXODUS 34.5–6: At the top of Mount Sinai, YHVH appears, and gives Moses the Tablets of the Covenant;

And the LORD descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 6. And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth.

LEVITICUS 22.2: God speaks to Moses, and says his divine name ‘I AM’;

Speak unto Aaron and to his sons, that they separate themselves from the holy things of the children of Israel, and that they profane not my holy name in those things which they hallow unto me; I am the LORD.

NUMBERS 22.22: – the first mention of an ‘adversary’, a ‘satan’ to Balaam, to oppose him on his wilful path.

And God’s anger was kindled because he went; and the
angel of the LORD stood in the way for an adversary (satan)
against him.

NUMBERS 3.14/15 – the LORD speaks to Moses.

And the LORD spake unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, saying,
¹⁵Number the children of Levi after the houses of their fathers, by their
families; every male from a month old and upward shalt thou number them.

NUMBERS 3.45 – the Lord reveals his name to Moses.

(And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying)
Take the Levites instead of all the firstborn among
the children of Israel… and the Levites shall be mine:
I AM the LORD.

Is this possibly the first statement of Jehovah’s key revealing of his name, and nature to humanity ie
‘I AM THAT I AM’ ? The first time God says this is actually at:

EXODUS 3.14/15 –

And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM; and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.
¹⁵And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, The LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob hath sent me unto you; this is my name forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.

Nb*- Although a virtuous man, and faithful through his trials, Job failed to fully understand the workings of the Lord, (and Satan) – and because of his excessive complaints, was denied the appellation for posterity of ‘the God of Job’…(unlike Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob). Louis Ginzburg, The Legends of the Jews, (1909).

DEUTERONOMY 34.5 – the death of Moses overlooking the ‘promised land’.

And the LORD said unto him, This is the land which I sware unto Abraham,
unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, saying, I will give it unto thy seed: I have caused
thee to see it with thine own eyes, but thou shalt not go over hither. ⁵So Moses
the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab, according to the word
of the LORD.

JOSHUA 3.3/4/5… – the LORD blesses Joshua.

And they commanded the people, saying, When ye see the ark of
the covenant of the LORD your God, and the priests the Levites
bearing it, then ye shall remove from your place and go after it.
Yet there shall be a space between you and it, about 2000 cubits
by measure; come not near unto it, that ye may know the way by
which ye must go; for ye have not passed this way heretofore.

And Joshua said unto the people, Sanctify yourselves; for tomorrow
the LORD will do wonders among you. And the LORD said unto Joshua,
This day will I magnify thee in the sight of all Israel, that they may know
that, as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee.

And thou shalt command the priests that bear the ark of the covenant,
saying, When ye are come to the brink of the water of Jordan, ye shall
stand still in Jordan.
And Joshua said unto the children of Israel, Come hither, and hear the
words of the LORD your God.

JUDGES 16.18 – Delilah betrays Samson.

And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she Sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, Come up this once, for he hath showed me all his heart. Then the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and brought money in their hand.

1.SAMUEL3 3/4/5/6 – The LORD speaks to Samuel in the Temple.

³And ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the LORD,
where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep.
⁴That the LORD called Samuel, and he answered, Here am I.
⁵And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And
he said, I called not; lie down again. And he went and laid down.
⁶And the LORD called yet again, Samuel. And Samuel arose and went
to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. And he answered, I
called not, my son; lie down again.

1 SAMUEL 11.1 – the Israelites offer kingship to Nahash. (as we see, he is representative of the Nagas).

Then Nahash the Ammonite came up, and encamped against Jabesh-Gilead; and all the men of Jabesh said unto Nahash, Make a covenant with us, and we will serve thee.

1 SAMUEL 16.18 – King Saul’s men look for someone to comfort him in his madness.

Then answered one of the servants, and said, Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite (David), that is cunning in playing, and a mighty valiant man, and a man of war, and prudent in matters, and a comely person, and the LORD is with him.

1.SAMUEL 3.14/15 – The LORD tells Samuel the House of Eli is condemned.

And therefore I (YHVH) have sworn unto the house of Eli, that the
iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be purged with sacrifice nor offering
forever.
And Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of the house
of the LORD. And Samuel feared to show Eli the vision.

1KINGS 3.14/15 – The LORD promises Solomon his blessings.

And if thou wilt walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as thy father David did walk, then I will lengthen thy days. …and he came to Jerusalem, and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and made peace offerings, and made a feast to all his servants.

1KINGS 11.11 – The LORD passes judgement on Solomon.

Wherefore the LORD said unto Solomon, Forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant.

ISAIAH 22.22 – The Lord predicts the coming of Jesus.

And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder, so he shall open, and none shall shut and he shall shut, and none shall open.

2SAMUEL.22.2 – David’s words when saved from death at the hands of both the giants of the Philistines, and Saul;

“And he said, The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer.”

PROVERBS 2.22;
“But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it”.

JOB 38.19 (φ) – the Phi ‘golden’ point between 0 and 1, ie 0.618 / 0.3819;

Where is the way where light dwelleth? And as for darkness, where is the way thereof?

MATTHEW 3.14/15 – Jesus asks John to baptize him;

But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized
of thee, and comest thou to me ?
And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now;
for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness.

MATTHEW 11.11; Jesus lauds John the Baptist;

Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist; notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

MATTHEW 11.12;
And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.

This becomes relevant to modern science in that one degree of the world’s circumference, at the equator, measures 69.12 miles, or 111.2 km. (While half of one-degree measures 34.56 miles !). Likewise, 400 / 3.14159 (π) = 111.2, meaning the transcendental value of Pi, representing the ‘circle of the heavens’, is in proportion of 1:1.112 to the ‘square’ of Earth/ material reality, as defined by a square of 4(00) units. Similarly significant, 180°/ϕ (1.618) = 111.2 !

MATTHEW 16.18 /19 – Jesus ‘ordains’ Peter.

And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven…

MATTHEW 18.18; repeated words from 16.18; (note, like Phi, the number has a significant value; 1/ 1.818 = 0.555, or 1/9 /2 = 0.111/ 2 = .0555, etc).

Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. If two of you shall agree on any thing… (that which they ask)… it shall be done for them of my Father, which is in heaven.

MARK 3.14/15 – Jesus ordains the twelve apostles, and grants powers.

And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils: And Simon he surnamed Peter.

MARK 16.18: Jesus ascends to heaven after granting powers to the twelve apostles.

And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues.
They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick; and they
shall recover.
So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God…

(So MARK 16.18 are Jesus’s last words to the disciples (after the resurrection), before his ascension to heaven… )

LUKE 22.22; continuing the association of ‘222’ with matters of transgression and sin;

“And truly the Son of man goeth, as it was determined: but woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed”…

JOHN 3.14/15 – the words of Jesus on his fate.

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up; That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
(For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life).

(Perhaps the most famous and often repeated verses in the entire Bible…)

REVELATION (of ST.JOHN), 16.18 – the prediction of the ‘end-times’.

And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as not was since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great. And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell…

REVELATION 11.1 – the sacred geometry of the Temple.

And there was given me a reed like unto a rod; and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein.

REVELATION 22.2: – the Tree of Life in the Heavenly City:

In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

---

We saw in another section how Jesus stated in Revelations 1.8; ‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending’, and in John 8.12 ‘I am the light of the world…’
Now as well as obviously indicating the ‘first and the last’ as would be inferred, there are some quite subtle possibilities raised by Alpha (1), and Omega (0) that are to do essentially with the line and the circle.
These may be interpreted to represent; the male/female energies united in the Tai Chi symbol into everything that exists, the Tao. This division is expressed in the I-Ching, the Chinese Book of Changes extant since the 6th century Bce, with yin and yang being shown by yarrow stalks or ‘heads or tails’ coins combinations.
A curious point in relation to the I-Ching is that it is said to be structurally similar to that of DNA! (see Martin Schonberg, etc).

Moreover, the founders of the I-Ching are said to be FuHsi (and NaKua / Nuawa) – the pair we have already seen depicted with intertwined serpents tails in identical manner to the Sumerian Ningishzida, one of the Anunnaki who was likewise closely associated with fertility /the Tree of Life/ the male organs, and hence genetics and DNA, (itself formed of the same archetypal double-helix).

Indeed, furthermore, the binary aspect of yin or yang is similar to the binary code which made the invention of the computer possible; this is more than coincidental, for the inventor of calculus and binary code, the German scientist Wilhelm Leibniz acknowledged that his interest in the structure of the I-Ching inspired to greater or lesser extent his creation of binary counting systems.
Pi and Phi may likewise be said to be representative of the circle (0), and the line (1) also, (although the Phi symbol itself – φ – is effectively a combination of 1 and 0).
The basic idea of matter being represented by the 1 (such as the proton ‘mass’ at the centre of the atom) and energy being represented by the 0 (ie, the electrons which circle the centre) brings the study of Alpha and Omega into the realm of physics and the atom, even Quantum physics, where polarity (1) and spin (0) are likewise manifested.
As we study in the Ley-Lines of England section, the two main types of the many standing stones archeological sites on Dartmoor, England are either stone circles, or stone rows (usually double lines)…a very neat encapsulation of the 0 and the 1 – and considering the unerring accuracy of the Neolithic (druids’) sites spread across Britain, Europe and the world, in terms of being based upon celestial alignments (for astronomical calculations), and also their designs and locations, this looks to be very possibly an intentional symbolism. At Avebury and Silbury Hill in Wiltshire, the double row of stones (called the Avenue) stretching a mile from Avebury ends at the Neolithic circle called the Sanctuary, besides West Kennet Long barrow. The Sanctuary is a stone circle, thus creating with the Avenue a line with a circle at one end of it, (and Avebury at the other) possibly symbolizing the spine and the head – again, the body (1) and the head (0), or matter and energy. Incredibly we see in the Ley-line section how the longest ley-line in England, the Michael and Mary line (366.35 miles long) passes within a mile of Avebury, 0.4 of a mile (640metres) of Silbury Hill, through the same field as the Long barrow, and within 6 metres of the circle, at the ‘neck-point’ of the symbol, where energy and matter conjoin… this at a point by the road from where the ancient ‘trail’ or ‘straight track’ called the Ridgeway runs across southern England to a point in Bedfordshire less than a mile north of the Michael and Mary line. (This track dating certainly to pre-Roman times, as many of England’s major routes did…) The point by the Sanctuary is precisely 172.8 miles from the end point at Great Yarmouth, ie twice 86.4, or half 345.6 miles..! (while the North-South line from the Isle of Wight to Holy Isle, Lindisfarne is 346.1 miles in length itself. See ‘Cos# and the Earth; the Ley-lines of England’ section for much more on this).
Thus in this respect the ground-plan looks to be very likely the result of advanced (cosmic) consciousness from the Bronze Age, circa 2000Bce or probably earlier.
For Jesus to say that he was Alpha and Omega is for him to say that he is the (symbol of?) unified matter and energy – the self-perfection described by the Gnostics, alchemists, Rosicrucians and so forth as the mystical (chemical) wedding of the male and female energies of the cosmos. And places Jesus at the centre of the godhead, within the creative powers of the universe, energies which find expression at the atomic level upwards – and indeed, within the physics of light itself…

A closer look at this letter shows there are some highly interesting facts to be found in the study of the word ‘Alpha’, as the Greeks labelled the first letter of the alphabet…
The letter came from Sumerian/ ABA/ Semitic/ Hebrew sources; originally a pictograph of a bull’s horns (a visual image of an object);

where it represented – an ox, symbol of strength or support, or ‘foundation’. The cow’s horns of the ox pictograph of the Sumerians were, in time, turned sideways by the Hebrews, to form aleph. The Hebrew language was one of the first to create an alphabet of 22 letters, with each said to represent a division or aspect of cosmic energy, and with its own particular number. (From this came ‘gematria’, the study of the numerical character of specific words, names and so forth, based upon synchronicities existing between energies, objects, people etcetera, and the words used to name them. . .)
As the first letter, in nearly all Near Eastern ‘Semitic’ alpha-bets (from SABA to Hebrew – to Phoenician – to Greek – to Latin, where it assumed its shape and name of Alpha, or ‘A’ we use today…) its value or number was one, and it represented the unity of God, and the heavens, and the original source of all things. Much like the open string of an instrument is in ratio of 1:1 and contains all the octave’s notes within itself. This points to the significance of the cube, which has dimensions of 1:1:1 and likewise represents divine unity. Hence the Ark of Utnapishtim in Tablet X of the Epic of Gilgamesh possessed the dimensions of 1 x 1 x 1, in its measurements of 60 cubits…the least ‘boat-like’ shape possible, indicating the design holds deeper inner meaning in allegorical terms.
Coincidentally, it is a fact that the word ‘Aleph’ is composed of 3 letters in Hebrew, thus indicating the three-fold nature of the ‘godhead’; Aleph (1), Lamed (30), and Pey (80) – giving the word a sum total in gematria of 111 !

For all the reasons above, and its uses in the Bible and Jewish religion, it is therefore highly appropriate that it is the (Greek) letter Alpha (α) which is used to represent in modern physics the Fine Structure Constant.

As we have seen, or note in Notes & Numbers, the Fine Structure Constant – or alpha – 1/137.0359992O6 – is significantly related to the speed of light – 186, 282 m/s – as well as to Pi (π), Phi (ϕ), and several significant cosmic # values. Indeed, scientists say that the fine structure constant determines many of the key characteristics of light; here are a few quotes by various physicists and writers on alpha;

“137 is the inverse of the fine structure constant…the most remarkable thing about this remarkable number is that it is dimension-free. Werner Heisenberg once proclaimed that all the quandaries of quantum mechanics would shrivel up when 137 was finally explained.” L.M.Lederman

“Only three constants are significant for star formation; the gravitational constant, the fine structure constant, and a constant that governs nuclear reaction rates.” Ian Stewart

“The bridge between the electron and the other elementary particles is provided by the fine structure constant…an expanded form of the constant leads to equations that define the transformation of electromagnetic energy into electron mass/energy”. Michael A.MacGregor.

And so on; and from this website’s perspective alpha is found to be in relationship with many of the values held in antiquity to be part of the geometric nature of reality;

For example – 314.1592/ 2 / 1.37035999206 = 114.6 265

With 114.6 being a highly significant value;

360/ 3.14159 = 114.6
365 x π /10 = 114.6
1.273/1.111 = 1.146 ie. √ϕ / √1.23456789…
90 x 1.273 = 114.6
38.19 66 x 3 = 114.59
141.41 /1.234 = 114.59

So 157.079 / 1.23456789 = 127.2 345/ 1.11 02 = 114.6
“ x 1.11141 = 141.41

314.159 / 38.19 x 0.1665 84589 = 1.37035999206
ie. π / ϕ (minor) x 1/6 = α

All these values are connected within the hexagonal geometry of the Vesica Piscis and Ad Triangulum system.
Another example of the recurrent harmonies that arise in this subject is;

365.24 / 1.370359992 = 4 x 66.6 (!)
the solar year / α = 4 x 66.6
(the # of solar power – for good or bad – is 666 – according to the traditions of cosmic #. See John Michell, etc – while 2/3 is obviously 0.666…)

And finally; 123.456789 x 3 = 370.370367
= 369 + 1.37036
ie. 3 x 123 = 369

• 3 x .456789 = 1.37067 In fact, 3 x 123 = 369
  and 3 x .456786666 = 1.37035999 8 (α) ** A connection which ties together several of the most interesting #s in this book.
  **(in similar manner, 34.56/ π = 11.000789 666 …)

The concept of energy lines running around, and through the earth, and across the land and seas, from antiquity, appears linked to the same way in which meridians (in Traditional Chinese philosophy and medicine) carry the (cosmic) energies of the life through the human body. These telluric forces as such are the energetic ‘life-blood’ of the planet, and consist of the absorbed energies of the Sun, the planets, the galaxies and the stars forming, as Gurdjieff indicated in the Ray of Creation, an Octave composed of the discrete dimensions of everything existing. These range from the highest level(s) of pure energy (the Absolute/ All Galaxies, etc) to the lowest – the Moon – (consisting of the densest matter possible vitalized, correspondingly, by the least amounts of energy). According to Ouspensky and Gurdjieff, these levels are points on the energy-matter continuum which show that all is ‘material’, ie. calculable and measurable, whatever the relative proportions of energy and matter. Also that the discrete levels of the Octave contribute to the whole, individually and in interaction. In this way providing the Creation with a counter-entropic coherency and purpose. This gives some indication of the interdependent workings of the different levels or dimensions which form as such, a living metabolism within the universe based upon the processes of the transformation of cosmic substances. Thus different energy centres of the human being are ‘formed’ of, or operate with, substances belonging to each of the seven levels, absorbing as well as producing these energies for use in the work of the human body. The forces of Qi within the body, which consist of the same cosmic energies in various energy centres of the body, are finer in substance than those of the nervous system itself. The ‘mechanical’ organisation of the body may be summarized as follows; it is the skeleton which holds the body in place, while it in turn is shaped by the muscles, tendons, ligaments and so forth. These layers are shaped in their turn by the nervous system; and the nervous system is shaped or patterned by Qi.

Regarding concepts of the cosmos from antiquity, the earliest civilizations of antiquity, particularly both Sumer, and Egypt, had signs such as the Rod-and-ring, or Shen-coil, which were symbolic of the divine order circumscribing the Cosmos, protecting it against the forces of darkness, or ‘chaos’ which surround the orderly world. Symbols such as a cord, shield of coiled rope, a belt, a circle around a dot, likewise symbolized the timeless revolution of the heavens around a central point occupied by the Creator, and the encircling protection of the divine cord.
The Babylonians believed Ninurta, the son of Enlil who was a leading deity of the Anuna, held the ‘markasu’, or ‘bond’ of the cosmos. Robert Langdon wrote;

“The word markasu, ‘band’ or ‘rope’ is employed in Babylonian philosophy for the cosmic principle which unites all things, and is used also in the sense of ‘support’, the divine power and law which holds the universe together”.

The cord symbol in Egypt was therefore a symbol of the ‘bond of regularity’ (shes maat) with which the sovereign was shown to rule ‘all that the Aten encircles’. Thus these encircling cords were considered to be protective, to ‘set the bounds’, of the kingdom, and the cosmos. The rope or cord symbols were sometimes coiled around spirally to create a shield, in various cultures of antiquity, which obviously further continued the theme of divine protection. The dynasties of Egypt did have ceremonies concerned with ‘setting the bounds’, as well as with measuring the dimensions of the land distance-wise. In similar vein the Sphinx, as we see in the Egypt section, is located intentionally, it seems, within a few hundred yards of the 30th Parallel North, looking eastwards to where the Sun rises each day; in this way likewise ‘establishing’, or pointing to, a significant energy-line wrapped around the world at this important geometric division of the globe.
This belief may well have been an early expression of the concept of the Ouroboros, the ‘celestial serpent’ wrapped around the world, with its tail in its mouth; by the time of the Greek civilization which popularized the concept (and which as a culture was shaped predominantly by both Egyptian, and Mesopotamian systems of knowledge and wisdom). The Ouroboros was comparable in ancient China with the energy lines connecting sacred sites across the land, and the Earth – as such the concept arose of ‘lung mei’, ‘dragon-lines’ carrying celestial energies throughout the earth…an early precursor of ‘ley-lines’. The Ouroboros in the Greek and other cultures was also used as a symbol of infinity, or eternity, encapsulating the idea of perpetual rejuvenation, and the turning of the earth and the heavens.

As mentioned in other sections, the Bible holds similar concepts;

Psalm 19 (1-7); “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun. Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race. His going forth is from the end of heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it; and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof ”.

Likewise many references to belts, cords, shields and girdles, etcetera may be considered to hold allegorical significance relevant to these energy-lines or harmonic fields. One of the most relevant portrayals of such matters comes from the Book of Ecclesiastes, in which the last chapter’s verses are apocalyptic and mystical in nature;

“Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not…While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain. In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the window be darkened. And the doors shall be shut in the streets…and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low; Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern. Then shall dust return to the earth as it was; and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it” (Ecclesiastes12.1-7).

One note of interest about this subject is the word used often for ‘serpent’ in Greek Septuagint versions of the Bible is ‘ophis’ – this word is used, in various spellings, at points such as Mark16.18, Luke11.11, John3.14, Matthew10.16/ 23.33, Revelation12.9. and so on… a curious point being that ‘ophis’ is spelt with the Greek letter ‘phi’, as can be seen in the term. One of this website’s foremost themes is that the relation between Pi (the circle) and Phi (the line) underpins not only many of the works of antiquity, but also present day understanding (of cosmic-number related subjects), including even mathematics and physics…as both Pi and Phi are ‘universal’ values in modern science ! As well as being of close relevance to the energy lines which circuit the Earth. (The two references to the Serpent within the Bible at Genesis3.14/15 and John3.14/15 are thus highly likely to have been placed at these Pi-value points precisely because of the geometries of the sphere such energy lines are shaped by and dependent upon).

The second number we will look at in this section is 369 itself; an example of the centrality of this in the Bible is its description of the crucifixion of Christ – there being three separate references to the time, or the hour on this unique day; namely, the 3rd, 6th, and 9th hours.* And considering the wealth of cosmic # metaphors and codes written throughout the Bible, this facet of the depiction of the day’s events may be a subtle reference to the significant value 369. *(Mark15.25/15.33/15.34, etc).

Another example comes from Psalm36.9, which reads as follows;

“For with thee is the fountain of life; in thy light shall we see light”…

Why is it that this, a value so rarely encountered even in Sacred Geometry, is so important? In effect an overlooked keystone of the entire subject… For the numbers of 3 6 9 were equally accorded significance by two of the 20th centuries greatest, and yet ‘non-mainstream’ individuals, Nikolai Tesla, and Georges Gurdjieff.

Tesla, the infamous scientific researcher and inventor, said of the number, and related matters;

“If you only knew the magnificence of the 3, 6, and 9, then you would have the key to the universe”.
“If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency, and vibration”.
“What one man calls God, another calls the laws of physics”.
“My brain is only a receiver; in the Universe there is a core from which we obtain knowledge, strength and inspiration. I have not penetrated into the secrets of this core, but I know that it exists”.
“The gift of mental power comes from God, Divine Being, and if we concentrate our minds on the truth, we become in tune with this great power. My Mother had taught me to seek all truth in the Bible”.

These words may seem less than objective, and yet his work stands vindicated as being truly ahead of his time.
A curious fact raised by these quotes from Tesla is their compatibility with the works of the major 20th century figure Georges Gurdjieff, whose writings and life have inspired many thousands of people to fulfil their true potential as humans, by developing their intellectual, emotional, and instinctive centres in balance while learning of the complexities of the human ‘frame’, ie. the inner structures of the mind, the body and the heart – as well as the spirit.
So, with regard to Tesla’s statement regarding our minds receiving information from the centre of the Cosmos, Gurdjieff maintained that we are defined by the three foods which we assimilate constantly; foods without which we would die. The ‘food’ of the chest level is breathing, and of the mind is ‘impressions’, or the flow of information of the nervous system (and energy centres/ Qi, which are of a finer materiality yet than the nerves), without which we would die in three seconds! Energies, or impressions which come from all levels of the cosmos, as different centres of the body receive (and function with) the energies of the seven levels of the cosmos as defined in the Ray of Creation. So each level of the cosmos has its designated centre within the human being, which in the totality enable the correct functioning of life in all its potentials within the person – this is why historically esotericism states that ‘man is a symbol of the divine’. (‘Person’ by the way in its Latin meaning means per sonnare, to ‘sound through’; signifying these connections between the self and the universe. In this way the nervous system is a link between the dimensions of energy, and matter, being comprised of both, and is sensitive to the higher dimensions as they reach us.

“Each day it is necessary to receive the food of impressions. Then you can say with serenity that you are not a dog, but that you are in the image of God”!
(Talks recorded at Gurdjieff’s Paris flat, 1947).

Gurdjieff taught many theories and symbols, as well as practices, to his pupils ; people such as P.D.Ouspensky, Maurice Nicholl, J.G.Bennett, A.Orage, Kenneth Walker, Fritz Peters, C.S.Nott and many more, all of who published books detailing their experiences with him at Fontainebleau and Paris (as well as in Russia and Asia Minor as a large group of around twenty or so men and women walked several hundred miles across the Caucasus mountains to the west via Turkey, during their flight from the violence and chaos of the Russian Revolution) . And one of the most wide-ranging and innovative of the symbols Gurdjieff taught was the Enneagram, which he introduced to western civilization.

The Enneagram can be said to represent the workings of the processes of reality in terms of the doubling/halving transformation of energies within matter, through the steps of the octave; with the seven notes, and two intervals (at mi-fa, and do-si ), making nine in total. This can be applied to virtually any process imaginable, so ubiquitous is the Law of Seven and the Octave, according to Gurdjieff. In this way the Enneagram can be studied from a mathematical, or geometric, or conceptual perspective, as well as being extensively developed for understanding the ways in which personality forms from the ‘essence’ (or individuality) we are born with. (See Helen Palmer’s excellent work on this). This understanding, received from Gurdjieff onwards (with his ‘Toasts to the Idiots’, and his writings in ‘Beelzebub’s Tales…’), also highlights the ubiquity of the Law of Three, as it divides the potential ways of perceiving reality, and thus types of ‘brain’, to three basic categories; mental, emotional, or physical, (ie. mind, heart, or stomach/ instinct). Gurdjieff went so far as to say that this three-fold division applies to all beings in the universe (!), making the division a cosmic phenomenon, and innate part of reality, alongside the Law of Seven. Thus the form personality settles on as it solidifies out of the essence we are born with, is rooted in one of the three possibilities, with each containing three possibilities, (likewise subdivisions of mind, heart or body) …with environmental factors playing a considerable part in which way of perceiving reality is given precedence by the growing child…

Examples of the workings of the Enneagram given by Ouspensky and others include the Food Octave whereby the food we eat is digested, and undergoes the steps of transformation within an octave which provide energy to the level at each step. This is reflective of the energies of the different levels of the cosmos or Ray of Creation within us, as well as producing the final refined energies stored in the body for use in creating further life either within, or outside of the organism.

One important detail of this octave is the mi-fa interval, at which in all octaves an additional energetic input is required to enable the continuance of the original line of evolution without errors or deviation. So this point in the food octave of the body occurs where the cosmic energies being transformed are focussed within the bloodstream; facing an energetic ‘impasse’ the blood is brought to the region of the lungs, which chemically provide the energies taken from air of a similar vibrational level to the blood at that stage of its octave. Thus the octave is enabled to continue its onward evolution; from here the blood travels to a point in the brain, and from there onwards to its final point at which the energies taken from food have precisely doubled in energy; from here, stored in the form of sperm, life may proceed on a new octave either within the body (the creation of an astral body where possible and enabled), or outside of the body, ie in the conception of a child…
This shows us that we have aspects of – or the energies of – each of the seven levels of the Cosmos including those of our sun, our galaxy, all the constellations and galaxies of sidereal space, etc within us, in different proportions. These include fuel of each type of refinement, each of which reflects the vibrational rate of the different dimensions, from highest to low, for our correct functioning within all our internal organs and energy centres.

As can be seen, the 369 triangle is separate from the other numbers, and each # can be viewed as the centre of the three sub-divisions of the nine; 234, 567, & 891. In Enneagram psychology books, such as those by Palmer, which are concerned with how essence ‘chooses’ which of the three forms of ‘perceiving’ (or more accurately ‘experiencing’) to concentrate on as the personality forms before the age of ten. In this process a combination of personal and environmental factors largely decide the basic type personality assumes as it replaces essence most normally – and which to a large extent determine many of the issues and experiences of a person’s life. Ultimate development according to Gurdjieff writers is the full awareness and exploration in life of the strengths and limits of the self’s chosen form; with the hopeful aim of eventually ‘rising above’ the incompleteness of the personality-based structures of self, and a re-connecting with one’s essence, (while development of the potentials and abilities of personality towards this aim is also essential, according to Gurdjieff)…
Thus 234 are ’emotion-based’ centres, 567 ‘intellect-based’, and 891 are ‘instinctive/physical-based’…with 3 6 9 representing, as can be seen, the ‘centre’ of each type/centre.

So the 3 6 & 9 points represent, as such, and among other things, the ‘untouched’ centre of each of the three divisions forming a triad of +/-/= while the remaining six numbers form a sequence of 142857 1428571 etc; theoretically in terms of self-development, ‘perfected man’ is one who is balanced essentially in all three centres of perception and being, to greater or lesser extent. For some reason, considering his experience in all the major religions of the world, at the highest inner levels – Greek Orthodox Christianity, the Sufis orders of Islam, the Buddhist authorities of Tibet, and many others – Gurdjieff did consider Jesus to have been the only man ever to have reached a certain level of being; ‘man number 8’ as he termed it, in Ouspensky’s ‘In Search of the Miraculous’. This is one level above what any human can achieve, and would be based, even at the ‘lowest’/’stomach’ level, in the non-ordinary higher potentialities of the human form, the higher emotional and intellectual centres; these are centres of consciousness we all possess, but very rarely experience in ‘ordinary life’, through which higher dimensional energies (in the form of mystical states, visions, dreams, flashes of wisdom) are brought into our waking everyday consciousness to greater or lesser extent – so any being at this level no.8 would no longer be ‘human’ as we know it, being in the realms of pure existential energy, according to some theorists. That Jesus is defined as such shows his unique and once human nature.
So the biblical narrative of Jesus’ crucifixion appears to be showing his cosmic importance, and perfection, at a moment which is the crux and fulfilment of his life, by the emphasis on the hours of 3 6 and 9 – present as signposts therefore, of the process of his ‘divine completion’ in all aspects and centres.

To return to Alpha, and the Speed of Light, the following equation indicates such connections;

186,282 / 1.37035999206 / π = 43,270

As we saw in the Egypt section, the height of the Great Pyramid is (most likely intentionally) in the proportion of 1:43,200 to the polar radius of the Earth, linking it to the 432,000m radius of the Sun as well as the 43.3 % proportion of the √3 ratios of the Vesica and the Ad Triangulum system…and also the 43,200 seconds of the day ie. in 12 hours… with the common theme being the harmonic relations the energies of the cosmos, particularly light, create in material processes, in order to enable life to exist on Earth. (Additionally, the radius of the Sun is actually closer to 432,500 miles/ 865,000 diameter than simply 432/864).

From these equations, and many more instances, it may be considered that close geometric relationships exist between; the speed of light – alpha – the Sun, planets, Earth and Moon – of the 360° of the circle, the mathematical values of Pi, Phi, the square roots of 2, 3, and 5, the √ϕ (1.272-3), √1.23456789 (1.111), and more; in fact are at the heart of the energies of sunlight, and life. This is in all likelihood why these cos# values are encoded into the ‘fabric’ of the Bible – for if the source of the books of the Bible was cosmic in origin, such values would not only be known, but also fully understood, even two thousand years ago or more, when these works were being written.

7. St PETER; Satans, strangers, Seraphim and the Nagas.

Allegorical themes of Simon Peter as Satan (or ‘satan’),or as example of the ‘celestial lineages’ of Sumer within the Hebrew peoples.

MARK 3.14/15;

And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils: And Simon he surnamed Peter.

To return to the previous encodings from the four synoptic gospels, the verse shown at Mark3.14-15 holds hidden layers of meanings. This apparently simple statement is in fact linked with the many semantic associations which connect Simon Peter to the concept of the ‘satan’, or ‘opponent’/ adversary. Another example is when Jesus retorts ‘angrily’ to Peter; “Get thee behind me, Satan”, at Matthew16.23/ Luke4.8, etc; examples which we shall examine in more depth later.

Is it possibly just coincidence Simon Peter is so often linked with ‘Satan’, and ‘the devil’ so often in the New Testament? It would appear so, considering Simon Peter is ‘the rock upon which’ Jesus builds his church? And yet the word ‘rock’ or ‘stone’ itself is closely related to biblical concepts of satan, for all kinds of metaphoric applications, such as the parables of Jesus; and in fact, many of the events of the New Testament, words of Jesus, and place and family names tied to Peter, point specifically in this direction of his being a ‘satan’’ – indeed, it is Peter who associates rocks with Satan himself, at 1Peter2.8; “a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them…(who are) disobedient”. (The parable related by Jesus of the Seed and the Rocky Ground is one way in which the negative aspect of the metaphor of rocks as being devoid of spiritual potential is continued throughout the Bible. Likewise that of ‘the desert’, or ‘wilderness’ as a form of ‘netherworld’, or even symbol of ‘hell’). This use of metaphor and allegory within the narratives of the Bible is something that was acknowledged as true by church fathers from the earliest of times, even up to the fifth century Ad. In his book ‘The Secret Power of Music’ David Tame relates on p.208 the writings of some of the early Church fathers in this respect;

“Only from the fifth century Ad did the Creation stories of Genesis begin to be taken as literal historical records; this occurring as knowledge of the ancient wisdom within the Christian movement deteriorated or was forced underground. Before this, we find Gregory of Nyssa (c.Ad 390) describing the Genesis Creation as ‘ideas in the form of a story’. The other prominent churchmen of the time also accepted the Creation stories as allegorical”.

So in this section we will examine some of the many connections between Simon Peter and a concept of Satan in some form or another…and what further deductions or relationships can be drawn from this ‘hidden’ theme of the Bible. The first point to make is that biblical passages, particularly in the Old Testament, contain concepts of the satan which possess implications rarely considered in modern (straightforward) ‘dualism’…

1Samuel 16.14; “But the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul; and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.’

This idea of ‘a satan’ performing his role under the direction of ‘God’ has many occurrences in the Hebrew Bible, and includes the ‘heavenly councils’ of the ‘sons of the gods’ such as in Job 1.6 and 2.1, or Zecharia 3.1-4. These passages put forward a concept of a ‘celestial being’ who is also ‘lowly’ in nature and as such is required to perform unpleasant actions – actions enforcing God’s will which would nonetheless ‘sully’ angels of a purer being; a good definition perhaps of the situation or ‘station’ of some of those in the Bible who are located within the ‘celestial lineages’.
Instances of such actions include those described in 1Kings22.22, of ‘being a lying spirit in the mouths of his prophets’, while still nevertheless committed to performing God’s will – in contrast to concepts of the Satan who attacks mankind to undermine God and mankind’s positive works. This is quite a significant and profound difference in essential nature to traditional held conceptions of an ‘evil’ Satan.

An excellent ‘definition’ of the role of such ‘satans’ comes from St Paul’s book of 1Corinthians5.5, in which the things of ‘heaven and earth’ are separated by their respective ‘angels’, or representatives;

“To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ”.

Without defining the role of the ‘devil’ too restrictively, there are so many indications in the words of Jesus, the apostles, and Peter himself, of ‘consciousness’ of his nature that it is virtually without doubt an intentional theme within the books of the New Testament. It is safe to suggest, in fact, that this is at the very heart of the narrative of him; with the qualifying statement that what the devil is may well be something different to common assumptions or beliefs… as we saw with Noah, Abraham, Moses, King David, Solomon and others, being of the lineages of the gods of Sumer is an essential part of their ‘destinies’ too, (though whether positive or negative or balanced representations of such lineages is not easily defined).

To start at the beginning of the biblical narrative of the ‘celestial lineages’ therefore, is the first division between ‘good’ and ‘bad’. In Genesis 5, the slaying by Cain of his brother Abel begins the division in lineage of Adam, between the line of his son Cain, and from the ‘replacement’ of Abel, the line of Seth.
The classification of the ‘line of Cain’ as being that of the ‘wicked’ does not simply stem from the fact that Cain was the first character of humanity in the Bible to commit murder – but rather from the rabbinical Hebrew texts which stated that Cain was the offspring not of Adam and Eve, but of the walking serpent of Eden, named Samael in the texts. That the Serpent of Eden is strongly reminiscent of the Sumerian deity Enki is thus a way in which the Bible links the line of Cain to the Mesopotamian lineages, and to the Nephilim of Genesis6.1-4.

As Genesis 4.17-25/ 5.3-32 show, however, the ‘divergent’ lines of Cain and Seth contain the same names (spelt in slightly different ways);

So the Cainite line is – Cain, Enoch, Irad, Mehujael, Methusael, Lamech; Tubal-Cain.

• while the Sethite line is; Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech; Noah.

And directly after these lists the next chapter in Genesis concerns the existence of the lineages stemming from the Watchers, or Nephilim, at Genesis 6.1-4;

And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of gods came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

This takes place before the Flood, as does the Book of Enoch (from which the Bible most probably drew the information of the ‘fallen angels’ the Watchers or Nephilim – in fact there are over one hundred references in the Bible to words and ideas from Enoch, (according to the introduction to 1Enoch written by Richard Laurence, 1883). In the Bible this course of events is given as the reason for God deciding to destroy mankind with the Flood; so, as such, the events described took place not in Israel, even though Enoch was a patriarch of Israel, but most likely in Sumer, or the Fertile Crescent of northern Mesopotamia.

This places the events squarely in the sphere of influence of the Anunnaki as they worked to establish the first communities on the earth, between the genetic creation of mankind, the granting of civilization, (covered by the King Lists of Sumer, such as WB-62, at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford), the Flood of c.10,800 Bce, and then the descent of the Anunnaki to begin civilization in Sumer circa 3,700 Bce. It is these King Lists which have been at the centre of this section’s proposition, in that Kingship was handed down from the ‘gods’ (‘cosmic visitors’ / ‘celestial beings’) to mankind, via the bloodlines of the Anunnaki; and the lineages then of the ‘hybrid’ human kings who began to help the creation of civilization. It is the hybrid nature of the lines which is at the heart of the Bible’s narrative of the conflicted nature of kingship, as represented by the lives of Saul, David, Solomon, and thereafter others. The central point of interest is that ‘earthly power’ may be viewed as largely unrelated to ‘the powers of heaven’, or characterised as opposite to it, from a certain point in the Bible onwards when the prophets no longer lead the nation, but instead simply advise the leader and the people of God’s will. And this perhaps extends to any type of ‘worldly authority’, even of the Christian church, as Simon Peter may be seen to represent as being the ‘founder’, or first prelate, of the church in the West, as the Bishop of Rome…

There is the sense, however, that the lineages of kings in both Mesopotamia, and in Israel were considered to be ‘of the Lord’, or as such the ‘Lord’s anointed’, (an idea contained likewise within the concept of the ‘divine right of kings’) – but in all instances, these rulers were not without imbalances and flaws, which they were required to overcome to greater or lesser degree. Portrayed in this way is the erratic first ‘anointed king of Israel’, Saul, whose imperfections cause the kingdom to be taken from him by YHVH, and eventually given to his successor David. One of the clearest examples of this narrative from Ancient Near Eastern mythology is that from the Epic of Gilgamesh, which introduces the eponymous ‘hero’ as the king of the Sumerian city-state of Uruk, who has divine parentage as his mother Ninsun is one of the Anuna, while his father the king Lugalbanda is a normal human. Gilgamesh is so dominant that he asserts the ‘traditional’ right to take any brides on the night before their wedding, for his own selfish purposes – to the dismay of the townspeople, whose complaints then reach the gods, including the mother of Gilgamesh. (Possibly a forerunner of the ‘cries of mankind rising to the heavens’ depicted within 1Enoch concerning the sins of the Nephilim, and as YHVH notices their effect on the world in Genesis6.1-4, causing him to create the Deluge).

So this early section of the Bible in chapters5 and 6 of Genesis provides the idea of the lines of Cain and Seth being opposing gene-streams of good and bad; while also juxtaposing the two lines! It then describes the creation of lines of the Nephilim which led to the Flood, and the reduction of mankind’s gene-stream to Noah and his family… But if the lines are linked, then Noah, the root-source of mankind post-Flood, is of the lines of the gods, whether they be of the positive, or negative examples of these.
It helps to look at the story of the conception of Noah to Lamech and his wife as described in the Book of 1Enoch, and related texts in the books of Jubilees/ Giants etc, some of the apocryphal (hidden) books (otherwise known as pseudepigrapha) of the Hebrew canon.
Some of the non-canonical books may probably be classed as such as being mostly the works of (the minds of) men rather than divinely inspired; while others which were little known may have been restricted in their circulation by virtue of their being kept secret by the inner religious orders who used them.

The Book of Enoch, first brought to Europe by the Scottish explorer James Bruce in 1774, and confirmed by parts of the same book which were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947 at Qumran, (believed to be part of an Essenes brotherhood repository), contained chapters describing the immediate circumstances of Noah’s birth, linking him and the lineage to ‘celestial’ genes – when Noah is born, his appearance shocks his father, in ch106 of 1Enoch;

“And after some days my son Methuselah took a wife for his son Lamech, and she became pregnant by him and bore a son. And his body was white as snow, and red as the blooming of a rose, and the hair of his head and his long locks were white as wool, and his eyes beautiful. And when he opened his eyes, he lighted up the whole house like the sun, and the whole house was very bright. . . And he arose in the hands of the midwife, and opened his mouth and blessed the Lord of heaven.
And his father Lamech was afraid of him and fled, and came to his father Methuselah, and said; I have begotten a strange son, diverse from and unlike man, and resembling the sons of the gods of heaven; and his nature is different and he is not like us, and his eyes are as the rays of the sun, and his countenance is glorious. And it seems to me that he is not sprung from me but from the angels, and I fear that in his day a wonder may be wrought upon the earth.”

Although his son resembles the gods, or celestial ‘Watchers’, whether this means the Anunnaki, or their offshoot, the Nephilim is unclear. Indeed, the appearance of the ‘cosmic beings’/’gods’ who created mankind from infusing their celestial genetics was symbolized by the fish, or the serpent from the start; hence the hybrid man-fish appearance of Enki/Ea, cited in Sumerian Creation myths as the ‘father of mankind’ (or the later version of Oannes, shown left in a Babylonian artwork), and one of the leading deities of the Annedoti – the collective term meaning the ‘repulsive ones’ according to the writings of the Babylonian priest and historian Berossus. And while of course, many passages in the Bible connect the energies of heaven with ‘light blazing forth’ from the face and so on, as with Moses as he descends from the top of mount Sinai having received the Tablet of Commandments from YHVH, this may be something which is also possibly connected to the celestial and solar-based genetics of the ‘fallen angels’. Moreover Jesus himself says, “Be wise as serpents, and meek as doves”… linking back to the celestial (genetic) infusion the Anunnaki gave to early mankind (constituting the fall?), as well as the wisdom contained within civilization mankind received from the higher sources. A narrative symbolised in Genesis by the eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, which in its symbolism contains meanings related to matters of sexuality, the ’sacred marriage’ of male and female energies, higher or divine consciousness, and the actions of the Serpent in the Garden of Eden, which walks upright at first, is capable of speech, and has extensive knowledge of the (heavenly) garden… linking to the mentioned narrative found in traditional Hebrew rabbinical texts and commentaries of Samael, who as the Serpent ‘knew’ Eve and created the line of Cain.

So when Lamech asks his wife if she has slept with ‘one of the Watchers’ she responds by asking would he tread upon his wife’s finer feelings? Methuselah the father of Lamech travels to the ‘extremities of the earth’ to consult his father, Enoch, who lives there while writing the secrets of heavenly wisdom (to pass on to mankind to help rebuilding after the forthcoming Deluge. Enoch was blessed by having been taken up through the heavens, by two angelic beings to hear the words and plans of the Lord). Hearing the report of Methuselah, Enoch answers, at ch.106, 1Enoch, Charles version;

“And I, Enoch answered and said unto him; ‘The Lord will do a new thing on the earth, and this I have already seen in a vision, and make known to thee that in the generation of my father Jared some of the angels of heaven transgressed the word of the Lord. And behold they commit sin and transgress the law, and have united themselves with women and commit sin with them, and have married some of them, and have begot children by them. And they shall produce on the earth giants not according to the spirit, but according to the flesh, and there shall be a great punishment on the earth, and the earth shall be cleansed from all impurity. Yea, there shall come a great destruction over the whole earth, and there shall be a deluge and a great destruction for one year. And this son who has been born unto you shall be left on earth and his three children shall be saved with him. And now make known to thy son Lamech that he who has been born is in truth his son, and call his name Noah; for he shall be left to you, and he and his sons shall be saved from the destruction, which shall come upon the earth on account of all the sin and all the unrighteousness, which shall be consumated on the earth in his days. And after that there shall be more unrighteousness than that which was first consumated on the earth; for I know the mysteries of the holy ones; for He, the Lord, has showed me and informed me, and I have read them in the heavenly tablets”.

This appears to answer his concerns; and yet may be interpreted as a disingenuous and ambiguous answer also, in that the wife of Lamech may be the mother of Noah, and yet at the same time be of the ‘lineages of the gods’, thus making Noah a genuine ‘child of the Watchers’ too. What purposes might be served by this being the intention of the writer(s) of 1Enoch and the related Bible themes, is clearly a question of some complexity.

So as the Bible depicts the different lineages of ‘giants’ after the Deluge, the acknowledgement in Enoch’s words that greater unrighteousness will occur after the Deluge likewise appears to indicate the inconclusive nature of the cleansing of the Deluge, however necessary that was. And if Noah and his line are the only humans on earth at the point of the Flood, how do these later ‘races of giants’ arise? Indeed, the Bible relates many of the ensuing tribes and peoples who are ‘sons of Anak’/ the Rephaim etc, as being descended from the sons of Noah which create the many peoples of the world in Genesis10/11. So it is not unreasonable to consider that the matter of Noah’s lineage has more questions than answers, in 1Enoch and the Bible. That Cain and Seth’s lineages have identical names, thus stands interpretation as an (allegorical) ‘sign-post’, indicating the two lines are somehow intertwined, in ways difficult to categorise.

This entire narrative and imagery is linked by the complex use of (Sun-related) 7/77 encodings, which are present in both the Old and New Testament, and relate to questions of blood-line, and of ‘sin’ – ie the bloodlines of Cain and ‘those sons of the gods who took wives from the daughters of men’. So the words of YHVH (Gen.4.15), Lamech (Gen4.24) and Jesus (Matthew18.22) repeat the 7 and 77 etc related theme. In fact, in the Song of Solomon, at 7.7, the daughter of Jerusalem mentions the grapevine (symbolizing bloodline), and the date-palm (the tamarind tree, a long-time symbol of the ’gods’ in the Near East, as well as meaning ‘tree of darkness’ – hence pointing to the ‘unknowable’ nature of the ‘gods’. One brief example is in the already featured Tablet of Shamash, from Assyrian ruled Sippar in Sumer, circa 855Bce, a sacred tablet awash with cosmic symbolism, such as;

the peak of the canopy and date-palm supports two Anuna; who hold measuring cords from the ‘heavens’ down to the sun-symbol of a four-rated symbol of Earth with four ‘rivers’ which point to the quarters of the compass, reinforcing the ‘angels with measuring cords’ theme; the Anuna headwear of ‘horns’; Shamash the sun-god holding a ‘rod and ring’ cord for measuring and encircling/ protecting the Earth or the Creation; wearing clothes of a design of ‘water’ (fish-related pattern), indicating the ‘celestial’ genetics of Enki, Oannes etc; a smaller Anuna standing besides the humans ‘introducing them’, identifiable also by the ‘horned’ headwear – and possibly a depiction of the younger generation of Anuna-human hybrid bloodlines present in Sumer and thereafter. And lastly, a date-palm tree besides Shamash, completes the canopy above Shamash, adding the axial sign of the unknowable celestial beings, the Anuna. Also symbolic of the female womb in Sumerian mythology, as well as the concomitant fertility of the land.

The inscriptions dedicate the Tablet to Sin (the moon-god father of Shamash), Ishtar, and Shamash.

And as Sitchin notes in The Stairway to Heaven, there is an almost identical scene drawn in the Book of Coming Forth by Day (or the book of the Dead) at the British Museum, in a page from the ‘Papyrus of Queen Nejmet’. In it two angels hold cords extending across the scene and around the sun. Most relevantly, both ‘Cordholders’ are situated, and measuring, at an omphalos point, signified by the conical symbols (that the four-rayed ‘planet’ symbol rests upon), akin to the Greek ones at Delphos. He also notes, in addition to Enoch’s showing two angels going ‘north to measure the secrets of the earth’, is a Ugaritic (form of ancient Semitic-related cuneiform language) text which states that from the peak of Zaphon, from Ba’al ‘a cord strong and supple stretches out, heavenwards to the Seat of Kadesh’. This means sanctuary, or refuge in the southern desert of Canaan and Judah, near to Beer-Sheba and the Wilderness of Zin. It was from the mountain Baal-Zaphon that the Israelites escaped the pursuing Egyptian forces by YHVH holding back the waters while they crossed at the Red Sea, after which the pursuing forces were then drowned. (Exodus14.2-4, Numbers33.7). Baal-Zaphon was called the ‘Lord of the North’ in Ugaritic, stemming perhaps from his being called also the god of sea and storms Hadad, (whose name is clearly derived from the Anuna storm-god in Assyrian and Babylonian cultures Adad, who features in the Deluge in Gilgamesh) and came to represent North to Israel, in Isaiah14.13, Gen13.14, and so on…)

So clearly a considerable amount of complex mythology is linked to this mysterious and beautifully made tablet, including the tamarind date-palm.

To return to the narrator of the Song of Solomon, she says of herself ‘I am dark but comely’ (ch.1.5), pointing obliquely to her solar-related genetics, and the nature of the genes; as well as potentially indicating Sheba, the ‘Queen of the South’. There are two females named Tamar, meaning ‘darkness’, in the Bible who are impregnated by their own kin, indicating by this the imbalanced genetics of the ‘dark’ bloodlines. (One is the daughter-in-law of Judah, the other is David’s daughter). Likewise, when Cain and his wife give birth to Enoch ‘of their line’ (Gen4.17), there are no other women except the family of Adam and Eve in the world by the Bible’s account, making it possible to infer the line is started by Cain and his sister…although, to place this in context, marriage to half-siblings, ie with one different parent, or to first cousins, was predominantly accepted in the ancient Near East and Hebrew cultures.
The mother of Tubal-Cain in this lineage, the wife of Lamech, is Zillah. This name means ‘shadow’ or ‘dark’ indicating simply the nature of the gene-stream. She is the third woman to be mentioned in the Bible, showing the significance of the bloodline involved…

In the Book of Jubilees the sister of Cain is named Awen meaning ‘iniquity’ or ‘potency’ – linking this name to the sun-worship centre in ancient Egypt at An or On – or as it was spelt in biblical Hebrew, ‘Awen’. And again, all the versions of this city, such as Heliopolis mean basically the ‘powers of the Sun’. Further still, this links to the original civilization Sumer, where the name Anu, the ‘Father of the Heavens was the earliest word for ‘(divine) light’. (Solomon the name contains thus ‘Sol’, ‘Om’, and ‘On’, all being names for cosmic and solar energies within the Hebrew, Egyptian, and Greek civilizations of antiquity. . .) Further pointing in this way to the dualities of the nature of the celestial (but unbalanced) ‘dark lineages’, which are strongly solar in nature, to be found within many of the details of the Bible.

If the ‘sons of the gods’ in Genesis are the descendants of Enki (in particular) and his original generation of celestial nature, they combine the positive ‘celestial’ genes of Enki, Ninhursag/Ninti the ‘mother of life’, and so on – which created mankind over the millennia through infusions at various points in the evolution of ‘homo sapiens’ – with the more earthly genes of early humans. Also the Nephilim lines were created of human-god hybrid offspring through (unauthorised) intercourse, rather than genetic procedures in the ‘Birthing Room’, described as a laboratory effectively in the Sumerian myths (see “The Myth of Enki and Ninhursag; The Creation of Dilmun and other Travails” (Dilmun being the original ‘garden of Eden’ where the Anuna settled on earth, and developed mankind, domesticated crops and farm stock, and gradually developed the agricultural bases of civilization). For an example of the potential narrative of the genetic creation of all these central planks of later civilization in one circumscribed area, the Fertile Crescent, the Myth reads as follows;

“Pure are the cities – and you are the ones to whom they are allotted. Pure is Dilmun land – and you are the ones to whom it is allotted. Pure is Dilmun land. Pure is Dilmun land. Virginal is Dilmun land. Virginal is Dilmun land. Pristine is Dilmun land”.

Though Enki and Ninhursag conjoin their energies to create this, the nature of their union was thus described as ‘pristine’ and ‘virginal’, while descriptions include; “. . .upon Ninhursag he caused to flow the ‘water of the heart’, She received the ‘water of the heart’, the water of Enki”. So the early Sumerian creation myths do contain descriptions which allow for the interpretation of ‘celestial creation’ to be concerned with matters related to genetics and sperm, but in ways potentially somewhat different to intercourse. This may be reflected in the repeated references to ‘seed’ which are to be found in Genesis; the word is used approximately sixty times in the first book of the Bible, just under a quarter of the times it is used in the entire Bible…

As an example of this, additional Sumerian creation myths such as that of ‘Enki and Ninhursag’, and the ‘Myth of Grain and Cattle’ depict the steps taken by the deities in creating humankind, and plants and domesticated animals which hold special significance for mankind. Nearly all involve a ‘creation birthing room’, (highly unusual as a concept for 3000Bce), and the gods providing of their substance, be that blood, or sperm, to conjoin with ‘earthly material’, symbolised by clay, etcetera. So, in ‘Enki and Ninhursag’, after Enki impregnates several resulting female deities of the Anuna, the ‘mother-goddess’ Ninkhursag removes his semen from the womb of Uttu, and plants it in the ground, causing eight plants to grow…

The similarity of the Dilmun myth to the reality of the Fertile Crescent (shown left, in the green shaded region, where both the mythic sites of Dilmun and Eden were broadly located) is markedly significant, in that this small region saw the development, from c.8000Bce, of the seven or eight domesticated crops, including emmer-wheat, einkorn, flax, barley, chick-peas, lentils etc, as well as domesticated strains of livestock including cows, sheep, goats, pigs, and donkeys which enabled the growth of agriculture and thus civilization. (see Jared Diamond; ‘Guns, Germs and Steel’, 2003, for more on this).

This historical narrative may be argued to be indicative of the role of the ‘celestial beings’ Enki, and the Sumerian gods in the ‘genetic manipulation’ which conceivably brought about not only mankind at an earlier time, but the noted essential crops, and domesticated livestock, from which civilization grew… experts such as Diamond find it difficult to explain why the key crops all arose within one small area of one continent, except to say that domestication practices must have played some role in the genetic refinement of useful crops…

The similarity to the creation of Adam and Eve from ‘dust’/ from the rib of Adam to Sumerian creation mythologies may well show where the Hebrew writer(s) of Genesis and the Old Testament found some of the underlying ideas of their myths – alternatively this may have been a widely held belief in the Near East in antiquity… From Samuel Noah Kramer’s quotation of the Sumerian Creation of Man (p.69-70, Sumerian Mythology, 1961), the deity Enki narrates;

“O my mother, the creature whose name thou hast uttered, it exists,
Bind upon it the. . . of the gods;
Mix the heart of the clay that is over the abyss (‘dust to dust’)
The good and princely fashioners will thicken the clay;
Thou, do thou bring the limbs into existence,
Ninmah will work above thee,
(goddesses of birth) will stand by thee. . .
O my mother, decree thou the new-born’s fate,
Ninmah will bind upon it the . . . of the gods,
. . . as man . . .”

The essential combining of matter and spirit in humanity, contained within the myths of mankind’s creation, may reflect early human intelligence regarding self-knowledge, or perhaps higher sources of consciousness at work in such ‘educational’ myths. Whether these lines from the earliest Sumerian creation myths, written more than a thousand years before the Babylonian and then Hebrew versions, are describing genetic ‘engineering’ is a matter of debate, and yet the possibility alone is an intriguing one.

But the relevant difference which may be deduced, concerning the Nephilim actions as detailed in Enoch, Noah, Jubilees, the Bible, and other texts, is the significant change to the original processes by virtue of their being unauthorized physical liaisons based upon physical desire. … something which finds echoes in numerous instances within the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, and within which narrative is the story of Cain, Enoch, Lamech, Noah and so forth, and the intertwined lineages. It is the Cainite Lamech who voices his despair at the (genetic) burden he cannot be freed of, but must carry, at Genesis 4.23;

‘Hear my voice ye wives of Lamech; for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold’

In other words his actions have been according to type, God’s punishment will be severe, and change – or forgiveness – will be a long time coming; possibly the numbers refer to the period of time appropriate to matters of the spirit, that is, across generations. Thus the near impossibility of his burden, especially when the situation is made worse by negative actions of violence. Though this passage, as with God’s curse on Cain, does upon close reading hold out the possibility of eventual forgiveness, if it is earned.
In this way the line of Cain, born of Eve after the expulsion from the Garden of Eden, is associated intimately (though not explicitly) with the (unbalanced) powers of the sun (777) and furthermore, in being the first murderer and fratricide, is linked to concepts of the devil. Also, tangentially, with the serpent of Eden, and thus with the celestial genetics of Enki/Ea/the ‘sons of the gods’.

There is some reference to a similar theme from the Sumerian/ Akkadian/ Babylonian works of religion. And interestingly, the reference is to the Anuna creation of humankind; the ’Atra-hasis’ epic describes how Ninti (the ‘Great Mother’) and Enki re-created mankind after the Flood; using ‘seven and seven’ wombs of women, they added fourteen ‘pinches of clay’, with the wombs being called the ‘Creatresses of Destiny’. The important point is the difference between the Anuna, the gods from heaven (who ’descended’ to earth), and the Nephilim, ‘those who fell’ (to the earth, and sin, against divine law and their own responsibilities).

The Nephilim therefore descended from ‘on high’ expressly to ‘commingle’ with human women, even while knowing it was against divine injunction; as told in 1Enoch (Laurence version, 1883), chapter VII;

“After the sons of men had multiplied in those days, that daughters were born to them, elegant and beautiful. And when, the angels, the sons of heaven beheld them, they became enamoured of them…Then their leader Semjaza said to them; I fear that you may perhaps be indisposed to the performance of this enterprise: and that I alone shall suffer for such a crime. But they answered him and said; We all swear; And bind ourselves by mutual execrations…Their whole number was two hundred, who descended upon Ardis, which is the top of mount Armon. That mountain was therefore called Armon, because they had sworn upon it, and bound themselves by mutual execrations” (chapter vii, vs 1-8).

So the ‘Atra-hasis’ reference to ‘seven and seven wombs’ may be one of the earliest uses of this form, while still not associating Enki or Ninkhursag, full Anuna deities with sexual relations with humans, despite being involved with the creation of significant genetic lineages. The authors of the Bible would have been well aware of these Sumerian and later mythologies/ religious works, mythologies which will in all probability have been passed on to Hebrew priests during the seventy or so years the Hebrew elite spent in Babylon during the Captivity, from 603-538Bce or thereabouts.
The authors of the Hebrew Bible may have adapted them to begin the ‘seven-and-seven’ theme within the Old Testament, concerned with questions of the gods (of Sumer), the Nephilim, sexual relations, and sin, as well as the ‘celestial lineages’ begun by either the Anuna or the Nephilim; lineages which the Bible itself at Gen11.states the Hebrews found their origins in…alternatively the use of ‘seven’ in such linguistic formulations as found in the Bible may have been an ‘intensifier’ derived from traditional uses of ‘seven’ to indicate completeness, or totality, (as indeed the octave has always been an intellectual tool for understanding reality, and even is today, as both light, sound, and even elements of the Periodic Table fall naturally into groups of seven, forming an octave).
.
Two of Cain and Lamech’s immediate descendants too are marked as such; Lamech’s son Tubal-Cain (Gen4.22) is the (‘father of’, or) ‘instructer of every artifice in brass and iron’; this connects him to both the Nehushtan, the Brasen Serpent created by Moses, as well as to those taught the ‘secrets of the heavens’ in 1Enoch, the two hundred ‘fallen angels’, which included all forms of wisdom, astrology, healing, prophecies, technology and metallurgy, (in similar way to Enki, and Oannes/the Annedoti, the ‘serpent-deities’ who in Sumerian and Babylonian mythology introduced the arts of civilization to mankind). In keeping with this non-spiritual, ‘earthly’ theme, even of knowledge of the crafts and skills of civilization, the name Tubal-Cain in Hebrew actually means; ‘world’, and the flowing along of a course of action… as well as his being the ‘first blacksmith’ with all the consequences of that, in terms of the development of civilization, the production of increasingly sophisticated ways of producing metals such as steel, and the weapons of war – and thus making endemic the sin of Cain, as well as enabling civilizations concerned with conquest and empire; the ‘powers of the world’.

And in Genesis10/11, the generations ensuing from the sons of Noah are listed – Shem, Ham and Japheth. We saw in the first section the possible correlation between Lamech’s three sons, and Noah’s three sons who peopled the earth after the Flood, thus becoming patriarchs as follows. Cain’s sons were Jabal, ‘the father of those such as dwell in tents and of such as who have cattle; Jubal, ‘the father of all such as handle the harp and organ’ – and Tubal-Cain ‘an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron’ (Gen4.22). It is possible to combine the two sets of three, so that the lineage of Ham equates with that of Jabal, Shem to Jubal, and Japheth corresponds to that of Tubal, indeed Japheth has a son named Tubal again indicating the primary/foundational nature of the three sons, plus the links between the two lines of Seth and Cain.

The three sons of Noah peopled the three continents of Europe, Africa, and Asia as follows;
Shem father to – Asia up to the Euphrates, Iran, Assyria, Chaldea, Sumer. Semitic peoples.
Japheth father to – parts of Asia and Europe. Europe, Ukraine, Greece, Romania, Russia.
Ham peopled the lands of – Syria, Arabia, Canaan, Egypt and Africa.

As such Africa is indicated by ‘those who herd cattle and dwell in tents’, Europe by those who ‘are artificers in every kind of metal’, and Asia ‘those who are skilled in ‘the harp and organ’; possibly indicating the esoteric uses of (sacred) music to refine human consciousness and being, in keeping with the East’s traditional expertise in spiritual rather than technological matters. And in keeping with the Bible’s association of music very often with higher forces or matters of the spirit. To return to our original point, however, concerning the bloodline links, Genesis10.8 lists;

“And Cush (the son of Ham) begat Nimrod; he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord; wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord.”

This connects the lineage of Noah directly with the Nephilim bloodlines; firstly as a ‘hunter’; when the offspring were born ‘giants’ they began to devour all the works of man, and even began to eat humans – the oppression, and corruption of morals thus causing the necessity of the Flood. So any biblical references to hunters, (or fishermen) hold these resonances, as we shall see shortly. Secondly, Genesis 6.4 describes the offspring as follows;

“There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown “…

It is clearly of the greatest relevance that Nimrod the great-grandson of Noah is thus described as such. Many warriors of David (among others), particularly his bloodline relatives are referred to as being ‘mighty’ men, again creating a perceivable but unstated connection. Many of David’s warriors are termed ‘gibborim’, a direct reference to the ‘giants’ of old… for example, at 2Sam16.6/ 2Sam10.7; ‘And when David heard of it, he sent Joab and all the host of the mighty men’ (‘ha gibborim’). And it is a telling point that this class of offspring of the ‘sons of God’ in Genesis ch.6, who were ‘mighty men of old’, and ‘giants in the earth’, is linked directly in the Bible to the bloodlines of Sumer!

So at Genesis10.10 “And the beginning of his (Nimrod’s) kingdom was Babel (Babylon, whose name means the ‘gateway of the gods’); and Erech (Uruk, home city of Gilgamesh, the ‘semi-divine’ king by virtue of his mother being a deity of the Anunnaki) and Accad (Akkad) and Calneh (within Assyria, home city of the ‘mighty’ deity Ninurta, the ‘Wild Bull of Enlil’ and the probable role-model for Nimrod), in the land of Shinar (Sumer). Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh (leading city of the Assyrian empire)…” and so on. All the places we have studied in this section as being those the Anunnaki created throughout antiquity forming the consequential (and concurrent to a lesser extent) Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian and Assyrian civilizations, or ‘empires’; (thus the Bible correctly delineates in this way the line of transmission of ‘celestial consciousness’ the Anunnaki introduced to mankind, as well as their related bloodlines – and thereafter the ‘arts of civilization’, all of which combined to make the Mesopotamian civilizations among the most advanced, and thus powerful, of the ancient Near East.
This theme of the effect upon civilization of such bloodlines is key not just to Sumerian history, but in Hebrew mythology to the Nephilim and the Flood; the narrative of the mighty ‘men of renown’ – born with powers of great vitality stemming from high proportions of ‘celestial’ genes, but of also uncontrollable appetites and personalities – is at the heart of the story of the building of the Tower of Babel, written in Genesis 11. Indeed, it is stated in Hebrew rabbinical sources such as the Book of Jubilees that it was Nimrod who was the motive force for the building of the Tower… likewise, in “The Antiquities of the Jews” (1.4.1.3) Josephus states that;

“Now the multitude were very ready to follow the determination of Nimrud, and to esteem it a piece of cowardice to submit to God, and they built a tower, neither sparing any pains nor in any way being negligent in the work”…

In the Bible, Genesis11.1 begins;

“And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech; and it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar… And they said, Go to, let us build a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. And the LORD said, Behold the people is one, and they have all one language, and this they begin to do; and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do… So the LORD scattered them; abroad from thence upon the face of the earth, and they left off to build the city. Therefore the name of it is Babel, because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of the earth ” (11.1-9).

As well as echoing the description at the start of the Book of Job of Satan as ‘walking to and fro, upon the face of the earth’, a repeated refrain, this passage helps to explain the sin of the two hundred ‘fallen angels’, in passing on to humans the ‘secrets of the heavens’ – ‘now nothing will be restrained from them’… Likewise that of the serpent in the Garden of Eden telling Eve what would happen if she ate of the Tree of Wisdom;
Genesis 3.4-5; “And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye surely shall not die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil”

So, upon close reading, the Bible shows us that the line of Seth in the person of Nimrod (son of Cush – Ham – Noah) is connected to both the Cainite lineages, and to the Watchers /Nephilim lineages which came through the first civilization, Sumer. The positive potentialities of the lineage of Adam and Eve, who represent as such the ‘archetypal’ man and woman made in the image of God and the creation, in the line stemming from Seth, is shown by the inclusion of Jesus – the ‘perfected man’ and incarnated ‘son of God’ – many generations later.

In confirmation of the often mentioned ‘duality’ of the celestial bloodlines within the Bible and elsewhere, the term ‘Watchers’ is applied to the Nephilim very often, and yet used in many texts of antiquity to refer to positive angelic orders; for example, in the Persian ‘Zend-Avesta’, in Syriac liturgies, and in the Bible;

Daniel 4.13;
“I saw in the visions of my head upon my bed, and behold, a watcher and a holy one came down from heaven”.

Likewise in Isaiah 21.11 the prophet writes;
“. . .he calleth to me out of Seir, Watchman, what of the night? The watchman said, The morning cometh, and also the night; if ye will enquire, inquire ye; return, come. . .”

In the Book of Jubilees, the term ‘watchers’ is applied to the Anunnaki, and then to the Nephilim offspring of the tribe who descend to Earth to mate with women… meaning that the term is really just a way of classing beings as ‘celestial’, or heavenly – again making the distinctions between good or bad examples of them difficult to discern when no categorical meaning is attached to such references…
(Seir itself gives rise to the Hebrew concept of the ‘seir im’, demons which inhabit desert areas; a good metaphor for the dry, waterless results of the excesses of the powers of the sun, while also linking to the ‘parched’ nature of the fiery serpents/angels, the ’Seraphim’…)
So there are many other examples of the positive nature of the Watchers/ ‘watchmen’ (!) are in the Bible, indeed the original Egyptian word for the Gods – the Neter – means ‘watchers’ in its form of N-T-R. (Arabic/Semitic languages are based upon the form of 3 consonants –the triconsonantal root – indicating the basic meaning, with interspaced vowels denoting gender, tense, number and so on. Nephilim, for instance, has the root of N-P-L, while Shalom meaning has the root of S-L-M, meaning wholeness, peace, complete or safe, from which many words have been derived, such as Solomon, salaam, Jerusalem and so on).

In connecting Simon Peter to ‘Satan’ therefore, the words of Jesus connect him to the lineage of Enki and the Anunnaki, the serpent of Eden, the lineage of Cain, (with its links to the negative aspects of the serpent), to the Watchers and to the Nephilim. Or more concisely, all these aspects are related to the inter-related concepts of ‘satan’, the serpent, and the Anunnaki deity Enki. (As we discuss elsewhere, at no point in the Bible is the ‘serpent of Eden’ actually called ‘Satan’ or ‘Devil’…a point of some significance).
So, without asserting any definitive conclusions around this complex subject, does the Bible show any other signposts of relevance to what might be called an incredible narrative concerning Simon Peter? What of the ‘character’ of the apostle as shown in the Gospels and afterwards?

2. The character of Simon Peter in the Synoptic Gospels;

SIMON PETER – is shown to be an incomplete person, a flawed character, and in confirmation of the allegorical (as well as historical) nature of the events described in the Bible, is actually called ‘Satan’ by Jesus. This is a point overlooked by those who wish to believe God would only use perfect, ‘blessed’ people to fulfil his plans, clearly an understandable if intellectually restrictive belief. Also a narrative that shows that some characters may be those who God requires to undergo essential change (through experience, and suffering) before being blessed. As Jesus says, ‘the least in heaven is greater than Abraham’.

Actions of Simon Peter in the synoptic gospels include; cutting the ear of man off at the arrest of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane (John18.10/26, Luke22.50). Later the same night he denies any knowledge of, or relationship with Jesus (when questioned) three times, even when warned he will do so (John18.27/ Mark14.54/68); making it possible that he was ‘fulfilling a role’ in so doing… or perhaps suffering the stress of events? He also falls asleep, against the injunction of Jesus, while Jesus suffers all night in the garden of Gethsemane in communion with God and his inner self, just before his arrest. Peter misunderstands Jesus too, at several times when asked about central issues; he is shown as not understanding the message of Christ in its essential respects, as not being able to understand ‘love’ in particular, while also acknowledging that Christ is the ‘Son of God’. He resents Mary’s closeness with Jesus and complains and sows dissension in this respect, (as emphasized in the Gnostic text The Gospel of Thomas), so that Jesus even upbraids him for criticizing others, or displaying jealousies. Jesus also gives the Parable of the Seeds, in which those that are sown on rocky ground do not take root or grow (Matt13.4-9). After the crucifixion, Peter assumes some form of authority among the apostles, while also being excluded from the group around James, the brother of Jesus, and John the Evangelist. When St Paul is converted on the road to Damascus and becomes a powerful figure in early Christianity, he and Peter fall out over minor matters; a symbol perhaps, of deeper differences…

And yet occasionally Simon Peter is the most perceptive and trusted of the disciples. He is taken along with the disciple John by Jesus alone up the mountain, to witness the ‘Transfiguration of Christ’, and hear the Lord speaking from the heavens to bless Jesus. He is a witness as such of (a vision of) the appearance of Moses, and Elijah, two of the most important prophets or leaders of the Israelites in the Old Testament. Peter at this point actually shows his ‘literal-mindedness’ by saying ‘should we build a tent for them to stand in, to hide their brilliance?’. . . (Mark 9.2-13)
Jesus also blesses Simon Peter with the quotes already mentioned in above sections; Matthew16.18/18.18. among others, establishing Peter’s position of authority in the post-crucifixion Church. (It may be argued these two clear verses regarding his authority were added by supporters of Peter at some later date to the original gospels – although little is actually definitely known concerning the authorship of the books of the New Testament).

He is also the first apostle to enter the empty tomb after the crucifixion, (John 20.1-9) and the first apostle to see the resurrected Christ, just after Mary Magdalene, on the Sunday (Luke 24.34).

It is after blessing Peter in Matthew16.18;

‘… for thou art Peter, and upon this rock shall I build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven’,

that Jesus begins to tell his disciples of his forthcoming trials and torments, and eventual crucifixion. In what appears to be effectively a semantic method of underlining the significance of Matt16.18, the textual ‘formulation’ of Matthew16.18 is repeated two chapters later, at Matthew18.18;

Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

And the significance of the symbol of the Keys of St Peter as created in these verses becomes clearer when it is seen that they mirror closely some of the most alarming descriptions of the destruction of a large proportion of the earth and humanity in the Book of Revelations by the various ‘angels’ – in what appears to confirm the hidden narrative of Simon Peter as Satan, or Lucifer – specifically the events when the Fifth Trumpet is sounded in heaven and on earth;

“And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth; and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth…and in those days men shall seek death, and shall not find it. And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle…And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon” (Rev.9.1-11).

Most biblical authorities believe that the locusts of the bottomless pit are demons, evil spirits ruled by Satan, who are released to torment those who have not been given the seal of God’s Elect upon themselves. The narrative of the Gadarene Swine in Luke8.31 states that when Jesus exorcises the demonic spirits possessing an insane man, they beg with him not to send them to the bottomless pit, but to let them instead ‘possess’ the swine. (This, of course, is an allegory of the essential nature of those people who place physical pleasure and gratification above the labours that spiritual principles demand)… The end result is largely the same anyway in Luke ch.8, as the swine immediately panic and stampede, before running straight off a cliff !
The narrative of Matthew16 continues after Jesus’ words to Peter regarding the powers he will have, with his further description of all that he, Jesus, will suffer shortly within his life. The text states that in answer to this, Peter ‘took him and began to rebuke him saying, Lord, this shall not be unto thee’… This prompts the reply of Jesus at Matt16.23;

‘But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me Satan; thou art an offence unto me; for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men’…

In other words, Peter’s being is still rooted in the perspectives of the lower ‘earthly’ or ‘egoistic’ consciousness; ie. has not risen to the higher intellectual or emotional centres but remained in the undeveloped consciousness of the normal intellectual and emotional centres, or even the three sub-centres of the stomach (the ‘instinctive/physical’; social; and sexual centres in Gurdjieff’s definition) where matters of the (physical) self are the main concern. In Matthew16.24; “then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”

So taken in conjunction with all the satan/devil references we are examining, the words of Jesus to Simon Peter begin to look more literal than ‘metaphorical’ than might be initially presumed, placing Peter towards the earthly rather than the heavenly. But in noting this, it is incidentally only two verses after this, (Matthew17.1-4) that Jesus takes Peter, James and John up a high mountain; 17.2 “And was transfigured before them; and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light”.

A passage ‘supportive’ of the virtues in Peter’s character in some respects, while also reminiscent of the events concerning the baby Noah when born. ie the ‘hybrid’ genes in Noah and his lineage were thus shown to be ‘of the sons of the heavens’ by his face ‘shining like the sun’ when he was born, in the Book of 1Enoch/ Jubilees, etc. Another related example is when God gives Moses the Tablets of the Law, on Mt Sinai; when he descends from where ‘the Lord passed by before him’, his face is ‘shines brilliantly like the sun’, so much so in fact that he is given a veil to wear made by his companions (Exodus34.1-33). (Though this phenomenon of the face being filled with light is accepted within religious circles as indicating the presence of higher dimensional energies within the self). In the Middle Ages artists depicted Moses as having horns, (like the gods of the Anunnaki), said to be because of this passage – the custom stems from an ambiguity of the Hebrew words used in that ‘his face was ‘crowned’ or ‘horned’ with light, being translated by St Jerome in the Latin Vulgate version in the fifth century Ad. But it is a valid proposal that this circumstance links Moses through allegory to the (bloodlines of the) Anunnaki or ‘Watchers’, as is the case with Noah in 1Enoch and the Qumran Scrolls, etc.

The most famous example of this convention of depicting Moses with horns is the statue carved by Michelangelo in Italy in 1515Ad – this (see below) is now displayed in Rome in the church of; St Peter-in-chains… (thus fitting the metaphor used throughout the Bible of anyone who is captive within the genetics of the ‘celestial’/dark bloodlines, as personified by Cain, Lamech; and we believe others such as Moses, Enoch, Noah, Nimrod, Abraham, his brother Nahor and his wives, his brother Haran’s son Lot and his family, Saul, David, Solomon, Peter and so on – where each individual must face the darkness within their own lineages, and rise or fall accordingly)…

Moses depicted with horns; statue by Michelangelo, 1515, Rome.

There is further symbolism connected to this subject, of Peter’s ‘captivity’ to the genes of his bloodline, in the circumstances of his life; his death and imprisonment by the emperor Nero (circa Ad 64), and his earlier imprisonment by Herod, detailed in the book of Acts12.6-21. In this he is chained between two soldiers one night in the prison (Acts12.6) when an angel of the Lord appears; it ‘smites’ Peter upon the side and his chains fall free. The angel tells Peter ‘Gird thyself, and bind on thy sandals…cast thy garment about thee, and follow me” (12.8), raising again the symbolism related to ‘gird’ and ‘belt’ included in Jesus’ prophesy about Peter at John21.18 (“when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not”). They walk out of the prison, then through the gates of the city, so that by the time Peter ‘comes to himself’ (12.11) he is near the house of Mary, mother of John. This entire passage may be interpreted to mean many things, such as the power of the heavens to achieve the ‘impossible’, or God’s ability to grant a person grace; or of the value of faith in testing circumstances – or perhaps even acceptance of the circumstances of life as being impermanent… but the theme of the possibility of dealing with the genetic inheritance he is born into may equally be considered within the story. And immediately after this passage comes the death of King Herod, (who dies shortly after having executed the guards who let Peter escape), directly at the hand of the angel of the Lord (12.19-23);
“And upon a set day Herod, arrayed in royal apparel, sat upon his throne, and made an oration unto them. And the people gave a shout, saying, It is the voice of a god, and not of a man. And immediately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the glory…”. (Acts12.21-3).

The parallels with Nimrod, the ‘great hunter before the Lord’, who built the Tower of Babel, are clear. This passage as such encapsulates the Bible’s many strands of reference to people who elevate themselves above all humanity, such as the merciless Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, who is punished with insanity for seven years after which he repents (Daniel4.33-37); the Pharaoh in the book of Genesis mistreating the Israelites; and so on. This is much as the Nephilim lines are the ‘sons of the gods’ who are repeatedly shown as condemned and punished – while the Bible only partly indicates the ongoing rise and fall throughout history of nations which are more powerful than their neighbours, ie. examples of inequality within the material world. Similarities exist to the Roman emperors of the line of Caesar who deified themselves/ claimed divine origins – yet the Israelites deified their rulers as the ‘anointed of YHVH’, which was the reason why David would not kill Saul even after his attempts on David’s life; partially asserting the ‘uniqueness’ of such figures. And as we have seen, links existed between the celestial lineages of varying nature and many of Israel’s founders, such as David and his family…

The next item containing significant pointers to Peter’s inner nature comes from Luke22.31, in a puzzling statement by Jesus;

‘And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat;
but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not; and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren’.

After which Peter promises he is ready to die for Jesus, prompting Jesus to reply that ‘…the cock shall not crow this day, before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me’. So this is a highly meaningful part of the biblical narrative with regard to Peter.

The words of Jesus constitute a strange statement beneath the surface; for having noted the presence throughout the Bible of the ‘serpent’ of Eden, representative of Enki, and the Anunnaki, plus the role of the satan as ‘servant of the Lord’, as an ‘opponent’ or ‘accuser’ (ie judge), the function of Satan in this instance seems to support that perspective; Satan ‘has asked ’ – and that ‘he may sift you as wheat’, ie test the character of Peter (perhaps as Satan is given the opportunity to test Jesus – confirming somewhat the Old Testament concept of the ‘shaitan’, the ’adversary’, or judge of men acting according to divine will).
One point of note is the use of wheat in the metaphor, suggestive as the image of a field of wheat is of a symbol of the life-creating powers of the sun, as well as the repeated associations in the Bible of bread with divine knowledge and blessings. This symbolism helps to associate Peter with the themes of wisdom or ‘knowing’, as the serpent in Eden promised Eve and Adam their ‘eyes shall be opened’, and they shall ‘be as the gods’ if they ate of the Tree; and the serpent’s associations to Enki the wisdom-giver. (See also the serpent’s association with the Plant of Life at the end of the Epic of Gilgamesh…)
Secondly, the passage links Peter to the cycle of life and death, light and dark embodied within Jesus’ allegory of the seed of wheat, which must be buried in the ground before it can give forth life. . . a cycle very much contained in Greek mythology by the story of the fertility-goddess Persephone, daughter of the goddess of fertility and agriculture Demeter, forced to live in the underworld for half of the year. While imprisoned there each year her mother does not allow crops to grow, thus giving shape to the yearly cycle. Similarly in Babylonian myths of Inanna (Ishtar) and Dumuzi, as well as Sumerian myths of Ningiszida and Tammuz/ Dumuzi, the heavenly ‘gate-keepers’ (as in the myth of ‘Adapa and the South Wind’) must descend to the underworld to fulfil divine will. So this duality is perhaps towards the centre of questions regarding Simon Peter’s being. Overall, the theme of incarnating ‘gods’ (or celestial beings) may be equated to the concept of the soul ‘leaving its natural home in heaven’ to fulfil the process of incarnating, living on earth with all the temptations thereof, and gaining meaningful life experiences that ‘the heavens’ cannot provide…

An additional question implied here also is ‘why’? – why has Satan desired to test Simon Peter, of all the apostles? Unless his nature has something particular to him which must be tested? None of the other disciples go through similar experiences, pointing to a possibly essential difference. No further mention of this circumstance is made in any of the books of the New Testament, leaving it as a literal ‘non-sequitur’ which must be explored by the individual.
Considering the assertion in these pages that he is connected in some way to the lines of Cain/Lamech etc, there is the conversation between Jesus and Simon Peter in Matthew18.21. This passage is as follows;

Then came Peter unto him and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Until seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times, but until seven times seventy seven.

This short passage is phrased in words which instantly recall the words of Lamech despairing of his sinful nature, caused by his bloodline heredity. (‘Lamech shall be avenged not sevenfold, but seventy and sevenfold’). While the Lamech of the Seth lineage, Noah’s father, lived to the age of 777 years! (the ‘celestial’ genetics of the pre-Flood era lines being so strong that these extended life-spans were a primary characteristic of the pre-Deluge patriarchs, or kings, in both the Bible (Genesis5.1-32), and Sumerian King Lists).
That seven is used as a number representative of a ‘natural’ period of time, denotes the workings of the octave in describing complete processes, an understanding made central by Gurdjieff and Ouspensky in their lifetimes’ works. So in describing the punishment of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, the term is used, and repeated, in Daniel 4.16 (and 4.23); “Let his heart be changed from man’s, and let a beast’s heart be given unto him; and let seven times pass over him”….

Thus the words of Jesus signpost with the numeric ‘identifier’ present throughout the Bible of seven, seventy-seven and 777 etc, that Simon Peter is related to the same (solar) bloodline, of Cain. The nature of the bloodline is signified by the use of the word ‘sin’, centring the question upon the negative lines. Likewise, the use of the word ‘brother’ in the question indicates it is concerned with family and bloodlines – even Simon Peter’s in particular (!) – indeed is reminiscent of the various conflicts between brothers in the bible, from Cain and Abel onwards.

It has also been noted in other sections on this site that 7, and 7.77 etcetera are numbers closely associated with the harmonics of the Sun (ie re the Sun’s diameter, 864/1.11= 7.77, or 864/ 1.23456789 = 7), as well as within ‘sacred geometry’ examples which incorporate theses significant proportions and values into their symbols, as values representative of the harmonics of the universe. And it is therefore of significance that the ‘powers of the sun’ symbolized by this number are the essence of the genetics of the ‘celestial’ bloodlines. Powers which create ‘mighty men of renown’, but are easily turned to imbalance and excess. As such there exist countless links between the Sun, and sunlight, and the ‘mighty men’ of antiquity, from the mythologies of many of the foremost civilizations; the Sumerian and Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Hebrew, and the various Canaanite/ Phoenician/ Syrian/ Hittite religions of the Levant, and the Fertile Crescent, as well as the Greek and Roman civilizations.

A further set of connections between Simon Peter and the ‘celestial’ bloodlines of Sumer, positive, negative or otherwise, comes from the collection of myths based around the meeting between him and Simon the Magician, as detailed in the Bible in the Acts of the Apostles 8.9-24 – this concerns the battle between the two when Simon the Magician offers money to Peter if he will teach Simon how to perform the miracles of the apostles.
Academic opinion largely concurs that this figure was first referred to only in the pages of the Bible, within Acts. Most, if not all other references and stories associated with him are the result of later works, such as Gnostic mythologies, Hippolytus, Justin Martyr etcetera were written in the second or third centuries CE, more than a century later. As such it is possible to speculate that Simon Magus was n allegorical creation by the writers of the New Testament. Reasons put forward include the proposal that Magus was a figure representative of ‘heretical’ strands within the Christian Church in Rome at this period. And the ‘spiritual victory’ of Simon Peter was thus a sign of the superiority of the mainstream traditional church existing in Rome. Differences between the ‘Jewish’ and the ‘Gentile’ factions of the church are likewise stated to be germane to the narrative, with Peter representing the ‘Jewish’ faction of Christianity…(see essays by Eric Langkjer, Chris Albert Wells, Duncan Macrae, and others, at Academia.edu’ for more on this). Indeed, Langkjer writes that Simon Magus was a ‘great founder of the Gnostic movement’, and continued strands of worship of the serpent, as allegorical symbol of wisdom, and the cosmos; narratives which the Roman Church distanced itself from quite emphatically, from this time onwards.

That said, the ‘cosmic consciousness’ present within the Bible may be inferred from the proposed narrative under examination, of the subtly negative aspect of Simon Peter’s ‘divided’ or ‘hybrid’ self. An ‘inner reality’ which may be said to be symbolized by this character – something the Bible may be considered to do if (spiritual) meaning is presented via allegory and metaphor as well as stated literally – there are some details within the story which are highly salient.
Firstly, Simon the Magician is from Samaria, (and is called the ‘bad Samaritan’ in some versions/ retellings); the origin or meaning of the name Samaria is ‘little Sumer’. The reasons this came about are unknown, but possibly relate to a small early grouping of Sumerians having settled in the area during the Assyrian defeat and ‘repopulation’ of Israel in 722Bce. It is telling that Mary Magdalene, believed by the majority of scholars to be Mary of Bethany mentioned in the Gospels (John 11.1-2, 12.3, Luke 7.36, 10.38-42, etc etc) was therefore from the village of Bethany, situated in the region (of the modern West Bank) known and referred to as Judaea and Samaria, a term used even in the 20th century by the United Nations, and by Israel… while Bethany means ‘house of Anu’, indicating the Anunnaki.

And interestingly, as we saw earlier, 2Kings 17.5-24 tells of the Assyrian forces of Shalmaneser V laying siege to Samaria for three years, and then taking the Samarians into captivity in Assyria. And more than that; “And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthath, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and lived in its cities” . . .as well as introducing the worship of pagan gods referred to as ‘abominations’ (such as Molech). As such they ‘caused their sons and daughters to pass through the fire’ (2Kings7.17). Verse 7.31 states the Avites made ‘false idols’, and the Sepharvaim likewise sacrificed their children to ‘Anammelech’ and other pagan deities…

These imported peoples were the predecessors of the New Testament ‘Samaritans’, who were viewed as ‘unclean’ because of this aspect of their history. And yet another example of the intermingling of the bloodlines of the Israelites with those of the peoples of Sumer-related lineages of the ‘heavens’. It is generally accepted however that the religions of Mesopotamia never included practices of human sacrifice within Mesopotamia – with the ‘putting of children through the fire’ as found in the worship of Molech/ Milcom being a practice that was found in the Syrian and Canaanite regions of the Levant in the first millennium Bce.

Indeed, one point raised by some commentators, such as ‘studylight.org’, is that ‘there is no evidence in any cuneiform literature of Mesopotamia that would point to the presence of human sacrifice, by fire or otherwise, as part of the ritual”; the predominant societies or cultures which did practice such rites were in the Levant, in the region of Phoenicia/ Lebanon, Canaan and Syria, thus causing some writers to look to links between there and the Assyrians – after decline from c.1050Bce for two or three centuries, it was during the period of the Neo-Assyrian empire’s re-growth under Tiglath-Pileser III, from 745-727Bce that the empire achieved control of the Levant all the way to the Egyptian border. Likewise, Babylon was conquered in 729Bce… Thus the practices mentioned, while nominally Assyrian may actually have been Syrian in origin..! Indeed, the predominant deity associated with these rituals, Molech, or Milcom, etc, was a deity of the Canaanite religion in the Levant from the 2nd millennium Bce through to the first centuries Ad. That the Bible associates the Assyrians with these practices may be either a reflection of the cruel nature the Assyrians were widely viewed as possessing during their periods of power in the ancient Near East, or equally a continuation of predominantly negative references to the civilizations of Sumer, Akkad, Assyria and Babylon, and the gods of the Anunnaki. The stated deity ‘Anammelech’ is one example, being a combination of Anu plus Molech, in this way; there are no other references to such a deity anywhere in the Bible, or elsewhere, indicating the insubstantiality of the name.

Also of interest to Simon Peter and Simon Magus, are the themes of the (Gnostic) sacred feminine, celestial beings incarnating in semi-human lineages, ‘sinfulness’, and redemption – all of which are a part of Sumerian mythology, as well as mostly being part of the sub-texts of the life and character of many in the Old Testament, as well as Simon Peter himself, (although Peter had few positive relationships with women; though that said, the New Testament relates that he was married, and had an extended family and sons, something he refers to himself several times). Some of the details of the story of Simon Magus told by Justin Martyr run parallel closely to Simon Peter’s life, such as the inclusion of the Phoenician city of Tyre (meaning ‘rock’), and then Simon Magus’ journey to Rome, which in the Bible is the Babylon of the modern era after Christ’s birth. Simon Magus was also possibly the inspiration for medieval stories of Faustus, including the version by Goethe, Faust; (in which Faustus asks the demon Mephistopheles to bring the shade of Helen of Troy for him to see in Marlowe’s version…!) – so perhaps it might be said the negative aspects of Simon (Magus? Peter?) find full expression in this mythic tale.

The themes of slavery, captivity and prostitution likewise relate symbolically to the burden and inescapability of the unbalanced genetic inheritance of the Sumerian bloodlines, as they were represented from the 3rd millennium Bce onwards, and on through the books of the Bible. Something we thus argue is an inner-meaning of many of the stories and references to both imprisonment and ‘slavery’ within the Bible, (while also having universal applications potentially to notions of attachment to desires, etcetera, freedom from which are prerequisites of spiritual development); and as we shall see later is repeated in the later Islamic myths of the descendent of Simon Peter, the Roman princess Narjis, who was sold into slavery in the Holy Lands and redeemed by her virtue, and marriage into the family of Al-Askari, the Eleventh Imam of Shia Islam; from the union of who came the mythic Twelfth Imam, the Mahdi.

One historic detail related to the two Simons comes from twelfth century France, in the following picture of the representation of Simon Magus at the Basilica of St-Sernin (or ‘Saturnin’; of relevance as Saturn represented the lineages of the ‘Archons’ according to Gnostic theologies, while those of Jupiter represented virtue, comparable to the lines of Cain and Seth respectively). This church is in Toulouse, France, and dates to the early 12th century; as can be seen, Simon Magus is in close proximity to imps and devils (who have bird-like claws or talons!), and interestingly, his hat is identical to the ‘horned’ headwear of the Anunnaki. Considering this church was constructed between 1080 and 1118 -1120Ad, this is a fascinating, if not amazing circumstance! And this date for the stonework is confirmed according to the article “St-Sernin of Toulouse: The apotheosis of Medieval Pilgrimage Basilicas” to be found at knoji.com website, “The marble altar and seven bas-reliefs are the work of a great artist, Bernard Gilduin and his workshop from 1095 to 1110Ad… at the same time, in the first quarter of the 11th century the artists of Moissac brought their craft to Toulouse, and from the meeting of styles was born one of the great masterpieces of the 12th century, the Miegeville Door. Framed by St Peter and St James walking among demons, it is a scene of great beauty; above the frieze of scrolls topping the dancing line of apostles is an almost round boss showing the Ascension of Christ’”.

The second image, below-right, is of Simon Peter himself, sited directly over Simon Magus, with two angels above his head; if it was conceived symbolically the entire montage could be viewed as a representation of the dual (subconscious) nature of Simon Peter, containing both celestial and infernal aspects – his higher and lower selves, united within his material self, in effect. . . a theme which the Bible points to numerous times in his life. So the composite from the highest centre downwards, (head: chest: stomach – or; higher centres: conscious: subconscious) reads; angels – Simon Peter – Simon Magus – devils; (thus potentially adding a fourth level, as Gurdjieff stated the lowest level of the stomach is divided into ‘moving centre’ functions concerned with movements, and below that ’instinctive centre’ functions of purely physiological nature, such as breathing, heart-rate, digestion, the organs, the workings of the nervous system, the vascular system, and more…the centre from where physical and sexual desires arise, and as such the source of many ‘sinful’ impulses within the Bible, 1Enoch and so on. For example, as the motivating factor of the ‘sons of the gods’ having seen the beautiful ‘daughters-of-men’…)
Further small details of the Door may be viewed as containing symbolic meaning; thus the demon in the first image sits besides a vine of grapes, something we have seen used repeatedly in the Bible to symbolize genetic bloodlines, in particular those of ‘celestial’ nature. Its appearance here besides Simon Magus indicates awareness of the biblical narrative of the genetic significance of many of the tribes and peoples found within the Bible, particularly those who represent the ‘powers of the world’, rather than heaven. That Magus sits on a stone symbol of a church may perhaps likewise be an indication of these lineages’ role in building the institutions of the world.

a. Simon the Magician, St-Sernin Basilica, Toulouse, 1118-1120A.
b. Simon Peter, above Simon Magus, the Miegeville Door St-Sernin.
c. An ‘apkallu’, or celestial being of wisdom, from Assyria, c.850Bce, depicted with the symbols of the Anuna, the horned head-dress.

Simon Magus is closely associated also with the tenets of Gnosticism, or what gradually by 200Ad became viewed as ‘heretical’ Christianity, (with links to the wisdom of Egypt, as shown in works such as Trismegistus Hermes, which were based primarily on myths of Thoth, the Egyptian deity), advocating the duality of the energetic and material dimensions, as well as union between man and woman as a way of attaining spiritual enlightenment and completeness. This concept led to some churches adopting rites which were comparable to ‘naked feasts’, a type of ‘holiday’ with longstanding traditions within many of the Levant’s religions. Simon Magus’ paramour is a ‘sacred prostitute’ called Helen; in Justin Martyr’s work of 155-157Ad he states that after being rejected by the Apostles Simon found his way to Rome, where he met Helen. His understanding of her significance, which is a brief but complicated exposition of some of the ideas and tenets of some strands of Gnosticism, was as follows; in the beginning God had his first thought, or Ennoia, which was female (the equivalent of Hebrew/Greek Sophia). From this divine ‘marriage’ of being and manifestation came the orders of angels in the heavens; but the angels rebelled against this female principle, and created the ‘sinful’ material world as a prison for her, imprisoning her in the body of a woman. She underwent numerous reincarnations, including Helen of Troy, before eventually incarnating as Helen, a slave and prostitute in the Phoenician city of Tyre. It was in this lifetime that Simon appeared, to rescue the Ennoia Helen, and in doing so redeem or enlighten mankind…!
It is curious that the various myths and texts dealing with the relationship between king Solomon and the Queen of Sheba are linked inextricably with this theme of male-female alchemy, or ‘marriage of celestial energies’, especially considering that the tale, even in the Bible, has extensive cosmic number and alchemical symbolism attached within it; as such their narrative may be said to contain links with various strands of Gnosticism. The complex adjoining of themes within the Solomon and Sheba mythology has the following links to the those studied in this Bible section, including; the Song of Solomon in which the female narrator says’ I am very dark, but comely’ (as was the Ethiopian Sheba possibly, the epithet for whom is the ‘Queen of the South’). From other sections we have seen the Sumerian deity Enki/ Ea was called the ‘Lord of the South’, and discussed the symbolism of this to include meanings related to the intuition of the deep subconscious, the stomach-based instinctive centre of consciousness. The sibyls of Greece at the Delphic Oracle were known as ‘pythonesses’, at a place where higher-dimensional influences arose from subterranean fissures according to historical sources. The term further supports the ‘serpent-based’ wisdom of the instinctive centre ascribed to Enki, the ‘giver of wisdom’ to mankind, and lord of the ‘depths’ or the ‘south’, the ‘Abzu’, or ‘Apsu’. (It is also possible to conclude therefore that many terms of language even today stem from this complex of symbols related to the ‘south’ as depicted by the Sumerians; words such as ‘sud’ in French for south.
This is related to the fact that it is Enki who gives ‘Noah’ within the Epic of Gilgamesh – Utnapishtim – advice on how to survive the Flood;

“Avoid death – build a boat,
Abandon possessions, save thy life”,

The Ark as such represents the body and its inherent ability to survive, particularly the subconscious/ instinctive centre. Much of the serpent symbolism of Enki, Oannes etcetera relates to the (reptilian) instinctive centre of the stomach concerned with ensuring the survival of the individual. Even ‘Utnapishtim’ can be interpreted as ‘one born of the fish ‘people’, or ‘of the waters’ perhaps, again linking to Enki, and to the subterranean depths – the ‘ap-su’, or ‘abyss’ – of the subconscious. In Gilgamesh’s version of the Deluge, this role of the instinctive subconscious is shown in the narrative by Utnapishtim entrusting the navigation of the Ark to Puzur-Amurru, the ‘helmsman’, or ‘navigator’, who is ‘separate’ in a sense to Utnapishtim and his family, ie separated from issues of personality, perhaps. The manifestations of this deepest instinctive consciousness within the human mind are so separate as to be unknown (in order partly to protect the physiological functions such as heart-rate and breathing etc from interference by the conscious mind).
This is not their only distinctive characteristic, or ability; they are also capable at the deepest levels of awareness of matters relating to the immediate survival of the self – forthcoming ‘disasters’, situations, shocks, problems, dangers, etc – the instinctive mind is able to perceive approaching. Thus adverting the self on a subconscious level to testing circumstances in the immediate future, and enable some degree of subconscious preparedness. Something the pythonesses at the Delphic oracle were concerned with bringing to the light of awareness, particularly in respect of how a person’s life is shaped by the inner self’s dynamics. (And in respect of human consciousness, the more in balance – or incorporated into the entirety of consciousness, ie. with the conscious levels of mind and emotion, the more harmonious are the instinctive mind’s functions and benefits, fulfilling in this way its natural function as part of the whole. Gurdjieff taught sensitivity to this subconscious/ non-intellectual intelligence, and himself was an excellent example of how harmonious and well balanced the ‘perfected self’ is, perceiving reality through the perceptions of all the centres, rather than just the usual preferred one).

So Sheba as the Queen of the South is a figure who incorporates all these meanings within her self, as a ‘woman of instinctive/intuitive wisdom’ in other words – while much symbolism in the myths around Sheba and Solomon relates to the Sun; and it is the energies of the sun that vitalize the genetics of the celestial beings the Anunnaki, and the associated gene-streams of their bloodlines created with human women (including the Nephilim, who are identifiable by their unbalanced solar energies).

In assessing the import of the mythology of the Solomon-Sheba relationship or ‘marriage’, they clearly represent also male, solar, rational energies on his part, and female, lunar, subconscious energies on hers; the symbols and metaphors of both indicate that the narrative does contain a deeper application than simply to the meeting of two particular individuals. In other words, the relationship has, or has been given, universal meanings, relatable for example, to the complex philosophies of alchemy – many of the meanings of which apply to the marriage of psychological or physiological energies within the self. This alchemical ‘marriage’, whether within the self, or in relationships, was thus seen as a ‘holy grail’ from which perfect fulfilment could be achieved. . . presumably from the time of such philosophies creation in the first centuries of the millennium, and definitely by the time of the Middle Ages in Europe, when alchemy became widely known and even practised across the continent, although taken solely to be referring to the production of gold by the majority at that time.

In the Bible, Moses, Samson, Noah, Solomon are all depicted as being connected in different ways with these energies. And all moreover are depicted as being ‘within’ the celestial bloodlines, making their narratives more ‘remarkable’, even ‘archetypal’. The story of Samson is so absurd and exaggerated in many respects that even Hebrew observers in the Middle Ages questioned the likelihood of its veracity as a record of events. . .
At the heart of the ‘extraordinary’ narrative, therefore, is Samson, (whose name means ‘little Sun’ or similar), a clearly chaotic and unbalanced individual from birth, empowered by his genetic inheritance, yet undermined by it too, so unable to cope is he. His story, told at extensive length between Judges13.2 and 16.31, across four whole chapters of the Old Testament, contains numerous instances of sun-symbolism, such as the (honey of) the bees, in the lion’s carcass; the foxes in the wheat-field with their tails ablaze, and so on. The Jewish commentary the Midrash states of Samson that he was ‘like a bell; he went once this way, once that’, showing the chaotic nature of the unresolved solar energies within the genes of the (incomplete) personality. (See The Legends of the Jews, by Louis Ginzburg, 1909).
Although it is twice mentioned that Samson is a ‘judge over Israel’, ie acting as the ultimate authority within that society, he is certainly shown as being less than perfect, in his frequently violent, and irrational actions. It is in his pursuit of a female partner and ‘counter-balance’ moreover, that many of the most significant and painful circumstances of his life are created. Delilah in particular is someone he knows is unsuitable, while wishing it was otherwise (from Judges16.4); the name ‘Delilah’ has its roots in Lilith, the Queen of the Night (symbolic of the negative bloodlines), depicted with birds talons for feet in Near Eastern mythologies; another metaphor for the hybrid combination of higher, celestial traits, and human ones. The semantic associations contained within the metaphor of the owl continue the frequent juxtaposition of knowledge, and evil, (and of darkness and knowing), in sacred texts from many cultures in antiquity, (from Enoch and the fallen angels the Nephilim, to the serpent in the Garden of Eden…)

Samson, in his loneliness, knowingly tolerates her plots and ‘treachery’ for as long as possible, before eventually giving up his innermost secret, in what is a last desperate attempt at connection. But it is fair to say that Samson acts not so much in hope as in resignation, in the recognition that he will never find a woman he can trust as a partner and an equal, so divergent from the norm is his inner being. . . (Judges16.18-). Especially as he seems ‘fated’ to only be able to have relationships with Philistine women, for some strange reason.
Incidentally, the biblical narrative of the imprisonment of Samson holds a subtle clue as to the significance of the genetic aspect of his life-story; for when a captive (symbolism concerned with both genetic inheritance, and of servitude to desire, and the appetites of the lower self), the Philistine women pay visits to Samson in order to conceive children ‘blessed’ by his ‘celestial’ strength. This is readable in the words of Judges16.21; “and he did grind in the prison-house”… this interpretive reading is one proposed as likely by several writers, such as the Jewish writer David Grossman, in his book ‘Lion’s Honey; The Myth of Samson’.

(Coincidentally or otherwise, there is some curiously hidden’ connection, as well as some cosmic-number symbolism, immediately after the story of Samson – for as Delilah betrays Samson to the Philistines for 1100 pieces of silver at Judges16.5, the first verse after the death and burial of Samson (Judges16.31) relays the story of someone named Micah, (Judges17.1-13) returning 1100 pieces of silver to his (unnamed) mother; “And he said to his mother, The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from thee, about which thou cursedst, and spakest also of in mine ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it. And his mother said, Blessed be thou of the Lord, my son” (Jud17.2). His mother then uses the silver to pay for the making of ‘a graven image and a molten image’ in the house of Micah…pointing perhaps to her pagan customs, and thus identity…? In fact the following narrative of Micah employing a Levite priest for his house, and the roaming men of the tribe of Dan who persuade the priest to be their group’s priest. He steals the icon, and joins them as they go to Laish to plunder there, and establish themselves as a tribe in Israel. So the possible allegories contained within this story are extensive, but appear to concern early peoples who are not refined in their societal and religious ways…

The connections to the house of Samson in the following story are supported by the location in Judges17 and 18 being in the lands of the tribe of Dan, which was Samson’s tribe ; “Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel. Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backwards” – Jacob’s blessing of his twelve sons in Genesis 49.16-17, connecting in this way with Samson being a ‘judge of Israel’, also in this role being similar to the biblical notion of the ‘shaitan’, the ‘adversary’ chosen by the Lord who tests the individual, or opposes the wrong-doer. Another pointer to the strange story of Micah and his mother being directly concerned with Samson comes from the mention at Judges18.7 that there was ‘no magistrate in the land’ – as Samson was the last judge of Israel before the first kings of Israel and Judah, Saul and then David were chosen).

The Song of Solomon features the female narrator saying at 7.7 “Thy stature is like to a palm tree, and thy breasts to a cluster of grapes”, linking to the themes throughout the Old Testament of bloodlines (the vine) and gods (the word tamarim for the related date-palm being also a word for the ‘divine’, stemming largely from tamar, ‘dark’ or ‘unknowable’. . .) From Sumerian civilization onwards in the Near East the date-palm was associated with the higher dimensions, and the gods. As such the tree or parts of it, such as the fruit, the boughs, palm-leaves or fronds etcetera, were used to symbolize fertility, victory, sovereignty and protection, peace, and so forth. Likewise in the Bible date-palms are part of many significant places and their names; Exodus15.27, Numbers 33.9, Judges4.5 (the ‘palm-tree of Deborah, the prophetess and judge of Israel’), Judges20.33 (Baal-Tamar and Gibeah, pagan city of the ‘mighty men’), Ezekiel47.19, 48.28 – and many times in reference to Jericho, the ‘city of date-palms’. See ‘The Shiloh Excavations’ at biblearcheology.org for more on this. So again, at chapter 7.7 the Song of Solomon links to the ‘celestial’ bloodlines, in some of the numerous ways they are referred to symbolically, through something as innocent as the date-palm, the grape-vine, as well as through number. Note the reference to ‘stature’ too in the verse, pointing to the ‘mighty’ stature of some of the lineages.

It can certainly be argued the innate duality of the original ‘celestial’ nature of the hybrid bloodlines is reproduced in the stories of Solomon and Sheba; whether this ‘blessing’ is positive, or contains the negative potentials of the Nephilim is a matter of debate in each case. Hence the many links to both God, the Sun, and to djinn, or demons, in the many versions of the couple to be found throughout history, in the Bible, Coptic (Egyptian), Hebrew, Ethiopian, Islamic and other versions.

For example, the Qur’an describes Sheba as follows, at 27.23-24;

“I found there a woman ruling them, and she has been given of all things, and she has a great throne. I found that she and her people bow to the sun instead of God. Satan has made their deeds seem right to them and has turned them away from the right path, so they cannot find their way”.

(Although the notes to Surah27 in the English translation state that ‘Her deviation was, in fact, due to her being born and brought up in a polytheistic environment, and not because of her being a slave to her lusts and desires. Her conscience was not devoid of the sense of accountability before God’. (Dr Khattab translation/ Quran.com); showing again some of the dualities attendant upon the characters of Solomon and Sheba.
Likewise, in works stemming from the Hebrew Qabalah, Sheba was considered one of the ‘queens of the demons’, and sometimes identified with Lilith, the demonic, negative, or possibly ‘night’ aspect of the feminine within the Near East. And lastly, bringing us back to where we started this ‘digression’ into one of the great ‘male-female’ marriage cycles of the Near and Middle East in folklore throughout history, in Ashkenazi Judaism the character of Sheba was merged with that of Helen of Troy (Encyclopedia Judaica).
It is greatly appropriate that the name for Ethiopia from biblical times until modernity was Abyssinia… connecting the Abzu/ Apsu with the Sud/ South as embodied by the Sumerian deity Enki, who was indeed the Lord of the Abzu/ South…

There is supporting evidence for this complex ‘matrix’ of associations, in the 2018 work “Sons of Seth and the South Wind” by Amar Annus, the Finnish academic and writer.
He states on p.9; “The Akkadian word sutu denotes both the cardinal direction of the south, and a pastoral tribe of southern origins”; (It is here he puts forward his theory the Suteans, a hill-tribe of nomadic tent-dwellers in Mesopotamia are directly connected with the ‘sons of Seth’ within Hebrew mythology, as well as with corresponding references within Egyptian mythology! – p.10). He continues; “The Suteans tribes were exemplary enemies of Mesopotamian kings and gods, the south wind had a negative character, e.g it was the antagonist of the sage in the Adapa myth. I will outline the idea that the account about Seth in Genesis polemically reverses the accounts in cuneiform literature about the Suteans… in Gen4.25 where God grants to Adam another child Seth in place of Abel” – this perspective, while intriguing, possibly overlooks the many anomalies, ambiguities and incongruities within the texts of the ancient Near East concerning aspects of mankind’s celestial nature, (separate from the more straightforward injunctions to follow the path of good and abhor committing evil which were common to all the leading civilizations) from the earliest times… complexities which have never, to be frank, been resolved to a satisfactory degree.
Equally of significance, Mr Annus connects the South Wind’s associations to evil in a feminine aspect; “In Babylonian texts the term Sutean is not only ethnic, but also a designation of a witch…(for example) in the Maqlu series belonging to the Babylonian host of malicious beings. The demoness Lamastu calls herself a Sutean woman. She is exorcised with fire, she leaves human habitations like smoke (Lamastu2;136);
“I am the daughter of Anu from heaven, I am a Sutean….I am terrifying. I enter the house, I leave the house (as I please). Bring me your sons; I want to suckle them. In the mouths of your daughters I want to place (my breast). Anu heard (this) and wept, the tears of Aruru, Lady of the Gods were flowing; ‘Why should we destroy what we have created, and why should the wind carry away what we have produced? Indeed, take her to the sea, or to the highest outcrop of mountain! Indeed, bind her to a free-standing tamarisk, or a lone reed stalk. As a corpse does not have life… may the Daughter-of-Anu like smoke leave town, and never return!” (p.11-12).

A relevant passage, certainly, and highly resonant of the mentioned Near Eastern goddess of the night, Lilith, as well as the ‘Queen of the South’, as Jesus called Sheba… References to bird-like demons within the Bible are similar to Sumerian/ Assyrian representations of the ‘apkallu’, eagle-headed humans (see Assyrian bas-relief of an apkallu besides the Tree of Life, left), in that even in the Akkadian period these beings were sometimes considered ‘celestial sages’, (as shown by its inserting the symbolism laden ‘pine-cone’ into the neck of the human being before the Tree of Life), while at other times were seen as demonic…

As examples of the related mythologies of these civilizations and others of the ancient Near East, it may be stated that many references to ‘the nest’, as with the owl, (often associated with Lilith), hold connotations within the Bible related to these aspects of winged ‘celestial’ beings. For example, in Ezekiel 31.3-6, the Babylonian situated Hebrew prophet relates the ‘word of the Lord’ concerning the Mesopotamian civilization;

“Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches…and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him great, the deep set him up on high with her rivers, running round about his plants…All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations”…

A passage which unites several of the themes raised in this section, particularly the references to cedars, Lebanon, great stature, the ‘deep’ waters of the Ap-su, (the subterranean waters of the earth, or of the cosmos/ ‘abyss’), and the ‘celestial’ (genetic) origins of the primary domesticated crops and ‘farm’ animals which arose in the Fertile Crescent within a circumscribed time-frame around the 8th millennium Bce – as outlined in the Garden of Eden mythology, and before that in Sumerian ones, such as the sacred place Dilmun, the ‘Myth of Cattle and Grain’, and so on…In other words the passage indicates the intentional advantages the Mesopotamian civilizations received from the Anuna in the earliest eras, while indicating the eventual change in their primacy.

The Kenites – metal-workers who are considered to have descended from Tubal-Cain, the ‘father of all those who artifice in metal’, are likewise referred to in Numbers24.20-1by Balaam speaking the words of the Lord; “And he looked on Amalek (Sumer) and said, Amalek was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he perish forever. And he looked on the Kenites, and said, Strong is thy dwelling-place, and thou puttest thy nest in a rock. Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted”. Isaiah 34.13-15 appears to refer to Lilith perhaps, as ‘the great owl’. The prophet Jeremiah 49.16 associates a high place with pride and folly; “Though thou shouldest make thy nest as high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from thence, saith the Lord”.

Similarly in Obadiah1.4; Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the Lord”. A common theme appears to be the prior civilizations of Sumer, Akkad, Assyria and Babylon…indicating the ‘host of the heavens’ who created Sumer, and so on, and guided their societies’ development for two to three millennium, until their time was past; (a progression perhaps symbolized most potently by the Zodiac’s changes, as well as by Jesus (and the similarly humanist philosophies of Buddha, Pythagoras, Zoroaster, Plato, Solon and others, from the 6th century Bce onwards), after which ideas of the universality of mankind’s spiritual potential attained primacy, no matter how precarious human life was in the material world. Of course, each of these philosophers may be considered as having benefitted from the foundations of civilization established by the Mesopotamian societies and the Anuna, (or the related major civilizations of Egypt, India or China), where law codes, education, art and technology, religious/ moral aims and harmonised societal living were part of the earliest manifestations of the ‘heavens-inspired’ civilizations – although wars between cities and tribes and states arose soon enough within the Near East as societies grew in power and size.

4. Simon Peter’s character in the Acts of the Apostles, etc;

This theme of the different nature of Simon Peter is considerably supported by many further additional details concerning the life, events, and relatives of Peter. While a number of the significant events in the narrative of Simon Peter are positive in nature, and indicate the position of trust he occupied within the group, many of the (mentioned) events regarding the actions of the apostles in the ministry of Jesus, and the rush of events towards the end of Jesus’ life show Peter in a more negative light; which combine to show that whatever Peter is, he is certainly not perfect. Or even close, as might be expected of the equivalent of the Old Testament prophets, ie of unquestionable personal character, and the ability to understand the mystical and sublime nature of the highest states of consciousness. So Peter is indeed different for some reason to these figures, and to the other apostles. And yet he is ‘blessed’ along with James (the brother of Jesus) and John (‘the disciple Jesus loved’) to witness on the high mountain the ‘Transfiguration of Jesus’, and to hear the voice of the Lord, and see the figures of Moses and Elijah. (Matthew17.1-9) Also he is blessed to be the first apostle to see the risen Jesus (Luke23.34), although Matthew28.9 records that Mary Magdalene sees Jesus prior to this.

But the subtle clues add up in the narrative of Peter. One of the most noticeable associations included in his story, and in his writings is the concept of being ‘strangers’, in a strange land; ostensibly denoting the difficulties the early Christians will face in their relations with all the other peoples of the world; Gentiles who are no longer part of the Jewish religion, or community, yet unable to accept the Roman or Greek gods or ways – and so on. And yet Simon Peter, as we have seen, is the personification of a ‘stranger’ on a deeper level, in his difference to men, and has awareness too of his inner nature; as indicated by Moses’ naming his son after the word, plus the explicit admission in Ezra10 of the remiss act of many Hebrews in taking ‘strange’ wives while in Babylon. Thus the first words of his book begin 1Peter1.1;

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.

The Roman Catholic Church in Rome was begun by Simon Peter, according to the historians of the time, and the Church, becoming in this way the ‘bridge’ between the people of the flock, and God. The first place mentioned in 1Peter1.1 may be symbolic of this, of his role as a ‘bridge’ – or ‘pontifex’ – in effect, but as much between the celestial bloodlines (of whatever nature), and humanity as between god and humanity… thus giving new meaning to the words in 1Peter3.19;

“By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison”

(as does Enoch in the Book of 1Enoch, in that instance as the ‘highest representative judge’ of mankind for the Lord; the two angels show him sinful spirits imprisoned in the ‘higher-realms’, who beg Enoch to intercede with the Lord for them; but the Lord explains to Enoch that their punishment will not be changed…)

Within the Bible the use of ‘rock’ comes to mostly signify that which is fully material, devoid of spirit or energy, or the ‘waters of life’. So, Jesus relates the Parable of the Seed and the Sowers; when the Seed is sown on ‘rocky ground’ it finds no purchase there or water, and thus withers. This metaphor of the rocky ground may be applied to the ‘dark’ bloodlines – as may the desert; or wilderness and so on; in this way echoing the words of the Lord in the garden of Eden;

“Unto Adam he said, …because thou hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake…Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, til thou return unto the ground. For dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return”. (Gen3.17-19).

To the serpent the Lord says;

“Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life”. (Gen3.14),

while in the next chapter YHVH says to Cain as his punishment;

“Now thou art cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand. When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength… a fugitive and a vagabond thou shalt be” (Genesis4.11-12).

So as the symbolism concerning the inheritance of some members of the tribes of Israel , and used by Peter in his writings is negative in many aspects, his adoption of the appellation ‘stranger’ and coded words of 1Peter1.1 may hold the meaning that he offers a bridge to redemption for those who are of the ‘rocky ground’ as described by Jesus in his parables; ‘sinners’ – or ‘satans’ – or more simply, of the bloodlines of Cain.

And a quick look at the words of the (short) book of 1Peter confirm these very themes, of his being concerned with a subtly different agenda (1Peter2.3-10);

“If so be (that) you have tasted that the Lord is gracious, To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious… but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner. And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word…
But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people: that ye should shew forth praises of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvellous light. Which in time past… had not obtained mercy, but now hath obtained mercy. Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims…”

The themes of exile and alienation, of ‘otherness’ to the vast majority of mankind may be clearly discerned in these verses, beneath the literal text referring to the early Christian communities. The original meaning of the word ‘satan’ was indeed as an ‘adversary’, an ‘accuser’, a (divine) judge; as such being a ‘stone of stumbling, a rock of offence’, standing in the path of the wrong-doer. In the Old Testament it is used to refer to human adversaries (ie.1Samuel 29.4) and then otherwise; in 2Samuel 24 Jehovah sends ‘the angel of Yahweh’ to inflict a plague on Israel lasting three days. In this period 70,000 people die. 1Chronicles 21 repeats this story but uses the word ‘satan’ instead. In this passage an angel ‘from the Lord’ (2Sam.24.16) is part of YHVH’s actions in killing such a large number of the Israelites in punishment for David taking a census of the tribes… This is a puzzling passage, as the captain of David’s forces Joab warns him of the unnecessary nature of the census, yet David still persists (2Samuel24.1-17) – puzzling in that as the first verse says, the Lord wished to punish the people so ‘moved David’ to number them. . . indeed some modern simplified versions of the Bible state that ‘Satan’ was the motive force of David’s actions in verse 1 of the chapter. So the presence of such a perplexing anomaly has bemused scholars over the centuries, creating a question to which there are no simple answers. Something it is likely is connected to the role, and nature, of ‘angels of the Lord’ (such as the Seraphim), and ‘satans’ similarly.

According to the Book of Jubilees, written around 200Bc, Mastema, the leader of the ‘fallen angels’ is described as acting in the role of ‘Satan’ in requesting Jehovah to test Abraham’s faith by requiring him to sacrifice his son…perhaps in the way of ‘testing’ a person’s inner-self as Satan does to Jesus in the biblical Gospels, or as Job is tested, through the withdrawal of many of life’s ‘pillars’ of strength and sanctity; wealth, stability, the love of family, societal respect, visible ‘blessings’ from the Lord/ feeling ones’ self to be ‘part of God’s plan’, enjoyment of life’s rewards, health, purpose, the support of friends during troubles, and so forth. All of which are taken from Job, and yet which cannot induce him to ‘curse God and die’, as his wife says… (although Ginzburg writes in the Legends of the Jews, 1909, that the number of Job’s vocal complaints meant he was denied the appellation ‘the God of Job’, as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and other patriarchs of Israel were honoured). Perhaps befitting the role of ‘satan’ which is so central in the narrative of the book…and reflecting the roots within Job which link it to so many of the central myths of antiquity in the ancient Near East. Indeed, the book of Job is somewhat unique in the Old Testament in the breadth of its non-Hebrew references.

Many other examples exist within the Bible of a ‘satan’ who does actually perform the Lord’s bidding; in Zechariah the ‘satan’ is a heavenly ‘prosecutor’; while in 1Samuel16.14 regarding Saul, as he is judged to be ‘unworthy’ by YHVH, “an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him”.

In like manner to 2Sam.24, the Book of Revelations, labyrinthine and confusing in its narrative, depicts seven angels of the Lord initiating the full stages of the apocalypse and destroying much of life, and mankind, on earth…!

So these examples highlight the difficulties attendant upon all individuals in committing themselves to perform God’s will, as well as the peculiarities of the role or nature of being for those people who are indicated to be ‘of the celestial lineages’, or genetics. This may well be a worthwhile perspective from which to view Simon Peter, (while further clarification or examination of the Lord’s attitude is necessary; for example, how intrinsically different to the other disciples Jesus and God assess Peter to be…)

Perhaps one of the clearest signposts in this respect are the words already mentioned of Jesus; “And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat” (Luke22.31) – one of the most straightforward ways to ‘sift’ Peter would be for him to be born into the celestial lines, or the ‘line of Cain’…

Also noteworthy in regard of the ‘satan’ is that Peter does actually fulfil the role of ‘divine accuser’ in the early Church in Israel, so that two members of the church actually die ‘on the spot’ when he accuses them of with-holding monies for themselves (Acts 5.3-10), as we will examine shortly.

Yet more connections or clues exist within the pages of the Bible in this sense of Simon Peter as ‘satan’…links which require a little more examination for their meanings to clarify.

His connections with the two cities most symbolic of ‘worldly power’, Rome and Babylon, (as well as the associations connected with Bethsaida, his place of birth) form a meaningful part of the narrative of Peter’s life and being; Rome, the place of Peter’s establishment of the Church, and his death at the hands of the Roman Emperor, is actually called ‘Babylon’ in the final book of the Bible, Revelations, with the Roman Empire representing the ‘Babylon’ of the Christian era, and the western world, as civilization extended out of the Near East across time.
And significantly, in 1Peter5.13 he writes he is in Babylon, with his son Mark; but as well as there being no record of any Christian church in Mesopotamia in the first century Ad, there is the fact that by this time Babylon was a desolate and ruined city…as Strabo wrote c.19Ad, “The greater part of Babylon is so deserted that one would not hesitate to say… the Great City is a great desert”. Scholars such as Craig Blomberg likewise state that there were no Christians in Babylon for several centuries, and the area was a long way from what is called western and central Turkey, where early Christian communities were arising at that time.

While many biblical commentators therefore believe him to be referring metaphorically to the city of Rome, which is named as the ‘new’ Babylon in the book of Revelations16.19/ 17.5, (and where Peter began the Church of Rome, being regarded as the ‘first Bishop of Rome’, and where he was crucified at the end of his life), it is also possible, however, that he is referring cryptically to matters relating to the Babylonian influx of ‘celestial lineage’ genes into the Hebrew – and his own – inheritance ! Perhaps one reason why Jesus calls him ‘Satan’, in consciousness of his innate dualities or potentials.

Incidentally, concerning his death, Pope Clement I of Rome posted the first record of it, written between 80-98Ad, describing the crucifixion of Simon Peter by the Emperor Nero. Eusebius writing in 232Ad likewise referred to his crucifixion in Rome; and Origen around the same time wrote that Peter requested to be crucified with his head downwards! Why downwards? The reason stated is his claim to be unworthy of dying the same way as Jesus. But it could certainly be argued to be a symbolic reference to his nature of being a ‘satan’, the ‘opposite’ of Jesus – or it could equally be in like manner to the bronze serpent hung upon the cross in the desert, created by Moses – linking him to the Nahash (or ‘Nehushtan’ as it is sometimes called), and thus potentially with the Nagas. (A circumstance mentioned by Jesus when talking of his own fate, at John3.14/15). The nature of the Nagas as being ‘celestial serpents’ which dwell ‘beneath the waters’ of sacred lakes is related to the nature of the Sumerian deities of the Near East who were depicted as serpent-men hybrids, namely Enki/Ea (‘he who loved water’), or Ningishzida in the Libation of Gudea, and Oannes, the fish-human hybrid, who swam up from out of the Persian Gulf with the other Annedoti – the ‘repulsive ones’ – to create civilization).

The crucifixion of St.Peter in Rome, painting by Caravaggio
c.1601, in Rome also. Attribution; Wikimedia, Public Domain.

This may be a formative reason for the fish-related symbolism of the Pope’s (fish-shaped) head-wear, as well as church matters related to bishops being named ‘episcopalian’ ie from ‘piscine’; fish. And Simon Peter, the ‘fisherman’/ the ‘fisher of men’, who was the first ‘bishop of Rome’, is located squarely within this traditional mythology…

The twin themes aligned with this strand of Near Eastern mythology are those of the Nagas and the ‘Seraphim’ – the latter the ‘flying’ serpents of the wilderness, who were ‘fiery’ in nature, and tormented the people of Israel in the wilderness on behalf of YHVH; similar to the ‘satan’ figures who were ‘accusers’ for the Lord in the Old Testament. As further sign of the ‘contradictory’ nature – or inner duality associated with them – the Seraphim were described by Isaiah as singing in heavenly choir at the foot of the Lord in the highest heaven (Isaiah6.1-7)
And the Nagas, parallel to the biblical Nahash though based in Hindu and Buddhist mythology of the Asia East, celestial serpent beings who dwell ‘beneath the waters’ of sacred mountains such as Mt Meru in India, another ‘omphalos-point’ conjoining the lower and higher dimensions. Like the Seraphim, the Nagas appear to have complex agendas, which often involve helping mankind with their wisdom and ‘celestial service to the Lord’, but also for the same reason can be sometimes ‘angels of the Lord’ who visit destruction upon sections of mankind as a corrective punishment, as Numbers22.22 indicates. . . and akin in this way to king Nahash in 1Samuel11.1.

In other words, examinations of these two celestial ‘orders’, as well as concepts attached to the Sumerian serpent-deity Enki, which may have been symbolized in the Serpent of the Garden of Eden, make these strands of allegory’ contained within the Bible difficult to categorically define.

So looking at the life and story of Simon Peter, it may be surmised he has connections to; ‘rock’/stone/satan/obstacle/adversary/violence/Rome/ Babylon/the devil/ serpents/ fish/water/ hunting/ Nimrud/ Sumer/Oannes/gate-keepers/angels/the underworld/ strangers/ aliens/ and exiles (!) – and yet, (like the Seraphim), his characteristics and associations are still not identifiable as being ‘good’ or ‘evil’; a frankly incredible narrative for the person entrusted with establishing the religion of Christianity in the West ! This essential ambiguity, or inner complexity, little explored, or even suspected by the great majority of orthodox Christians over the centuries, is to some observers quite clear evidence of the cosmic consciousness which created the entire work of the Bible.

5. Place names, people and tribes with meanings related to Simon Peter’s inner narrative;

A reading of the places, names, and acts of Simon Peter in terms of his family and friends, with these potential dualities in mind leads to yet more highly interesting material.

Among other semantic hints is that of the description Jesus gives to Peter when he first makes him a disciple, calling Peter a ‘fisher of men’, (as Peter and his brothers are fishermen in the Sea of Galilee). Not only does this link Peter with the fish/men hybrid of Oannes and the Annedoti bloodlines, as just mentioned, but additionally has an implication of other-worldly predation, as the Nephilim were in nature ‘hunters’, indeed they were accused of ‘devouring’ all the resources of/ oppressing the earth, so great were their appetites; “And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nonetheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”. (1Enoch15.10, Rev. R.H.Charles version).

This is one meaning of the primary meanings of the reference in Genesis to Nimrod the Hunter (Gen10.8-9).

And this is not the only link between all of these related strands; in the cos# section above we saw in 1Kings3.14-15 how immediately after Solomon is crowned king he journeys to Gibeon, ‘the high place’ where Israel sacrificed and worshipped, in what was apparently a manner of worship imbued with ‘pagan’ undertones, somewhat similar to the ‘groves and high-places’ decried by God in this period (1Kings3.3 highlights this uncertainty); so Gibeon has associations with pagan influences – Solomon stays the night there and during his sleep hears the voice of the Lord; he is offered the choice of wisdom or riches, and picks wisdom, upon which YHVH promises him he shall have both during his reign. The relevant point here is the lineage to which his father David is indicated as belonging to, of one of the ‘bloodlines of the gods’ (not definitively positive or negative in character). So in Genesis6.1-4 the lineage of the Nephilim is described ‘There were giants in the earth in those days, and also after that, when (the daughters of men bore children to the sons of the gods) the same became mighty men, which were of old, men of renown’.
The description of the Nephilim correlates closely to how Nimrod is described as we have seen in Genesis10.8. It may be argued that the phrase ‘a great hunter before the Lord’ gives Nimrod a ‘cosmic’ nature, (ie semi-divinity of birth) as might be expected from the character said to have ‘established’ the cities of Sumer, and been instrumental in building not just Babylon, but the Tower of Babel itself; another symbol of the nature of unrestrained, or unbalanced growth.

Thus great ‘hunters’, warriors, leaders and soldiers of renown are potentially related to the more negative lineages of the Bible. And there are several alternative names for this bloodline(s) in the Bible, (and texts such as ‘The Book of Giants’, one of the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran in 1947); the Rephaim, Anakim, Emim, Zimzammim, and Gibborim. This last name means ‘mighty’ and applies in much the same way as ‘the mighty men of old’, relating to war in particular. There are several notable warriors, particularly who fought for king David, who are called Gibborim (2Sam23.8/ 1Kings1.8/ 1Chron11.26/ 1Chron29.24) as in mighty men, indeed the ‘gibborim’ are even called giants by some writers, such as Josephus, and Philo (De Gigant), as being men of ‘extraordinary stature’.

A chapter in Ezekiel lists the many peoples who have caused ‘terror on the earth’ (Ezekiel 32) promising that “I will vex the hearts of many people, when I shall bring thy destruction among the nations” (32.9-32); the Egyptians, Assyrians, Elam, Meshech, Tubal (ie Tubal-Cain), Edom (home of Herod’s line), the ‘princes of the north’, the Zidonians (ie Sidon, the ‘place of fishers/hunters’), and so on. The verses of Ezekiel 32 are thus a list of those who were ‘mighty on earth’, who lived ‘by the sword’ and caused terror. And a concise list of the several strands examined in this section.

So, in a juxtaposition of the associations between these potential lineages and that of David and Solomon, the experience Solomon has the night before his coronation, where Yahweh questions and then blesses his reign, takes place in the settlement of Gibeon, a place where the Tabernacle of the Ark remained after the ark was moved to Jerusalem (1Chron15.14-25), and from where several ‘mighty soldiers’ or men come to fight for Israel. (1Chron12.4, etc). The alternative meaning of Gibeon as ‘high place’, or ‘high hill’, indicating again the presence of powerful energies, and accelerated growth…
So in fact it assumes the meaning of ‘pagan worship’; for just before the passage quoted in the cos# section, 1Kings11.11, (‘Wherefore…thou hast not kept my statutes which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant’), the reason for the Lord disowning Solomon is made clear at 1Kings11.5-8;

And Solomon did evil in the sight of the Lord, and went not fully after the Lord, as did David his father. Then did Solomon build an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech the abomination of the children of Ammon. And likewise did he for all his strange wives, which burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods.

So, in all, the bloodline of David and Solomon is related to these themes in multiple interwoven ways.
Indeed, this may be viewed in the links between David’s line and Nahash, the (Nagas related) king of Ammon. As well as other linguistic similarities all centred around the stem of Nahash, it is curious to find two examples of the female name Naamah in the Old Testament; firstly as the daughter of the Cainite Lamech and Zillah , (one of only a few women named in these genealogies); and the second Naamah is an Ammonite princess, and the only one of Solomon’s wives to have borne him a son (1Kings14.21,31; 2Chron 12.13) …the Kebra Nagast, the ‘Book of Kings’ relates that Solomon sired a son with the Queen of Sheba; as she returned to her home from Jerusalem he was born in Ethiopia. It also contains the prophecies of Enoch, (concerned with the bloodlines of the sons of the gods), and discussions of the royal blood of kings, indicating it was cohesive but most likely the product of the ‘minds of men’ also, being probably drawn together from multiple sources at some time in the 1st millennium. Coincidentally, in India, the royal cobra is called the naja naja, a Latinization of the Sanskrit word nagas)…

Indeed, as seen already, it is at 1Kings11.1 that we see; ”But king Solomon loved many strange women, together with the daughter of Pharaoh, women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites” – virtually the same names and tribes as those listed by Ezekiel above (in Ezekiel 32.9) – the Hittites being in the north of Iraq towards Assyria, Turkey and Asia Minor.
And at 1Samuel11.1 the Ammonite king Nahash lays siege to Jabesh-Gilead, and offers to spare them/ make a covenant with them if they allow him to ‘thrust out all their right eyes’… a complex narrative pointing to both the cruelty of the Cainite celestial bloodlines, as well perhaps as the impersonality or impartiality of the Nagas celestial agendas…particularly if the deal offered is considered in conjunction with the saying of Jesus, ‘if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out’ ie if it gets in the way of the growth of the spirit… thus pointing to the serious, even ‘cruel’ nature required by those servants of the Lord to be ‘judges’, or ‘opponents’, or ‘satans’ – something Simon Peter likewise displays, in the passage concerning Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5.3-10.

Likewise, the presence in Solomon’s life narrative of Sun-symbolism, reflects these concepts of the genes of the lineages having a higher proportion of the celestial powers of the Sun. (So the Kebra Nagast relates that the night before Sheba left for her homeland Solomon dreamt that ‘a sun had left the land of Israel”, making the symbolism of their ‘alchemical marriage’ clear).
Solomon the name likewise means ‘the Sun’ in the languages of the Indo-Europeans, and the Egyptians , and Greeks; Sol, -Om and -On are three words related to the sun; On* was the ‘City of the Sun’ located near modern-day Cairo, otherwise called by the Greeks later Heliopolis…), or ‘Awen’/ ‘An’, connecting it to the Sumerian root word Anu, meaning ‘the light of heaven’, as well as the sister of Cain, called Awen also, from whom the line of Cain possibly stemmed).
From the life story of Solomon, the first reference in the Bible to the number 666 is in connection with ‘talents’ or bars of gold; the metal which is symbolic of the sun, as is the number itself, representing in the near-exclusively male energy of the Sun’s light.

Despite this welter of information sounding entirely negative towards David and Solomon this is not so; they are ‘blessed of the Lord’ in their reigns, and establish the nation of Israel. But the sub-text does indicate a significance, and a potential for misuse or development of the (genetic) powers they embodied, which is shown in their various misbehaviours and misdeeds – which ultimately lead the Lord to limit both of their ‘blessings’. Indeed, the name Solomon actually means ‘fair penalty’, or ‘recompense’, indicating this relationship and a ‘balancing’, as well as the presence of a degree of ‘guilt’ somehow within their lives or beings. (As well as reflecting the circumstances of Solomon’s conception described in 2Sam12.1-24, concerning YHVH’s punishment of David for his killing of the innocent man Uriah to attain his wife Bathsheba) …

These extensive themes are encoded extensively within the Bible; for example, the birthplace of Peter (and Philip and Andrew) is stated to be Bethsaida (John1.44-45/12.21) – this means ‘the House of Fish’/fishing, but its literal meaning is ‘house of hunting’…
While linked to the biblical theme of the brother/disciples being ‘fishermen’, and also to the thread through antiquity from Enki/Ea/ Oannes, it also provides another connection to the ‘mighty hunters’ of the Nephilim. A point further reinforced by the association of the two Phoenician towns of Sidon and Tyre with the ‘forces of wicked’ which will be punished, as Isaiah23 indicates; with Sidon bearing the same meaning as Bethsaida in this respect.

An alternative reference to Bethsaida in the Bible is a city east of the Jordan that is a bare desert-place ie uncultivated scrub-land used for grazing – another metaphor for Peter, conceivably and potentially linking to the Seraphim (whose name can mean ‘dry’ or ‘parched’, and again, likewise, the serpent of Eden, told by the Lord ‘dust shall thy have in thy mouth all thy days’, as punishment (Genesis3.14). As are Adam and Eve when expelled from Eden soon after;

“Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life… In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, til thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return” (Gen3.17-19).

Jesus also ‘curses’ Bethsaida, along with Chorazin, for not recognizing his miracles in their towns – saying at Matthew11.21-26;

Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgement, than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shall be brought down to hell; for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgement, than for thee.

(All of which raises the question of why Tyre and Sidon in particular are taken as examples by Jesus here. Likewise by Ezekiel in chapter 28 of his book. And also, why a town can be considered guilty of punishment, when it is the individual who is judged – this question leads back to the most famous example of this dichotomy, the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah – indeed, the next two verses in Matthew contain references to these towns). Can the judgement of towns be a metaphor as such for the judgement of specific lines, or types of genetic nature?

The Hebrew base for Sodom is unclear, but meanings ascribed include ‘flaming’, violent, excessive – all indicative of the Nephilim, and furthermore, characteristics from the Gurdjieff perspective of the misuse of the energies of the sex centre. (Located within the stomach-based instinctive centre, alongside the social and physiological ’sub-centres’). This does not necessarily express itself only in sexual behaviours, but in mis-directed, impulsive and fervent behaviours; all of which are egotistic, rushed and unsustainable… as well as often harmful to others.

The name Gomorrah means in Hebrew ‘to grip, or bind; to deal tyrannically with, to enthral or worship’ (Ab*) ie emphasizing those who act towards others in a compulsive or cruel way, giving no choice to people – and within the self, those who are in the grip of their own passions, desires or perspectives, to the point where they cannot ‘see reality’ ; or those within the grip of the effects of their unbalanced genes.
It is in this sense that the NOBSE Study Bible Name List gives Gomorrah the meaning of ‘Submersion’. ie in the currents of everyday life, or the self, which deluge the ability to see; to have one’s head underwater. And there is great support for this from Gurdjieff circles, where the works of Dr Maurice Nicholl (The Psychological Commentaries…) examine the passage where Jesus walks on the water precisely with this meaning, of rising above the ‘pull’ of the flow of everyday life, of being ‘free’ from the self’s ‘lower’ concerns, and psycho-dramas which prevent clear consciousness or growth.

Freedom from being ‘engrossed’ in lower matters of the self, in other words is a central aim of self-development.
And as the Bible shows, it is Simon Peter who attempts to mimic Jesus’ action, succeeding momentarily, but lacking true ‘inner freedom’, he plunges beneath the waves..! (Matthew17.15 likewise refers to a man asking Jesus to heal his ‘lunatick’ son, ‘for oftentimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water’.
John Michell in the City of Revelation notes the use of these two extremes in antiquity to characterize the dangers of either excessive and constraining authoritarianism, or the opposite of a deluge of ‘freedom’ which washes away all social structures in a purgative, and destructive wave of energy. On a personal level the former represents the solar, rational mind which always ‘knows the perfect answer’ ; and the latter the lunar, subconscious energies of raw life – the abyss, the ‘abzu’, or subterranean reservoirs of water – which will burst through such ‘repressive’ structures if life is becoming an ‘arid desert of rationality’. So Plato for example cautioned against either extreme, according to Michell, on p.30. To many writers, Simon Peter is considered to represent the worldly structures of authority, the outer structures of the Church in Rome, in what is not so much repression as ‘control’. Much in the way the builders of the empires of antiquity, in the Age of Aries, the Ram, from 2000-0Bce were authoritarian figures, who were replaced by the universalism and ‘democracy’ of the Piscean Age. So in this sense, and in the New Testament, he is rarely equated with the ‘waters of the spirit’, which bubble up from the subconscious in other early church members).

But to return to the narrative of the bible, where does the Bible say Jesus walked on the water – on the Sea of Galilee, near to land belonging to Bethsaida. (Mark 6.45-52./ John 6.16-24/ Matthew 14.22-36).
In other references the desert Bethsaida gives every impression of being another metaphor of ‘the rocky ground’ upon which the Seed is unable to flourish… indeed the ‘mara’ part of the word Gomorrah refers to the gradual effect of small actions, (Ab*), in particular the related noun ‘yoreh’ refers to the ‘time of the agricultural year when light rainfall makes seedlings bud, but not bear fruit yet’…
It is at Matthew13 that Jesus relates the parable of the Seeds and the Rocky Ground. (Matthew13. 1-8 followed by the parables of the Sower/Tares of the Field(18-3O), and of the Mustard Seed 31-32); and in the next chapter that Jesus walks on the water (Matthew14.22-36), near to Bethsaida.
The second part of the word Beth-saida refers also to the ‘hunter’, as we have seen linking to (descendants of) Nimrod the Hunter. Could ‘-saida’ be related etymologically to Sidon ? Indeed, Sidon does mean place of fishing, or of hunting – directly the same as Bethsaida.
The words ‘hunter’ or ‘fisher’ may effectively mean, therefore, ‘desire’ – ie Jesus was referring to – people ‘blinded by their desires’ (thus are submerged beneath the waves of life…) This understanding of the influences of desire(s) is related to 1Enoch, in which desire for the ‘daughters of men’ the motive cause of the ‘sons of the gods’ descending to earth, even though they show knowledge of its being forbidden by the ‘celestial powers’. This theme of ‘gods’, or the ‘sons of gods’, or of ‘angels who fall’ into the earthly sphere, through physical desire, are highly significant throughout antiquity, in highlighting the differences between spiritual and carnal love and knowledge. So this provides a different emphasis to the epithet Jesus applies to Simon Peter, that he is a ‘fisher of men’, when viewed from the perspective of Peter’s possible inner nature.
*In the Book of Jubilees texts found at Qumran, the wife of Enoch is named as Edna; meaning ‘pleasure’… there are two other spouses so named in Jubilees, namely the wives of Methuselah (the son of Enoch whose son is Lamech, Noah’s father), and Terah, the father of Abraham (whose homeland is therefore Sumer). All three men (and women) are therefore part of the lineage of which Noah is the representative example, indicated as being the child of a ‘son of the gods’… indeed, the name ‘Cain’ itself means to ‘possess’ or ‘own’, again indicating the ‘corrupting’ nature of unrestrained greed or desire.

TYRE – means ‘rock’ (see previous interpretations of rock/stone/rocky ground for metaphorical meanings, (in fact Abarim.com states that Tyre is the Hebrew equivalent of the Greek name Peter) -a famous biblical town, often mentioned alongside Sidon, Tyre was a Phoenician coastal town in the south of Lebanon, and north of Jerusalem. It is noteworthy, the head builder/craftsman of Solomon’s Temple, who was called Hiram, came from Tyre. So this may put in context why Jesus said of Peter ‘This is the rock upon which I shall build my church’, although the symbolic meanings attached to the metaphor are central too, as we have seen.

SIDE-BAR : The Phoenician City of Tyre.
The city of Tyre is associated with Satan in Near Eastern mythology in the legend of ‘Melqart, king of Tyre’. George A.Barton writes in his work ‘On the Pantheon of Tyre’ that “Baal of Tyre was called Melqart, (king of the city).” And the title ‘king of the city’ was considered by the Phoenicians to represent both the king and the god, as the underworld was referred to by the euphemism of ‘the great city’ in Akkadian myth, by the word ‘irkallu’.
Melqart (mlkqrt) was also identified with the Greek god Heracles, in a Phoenician portion of a bilingual inscription from Malta, putting him in the lineages of the gods, in a similar sense as the Titans were; a concept which probably stemmed back to Mesopotamian myths of the offspring of Tiamat, the ‘serpent of the deep’, (and as the Nephilim were ‘mighty men before the Lord’…)
Melqart/ Baal was mocked in the Bible as the ‘sleeping god’, by the prophet Elijah, in 1Kings18.27, and in Ezekiel28 as the King of Tyre. There are curious parallels linking Melqart to the themes we have noted in the life of Solomon, the Song of Solomon and elsewhere concerning the ‘celestial’ associations of Lebanon; for example, in Josephus’ Antiquities’ (8.5) he writes of king Hiram; “He also went and cut down materials of timber out of the mountain called Lebanon. For the roof of temples…he built both the temple of Heracles and that of Ashtart (Astarte); and he was the first to celebrate the awakening of Heracles in the month Peritius”, thus echoing Elijah’s reference in 1Ki18.27.
The myth of his annual awakening in Phoenician religion may have been an example possibly of the life-death-rebirth mythology, one which Jesus spoke of as necessary in relation to the spirit in his allegory of the Seed of Corn. The Phoenician myth may possibly also have had connotations relating to the flow of life-force through the year in terms of the earth’s fertility and growing cycles, ie spring–summer–autumn–winter, and so on.
Modern freemasonry has extended or explored the myths surrounding the builders of Solomon’s Temple, naming the master craftsman and architect as Hiram Abiff. Interestingly the father of Hiram was named in Josephus’ Antiquities of the Jews as ‘Ur’ (8.76) – the ancient leading city of Sumer, and home of Abraham and his forebears, while Josephus calls Hiram ‘an artificer’ or ‘craftsman’ in bronze; bringing to mind resonances of Tubal-Cain, as well as the Nehushtan, the ‘brazen serpent’ and ‘knower of secrets’ as the word means. Gerard de Nerval, the French freemason who wrote the modern retelling which informed masonic myths of Hiram, wrote in his 1851 work ‘Voyage en Orient’ that the Master Craftsman is named ‘Adoniram’…meaning ‘master Hiram’. De Nerval also wrote in this work of ‘Balkis’, (Sheba), the Queen of the Morning’, and ‘Soliman’, Prince of the Genii’, continuing the (inexplicable, or unexplained) mythical associations we have noted of both Solomon and Sheba with djinn and genii etcetera…(again, relating the themes to both ‘celestial lineages’, as well as ‘forces’, or perhaps instead, negative aspects of the same unbalanced (cosmic) forces that may be defined as ‘demons’, although often with skills and powers, ‘sovereignty’ or ‘dominion’). The Song of Solomon (6.10) has this to say of the Shulamite;

“Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?”.

And 1Kings4.6 refers to the ‘slave-driver’ responsible for the ‘draft’ of Israelites and others needed to build Solomon’s Temple as being Adoniram; in other words ‘Adonai (master) Hiram’ –a narrative confirmed in the next chapter, at 1Kings5.1-14; “Now therefore command thou that they hew me cedar trees out of Lebanon; and my servants shall be with thy servants; and unto thee will I give hire for thy servants according to all that thou shalt appoint” (5.6)…”So Hiram gave Solomon cedar trees and fir trees according to all his desire” (5.10).

The narrative of Solomon’s Temple receiving 666 talents of gold combines so many of these interwoven themes; 1Kings10.14/ 10.21-22 states; “And all king Solomon’s drinking vessels were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure gold…it was nothing accounted of in the days of Solomon. For the king had at sea a navy of Tarshish with the navy of Hiram; once in three years came the navy of Tarshish bringing gold, and silver, ivory and apes, and peacocks”. Isaiah23 confirms the connection between king Hiram of Phoenicia and Solomon’s great wealth in precious metals, while also associating Tyre, Sidon and Tarshish with divine punishment (Isa23.1/6-8/15), also in this way linking Tyre semantically with verses from the Book of Revelations; “She (Tyre) shall turn to her hire, and shall commit fornication with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth” (Isa23.17)…

The cities of Tyre and Sidon (like the Egyptians, or Rome, etc) are repeatedly portrayed in the Bible as being representative of the ‘powers of the four corners of the earth’, (in perhaps polemical fashion) in their Phoenician maritime trade across the western world – while this holds correspondences with the known history of the Phoenicians’ trading links across the ‘ancient world’ in the first millennium Bce; with links to even the British Isles and Cornwall, where tin and iron ores were obtained, essential as they were (along with copper ores) for the production of bronze/ brass alloys.

Connecting the narrative of Hiram and Tyre to the Brasen Serpent the Nehushtan, the Bible says of the master craftsman king Hiram sent to Solomon to build his temple, Hiram of Tyre was also “a widow’s son of the tribe of Naphtali,…a worker in brass; and he was filled with wisdom, and understanding, and cunning to work all works in brass” (1Kings7.14/ 2Chron2.14), which says he is a child of a ‘mixed’ or ‘strange’ marriage, of a woman of the tribe of Dan, and a man of Tyre; of relevance are Jacob’s words to his twelve sons of Israel at Gen49.17; ‘Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path…” ie ‘satan’ or ‘adversary’, as was Samson, the last judge of Israel, who was of the tribe of Dan too. Whether the Naphtali tribe has etymological connections to the Nephilim, with the two names sharing the N-P-L consonantal root, is uncertain at this point, but worth bearing in mind). This wisdom and skill of Hiram may be resonant of one of the Nahash’s meaning of ‘knower of secrets’, continuing in this way several of the themes contained within the activities of metal-working, craftsmanship, ‘brotherhood’, maritime trade, and the building of Solomon’s Temple, as well as Sidon, Tyre, ‘giants’ and the Cedars of Lebanon…the verse at 2Kings25.13 likewise connects several of these themes, to Babylon in this instance. (The points made are implied within the ‘ram’ part of Hiram’s name moreover, as ‘celestial’ powers which are inherited genetically, rather than divinely granted to the individual). The original Hebrew Bible actually calls Hiram ‘a brother’ to David and then Solomon, which modern Bibles interpret as ‘great friend’, or David loving Hiram (1Kings5.1), but which clearly has other possible implications of bloodline…as David was shown to be related to king Nahash (meaning ‘serpent’) and the Ammonites, forming alliances with him as a result (2Sam10.12).

A complex set of interlocking themes and metaphors concerned with wealth, power and highly developed skills is therefore based around the various Lebanese/ Phoenician kings and cities etcetera, in continuation of the Sumerian depiction of the ‘holy’ or ‘sacred’ nature of the mountains located within the ranges of Lebanon (while overall, it may be said, putting a slightly more negative emphasis on the various themes).
The themes contained are all characteristics, therefore, of the lines stemming from the Nephilim, in their numerous instances. The meaning of Sidon, as (place of) ‘fishers’, or ‘hunters’ similarly connects with 1Enoch and Gen6.1-4’s depictions of the gargantuan appetites of the ‘giants’* of the Nephilim/ Rephaim lineages, as Nimrod, builder of the Tower of Babel was ‘a great hunter before the Lord’, the owner of near-divine powers, but base instincts also. *(compared in many texts to the ‘Cedars of Lebanon’…)
(While Simon Peter’s association with Bethsaida, the ‘house of fishers’, as well as being named ‘a fisher of men’ by Jesus, is another allegorical indicator of Peter’s ‘celestial nature’ or ‘powers’, which he struggles to control or balance… giving deeper significance to why Jesus calls him ‘Satan’ more than once).

6. Peter’s position in the ‘Christian church’, in the years after the Crucifixion.

Several of the New Testament’s books also provide information of how Peter acted, and related to the other church members in the years following the death and ascension of Jesus, circa33Ad onwards. These are found in the books after the Synoptic Gospels, such as Acts (of the Apostles), Galatians, Ephesians, Corinthians, Romans, Hebrews, Peter1 & 2, and so on, with much of this being written by St Paul, or Paul of Tarsus as he was also known.

The already mentioned story of Simon Peter’s actions to (or effect upon) the couple who cheat the nascent Christian church of some money from a land-sale, in the first years after Christ, Ananias and Sapphira, is related in Acts 5.3-10. When Peter asks the man Ananias why he withheld from the church monies from the sale, the man falls dead on the spot! Then three hours later the wife of Ananias (Sapphira) enters, unaware of events; when Peter asks her the same question she then falls down dead…!

These events border on the ‘miraculous’, or perhaps ‘otherwordly’, and may be either pointing allegorically to Simon Peter’s cosmic role as ‘satan’/judge/’accuser’ – or possibly the ‘Seraphim’/ ‘destroyer’/ ‘angel of the Lord’, as destroyed the cities of the Sodom and Gomorrah with the powers of the Sun, or brought the plague in 1Chronicles21 – or alternatively, as being representative of the negative Herod-like aspects of some of the bloodlines of the serpent and the Nephilim. But as a ‘defender of the faith’ of Christianity, this is clearly excessive…

From this perspective the passage may show the negative bloodlines’ typical immaturity, and excessive violence; as well as a lack of understanding in Peter of Christ’s message, and thus being unforgiving in the exercise of power given to him… supporting the excessively ‘externally-based’, ‘rational, ‘fiery’ nature of Peter’s mind, and role, as stated.
Or these narratives perhaps show equally these different aspects. This is a question difficult to answer. (And in fact, the section in Acts does not say Peter wished any ill, or attempted to cause any injury to them – so in effect it may have been not Peter’s will or doing, but that of the Holy Spirit !) The meanings of Ananias (‘Yahweh has been gracious’) and Sapphira (‘to be calmly and harmoniously composed’) do indicate a definite quiet sanctity to their natures…and in keeping with their overall ‘innocence’, observers have noted the gradual loss of authority of Simon Peter as the early Church evolved within Israel and wider afield.

It is a feature of the books of the New Testament after the death of Jesus that Simon Peter had a position of some authority in establishing the church within Israel and the Near East. But over time it might be said that the ‘more complete’ disciples assume natural authority; John, the disciple ‘Jesus loved’, James the brother of Jesus, and St Paul of Tarsus, the opponent of Christ who was converted on the road to Damascus by a blinding flash and the voice of the Lord speaking to him. It is with St Paul ‘s growing role of influence that Peter and he appear to come into conflict, in ways both apparent and hidden.

So the relationship between Peter and Paul seems to be perfunctory at the very best. Indeed, in Galatians 2.1-21 Paul criticized Peter publicly for hypocrisy and cowardice, for abiding by Jewish eating laws when eating with Jewish dignitaries visiting the church at Galatia, so ‘disowning’ the gentile Christians of his own church in their early days of establishing a Christian identity. In his book, at 2Corinthians 11.3-14 Paul writes of the problems of the early church as it spreads across Asia Minor and the Mediterranean countries;

³But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through its subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.
For I suppose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles. But though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge…I robbed other churches, taking wages of them, to do you service…
But what I do, that will I do, that I may cut off occasion from them which desire occasion; that wherein they glory, they may be found even as we. For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the workers of Christ. And no marvel, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

Considering the dynamics of the church as it formed, it may be inferred that Paul was referring directly to one or more of the apostles who he believed to be spiritually incomplete; of all the candidates Simon Peter clearly stands out as the potential subject of these words, a conclusion in keeping with the words of Jesus also.
Although Paul has disagreements over circumcision with James and his closest friends, on his second visit to Jerusalem fourteen years after his first, Paul states (in Galatians2) that James, Cephas and John gave ‘unto me the right hands of fellowship’ (ie. that they separately preach unto gentiles and Jews)…”but when Cephas was come unto Antioch I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed”. Ostensibly for the matters mentioned, but it is possible these declarations are stating deeper judgements regarding character.
So if Paul was divinely made aware of the apostles’ realities, (as his experience on the road to Damascus indicates he was the recipient of divine illumination), living away from the main body of the church for nearly all of his years as he was, he would have been aware of Peter’s (hidden) inner-narrative; that of being of a ‘satan’, and thus, very possibly, of the ‘bloodlines’ issue stemming from Sumerian times on. In fact, Paul’s calling Peter ‘Cephas’ as in the quote above, means he is calling him simply ‘rock’ (or ‘foundation’) – making it likely used by him in the pejorative sense relating to the city of Tyre, and to the satan. . . and in the sense that rocks and stones are nearly always used in the Bible to indicate the material earth, strong in its structures but not imbued with spirit. The ‘rocky’ ground and the stony desert are descriptive metaphors of such, where there is little or no water, the stuff of life; and hence, the ‘seed’ is unable to grow.

Whoever the subject is, the following words of St Paul seem to indicate the church as established by one or more of the leaders is questionable in morals or substance, writing (2Corinthians 12.13-15);

”For what is it wherein you were inferior to other churches, except it be that I myself was not burdensome to you? Forgive me this wrong. Behold, the third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be burdensome to you. . . for the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children.
And I will very gladly spend, and be spent for you; though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved”…

7. St Peter and the Sumerian celestial bloodlines found within the Bible;

The use of the metaphors of ‘strangers’, and ‘prisoners’/ ‘captives’ for these lines.

To examine some of the other information given of Simon Peter’s life in the Bible, seeing the wealth of associations and relationships which even the smallest of details can hold; so as noted, 1Peter5.3 says he is in the church at Babylon, pointing to the Sumerian roots of the Old Testament narratives.

The number of bloodlines in the Old Testament which are related to these Sumerian deities is also noted; all contain ‘celestial’ aspects, some being balanced while others are highly unbalanced – such as the Nephilim, and the lines of Cain, and of Nimrod. The latter, a descendant of Noah’s son Cush, was ‘a mighty hunter before the Lord’, in Babylon, and was ruler when the Tower was built, according to pseudepigraphic sources such as Jubilees. (The theme of excessive, uncontrolled or irresponsibly utilized power is at the heart of the Tower of Babel narrative, perhaps something the life story of Peter reflects in some ways).
For example, in Joshua15.13 Caleb drives out three sons of Anak, (or three-fold ‘subdivisions’ of the Anakim, who are in effect the Nephilim, or the Anunnaki) called Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai. And yet in 1Chronicles 9.17 is a minor list of the Levites, (the ‘priest-class’ or tribe of Israel without a specific region, whose name links them thematically to the Leviathan), many of whom returned from Babylon to Jerusalem in c.538Bce, which contains the names; Akkub, Shallum Ahiman, and Talmon. There are few explanations of this symmetry, but as we saw in the lines of Seth and Cain, such parallels are often indicative of some form of relationship. This curiously structured, (indeed improbably accidental) similarity is indicative of the way in which the bloodlines of ‘the gods’ of Sumer found their way through the civilizations from there, to Assyria, and Babylon, which is where the Bible states these three sons of Akkub were born, following the marriage of their father to one of the ‘strange’ foreign wives within Babylon during the Israelites seventy-year captivity there, between 598 – 539 Bce. The book of Ezra ch10 details the extensive number of families created by such marriages, and effectively admits the near impossibility of changing the situation, despite the efforts of the congregation to identify and ‘isolate’ such women; for the children remain within the tribe, presumably. . . and incredibly, Ezra 2.13 sees the first use of the number 666 in the Bible, when listing the children of Adonikam, one of the many Israelites who married foreign women in Babylon!
Foremost in Ezra10 is the use of the word ‘strange’ to describe these foreign women – and it is the same word which Simon Peter uses to describe himself, and his relatives and fellow church members as they move across the Near East and Asia Minor into Europe, and Rome, for example in 1Peter1.1.

Further links between these semantic groupings are to be found within the pages of the Bible; for example, in 2Kings17, in the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah, the king of Assyria finds cause to invade the land, besieging Samaria (‘little Sumer’) for three years then taking Israel into captivity in Assyria (2Kings17.5-6). The narrative states this is part of YHVH’s divine punishment of the Hebrew peoples;

“For so it was, that the children of Israel had sinned against the Lord. And walked in the statutes of the heathen, whom the Lord cast out from before the children of Israel, which they had made. And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city.
And they set them up images and groves in every high hill, and under every green tree” (2Kings7.7-10).

And in the story of Balaam and Balak, the third hill-top site they visit is the ‘top of Peor’ at Numbers 23.28. This is stated as the place where Moses is laid to rest in the earth (Numbers34.6), and is a hill-top pagan shrine or grove as the Canaanites built, and as described in the Bible, at 2Kings23.13, etc.
After these various journeys Balaam and his companion build an altar and sacrifice some animals to YHVH. Balaam speaks of the blessed nature of Israel, which angers Balak, who then tells Balaam to leave and go home, though “I had thought to promote thee to great honour, but the LORD hath kept thee back from honour” (24.11). But Balaam asserts he spoke as he was directed by the Lord; moreover, he says at Numbers24.17-18;

”…there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall arise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth… And Edom shall be a possession, Seir also, and Israel shall do valiantly”

The name Seir, for instance, denotes the presence of intense negative emotion, and unreasoning violence, or ‘horrible’ characteristics (Abarim.com), and was home to the Edomites, the bloodline tribe of the Herodian family. (In fact the Hebrew word ‘seirim’ mans a specific type of desert-dwelling ‘hairy’ or ’bristly’ demon)… in the Old Testament the Horites of Mount Seir are destroyed by YHVH, at Deuteronomy2.22, to be heard of no more – while the book of Genesis states at 32.2/36.8 that Mount Seir was adopted as a homeland by Esau, the vengeful brother of Jacob who became the ‘father’ of the Edomites. The Moabites are listed among ‘sinful’ pagan peoples several times in the Bible, due to their worship of gods including ‘Chemosh’, as at 1Kings11.33/ Ezra9.1/ Jeremiah48.1, the latter of which mentions the (Sumerian) deity Nebo, emphasizing the eventual destruction of the Babylonian empire. (That the Moabites and Ammonites were not completely destroyed when the Hebrews established the nation of Israel is because of their bloodline relation to the Hebrews via Lot and his daughters…)
This speech at Numbers24.17-18 depicts therefore the destruction of several of the regions peopled by the lines of Cain etc, ie is foretelling their eventual defeat, as well as the ultimate obsolescence of the Anunnaki. The phrase ‘the sons of Sheth’ causes some perplexity among biblical commentators, as it implies the descendants of the replacement of Abel, Seth, from whom mankind arose, in opposition to the ‘sinful’ ‘lines of Cain’… as we examine elsewhere, the Shethites may have been derived from the Akkadian ‘Suteans’ or ‘Sheshites’, who were a nomadic Semitic tribe of mountain dwellers, holding primarily negative connotations to the Akkadians. The Hebrew usages of Sheth/ Sethite is argued by academics such as Amar Annus to be a polemical development, explaining possibly the evolution of the Hebrew Semitic peoples… (in his work ‘The Sons of Seth and the South Wind’). Alternatively, it may be viewed potentially as confirmation of the ‘allegorical’ conflation of the two near-identical lineages of Seth and Cain, in Genesis4/5 which we have noted as indicating some form of equivalence, or shared characteristics between the two lines…of the ‘celestial lineages’ of Sumer within the Hebrew peoples, and throughout the ancient Near East, as depicted in Genesis10/11.

The prophet Balaam continues (Numbers24.20) and brings in a people associated by some with the Nephilim bloodlines;

“And when he looked on Amalek, he took up his parable and said, Amalek was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he perish forever. And he looked on the Kenites, and took up his parable, and said, Strong is thy dwellingplace, and thou puttest thy nest in a rock. Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted, until Asshur shall carry thee away captive”.

The tribe of Amalek, possibly a derivation of Molech the Canaanite god who demanded the sacrifice of children in the fire – the name means ‘king’, though the tri-consonantal root ‘m-l-k’ as used in the Bible and Hebrew means ‘messenger’, particularly celestial messenger, (as Jesus refers to John the Baptist in Matthew11.10). The use of the name to imply the Sumerian Anunnaki, who as the ‘gods of heaven’ set the framework for religion in the ancient Near East (through the Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian and Assyrian civilizations) is subtle in allowing the possibility of either negative or positive interpretations….

The worship of Molech by Syrian and Canaanite tribes in particular was a clearly terrible practice – and according to the books of the Bible, was followed by some of the Israelites at certain points in the period covered by 1 & 2Kings, thus leading to divine punishment; in fact, it is possible that these practices of worship arose from after king Solomon adopted the pagan gods of his many wives’ religions. Thus the Israelites began at several times under various leaders to ‘put their children through the fire’ in this way. (2Kings16.3/17.17/21.6/ 2Chron33.6/ Ezekiel20.31/ etc ).

One story from the Old Testament encapsulates the opaque narratives present within the (Sumerian created) lineages of the Hebrews, namely in the character of the first King of Israel and Judah, David – as the chapter of 2Samuel12 shows, as well as outlining the sexual sins and murder he committed with Bathsheba and Uriah, and YHVH’s divine sanction therefore, it depicts David himself acting in cruel, even tyrannical fashion to the people of the Ammonite tribes; after defeating the capital city of the Ammonites (at 2Sam12.31), and ‘putting them under the saw, the harrow, and axes of iron’, and ‘through the brick-kiln’ …(In original Hebrew Bible notes contained within the text are references to the brick-kiln where sacrifices were made being dedicated by the Ammonites to ‘Malchan’, ie Molech). This may have been as punishment for the Ammonites’ own abominable practices in this respect, or possibly for more complex reasons, raised by David’s punishment and humiliation by YHVH earlier in the chapter.
But what is often overlooked is that none of the Mesopotamian civilizations ever sacrificed human beings in religious ceremonies; although executions of prisoners-of-war undoubtedly did occur. Human sacrifice in this sense appears to have originated, or occurred predominantly in the Levant region of Syria, Lebanon, Phoenicia, Canaan and so on. And been copied by several Hebrew rulers who followed pagan practices; notably Solomon being the best-known example of such a ruler, with his foreign wives leading him to pagan forms of worship.

So Balaam words concerning the tribe of Amalek is parallel to many of the Bible’s references to the civilizations of Sumer, Akkad, Babylon and Assyria which (possibly polemically) frame their achievements (as such undeniably the ‘font of civilization’) as ‘pagan’, and ‘godless’. Likewise their deities were therefore only referred to in negative terms as being ‘abominations’ and so forth, while in fact the deities of the Anuna were most similar to those of Egypt, or the Greek ‘gods of Olympus’, in fulfilling their roles as the creators of the cosmos, the ‘bringers of heavenly wisdom’ to mankind, and as protectors of mankind in its many activities and circumstances. Thus, leading female deities such as Ninti/
Ninkhursag, and Inanna/ Ishtar assumed the role of ‘fertility’ goddess who women could pray to for protection in matters related to childbirth, health and so on. Thus Ishtar, as a Near East goddess of female fertility, gave her name to words such as Easter, oestrogen, and so on, while in the Hebrew Bible the character Esther appears to have been named after the cognate-group of names and words associated with the original Mesopotamian goddess…indicating in this way Inanna/ Ishtar’s role as saviour and protector of the various ancient Near Eastern peoples which worshipped her. (While her father’s name Mordechai is believed to have connections to the predominant Anuna deity of the Babylonian civilization, Marduk…)
The Kenites in 24.21 meanwhile, derived their name from that of the Cainites, as they were predominantly associated with metalwork, as were the descendants of Tubal-Cain, the offspring of Cain and ‘an instructer of every artificer in brass and iron’ (Gen4.21). In so developing metal technologies and weapons of war Tubal-Cain made endemic the first murder, by his ancestor Cain of Abel.

The entire passage of Balaam, therefore, would appear to be concerned with the symbolism and associations linked to the ‘bloodline’ tribes and religions of Sumerian origin which existed at that time. Balak is the son of Zippor, (Num23.18), his name the same as that of the wife of Moses (Zipporah; Exodus 2.21) which means; ‘bird’, or alternatively ‘doom’. Coincidentally or otherwise, the ancient Sumerian city of Sippar, the home city of the Sun deity Shamash, was sometimes related to the ‘birds of the heavens’. The ‘bird’ aspect may be referential to the higher, celestial nature of the Anunnaki genetic lines, as passages such as Ezekiel31.3-13, likewise indicate the original ‘celestial’ nature of the civilizations of Mesopotamia, especially verses 31.6-9.

And again, we find a significant reference to the bloodlines of the ‘strangers’ here, at verses 31.10-13;

“Therefore thus saith the Lord; Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height, and he hath shot up his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height; I have therefore delivered him into the hand of the mighty one of the heaven…I have driven him out for his wickedness. And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him…and all the people of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him. Upon his ruin shalt all the fowls of the heaven remain, and all the beasts of the fields shall be upon his branches”.

This last sentence is perhaps resonant of the ‘fate’ of the Mesopotamian civilizations in their being buried by desert from the last centuries Bce until the 19th century, when predominantly European antiquarians and archaeologists uncovered from the sands their incredible palaces and cities – while the phrase ‘the fowls of the heaven’ may be taken as referring, among other things, to the Sumerian concepts of celestial ‘bird-men’ hybrids, or symbolic beings, (as shown left), sometimes referred to as ‘apkallus’, the ‘sages of the deep’.

The Book of Job is another curious mixture of discernible perspectives, in what is one of the Old Testament’s deepest books in terms of references to some of the most significant non-Hebrew religions of the Near East, particularly perhaps the civilization of Sumer and its off-shoots, as they formed the foundations of many of the Near East’s religions… and as well as the focus of attention on the nature and role of Satan in the opening chapters, there is in Ch.41.1-34 one of the longest passages on the ‘nature’ of Leviathan (or ‘dragon’, or Satan) in the entire Bible. As an example of Sumerian origins of religious concepts and symbols, the Sumerian (seven-headed) dragon the ‘Mus.mah’ was the first instance of such ‘celestial beings’ or conceptualizations of celestial forces, which led to the Babylonian ‘Tiamat’, as well later as the Hebrew ‘Rahab’, the ‘serpent of the deep’ (cosmos) which like Tiamat was a character symbolic of the forces of Chaos. The Leviathan is similarly associated with such forces, as was the ‘dragon’ in the book of Revelations…with the qualifying statement that some subtle and important differences exist between all these various ‘serpents’ or ’dragons’ mentioned. The name ‘Job’ does in fact have the Hebrew meaning of ‘the adversary’, a clear link to the original word or role of ‘sheitan’, while there are several ways of viewing the meaning of the name considering the narrative of the book – one which biblical scholars agree is among the Bible’s most mysterious works of literature.

8. Cosmic-number encodings of 2.22, etc and St Peter

as a representative of (the punishment of) the ‘sinful’.

We have noted the semantic meanings that may attach to Simon Peter calling himself and his family ‘strangers’, as did Moses, who named his son Gershom, meaning the same. Few of the books of the New Testament make such frequent allusions to the idea of being ‘a stranger’, as Peter draws attention to the possibilities raised by he and his relatives’ inner natures. . . much as first Lamech, Moses, king David and others faced up to their precarious circumstances, and tried to balance the scales between their potential destinies as servants of God, and their (pre-determined?) fate. That the word ‘estranged’ means ‘divided’ in French shows the essential reality of the celestial lineages’ inner estrangement
as hybrid beings of the genetics of the ‘gods’ and of mankind. Thus giving meaning to the words of Jesus in saying ‘the house which is divided against itself shall not stand’ – words which apply to both the groupings within tribes, nations etcetera of ‘the sinful’, ie the ‘lines of Cain’, (most often assimilated with references to ‘the powerful of the earth’), and to the individual likewise of the ‘heroic’ genes… The hybrid nature of Simon Peter, inferred in the essence of the double name given by Jesus to him, and also semantic connections to ‘fishes’, and so on, are indicative of his inner duality of being, and connections also to the ‘powers of the earth’. Also additionally to his ‘satan’-like role concerned with punishment of the sinful that he eventually appears to fulfil – hence the references in Matthew16.18-19/18.18 to the ‘heavens and the earth’. In other words, functioning as a mid-point in various ways between the higher and lower dimensions. A role perfectly expressed by his traditionally ascribed position at the ‘gates of St Peter, and similarly, as the first ‘Bishop of Rome’, where the word ‘Pontiff’ stems from ‘pontifex’/ ‘pontus’, meaning ‘bridge’. Some biblical scholars assess Simon Peter’s role between the two positions of James the Just and Paul to show that he ‘did more than any other to hold together the diversity of first-century Christianity’ (Dunn, 2001).

His role as the ‘rock’ upon which the church of Christ will be built, as Jesus says at Matthew161.8 thus confirms Simon Peter’s status as conceptually the ‘lowest of the celestial levels’, the foundations of the Temple when viewed as symbolic divine structure. The numerous instances associating ‘Cephas’, or ‘Rock’ with stones, the dust and the earth thus appear coherent in this manner, among the many references to earth which hold a negative implication; the dust the Serpent of Eden is cursed to always taste; that Cain is told will never yield any of its strength to him (Gen4.12), the earth that the rebel Korah and his associates are ‘swallowed into’ at Numbers16.32; the earth that Satan is forced to walk, ‘going to and fro’ in his wanderings at Job2.2; and which the ‘powers of the world’ are often described as being the rulers of the ‘four corners of the earth’…and so on, giving Simon Peter a level potentially equivalent to the ‘satan(s) of the divine council’ who perform God’s will in their lowly spheres.

The import of these metaphors connecting Simon Peter with these related areas of meaning is highlighted by the placing of significant passages at places identifiable by ‘encoded’ numbers…

The blessing we see Jesus conveys upon Simon Peter at Matthew16.18 (φ) is linked to other passages concerning the biblical concept of ‘satan’ (as ‘divine prosecutor’) – something Simon Peter is effectively described as throughout the New Testament – in a quite extraordinary way.

This is just one example of ‘cosmic-number’ encoding within the verse and chapter numbers of the Bible, as the value of Phi (ϕ) – 0.618/1.618 – is the Golden Section/ Proportion of a line, (which is found throughout nature, the human body, and the universe, so ubiquitous are the harmonic geometries centred around Phi; especially in Phi spirals, which expand logarithmically according to phi proportions). The value 18.18 is also significant in cosmic-number, as 1/1.818 = 0.555.
Several ‘cosmic-numbers’ possessing significances within ‘sacred geometry’, a field of knowledge which links the human, the temple, the earth and the heavens, are to be found within clearly related points within the Bible – as the section preceding this examines in some detail.

There is, in fact, a quite unusual theme of number-encoding regarding the ‘lines of Cain’ or similar, which frequently involves verses and chapters numbered as 2.22, or 22,2 etc… And Simon Peter is linked with both Phi, and this set of encodings; as a mid-point between the ‘heavens and the earth’, or between the ‘blessed and the wicked’, perhaps, in his dual-natured role.

So the first reference to a ‘satan’ in the Bible occurs at Numbers22.22 is when an ‘angel of the Lord’ is called to stand in the path of Balaam, a non-Jewish prophet whose word, according to the Moabite king Barak, is such that ‘he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed’ (Num22.6). But Balaam refuses to curse Israel for the Moabite king, despite the great rewards offered. When Balaam refuses to do this, citing YHVH’s instruction that he ‘refuseth to give me leave to go with you’ (22.13), Balak sends more ‘princes’ asking him to travel with them to the Moabite hilltop temples. YHVH tells Balaam to go with them, but only say what he is told to say (22.20). Yet it states, in somewhat confusing manner at Numbers22.22;

“And God’s anger was kindled because he went; and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary (‘satan’) against him”

With the result being that although Balaam does not see the angel of the Lord, the ass he is riding does, and veers off the path several times, causing Balaam to beat the animal. It is certainly apposite that the story of Balaam immediately after, at Numbers 22.39 places him at several mountain tops, symbols of the celestial and sacred matters of the gods throughout Near Eastern and Hebrew religious mythologies. The first mountain-top is to the east of the crest of Nebo, where Balaam and Balak journey to ‘the high places of Baal’ (22.41), which is believed to be the summit of ‘mount Pisgah’, as referred to at Num23.14/ Deu34.1, etc. This association between the site(s) and the hill-top places of ‘pagan’ worship is something extant throughout the Old Testament. Balaam next travels to the high point of Mt Pisgah itself (Numbers 23.14) with Balak. Again, more detail connects these sites to deeper matters; for as 23.14 states, “And he brought him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah”… with Zophim being the name used for ‘the Watchers’! Moreover, as students of Hebrew will know, the name ‘Adam’ means ‘field’ – so it may be inferred further that the use of the word here relates metaphorically to the matter of ‘bloodlines’ and genes of the Watchers…as Adam was brought from the dust of the earth; and as ‘fields’, ‘furrows’, ‘grapevines’, and other metaphors refer to similarly.

The theme of ‘temple prostitution’ is alluded to in 1Samuel2.22;

Now Eli was very old, and heard all that his sons did unto Israel; and how they lay with the women that assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.

This is the story of Phinehas and Hophni, the two sons of the priest of Israel, Eli, who use their position as ‘officers of the tabernacle’ to profit themselves gratuitously (1Sam2.12-17), by taking as much as possible meat from dedications to the Levite priests, using their ‘flesh-hooks’ immoderately taking their portion from the pans…as well as demanding the choicest pieces of meat and fat from petitioners, and threatening to take these by force (2.16). Eli warns the two that he hears of their sins, and warns them of potential consequences, words which they obviously ignore (2.25). A man of God comes to Eli, at 2.27-34, to tell him that his house will be punished, and the young neophyte Samuel will be the priest who replaces Eli, so that “Behold, the days will come, that I will cut off thine arm, and the arm of thy father’s house, that there shall not be an old man in thine house” (2.31). Moreover, that as a sign, his two sons, Phinehas and Hophni will die on the same day… (2.34). This comes to pass when Samuel has reached his early adulthood, with the two sons dying at a battle with the Philistines, at 1Sam4.11.

But the significant part of their narrative, highlighted by its position at 1Sam2.22, is the taking of young women sexually who congregated at the door of the tabernacle. As well as relating to festivals or ‘holy days’ in Canaan and the Levant which were religious practices involving considerable sexual profligacy, it also relates circuitously (!) to the story of Judges19, which takes place in the period (Judges17-21) after the death of the last judge of Israel Samson, and before the first king, Saul.

This details the concubine of a Levite, who runs away to her father’s house in Bethlehem. He follows her there, and after staying a while to ‘break bread’ with her father, they set out to return to the hill-country of Ephraim. On their journey they stay overnight at Gibeah (as noted, related to the Gibborim /Nephilim, and meaning ‘mighty’, or ‘high place’) in the tribal region of Benjamin. And in keeping with the Nephilim narrative, the inhabitants of Gibeah drag her out at night and ravish her, in a manner which echoes exactly the behaviour of the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah when the two angels visited Lot’s house – with the only difference being that the angels were powerful enough to resist the mob outside the house, by striking some of the attackers blind… events which then ensured the cataclysm enacted by YHVH at Gen19.24-30. (With these events then leading to Lot, the Sumerian nephew of Abraham who fled with his family from Sodom, becoming the incestuous ‘father’ of the Ammonites and the Moabites – this through his two daughters making him senseless with alcohol, for what appear spurious reasons). The raped concubine, meanwhile, dies overnight of her injuries, and the Levite sends her dismembered body to the remaining tribes of Israel, asking for justice and vengeance (Judges19.30).

The tribes unite and decimate the tribe of Benjamin, thereby leaving only six hundred men, and no women, in Judges20. (The name Benjamin, incidentally, means ‘son of the South’, while in his final speech describing the character of each of his twelve sons who will create the twelve tribes of Israel, Jacob says; ‘Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf; in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil’…Genesis49.27).

The surviving six hundred Benjaminites soon turn their attention to finding wives for themselves, to repopulate the tribe; something which the Israelites concur with, regretting that one tribe has been ‘cut off’ from the nation (21.3/6). However, this is not easily solved, the Israelite tribes having collectively vowed not to provide wives from their own tribes to the transgressors of Benjamin… but they realize that having all gathered to discuss the problem one city had failed to attend, namely Jabesh-Gilead (Judges21.5-8). This is the town associated later with king Nahash (meaning ‘serpent’) of the Ammonites, at 1Sam11.1-11, (when the townspeople asked him to be their king when the town was besieged, a somewhat craven act. The demand of Nahash that he would rule them if they each gave up an eye is something interpretable as clearly symbolic, and containing hidden meanings. However, the two narratives combined tend to confirm the town’s nature to be distinctly related to questions of the Nephilim lineages, particularly in the post-Deluge era, and different in some unstated way to the majority of the Israelites.

The Israelites thus raid and defeat the town, and save only four hundred young virgins, who they take to the camp of ‘Shiloh’, which ‘is in Canaan’ (Jud21.12). And again, at 21.13-14, many of the Israelites regret the punishment handed to the Benjaminite tribesmen, and give the four hundred girls to the wifeless men of Benjamin. These are not enough however, which leads the Israelites at 21.16-19 to propose they take wives from the yearly festival at Shiloh – so they wait in the vineyard to; ‘catch you every man his wife of the daughters of Shiloh’ (21.21), from among those women who come to dance… when the fathers and brethren of Shiloh complain, they are plainly told to accept the situation for the sake of unity. The final verse of Judges21, at 21.25 repeats the refrain from the start of Judges19; “In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes” – a theme closely comparable to the actions and characters of the Nephilim, or of any man who is unable to control his instinctive desires…or those who ‘ravin like wolves’….

As to the theme of the harlots at the temple door, the dancing girls at Shiloh who are considered suitable wives for the Benjaminites, and other incidents, this is generally interpreted to be evidence of the debased state of the Israelite tribespeople at that time, (when the nation had no judge, or clear ruler). A theme introduced in Judges19.1/2 in stating it was when ‘there was no king in Israel’ that the Levite man’s concubine ‘played the whore against him’, and left him to visit her father’s home for four months.

From an earlier and more righteous time, comes the story of Tamar, Er, and his father Judah (Genesis38.5-30). When Er dies, his wife Tamar asks her father-in-law Judah to provide her with another husband from his sons, namely Shelah. When he forgets his responsibility as Shelah reaches manhood, Tamar constructs a cunning plan; she disguises her face, and waits by the roadside for Judah; she takes him indoors, and sleeps with him, taking his signet-ring, a bracelet and a staff, as a token for later payment. Judah sends the payment soon after, but the harlot has disappeared (38.20). Several months later one of Judah’s men tells him “Tamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot; and behold, she is with a child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let her be burnt” (38.24) – but of course, when questioned she says, “By the man whose these are, am I with child”; which Judah acknowledges as his, and of his own guilt for not keeping his word… This narrative can be seen to highlight the double standards applied by men to women in the eras of the Bible; while also providing some insight into the serious ways in which (female) sexual licentiousness was dealt with. The book of Proverbs also gives a glimpse into social life of the Ancient Near East, in describing (and showing the toleration of, to some extent) women who are harlots, or sexually voracious, tempting men who pass by their houses… stating that ’her house is the way to hell’ (Pro5.5/7.27/9.18).

And this theme of the moral dangers of unrestrained sexual behaviours is also reflected in the story of the wicked men Hopni and Phinehas (whose name contains the stem of ‘Nahash’!), as described in 1Sam2.22 etc, the two venal sons of the priest Eli..! Bearing in mind that Phinehas, Hopni and Eli in 1Sam2.22 live in Shiloh also, it is noteworthy that it is twice that the Benjaminite men are provided wives from the women residing in Shiloh.

(An earlier Phinehas was also the son of the Levites’ chief priest, at Numbers25.7, being the son of the priest Eleazar, who is the son of the brother of Moses, Aaron. In contrast to the later Phinehas, he is a courageous and zealous fighter for the Levites and the Israelites in battle (Num25.11/31.6/ Judges20.28) – and in fact, he fights at the battle of the Israelites against the Benjaminites who raped and murdered the concubine of the Levite, and even calls them ‘his brothers’ at Judges 20.28…! )

It is curious to note, therefore, in terms of the theme of this section, that the son promised to Tamar by Judah is called Shelah, so shares his name with Shiloh, both of which are based on the same three consonants. As such, they each hold the meaning of ‘to extract’ or ‘to plunder’ or to take ‘booty’…! Clearly meaningful to the narratives associated with Shiloh. Rather as the ‘daughters-of-men’ who prompted the Nephilim to descend to earth appear to have been taken without any say or consultation in the matter, as the texts of 1Enoch7 and the Bible at Genesis6.1-4 indicate; and indeed the narrative of the Song of Solomon appears to describe, whereby the Shulamite is chosen to be taken into the ‘chambers of Solomon’ (Son1.4), and mourns the loss of her love, (the lowly sheep-herd or similar). The fact she is continually searching for her love is a subtle indication that whoever he is, he is not Solomon – as the location of the king of Israel would always be well known, especially to his wife or concubine…

Yet another coincidence of names is that of Tamar; stemming from the tamarind date-palm, and meaning ’dark’, this name held links to the Sumerian gods, and fertility, as such being associated particularly with female deities. As noted, the first Tamar is the daughter-in-law of Judah, who has intercourse with him ‘as a harlot’ to expose his broken promise; from this liaison come the twins Pharez and Zarah (Gen38); both of whom are ancestors of Jesus, in the lineage written in Matthew 1.3-16. The next Tamar is the daughter of king David, who is raped by her half-brother Amnon, which ultimately causes the rebellion by her brother Absalom, and the deaths of many people. And strangely, considering this theme of rape, incest and sexual matters within the tribes of Israel, the battle between the Israelite tribes and the Benjaminites takes place at somewhere named Baal-Tamar (Judges20.33); a place mentioned only once in the entire Bible, making it a little more likely to have been a metaphorical name, rather than actual place.

It is thus quite clear that this discrete section of Judges, of the four chapters 17-21 (from the death of the last judge of Israel, Samson, at the end of ch.16), is written in such a way as to incorporate several strands of related narratives which apply to male and female sexual ‘immorality’, including female prostitution, and dancing/ wanton sexual behaviour… And are moreover connected by this theme of lack of self-control to that of the Nephilim, who descended to earth intent on taking wives from the beautiful ‘daughter-of-men’, even though they knew this was a sin in breach of divine ordinances, which would thus occasion punishment.

So Judges17, the first depiction of the period when Israel had no clear rulers or guidance, begins with the mother of Micah worrying where her eleven hundred pieces of silver have gone; this appears to continue the story of the Philistine woman Delilah as told in the preceding chapter of Judges16, who received eleven hundred pieces of silver for betraying her ‘lover’ Samson. That she is a ‘harlot’ as well as a cause of suffering and death to her lover is part of her narrative. That Samson was a ‘hero’ born into the solar celestial lineages, who displayed great strength, bravery, even intelligence, but was also violent, lustful, and incomplete as a person, was part of his. And he is an almost perfect encapsulation of the ‘mighty men, men of renown’ as described in Genesis6.1-4. That his name means ‘little Sun’, or ‘son of Shamash’, stemming as it does from Shamash, the Sumerian sun-deity who was worshipped throughout the ancient Near East, is some confirmation of this perspective on Samson. Likewise the extensive amount of sun-symbolism in his story; the lion, bees, honey, foxes, wheat fields, fire, burning flax, and so on. Considering the immense amount of data linking the subjects, this is indicative of his being of the bloodlines of the Sumerian gods, as they spread through the different nations and peoples of the Near East, including the Hebrews.

In addition to the metaphor of the ‘lion’, Samson’s life-story includes that he comes from the tribe of Dan; and as Jacob described in Genesis49.17, “Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backwards”. The additional links this metaphor contains are to the ‘satan’, or ‘adversary’, the (divinely appointed) judge who tests characters, as in the book of Job…a name which similarly actually means ‘the adversary’, or ‘enemy’. (In Psalm91.13 is mention of both serpent or dragon, and lion, while verse 12 says that the angels will ’bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone’ – a metaphor again linking stones with ‘satans’).

So it is fair to conclude, in this regard, that much (although not all) of the symbolism of the Bible pertaining to either serpents or lions is thus directly referring to the solar nature of the bloodlines stemming from Sumer, (whether Nephilim or some other definition). And these very often are defined as concerning the ‘lines of Cain’, said in rabbinical texts to have been the offspring of the walking serpent Samael in Eden, who mated with Eve to produce Cain. That his name means to ‘possess’, as his mother makes the pun that ‘I have got me a man from the Lord’, links to the venal, appetite-driven characteristics of the Nephilim, the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Benjaminites, Shiloh, Hophni and Phinehas, Samson, Solomon (!), and many of the people in this section, in which unbridled and excessive (sexual) appetites lead almost inevitably to self-destruction or ruin. As the book of Proverbs, (traditionally ascribed to Solomon), states in eight verses of vivid imagery, from 23.27-35; “…a whore is a deep ditch, and a strange woman is a narrow pit…she also lieth in wait as for a prey” – and so on….

Hence the connections between those (like the Nephilim), who are counted as ‘hunters’, or as ‘wolves that ravin’ – this is perhaps a key to these numerous interwoven strands, contained within the chapters of Judges17-21.

---

To return to the theme associating the number with those who transgress divine commandments, as such being thus ‘of the wicked’, are David’s words at 2Samuel22.22, which considering his life’s actions might be construed as a denial rather than a statement of fact;
For I have kept the ways of the Lord, and have not wickedly departed from my God.

In continuing the theme associating the number with the celestial lineages and/or the ‘the wicked’, or ‘those who transgress YHVH’s laws’, can be found David’s words at 2Samuel 22.22;
For I have kept the ways of the Lord, and have not wickedly departed from my God.

The book of Job depicts when Satan attends the ‘heavenly council’, at Job2.2, at a time when ‘Again, there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them to present himself before the Lord’ (Job2.1). The Lord questions Satan at Job2.2, with Satan’s reply perhaps emphasizing his confinement to matters of the lower spheres such as the ‘earth’ (as well as echoing traditional myths of angels incarnating into human lifetimes, or ‘descending’ to earth as the Nephilim did in 1Enoch7);

‘And the Lord said unto Satan, From whence comest thou? And Satan answered the Lord, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it’.

After Moses is named, (Exodus 2.10), he then kills an Egyptian, and is forced to flee Egypt (Exodus2.11-21), and at Exodus 2.22;
And she bare him (Moses) a son, and he called his name Gershom,
for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land.

The theme of ‘strangers’ unites the ‘strange wives’ the Hebrews married in Babylon (Ezra), to those of Solomon who ‘led him astray’ into worship of pagan gods in Israel, to Simon Peter who repeatedly uses the word for those nearest him; going some way to explaining the different nature of Simon Peter.

In the book of Isaiah 22.22 YHVH says the following of Eliakim who he establishes as ruler of Jerusalem and Judah;
And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder;
So he shall open and none shall shut; And he shall shut, and none shall open.

This is ostensibly a prediction of the future role of Jesus – and yet the idioms of language used match closely to Matthew16.18 (ϕ) regarding Peter;
And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven…

– thus the two passages relate in oblique manner. The mention of the words ‘rock’ (symbol of stony ground/ desert, and satan), and ‘hell’ in Matthew16.18 are relevant to the theme under consideration. Additionally the word ‘key’ in both passages is clearly not coincidental; and indeed, the Keys of St Peter hold further metaphoric meanings related to cosmic number and symbolism. The role of Simon Peter as a gatekeeper is apposite in that two of the earliest representations of ‘celestial gatekeepers’ are Ningishzida and Dumuzi in the Middle Babylonian story ‘the legend of Adapa’, portrayed as the two door-keepers of the celestial palace of Anu (linked by some to the two angels who escort Enoch up through the heavens to receive blessings before the ‘face of God’, in the Book of 1Enoch….)
These two deities were thus representative of both the heavens and the subterranean underworld; the latter perhaps as deities of fertility. This duality is suggested in the Bible by the words of Jesus relating the ‘powers’ granted to Peter in both heavens and earth. In a curiously circular manner, the French writer Rene Guenon in his 1962 work ‘Symbols of Sacred Science’ noted the dual-role nature of the Roman/Greek god Janus, the deity always portrayed with two faces. This came from his being the god of the cusp of the New Year, thus being situated at a point where he looked both forwards to the coming year, and back to the preceding one.
So Guenon writes (p.166); “Janus, under the aspect (of the two solstitial gateways) is the janitor who opens and closes the doors of the annual cycle, with the keys which are one of his principal attributes; and we recall in this connection that the key is an axial symbol”.
He goes on to link Janus with the two biblical Saint Johns, saints of the two solstitial feasts of December and June, without perhaps noting the extensive symbolism within the narrative of Simon Peter linking him similarly to Oannes/ Janus. The identity of Janus stemmed originally from the Babylonian deity Oannes, the god we have seen to have extensive links with the Sumerian deity Enki/Ea, and like Enki was depicted as a hybrid fish/human.
This again parallels quite closely the depiction of Simon Peter as a fisherman, a ‘hybrid’ being, and a ‘gatekeeper’ as the Keys of St.Peter, the ‘episcopal’ mitre, and many references to ‘heaven and earth’ in Peter’s narrative imply.

And there is another passage; at 2Samuel 22.2, immediately after the description of four different Rephaim ‘giants’, namely ‘Ishbi-benob’, ‘which was of the sons of the giants’ (ie, bloodlines of the Nephilim), ‘Saph’ of the Philistines, the unnamed Philistine brother of Goliath, and a giant of ‘Gath’, (2Samuel21.16-22), the book describes the words of king David; ‘in the day that the Lord had delivered him out of the hands of his enemies’ (the giants, the Philistines, Saul etc);

2Samuel 22.2; “And he said, The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer”

Which is a key affirmation of the faith David has in God, as well as raising the theme of rocks or foundation – which link additionally to Simon Peter, the city of Tyre (meaning ‘rock’, and closely associated with Baal etc), and Satan; with the theme of the ‘celestial’/human bloodlines of the ‘giants’ acting as a backdrop to the story. (And coincidentally after Isaiah 22.22, the next chapter, Isaiah 23 is concerned with describing YHVH’s punishment of Tyre for seventy years in some detail).

The association of the many chapters and verses centred around 222 etc to that of the ‘sheitan’ or ‘satan(s)’, and related bloodlines, (thus nominally those who belong to the class of ‘the wicked’) is confirmed to be a conscious encoding by another example, this time of the wisdom of Solomon, (as already seen, he and his father David, relatives and several wives were shown to be related in significant ways to the ‘celestial’ hybrid bloodlines of Sumer and the Anunnaki, including but not necessarily of, the Nephilim);

One example highlighting the association of the numerical ’code’ to questions of ‘sin’, and divine punishment, is found at Joshua22.22, which considers in the preceding verses the acts of some of the tribes of Israel in worshipping other gods than YHVH. So the verse states that some of the tribes-people say to the ‘heads of the thousands of Israel’;

“The Lord God of gods, the Lord God of gods, he knoweth, and Israel shall he know; if it be in rebellion, or if in transgression against the Lord, (save us not this day)”.

Examples of related themes centred upon punishment of sin, ‘slavery’, ‘imprisonment’, being ‘bound’ and so on continue throughout the Old and New Testament;

Proverbs 2.22; “But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it”.

Similarly one of the Bible’s worst transgressors, Judas, is mentioned at Luke 22.22;
“And truly the Son of man goeth, as it was determined: but woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed”…

This theme has further links, in Deuteronomy2.22; in the fifth book of the Pentateuch, (the first five books of the Bible which are traditionally ascribed to the authorship of Moses), is a description again of four or five of the ‘tribes of the giants’ – from Deuteronomy 2.19 onwards;

And when thou comest nigh over against the children of Ammon, distress them not, nor meddle with them: for I will not give thee of the land of the children of Ammon any possession; because I have given it unto the children of Lot for a possession.
That also was accounted a land of giants: giants dwelt therein in old time; and the Ammonites call them Zamzummins;
A people great, and many, and tall as the Anakims; but the Lord destroyed them before them; and they succeeded them, and dwelt in their stead;
²²As he did to the children of Esau, which dwelt in Seir, when he destroyed the Horims from before them; and they succeeded them, and dwelt in their stead even unto this day; And the Avims which dwelt in Hazerim, even unto Azzah, the Caphtorims, which came forth out of Caphtor, destroyed them, and dwelt in their stead.

So this collection of peoples listed, including Deuteronomy2.22 is effectively a list (the same as noted in the story of Balaam at Numbers24.17-18) of the tribes of the giants (ie. descendants of the Nephilim) – the ‘seirim’ being a form of (hairy) desert-dwelling demons, as Esau, progenitor of the Edomites and Herod’s lineage was also described. Avim relates to Avva/Awen, the sister/ wife of Cain who thus begot all the ‘lines of Cain’ found within the Bible. Her name relates closely to the Egyptian city of Awen/An/On, also named Heliopolis, or the ‘City of the Sun’… The Zamzummim are another form of Rephaim, as are the Anakim, all of who live in or around the nation of Israel/ Canaan/ Lebanon at that early time. And most relevantly in this respect, these bloodlines or tribes are shown to exist after the ‘purging’ of the ‘sons of the gods and their monstrous offspring’ which was the reason for the Flood..! Because if the Ammonites called them the Zamzummim, they existed after the Ammonite tribe came into being; and the Ammonites, as mentioned, are descendants of Lot and his daughters! Lot being Abraham’s nephew who escaped the conflagration of the destruction of the sinful peoples of Sodom and Gomorrah only through the benevolence of his patriarch uncle, while his wife didn’t survive – thus providing one explanation of how the ‘dark’ bloodlines are shown to have survived the Flood when only Noah and his family (eight people precisely according to Simon Peter in his book 1Peter3.20). This highlights the significance of the pseudepigraphal texts such as the Books of Enoch, and Noah, etc, which indicate that Noah was the offspring of the ‘sons of the gods, the Watchers’…as Lamech says to his father Methuselah after seeing his new-born child – “I thought in my heart, that the conception was the work of the Watchers, the pregnancy of the Holy Ones, and that it belonged to the giants (Nephilim) . . .and my heart was upset by this. . .”

Indeed the short verse of 1Peter3.18-20 is concerned with the same issues of the ‘captive’ bloodlines;

“For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison ;
Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water”.

And yet another example whereby the code is used concerning aspects related to the ‘sinful’ and appropriate punishments comes at Exodus22.2;

“If a thief be found breaking up, and be smitten that he die, there shall be no blood shed for him”…

while at 1Kings22.22 events significant to ‘satans’ unfold, when the kings of Israel and Judah seek to consult their oracles, or ‘soothsayers’ (in what is partly a ‘pagan’ practice, as symbolized by the character with the headwear with the horns of iron who denigrates Micaiah) regarding whether to pursue a military course of action, (in an extensive, and incredible chapter, at 1Kings22). Jehosophat, king of Judah asks, ‘Is there not here a prophet of the Lord besides, that we might enquire of him?’ (22.7), to which Ahab, the king of Israel replies “There is yet one man, Micaiah the son of Imlah, by whom we may enquire of the Lord; but I hate him; for he doth not prophesy good concerning me, but evil. And Jehoshaphat said, Let not the king say so”. (22.8) – the relevant point being that when Micaiah is forced to prophesy to the two kings, he describes a situation whereby; “I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing by him on his right hand and his left. And the Lord said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead?” (22.19/20).

Thus one of the ‘host of the Lord’ (our italics) says he will persuade Ahab to venture out, to his eventual death;

“And the Lord said unto him, Wherewith? And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets”… ( 1Kings22.22).

This repeats the theme of the ‘satan’ examined earlier who stands not as an equal opponent of the (creative) powers of the Lord, but as a servant of his will, particularly in the role concerned with testing, or punishing the ‘wrong-doer’, in whichever way YHVH decides. The reference to the ‘host of heaven standing at the Lord’s right hand and left hand’ may relate to this concept, of those who are blessed from birth in their sanctity, and those who require forgiveness for various sins.

The ‘lying spirit’ of the ’host of heaven’ is closely similar to the spirit of the host of the Lord in Zechariah ch.3 who acts as a ‘satan’, a divine adversary, who ‘tests’ the prophet Zecharia – while at 2Samuel 24.1-16, it describes an ‘angel of the Lord’ who carried out the will of YHVH to punish the Israelites by killing 70,000 of them through illness (24.15), until YHVH “repented him of the evil” (!), and stopped the punishment (24.16).

The character of Satan who is so integral to the plot of the book of Job similarly is likewise one of the ‘host of heaven’, described in Job1.6-12/2.1-7 as ‘one of the sons of God who came to present themselves before the Lord” – and in fact it is the Lord who raises the question of the character of Job, “a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil” (1.8). So the role of the ‘adversary’ which is occupied by ‘the satan’ is quite different to that implied by the concept of a force which seeks to destroy humanity’s potential, acting as an opposite force to that of Good, and as such requires the attentions of the celestial orders to counteract. This viewpoint of evil does appear to have developed in the post-canonical age in particular, rather than forming part of the Scriptures.

This revised concept may be quite clearly related to the actions (and nature) of both the Seraphim (as ‘fiery flying serpents’ in the wilderness), and the Nagas, depicted as celestial beings in Sanskrit works of the Hindu religion who are nevertheless highly capricious in their dealings with mankind.
The etymology of their name and being indicates some form of relationship to the Brasen Serpent, the Nehushtan, with all its associations and meanings, as well as to the Ammonite king Nahash – we have noted, the powerful yet ‘cruel’ king (from 1Samuel11.1) who David had some unstated connection or relation to, (as the mother of David’s sisters Zeruiah and Abigail stated at 2Samuel17.25 is called Nahash – and as displayed in David’s gratitude to previous kindness from king Nahash, leading to his kind treatment of Hanun at 2Sam10.2). These themes indicate that Nahash is a person whose actions may be equated in a sense to a higher spiritual force, or perspective; so these are just some of the many subtle links which exist between these various strands within the Old Testament, and appear to be situated often where the numeric value is given.

One last example connecting the value to questions of morality, sin and justice, comes from 2Kings22.2;
“And he (king Josiah) did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in all the way of David his father, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left”
– placing, perhaps, the concept of balance between good and evil, or of finding a path which personifies inner balance against the pressures of life, towards the heart of this theme.

And one last encoding of significant (thematic) information at a numerical point comes from the last book of the Bible, St John’s book of Revelations. This example does not directly refer to ‘the wicked’ or to divine punishment, but instead contains a description of the Tree of Life in the Heavenly City, at Revelations22.2;

In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

– thus, with regard to the numerical theme, the Bible ends on a note of forgiveness, and redemption…

9. Symbolism associated with St Peter;

References to him in other religions; the story of Narjis. Peter and other religions of the Near East.

Simon Peter has some highly interesting connections to other religions than Christianity from both his life-story/ narrative, and also the symbolism attached to his being a ‘gate-keeper’ to ‘heaven’, particularly the ‘Keys of St Peter’, mentioned in Matthew16.18, and developed as an artistic theme throughout the Middle Ages. As such this symbol contains extensive semantic and geometric meanings.

So the role of ‘gate-keeper to heaven’, as noted, was first mythologised in Sumer by the pair of celestial beings Ningishzida and Dumuzi, (both deities associated with the underworld, fertility, growth and healing) in the ‘Myth of Adapa’ – a work which has enough similarities with the narrative of 1Enoch, to qualify as a ‘potential source’ for the Hebrew masterpiece, a fact noted by Sitchin among others in ‘Divine Messengers…’

The keys of Peter are most often depicted in a geometric fashion with the two keys crossed. (Although why this is two keys is something which is rarely explored, but is another example of duality which lays at the heart of Simon Peter…)
Visually it is significant that the keys of St Peter (image a.) contain the hexagonal geometries found within a (vertical) axis with crossing lines or sine-waves ; geometries which are central in many examples of ‘sacred architecture’ such as the cubic Holy-of-Holies of Solomon’s Temple, the Kaaba, and so on, throughout history. In antiquity, and in the Qabalah, this is called ‘the Cube of time and space’…

We have noted the words of the French writer Rene Guenon noted in his 1962 work ‘Symbols of Sacred Science’ , in which he writes (p.166); “Janus, under the aspect (of the two solstitial gateways) is the janitor who opens and closes the doors of the annual cycle, with the keys which are one of his principal attributes; and we recall in this connection that the key is an axial symbol”.

This hexagonally-based geometry is found within many of the key symbols of antiquity, from the Keys of St Peter (a) onwards;

This pattern also plays a central part in symbols such as the Greek Caduceus (b.), as well as the related Rod of Asclepius (c.) (which forms the modern symbol used to identify medical matters, vehicles, etc). These echo the axial symbol of intertwining serpent(s) in the Sumerian depiction of the afore-mentioned Ningishzida, in the Libation of Gudea (e.) which dates to around 2100Bce. (The Seal of Gudea likewise contains a ‘mushussu’, or ‘horned dragon’, and also uses the motif of an Anuna deity with waters flowing from his shoulders, as seen in the Adda Seal c.900Bce (h.), in which the water/serpent deity of Sumer Enki/Ea, who created plants, animals, and humanity through genetic interventions in the ‘Creation chamber’, is shown with fish and waters coming from his shoulders; the similarities to the twin-helix of DNA (e.) are apparent, an amazing coincidence considering his role as ‘chief scientist’ in Sumerian mythology who was concerned with the (genetic) creation of homo sapiens, as well as the key domesticated plants and livestock of the Fertile Crescent. The Nehushtan symbol made by Moses is shown in a 19th century illustration (d.); this can be said to resemble an X-Y axis with a sine-wave crossing along it, if the symbol is turned around 90° from vertical to horizontal (g.)

The Nehushtan unites themes of the Seraphim, the fiery flying serpents and order of angels whose bites caused the Israelites such suffering, the theme of brass or bronze metal-working which is intimately linked with questions of ‘divine wisdom’ given to mankind, as well as the Nephilim, who likewise in Hebrew mythology passed on ‘divine secrets’ as part of their ‘programme’ on earth. The role of the descendant of Cain named Tubal-Cain who is the ‘father’ of all those who ‘artifice in brass and iron’ (Gen4.22) is another signpost to these thematic relationships, while the Phoenician king Hiram and the master-craftsman Hiram of Tyre who build Solomon’s Temple are both significantly related to questions of bronze working, the Nahash and so on. That the Nehushtan represents the (‘lowest’), instinctive centres of the body, from which also come intuition, skills and the ability to survive, is something which these serpent-related symbols all contain, as metaphors for the intelligence of the body (as well as its potential imbalances).

A relevant interpretation is raised in the study ‘Gudea and Ningishzida – A Ruler and his God’, by Ludek Vacin. To briefly look at Ningishzida as a possible ‘mythic’ precursor of St Peter, (and a role indicated by the axial symbolism at the heart of his associated symbol), we shall quote Vacin’s thoughts on one aspect of his being, found in many Sumerian and Akkadian hymns, narratives, poems and songs;

“The god’s role in the Netherworld is explicitly mentioned in Ningiszida A; “King, you who carry out commands in the Netherworld, you who carry out its business”, and in the fragmentary lines 64-75 of ‘Ningishzida’s Journey to the Netherworld’ which refers to insignia of Ningishzida’s office, and to his office of a Netherworld Chamberlain itself. His infernal character is also reflected in the overall imagery of hymns Ningiszida A-D showing him as a warlike, frightening deity associated with snakes, magic, and flood-waves. Moreover, he appears as a Netherworld deity (along with Dumuzi) in the Death of Gilgames, in the version from Meturan relating that the words of dead Gilgames shall be as weighty as those of Ningiszida and Dumuzi once the hero becomes a governor of the Netherworld entitled to pass judgements and render verdicts…”

Considering the additional role of Ningishzida as a primary fertility deity, and ‘heavenly Chamberlain to the throne’, this perspective is perhaps a good one to view the ‘celestial’ role of St Peter, in combining both his divine, and ‘lower’ characteristics as described by the Bible. Hence the several New Testament references of Jesus to St Peter’s authority ‘in heaven, and in earth’ in Matthew16.18/ 18.18, etc, thus bridging the higher and lower dimensions…

This relates additionally to the famous saying of Jesus;
“Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast younger, you girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest; but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not”. (John 21.18).

As well as being germane to Peter’s character and destiny or fate as a martyr, one perspective holds that this verse refers to an intrinsic part of life, in the gradual transition of the self as it moves from youth to adulthood to old age; much as an arrow rises and then falls in its natural arc. And the symbolism of what is a cord, or a belt is such that it may also be interpreted to refer to celestial spheres, such as the orbit of all the planets round the Sun, or alternatively may refer to Orion’s Belt, the Milky Way, the Kuiper/ asteroid Belt and so on. It may, however, also be a judgement upon Peter himself, as a ‘satan’, as the Bible surreptitiously indicates he is by birth and lineage, pointing in this way to what the hidden narrative of his life always stated; that he was a ‘captive’ of his own ‘celestial’ genetics, from the Sumerian lineages which formed part of the Hebrew hereditary. This obscure narrative may be argued to be the subject of many of the verses of the Bible referring to slavery and captivity, among other metaphors.

An interesting connection here comes from the Book of Job, one of the few books of the Bible which mentions any constellations by name, which previous civilizations considered to be sacred parts of the heavens; namely at Job38.31 the narrator states the words of YHVH to Job;

“Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?”.

This concept of belts, or bands, linking as it does also to the ‘constraints’ of the ‘celestial bloodline’ inheritance of certain characters, is all the more apposite because the entire book of Job is predicated in the first and second chapters on the circumstance of a meeting of the ‘sons of the gods’, a ‘divine council’ as academics call it, which is attended by Satan, who in his role as ‘shaitan’ or ‘divine adversary’ speculates that the highly respected patriarch Job only pays homage to YHVH because he has been blessed with a wife, loving family, large farmland and immense wealth. God tells Satan he may remove all the wealth and security of Job’s life, to see how he reacts, as the rest of the book explores.
Bearing in mind the ‘celestial lineages’ characteristics of ‘heroic’ strength and ‘mightiness’, as well as instinctive skill and knowledge, it is certainly interesting in one of Job’s first talks with his friends that he says the following, at Job6.11-13;

“What is my strength, that I should hope? And what is mine end, that I should prolong my life? Is my strength the strength of stones? Or is my flesh of brass? Is not my help in me? And is wisdom driven quite from me?”

Towards the end of the book of Job (41.1-34) is perhaps the Bible’s longest passage describing the Leviathan, a fearful mythical beast akin to a dragon or similar, and one which Isaiah27.1 and Psalm74.14 describe being killed or ‘brake into pieces’ by the Lord.

To further the associations within the book to concepts of ‘satan’ within both Hebrew and other civilizations of the Near East, the name Job itself means exactly that, ‘the adversary’ or the ‘enemy’, ostensibly because of the structure of the book, but on a deeper level exploring some of the themes this section has given much space to… so that many of the words of Job spoken as he undergoes the ‘testing of his soul’ appear applicable to the souls of those who ‘damned’, (as 1Enoch depicts the souls of the ‘fallen angels’);

“O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave, that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me!” (Job14.13).

“With him is strength and wisdom; the deceived and deceiver are his. He leadeth counsellors away spoiled, and maketh the judges fools. He looseth the bonds of kings, and girdeth their loins with a girdle. He leadeth princes away spoiled, and overthroweth the mighty” (Job12.17-19).

“How many are mine iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgressions and my sin. Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and holdest me for thine enemy?” (Job13.23-24).

And so on. From this perspective therefore, the words regarding Orion dovetail quite neatly with several of the sayings of Jesus and others regarding Simon Peter.

St Peter’s ‘destiny’ and ‘being’ raise also the many dualities present from the earliest Sumerian myths onwards regarding the Anuna, such as Enki/Oannes (and the offspring of divine parent/s such as Gilgamesh), and other celestial beings, questions which remain unresolved… To say that the Hebrew faith changed the narrative (polemically) about the gods of preceding civilizations is an understandable perspective, and yet on both sides existed sophisticated complexities and dualities from the earliest times, meaning these intrinsic uncertainties were actually a significant part of both civilizations ‘narratives’ and their religions; and the Hebrew religion may very well have absorbed these complexities from the higher-consciousness traditions present within Babylonian and Sumerian mythologies. In other words, such ambiguities of meaning may form part of the fabric of the Bible.

Another example of the imagery centred upon the belt comes from a section of the Bible we have already seen in the events centred around king David and his family. This occurs at the end of his life, as the aging David instructs his son Solomon with regard to certain people of the royal court. Having noted in our study of David his despair at being (of) the same (lineage) as the ‘sons of Zeruiah’ – his cousins – born to apparently innate violence and bloodthirstiness (much like Peter’s despair or acceptance at being one of the ‘strangers’ he refers to numerous times), the king instructs his son with regard to the captain of his forces, Joab, one of his cousins;
“Moreover you know yourself what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me, and what he did to the two captains of the hosts of Israel, unto Abner, and unto Amasa, whom he slew, and shed the blood of war in peace, and put the blood of war upon his girdle that was about his loins, and in his shoes that were on his feet”. (1Kings 2.5).

Thus it might be seen to be associating the two men ‘of violence’, Joab and Simon Peter on some level, one which Peter stoops to when he pulls his sword as Jesus is arrested, cutting off the ear of a Roman soldier, (thus causing Jesus to then heal the wound, and rebuke Peter). More than once in the Old Testament characters say “Put on your bucklers (small shields), Israel; to war!”, indicating some of the metaphorical meanings the belt, sword and shield (coincidentally all parts of the figure of Orion the Hunter in antiquity) hold across the books of the Bible are predominantly to themes of war and violence – although the Old Testament in particular does feature much violence instituted by YHVH as part of the divine will.

In fact, along with the sword, the concept of the buckler in the Old Testament is repeatedly linked exactly with the personalities or peoples this Bible section has considered in terms of their inner nature; thus the following examples are to be found; Job15.20-26;

“The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days…Trouble and anguish shall make him afraid; they shall prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle…For he stretcheth out his hand against God… He runneth upon him, even on his neck, upon the thick bosses of his bucklers”…

Next, from the Song of Solomon4.4; “Thy neck is like the tower of David builded for an armoury, whereon there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men” !

After that is Ezekiel 38.3, again a book closely concerned with YHVH’s punishment of war-like or oppressive tribes or peoples;

“And say, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal; And I will turn thee back, and put hooks in thy jaws*, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields…”.

see Job’s mentioned description of the Leviathan, at Job41.1-2; “Canst thou draw out Leviathan with a hook? Or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down? Canst thou put an hook into his nose? Or bore his jaw through with a thorn?”

The book of 1Enoch ch.7 details the sins of the ‘sons of the gods’ who started the Nephilim lineages in terms of the teaching of ‘divine’ skills to mankind, particularly the refining and uses of metals, for weapons and such, while the association of Tubal-Cain with metal weapons of war in the Bible has already been noted.
In like manner the book of Ezekiel 39.9-12 again connects bucklers, and all weapons, with the forces of the Rephaim king named Gog (who is related to events taking place at the Apocalypse in Revelations20.8, along with Magog, in a passage which again refers to the ‘four corners of the earth’). Ezekiel39.9-12 reads thus;

“And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years….and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that robbed them, saith the Lord God. And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog a place, there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers on the east of the sea…and there shall they bury Gog and all his multitude; and they shall call it the valley of Hamon-gog. And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land”…

It is surely not coincidental that the ‘sons of the gods’ the Nephilim in 1Enoch descended to Earth at mount Hermon/ Hamon/ Armon/ Baal-Hamon in Lebanon in order to ‘commingle with the daughters of men’…from the Laurence version of 1Enoch;

“After the sons of men had multiplied in those days, that daughters were born to them, elegant and beautiful. And when, the angels, the sons of heaven beheld them, they became enamoured of them…Their whole number was two hundred, who descended upon Ardis, which is the top of mount Armon. That mountain was therefore called Armon, because they had sworn upon it, and bound themselves by mutual execrations” (chapter vii, vs 1-8).

The site of Baal-Hamon is also mentioned in the Song of Solomon at 8.11-12, linking Solomon, and the Shulamite,
with the ‘strange wives’ narrative, as well as the ‘sons of the gods and the daughters-of-men’ lineages. Also at Son4.8; “Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon; look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the lions’ dens, from the mountains of the leopards”.
A narrative of ‘one-sided conquest’ shown in the words of the first chapter of the Song; “Draw me, we will run after thee; the king hath brought me into his chambers; we will be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine.” (Son1.4)
Stating in other words the loss of her existing love, as she is chosen by the king, Solomon, without choice in the matter. And in confirmation of the acts of ‘the Watchers’ in this manner, chapter 5.6-7 of the Song relates;

”The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me”…

A good description perhaps of the situation of the ‘daughters-of-men’, as might be surmised by a close reading of 1Enoch, and Genesis6.1-4, etc, which place responsibility for the events completely with the ‘sons of the gods’, with little or no choice being given to the human women.

A related metaphor found in various books of the Bible concerns feet, which are frequently associated with the lowly, or lowest levels, as in the dream of Daniel regarding a statue with a head of gold, chest of silver, stomach of bronze, legs of iron, and feet of clay. (Daniel 2.32-33). (This metaphorical association is still widely found in Near East and Arabic countries even today, whereby the feet can be a cause of serious offence, as the ‘lowest’ part of a man, in continual contact with the dust…)

In Deuteronomy32.35 YHVH says; “To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them shall make haste” … pointing to the punishments YHVH intends for the base and violent.

And of course, Peter the name is connected to the lowest part of the body, as ‘podiatry’, ‘pedal’, ‘pedestrian’, ‘biped’ etc show. All stem from the Latin ‘pedale’ meaning of the foot, which stemmed from the PIE root *ped, meaning also foot. Peter’s name came from Greek ‘Petros’ meaning rock, after being named ‘Cephas’ by Jesus – yet the meaning remains the same of the lowest level of reality, on the energy-matter continuum.

The term ‘satan’ itself held connotations of a rock, or stone in the road of the wrong-doer, an obstacle, adversary or opponent. The name of the city of Tyre means ‘rock’, this being the Phoenician city from which king Hiram ruled, while he was depicted as the provider of the craftsmen, and the ‘forced labour’ to build the Temple of Solomon, as well as the materials used, such as the Cedars of Lebanon, brass or bronze, gold, and so on. So Jesus referred to this role of the city in building Solomon’s Temple in saying Peter would be the ‘rock’ upon which his church would be built. Tyre is clearly delineated as ‘sinful’ and ‘cursed’ in Isaiah23/ Psalm83.7 & 87.4/ Matthew11.21/ Luke10.13-14, etcetera.
Luke8.13 states simply “They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy, and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away”; arguably a good description of the Bible’s depiction of Peter’s essence. A narrative continued in the Synoptic Gospels directly after the speech of Jesus, and feeding of the Five Thousand, when Peter copies Jesus walking on the water, only to fall beneath the waves after a few seconds.

The narrative of Jesus walking on the water occurs at Matthew8.23-27/ Mark6.45-51/ Luke8.23-25/ John6.16-21. Within John6 Jesus feeds the five thousand (6.1-15), walks on the water (6.16-21), talks of the Father and himself as the ‘bread of life’ (6.26-59), and from verse65-71introduces the theme that ‘no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my father’ (6.65). John6.66 (!) states of this, “From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him. ⁶⁷Then Jesus said unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe that thou art that Christ, the Son of the Living God. Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?” (6.65-70). The ‘devil’ is ostensibly Judas Iscariot – but as this section on Simon Peter has argued, it is Peter who is the ‘alien’ one among the disciples, who embodies almost uniquely among the twelve the contradictions inherent in the ‘celestial lineages’ derived from Sumer within the Hebrew (and other) peoples. And again, the conjunction of occasions when Jesus speaks of Satan with the presence or words of Peter, is thus more than mere coincidence.

In Psalm87.4 Tyre is associated further with the conjoined symbols of failure or wickedness;

“I will make mention of Rahab* and Babylon to them that know me; behold Philistia, and Tyre, with Ethiopia; this man was born there”…

• (the female ‘serpent of chaos’, or ‘– the deep’, akin to Tiamat in the Babylonian creation-epic the Enuma Elish).

The other quoted verses similarly indicate that Tyre was among the ‘lowest’ of cities or nations, and would face judgement in the ‘end-times’ referred to in Revelations, as a symbol of the wealthiest nations (made rich by international commerce). As Isaiah23.8 states; “Who hath taken this counsel against Tyre, the crowning city, whose merchants are princes, whose traffickers are the honourable of the earth?”

As mentioned, the name Sidon means ‘town of fishing’, as Simon Peter was a fisherman, and came from Bethsaida, or ‘House of fishing/ hunting’… In other words describing Peter in essence with words also deeply associated with Satan, the Nephilim (as ‘hunters’, like Nimrod), and the lines of Cain (whose name reflects his character, meaning to ‘possess’, or ‘take/ obtain’…(as well as continuing the hybrid fish (or serpent)/ human theme present in Mesopotamian mythology of the gods and their offspring from the earliest of times; again, as represented in Genesis10 by the person of Nimrod, the ‘mighty man’ associated with the building of the Tower of Babel). This symbolism may thus be inferred to be part of long-term traditions of higher, even ‘celestial’, consciousness, across the civilizations of the ancient Near East.
The latter meaning forms some connection semantically to the Nephilim, whose predatory natures led to their ‘preying’ upon the world, so much so that YHVH was forced to allow the Deluge to purge the earth of their excesses within human civilization.
So, in 1Enoch7/8 the Nephilim were accused by Enoch of teaching mankind “charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants’”. Also how to make “swords, and knives, and shields, and breastplates, and made known to them the metals of the earth and the art of working them; and ornaments, and the use of antimony… and all kind of costly stones. And astrology… and the constellations… the signs of the earth… the signs of the sun… and the course of the moon” – and so on, even as their ‘gigantic’ progeny began to ‘sin against the earth’, and ‘… to sin against the birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another’s flesh, and drink the blood…’ so that, “as men perished, their cry went up to heaven”.

Or as the narrative of 1Enoch states in ch.15;
“And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble; they take no food, but nonetheless hunger and thirst, and cause offences”. (Rev. R.H.Charles version, 15.10).

It is curious, bearing this in mind, that Jesus says of Simon Peter he will be ‘a fisher of men’, when taking him and his brother Andrew as apostles (Mark4.16), as well as the fact of his connecting him with Tyre (through ‘rock’), and Sidon (through ‘fishing’)…

And indeed, Deuteronomy 32.31-32 refers directly to the concept of ‘the rock’, immediately before verse 35;
‘For their rock is not as our Rock (YHVH), even our enemies themselves being judges. For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter ”.

---

So to return to the association of Simon Peter with axial symbols from the earliest eras of antiquity, particularly symbols of serpents, these pictorial representations of intertwined serpents and similar all have levels of meaning, from the atom, to DNA, to energy, and to the Earth, as well as the human being where the bilateral symmetry of the body is centred around the vertical axis of the spine. As such both the keys of St Peter and the entwined serpents may be said to symbolize the geometries of the hexagon, which as we have seen is a central aspect of the Vesica, and related symbols. The hexagon, as we have seen, is closely connected to Pi, Phi, the irrational roots of 2,3 and 5, and other values within the extensive field of cosmic number. Note the hexagonal geometries shown within the ambulance symbol above, similar to the Keys of St Peter in portraying a central heaven–earth axis, with sine-waves to either side which cross at a point on the axis. The inverted cross symbolizes the death of Peter when he was crucified upside down, according to historical writings by Tertullian, Origen, and Jerome and others in the 3rd and 4th centuries, at his own request.

Similar geometries are intrinsic to symbols concerned with depicting atomic energies, such as the pathways of electrons around the nucleus, or in symbols of radioactive materials.
With regard to the cultures which were the source of the entwined serpents, both early symbols were said to originate from ‘cosmic beings’ involved with the transmission of ‘celestial wisdom’ to mankind, to help with the creation of civilization, both in Sumer and China, (as well as Egypt and India)… and incidentally, both were concerned with genetics and questions of DNA, characterised by the two intertwining ribbons which constitute its form. The Chinese deity considered to have been the source of this in pre-history was FuHsi, (or Fuxi);

“The great heavenly Fuxi…in remote antiquity replaced Suirenshi (the legendary creator of fire) and became Emperor. His merits and achievements were great, he devised the eight tri-grams, invented writing, instituted marriage, and taught humankind to catch fish, grow plants, and keep animals”. Attributed to Gan Baozong, in the Tang Period (618-907).

Depictions of FuHsi as human (right), and (left) with NaKua, from Astana Cemetary, 651Ad, Tan dynasty, Xiang Museum, China; and (centre) the Pakua, or Eight tri-grams, believed to have been introduced by FuHsi.

According to tradition he had a snake’s body, and human head, while often depictions of him were as fully human (left). Most depictions of him and his sister/paramour NaKua, (Nuwa, or Nugua) – related in all probability to the Proto-Indo-European root word ‘(s-)nego’, from which both Nagas, meaning ‘(royal) cobra’, and ‘snake’ both stemmed – indicate their hybrid human and serpentine nature, as well as their representing cosmic forces such as male/ female, or yin/ yang energies. Much like king Solomon and the Queen of Sheba represent solar and lunar, or male and female energies in the alchemy of their ‘hieros gamos’, or ‘sacred’ or ‘alchemical marriage’.

And this is not the only existing links the mythology of Simon Peter has to the Nagas and related mythology throughout other eras and religions of the Near East. For from Shia Islam comes the myth of Narjis, who significantly, is reputed to have been a Roman princess and a descendant of Simon Peter..!

Narjis Khatoun, the wife of the Eleventh Imam, and mother of the Twelfth;

In the canon of Islam, Simon Peter is said to be the forbear of Narjis, who was a Roman (slave girl) captured in the Islamic-ruled Holy Lands, and sold to the family of the Eleventh Imam, Al-Askari, the Shia descendants of Mohammed. Narjis married Al-Askari, and was the mother of the Mahdi – the mystical Twelfth Imam who Shia Muslims expect to reappear towards the end of the world, as a Holy Messenger and guide.

The various myths of Narjis aver that she was a Roman noble/princess, inspired to follow behind the forces of the Papacy in their journey to fight in Holy Land in the crusades. Captured by Islamic forces, taken as a slave to Iraq – rescued/bought from slavery/ by righteous Imams (the religious leaders and family descended directly from the Prophet Muhammed) who recognised her as highest of European stock – descended from Caesar on her father’s side, and Simon Peter on her mother’s – so was, in effect, a Roman princess.
(According to Wikipedia she is known by various additional names, foremost of which is Anna; possibly a stem of Anu, the father of the Anunnaki, which is also the source for the name of Bethany in the Bible by which Mary Magdalene is known; the Beth/ House of – Anu). And Bethany was in Samaria, (probably meaning ‘little Sumer’, after the son of Noah called Shem, who peopled Sumer/ Sumeru/ Shinar/ Shumer, as it is variously called, at Genesis10/11). It is believed to possibly stem from a king called Shomron, or Shimron, whose name means ‘Watcher’, or ‘Guardian’, etcetera; the links to the Watchers (or ‘celestial beings’) of the Sumerian lineages is certainly interesting also, while the ‘On’ part of the name relates significantly to the name ‘On’, meaning ‘Pillar’, or ‘Abode of the Sun’; the Egyptian city of An/ On etc, was called Heliopolis by the Greeks, meaning ‘city of the Sun’. That the Sumerian deity of the sun was Shamash is likewise meaningful, and is part of the etymology of Samson, whose name thus means ‘little Sun’.
Samaria as a region of Israel/ Palestine may have gained its name, and certainly did its negative connotations within Hebrew society, from when the Assyrians under Sargon II invaded, ruled, and introduced Assyrian tribes into Samaria from 722Bce onwards (see 2Kings17-23). The tribes which were imported into Samaria by the Assyrians were considered to have introduced pagan and heretical ways into Israel, thus tainting the Samarian Hebrews for many centuries.

It may also be coincidental that the husband of Narjis, the Eleventh Imam spent most of his life in Samarra, in modern-day Iraq. The town had the name of Sumere in Latin, and Sumra in Syriac, and is based on the east bank of the Tigris 80 miles north of Baghdad, so is effectively in the region of ancient Babylon and Sumer, as shown by the ancient languages having names for it as such. The name Askari means ‘military’, after the town’s primary role as a military base in that period; in fact the word Askari means ‘inmate’, and the Eleventh Imam spent a long proportion of his life under house arrest under the eight Abbasid Caliphate – a continuation of the themes of captivity (within the genetics of a ‘celestial bloodline’) present in the words and life-stories of Simon Peter (‘St Peter-in-Chains’), and Narjis…

Proving her fidelity and devotion to God in her words and comportment, Narjis converted to Islam, and was accepted by the family of Al-Askari; and then married Imam Hassan Al-Askari, the Eleventh Imam, thus giving birth to ‘the awaited holy spirit’, Al-Mahdi (the Guided One). Shia texts say the Mahdi did not die, but instead disappeared from the material world in line with God’s Will according to Islamic legend, and will thus reappear when needed at some crucial point in the future. This disappearance rather than death is called the Occultation – and is similar in nature to the highest biblical characters Enoch and Elijah, who were so righteous that they both ascended to heaven while still alive. (Genesis 5.24 /2Kings 2.11)

An examination of the holy books, myths and legends of Indian history, the scriptures of both Brahmanism, and Buddhism, provides a more detailed understanding/ division of the ranks of the Nagas in antiquity. It is theorized by some researchers that the World rule Nagas may be divided into four separate classes or levels; primitive dragons – Europe; spiritual Dragons – East primarily, which take on semi-human form; divine Dragons, ie. cosmic beings (Seraphim?) And lastly, Supreme Divine Nagas, (who effectively constitute Archangels, theoretically).

This broad categorisation does provide a perspective for understanding some of the mechanisms of ‘higher dimensional’ influences at times in history, ie. providing ways in which ‘celestial influences’ have been allowed to intervene in human affairs, for reasons perhaps of guidance – while still observing mankind’s free-will. In other words, at a certain level divine influence upon human decisions which will affect large sections of mankind is acceptable, within the boundaries of individual free-will. Whether the (groups of) celestial beings depicted in sacred texts in antiquity such as the Seraphim, or the Nagas, work as conduits of divine will, or have some independence of will and agenda is by no means clear…
The wisdom of Solomon (as the reputed author) provides some confirmation of this, in the book of Proverbs;

“Counsel is mine (YHVH’s), and sound wisdom: I am understanding; I have strength. By me kings reign, and princes decree justice. By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the earth”. (Proverbs8.14-16).

Likewise, Proverbs 21.2; “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water; he turneth it whithersoever he will”…

Bearing this in mind, it becomes a little clearer how Narjis (or Narges Khatoun in some spellings) in the historical myths of Shia Islam fits into this categorisation. Considered by many Shias to be the mother of the Twelfth Imam, she has a detailed and complex ‘mythology’; (*the first Arabic writer to examine the life and character of Narjis was Al-Mas’udi, a historian, geographer and natural philosopher known as the ‘Herodotus of the Arabs’) while another early chronicler was Ibn-Babawayh. Nowadays nearly all Twelvers of the Shi’a denominations accept the biography of Narjis as a Roman princess…

To look at these myths in a some detail – she is said to be a descendant of Simon Peter – one of the most clearly dual-natured positive and negative figures in the Bible, communicated in the Bible by the numerous metaphorical and semantic links connecting Simon Peter to hybrid forms, and the ‘celestial lineages’ of Sumer; while this intrinsic dichotomy, or nature, appears to be reflected in the Nagas by the way they are said to be sometimes help mankind, and at others appear completely uninterested in aiding humanity achieve it’s aims. In other words, the celestial agenda(s) sometimes supersedes or differs from the agenda(s) of mankind, (at least mankind’s ‘temporary-minded’ goals of self-advancement or protection and survival) – while the divine agenda can supersede the celestial agenda, thus ensuring at times an alignment with humanity’s needs.

This is mirrored in the narrative of the fiery serpents the Seraphim, who both torment and injure the Israelites in the wilderness of the desert (forcing Moses to create the Brasen Serpent the Nehushtan to heal their wounds somehow), and yet who also form a choir of angels singing hymns to the Lord in the highest dimensions…! (in Isaiah 6.1-10).
This inconsistency, or ambiguity, mirrors also the strange, even anomalistic agenda of king Nahash who asked an eye of each of the inhabitants of Jabesh if he was to be their ruler, (1Samuel 11.1-2/12.12); possibly in the sense that Jesus said ‘If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out”..! Meaning in other words, the spiritual should be given precedence over the material…his words may perhaps be viewed also as a comment on the ultimate nature of kingship, taking place as it does shortly after the Israelites demand of YHVH their first ever king – as the surrounding nations have kings – to lead and protect their nation at 1Samuel 8.4-22; a request born perhaps of difficulties arising from the divine injunction of YHVH that they create and protect the state of Israel in the densely inhabited land of Canaan…)

Also considering much of the serpent and devil imagery and associations directed towards Peter by Jesus, the Roman princess aspect of Narjis locates her within the celestial bloodlines of Sumer as described in the Bible, which may be surmised to have found their way to the ensuing lineages of royalty in the Near East, and Europe.
So Simon Peter fits perhaps into the broad category of the lowest level of the European Nagas; reflected by his travels westwards from Israel towards his final destination, Rome; symbol of the ‘powers of the world’, and precursor or early example of European hegemony in the first and second millennia Ad. Rome, like the Assyrians, Egyptians, and Babylonian rulers in the Bible, may be a symbol of the ‘powers of mankind’ achieved without divine blessing, (ie representing cultural developments which undermine mankind’s moral growth). This perspective may be deduced according to the Hebrew perspective of the Bible, perhaps due to the stated civilizations’ reliance on military conquests and ‘enslavement’ to sustain the empires they created, as well as disdain for the universal rights of men and women to develop spiritually. In other words strongly autocratic, militaristic societies ruled by elites, with large underclasses of the poor and needy. (Simon Peter’s ‘treatment’ of the two church members Ananias and Sapphira, is related in Acts 5.3-10, who steal a small amount of money from the sale of a piece of land, may be symbolic of such dynamics – for both individually drop down dead to the ground when confronted by Peter, who is acting as leader of the church at that point. The severity of the punishment, with its absence of forgiveness, may be indication of some aspect of Peter’s ‘Herod-like’ inner nature – although as he says and does nothing directly in this passage, this is uncertain…) Overall, as examined in detail already, it is fair to assess the New Testament and the Synoptic Gospels depiction of Peter to be that of a mentally and physically violent man who is lacking in understanding and love. Rather as Matthew11.12 states that “…from the days of John the Baptist to now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force”.

Simon Peter’s role as symbol of the European Nagas is indicated symbolically also by his end (upside down crucifixion, like the Nehushtan, as indeed, Jesus said at John3.14 his fate was to be like that of the serpent ‘lifted up in the desert’. In being crucified upside-down Peter was even nearer to the symbol of the Nehushtan perhaps). Also relevant to the theme are Peter’s repeated comments re himself and his family/descendants as ‘strangers’, tying him to the bloodlines stemming from Sumer, Assyria, Akkad and Babylon which found routes in various ways into the Hebrew lineages.
Also relevant are the words of Jesus saying (at Luke22.31);”Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat…” (ie. ‘test his inner being”, rather than to punish or destroy him. In this, Satan as a ‘divine servant’ who is additionally the ‘king of the world’ may also fit into Nagas ‘theology’, as the fitting ruler of the terrestrial sphere, concerned with lower matters, and those who seek to control the ‘four corners of the earth’…).

The capital of the Roman Empire, Rome, thus functions in the Bible as a metaphorical location akin to Babylon, so that it represents equally; empire/ wealth/ enslavement to possessions, or pleasure, or the needs and desires of the self; as well as to those ‘enslaved’ to their genes/ the negative bloodlines of Cain/ those of the lines of ‘strangers’/ or possibly the celestial Nagas.

And indeed, the slave-trader who brought her to Samarra, Iraq (from wherever she and other European ‘camp-followers’ were taken captive) had the name Umar bin Yazid Al-Nakhas.

This man’s name contains not one but two very significant references; the Yazidi tribe of central Asia, as reported by Gurdjieff in Meetings with Remarkable Men, have traditionally been considered, or reputed to be ‘devil-worshippers’, (although the true perspective is surrounded by uncertainty, as their culture is a closely guarded and secretive one). And secondly, the name Al-Nakhas (Al=the son of-), raises the (etymological) clue again of the Nagas/ Nahash, etcetera…

These semantic associations provide some clue as to inherent meanings contained within her alternative names; as noted, of Anna, (ie related to the Anuna bloodlines), and Magdalena, (as a potential symbol of the ‘dark’ celestial lineages, similar in this way to Maacah, Tamar, Sheba, etcetera, each of whom may or may not be considered to have been redeemed by virtue in some sense), and Liliana (related again to Anu, but primarily to the Hebrew demoness Lilith, considered to be a negative, compromised, or ‘night-time’ aspect of (celestial) femininity, This perspective originated in the Mesopotamian cultures, where demonesses such as Lamastu, or Lilutu were depicted in myths such as Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the Netherworld as destructive non-human beings who introduced chaos into the world, despoiling as such the ‘garden of the earth’.
(In the positive representations or aspects of female divinity, often concerned with childbirth, fertility, healing and love, the Black Madonnas (or ‘vierges noir’) have been venerated in Europe, and across the world as symbols of the Holy Virgin and feminine divinity since the 4th century Ad, with links to the pre-Christian goddesses of Ishtar, Astarte, Venus, and so on in the Near East and Europe).

So it is possible to view the negative aspect of Lilith as linking Narjis to that of the ‘Roman’ bloodline of Simon Peter in its lower aspects, as we have seen. The city which the book of Revelations described as the ‘new Babylon’, as well as where the western Christian Church was established by Peter according to accepted tradition.

Some of the finer details of the story as told may be seen to hold meanings related to some of the associated themes; so, according to the story as told, she is bought for 220 gold pieces (half of the 440 harmonic; presumably her husband-to-be, the 11th Imam, represents the other half of the significant value, from the conjoining of which comes the ‘cosmic result’, the birth of the Mahdi) – and she mentions at the same time the words ‘I would not be your slave if you were King Solomon himself’ to a different bidder. As we have noted, Solomon has close connections to Cos# and gold in the Old Testament, and is the first character linked to the number 666 in the entire Bible, this being the amount of gold given to Solomon. (apart from Ezra2.13, when listing the children of Israelites who have foreign, pagan mothers, taken as wives by the Hebrews when in the Babylon Captivity…. therefore being children of the Sumerian ‘celestial’ lineages such as the Nephilim).
Both his name – and Gold – and the number 666 have metaphorical connections both to the sun and to the serpent. (666 being the # of male solar power traditionally, as well as being given in Revelations as the ‘number of the beast’, equated with ‘that old serpent’ in Revelations20.2) – and thus to the solar genetics of the ‘celestial lineages’. And of course, the meeting of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (meaning ‘seven’, as well as Sabean, ie. of the southern tribe) is presented as an allegory of the alchemical conjoining of male (solar) and female (lunar) energies, within the ‘process’ of the octave.
The reference of Narjis to slavery is relevant in several ways; so in the building of the Temple by Solomon, as noted previously, much of the labour used was in the se