There's an alternate account of how the Babylonian exile came about to start off Book of Daniel. Later, Daniel himself is introduced as a select group of exceptional, handsome youths (such a biblical trend!) who are to be trained and educated to serve Nebuchadnezzar. He opts to remain religiously pure, overcoming the first of many such challenges. He's the only one to who can interpret Nebuchadnezzar's dream, which creates a parallel with Joseph. There are tons of parallels in this book, as in virtually every other narrative book of the Bible.
This just in: apparently the Babylonians had bagpipes.
There's the famous Daniel's-companions-in-the-fiery-furnace episode. Then the writing-on-the-wall episode. This one features Nebuchadnezzar's successor and son, Belshazzar. Then Darius of the Persians takes over.
It's under Darius that perhaps the most compelling parallel can be found. See if you can't tell me what it reads like: "Then this Daniel became distinguished above all the other presidents and satraps, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king planned to set him over the whole kingdom. Then the presidents and the satraps sought to find a ground for complaint against Daniel with regard to the kingdom; but they could find no ground for complaint or any fault, because he was faithful, and no error or fault was found in him. Then these men said, 'We shall not not find any ground for complaint against this Daniel unless we find it in connection with the law of his God.'"
Daniel is subsequently sent into the lion's den, another classic episode from the book.
Then the book shifts (there's clear signs that several different works even before this point have been soldered together) into some outright prophetic talk. "There came one like a son of man." Yes, Daniel is another book that features this phrase. There's one sequence that sounds like it could have come from the much later prophecies of Nostradamus.
And then there's a flashback to Daniel saving Susanna from some lecherous old men who attempt to damn her with false witness. Then Daniel exposing the mischief of the priests of Bel. Then Daniel defeating a dragon. (As far as I know, even if I try to say otherwise in some of my fiction, dragons are completely fictional, for the record.)
And then it ends with an alternate version of the lion's den story, featuring Habakkuk.
Showing posts with label Nebuchadnezzar. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nebuchadnezzar. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Book of Jeremiah 36-52, Lamentations 1-5
Baruch shows up again and starts to do actual things. Such as act very much like Aaron to Jeremiah's Moses.
Jeremiah utters, "What wrong have I done to you or your servants, or the people, that you have put me in prison?" Then a little later, it's said of him, "Let this man be put to death, for he is weakening the hands of the soldiers who are left in the city, and the hands of all the people by speaking such words to them. For this man is not seeking the welfare of this people, but their harm." Sounds a lot like Jesus foreshadowing to me.
Jeremiah is then thrown into the pit. It's Ebedmelech the Ethiopian who gets him out.
The further Jesus analogy in this scenario is Nebuchadnezzar in the Pontius Pilate role. In fact, the whole depiction of Pilate could very well have been drawn from Book of Jeremiah. As historians are increasingly quick to note, the real Pilate would never even have thought twice about executing Jesus.
I have a correction to make about the earlier reference to "queen of heaven." Now I'm interpreting to have always been an Egyptian reference, likely to Isis. Egypt is prominent in Jeremiah.
In the litany of terrors against nations that helps comprise Book of Jeremiah (it seems obvious that several separate works were at some point combined), there's the suggestion that the conclusion of the Esau legacy is finally reached. You'll remember that although Jacob's brother did actually get to enjoy prosperity through the generations his adventures disappear from the Bible soon after.
The variations of this book from earlier biblical record continue: the end of the Babylonian exile is far less mutual and more like rats fleeing a sinking ship, with Babylon meeting the same sorry fate as other nations in the litany of doom and woe. I'd suggest that it seems obvious some or all of this was written well after the fact, even there's at least one line ("Thus far are the words of Jeremiah") that would try and suggest otherwise. Most of the books of the Bible probably didn't exist in direct awareness of each other much less reflect a lot of direct record. It's hard enough to authenticate such things in the New Testament.
Sodom and Gomorrah, however, are clearly part of the tradition everyone knows at least by name (some suggestions made here indicate varying reasons never actually given as to why they were so famously smited), as they are referenced several times in Book of Jeremiah.
I imagine one way or another that this is not a favorite book of Iraqis. Although funny enough, and maybe I said this already, but Abraham's ziggurat is in Iraq.
It ends funny, though. Jeremiah abruptly disappears (to say nothing of an earlier and random sequence involving a bloody warrior named Ishmael). It rewinds back to the very start of the Babylonian saga, right after having apparently closed the book of Babylon itself.
Lamentations, traditionally ascribed to Jeremiah but clearly not by him, is a, well, poetic lament about the destruction of Jerusalem, and even a moment of religious doubt (which suggests people generally did believe what they were supposed to believe with or without Jeremiah), some lines of general woe concerning the exile era.
Jeremiah utters, "What wrong have I done to you or your servants, or the people, that you have put me in prison?" Then a little later, it's said of him, "Let this man be put to death, for he is weakening the hands of the soldiers who are left in the city, and the hands of all the people by speaking such words to them. For this man is not seeking the welfare of this people, but their harm." Sounds a lot like Jesus foreshadowing to me.
Jeremiah is then thrown into the pit. It's Ebedmelech the Ethiopian who gets him out.
The further Jesus analogy in this scenario is Nebuchadnezzar in the Pontius Pilate role. In fact, the whole depiction of Pilate could very well have been drawn from Book of Jeremiah. As historians are increasingly quick to note, the real Pilate would never even have thought twice about executing Jesus.
I have a correction to make about the earlier reference to "queen of heaven." Now I'm interpreting to have always been an Egyptian reference, likely to Isis. Egypt is prominent in Jeremiah.
In the litany of terrors against nations that helps comprise Book of Jeremiah (it seems obvious that several separate works were at some point combined), there's the suggestion that the conclusion of the Esau legacy is finally reached. You'll remember that although Jacob's brother did actually get to enjoy prosperity through the generations his adventures disappear from the Bible soon after.
The variations of this book from earlier biblical record continue: the end of the Babylonian exile is far less mutual and more like rats fleeing a sinking ship, with Babylon meeting the same sorry fate as other nations in the litany of doom and woe. I'd suggest that it seems obvious some or all of this was written well after the fact, even there's at least one line ("Thus far are the words of Jeremiah") that would try and suggest otherwise. Most of the books of the Bible probably didn't exist in direct awareness of each other much less reflect a lot of direct record. It's hard enough to authenticate such things in the New Testament.
Sodom and Gomorrah, however, are clearly part of the tradition everyone knows at least by name (some suggestions made here indicate varying reasons never actually given as to why they were so famously smited), as they are referenced several times in Book of Jeremiah.
I imagine one way or another that this is not a favorite book of Iraqis. Although funny enough, and maybe I said this already, but Abraham's ziggurat is in Iraq.
It ends funny, though. Jeremiah abruptly disappears (to say nothing of an earlier and random sequence involving a bloody warrior named Ishmael). It rewinds back to the very start of the Babylonian saga, right after having apparently closed the book of Babylon itself.
Lamentations, traditionally ascribed to Jeremiah but clearly not by him, is a, well, poetic lament about the destruction of Jerusalem, and even a moment of religious doubt (which suggests people generally did believe what they were supposed to believe with or without Jeremiah), some lines of general woe concerning the exile era.
Saturday, January 4, 2014
Book of Judith 1-16, Book of Esther 1-11, Book of Job 1-5
Book of Judith may have a few facts wrong about its period setting, or I was simply confused, because it's set during the Nebuchadnezzar era but seems to have his associations all wrong, including references to Assyrians rather than Babylon, and set after the period of exile. Either way, the key figures in the story are Judith, naturally, and Holofernes. I learned this story originally from a painting in college, likely a Caravaggio, but we'll get to the reason why one specific image might be appropriate a little later.
Holofernes is the chief general of the army (whose army exactly we'll leave as a matter for some other time). Nebuchadnezzar (or whoever) has become angry with nation states who refused to help him in his time of need, even though he succeeded perfectly well without them in his military campaign, so he undertakes to teach them all a lesson. The Israelites learn that they're along this warpath, and dawn (for the first time in the Bible), ashes and sackcloth. During the course of this prelude material, the whole history of the Hebrews is recapped, minus any significant figures. Nebuchadnezzar wants to be worshiped as a god (like Egyptian, Roman, and Japanese rulers, for instance), and doesn't take kindly to any peoples who won't play along. The God of the Hebrews is described as the god of iniquity (in polytheistic cultures, it was common for individual gods to be associated with a particular attribute; the Hebrew God is said to have derived from a whole pantheon, and was originally a god of war, which would be hugely appropriate).
The "people of Esau" are referenced, which would once again indicate diverging traditions that once introduced in early books are no longer considered part of the Jewish record. They tell Holofernes how to defeat the Israelites, which namely is to make God angry with them.
Judith finally appears. She's a widow. She's extremely beautiful. She's also extremely faithful. She tells the rest of the Israelites that she has a plan. She takes offense when it's suggested that you can put God to the test. She says he's incomprehensible.
It occurred to me that Tolkien's dwarves in Middle Earth are a lot like the Jews of this period. Probably deliberate on his part.
She invokes God's testing, rather, of Abraham and Jacob. She prays for strength. In a lot of ways, she is a Jesus figure, although I would have to significantly digress to fully explore that assertion. More simply, she might be considered a Mary figure. She's declared "blessed among women," much like Mary, for instance.
Judith sets out to seduce, trick, and assassinate Holofernes. She cuts off his head. This part of the story evokes the Medusa myth. It also makes for a distinctive painting. It makes for an unusually funny line in the Bible, too: "For look, here is Holofernes lying on the ground, and his head is not on him!"
She sings a song, which includes the lines, "the sons of the Titans," making it all the more clear that whoever composed this book definitely knew their Greek myths. Actually, the extant translation is a Greek one, so perhaps some of these things were simply grafted on after the fact.
"Thou didst send forth thy Spirit." Christians will recognize the third member of the Holy Trinity in that line.
Book of Esther features another heroic woman from the general exile era. It's a story featured in the recent movie One Night with the King, and I've also seen high school one-act stage productions of it, so you don't really need to be religious to know it.
This is the era of Artaxerxes. The Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, exile era is stated, so that much is clearer in this book. Our story concerns the faithful Jew Mordecai and his cousin Esther, whom he adopted as a daughter. Both of them end up tangled in the life of a king whose name I won't bother to record, because it isn't nearly as well-known as either of theirs, or the wicked Haman, who is the Iago of this piece.
Basically, Mordecai saves the king's life, and Esther ends up becoming the new queen. The two events are unrelated, but they become fortuitous when Haman seeks to assert his own power as the king's right-hand man by having revenge on Mordecai for showing him disrespect that the Jew could not have avoided and still be faithful to God. Haman eventually decides that all Jews must die. Esther must reveal her previously hidden faith as she moves to spare Mordecai's life, and in turn saves all of her people. It's also a story Jews of the modern era might recognize in the story of Oskar Schindler during the Holocaust.
The book seems a little cobbled together, different from the repetition of a story from oral tradition in that when things are restated it's not really in the sense of emphasis. Like Kings and Chronicles, the repeated statements don't always seem aware that they aren't being completely accurate with one another.
Hades is referenced. Hades is the God of the underworld in Greek mythology. The name has also been used as synonymous with Hell.
Sackcloth and ashes appear again.
The story is also an excellent way to explore a melting pot population and the conflicting results from trying to reconcile cultural differences.
"All-seeing God and Savior," which is an interesting description. God is described as changing the mood of the king, to make him more willing to listen to Esther. Previously in the Bible, whenever God interfered like that, he made the recipient more "hard-hearted."
The changing fortunes of Mordecai might also be interpreted through the lens of Jesus, especially during the Passion. Again, this would cause a considerable digression to more fully explain. Parallels of this kind would have been excellent selling points to intellectuals interested in embracing Christianity as the new state religion, as the Romans did. The poetry and romanticism even in the midst of tragedy would help explain how Jesus could be interpreted as the Greatest Story Ever Told, something far more resonant than the regional faith of a wandering people. It would be naive to assume Constantine at that point in Christian development adopted the emerging religion for anything more than strategic worth. The story of Esther would certainly illuminate the advantages of such a move.
This whole book also establishes the holiday of Purim.
It's interesting that Mordecai begins the book with a vision, and then at the end of it interprets it. The Bible would be easier to read today if all such visions had been explained like that. The very last part of the book also references Ptolemy and Cleopatra, among the last significant remnants of the once-great Egyptian race, following the conquests of Alexander the Great.
Book of Job is famous, too, although the way it's told may be different than most people would expect. "Sons of God," Satan among them, consult with him about the figure of Job, who is good and faithful in the midst of having every earthly advantage. What if they are taken away? Will he curse God?
Leviathan is referenced.
This is the first of the philosophical works in the Bible. It's strong that such things exist and no one really thinks of that, much as they don't think of all the war that happens in it. It also seems to be a theological study.
Holofernes is the chief general of the army (whose army exactly we'll leave as a matter for some other time). Nebuchadnezzar (or whoever) has become angry with nation states who refused to help him in his time of need, even though he succeeded perfectly well without them in his military campaign, so he undertakes to teach them all a lesson. The Israelites learn that they're along this warpath, and dawn (for the first time in the Bible), ashes and sackcloth. During the course of this prelude material, the whole history of the Hebrews is recapped, minus any significant figures. Nebuchadnezzar wants to be worshiped as a god (like Egyptian, Roman, and Japanese rulers, for instance), and doesn't take kindly to any peoples who won't play along. The God of the Hebrews is described as the god of iniquity (in polytheistic cultures, it was common for individual gods to be associated with a particular attribute; the Hebrew God is said to have derived from a whole pantheon, and was originally a god of war, which would be hugely appropriate).
The "people of Esau" are referenced, which would once again indicate diverging traditions that once introduced in early books are no longer considered part of the Jewish record. They tell Holofernes how to defeat the Israelites, which namely is to make God angry with them.
Judith finally appears. She's a widow. She's extremely beautiful. She's also extremely faithful. She tells the rest of the Israelites that she has a plan. She takes offense when it's suggested that you can put God to the test. She says he's incomprehensible.
It occurred to me that Tolkien's dwarves in Middle Earth are a lot like the Jews of this period. Probably deliberate on his part.
She invokes God's testing, rather, of Abraham and Jacob. She prays for strength. In a lot of ways, she is a Jesus figure, although I would have to significantly digress to fully explore that assertion. More simply, she might be considered a Mary figure. She's declared "blessed among women," much like Mary, for instance.
Judith sets out to seduce, trick, and assassinate Holofernes. She cuts off his head. This part of the story evokes the Medusa myth. It also makes for a distinctive painting. It makes for an unusually funny line in the Bible, too: "For look, here is Holofernes lying on the ground, and his head is not on him!"
She sings a song, which includes the lines, "the sons of the Titans," making it all the more clear that whoever composed this book definitely knew their Greek myths. Actually, the extant translation is a Greek one, so perhaps some of these things were simply grafted on after the fact.
"Thou didst send forth thy Spirit." Christians will recognize the third member of the Holy Trinity in that line.
Book of Esther features another heroic woman from the general exile era. It's a story featured in the recent movie One Night with the King, and I've also seen high school one-act stage productions of it, so you don't really need to be religious to know it.
This is the era of Artaxerxes. The Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, exile era is stated, so that much is clearer in this book. Our story concerns the faithful Jew Mordecai and his cousin Esther, whom he adopted as a daughter. Both of them end up tangled in the life of a king whose name I won't bother to record, because it isn't nearly as well-known as either of theirs, or the wicked Haman, who is the Iago of this piece.
Basically, Mordecai saves the king's life, and Esther ends up becoming the new queen. The two events are unrelated, but they become fortuitous when Haman seeks to assert his own power as the king's right-hand man by having revenge on Mordecai for showing him disrespect that the Jew could not have avoided and still be faithful to God. Haman eventually decides that all Jews must die. Esther must reveal her previously hidden faith as she moves to spare Mordecai's life, and in turn saves all of her people. It's also a story Jews of the modern era might recognize in the story of Oskar Schindler during the Holocaust.
The book seems a little cobbled together, different from the repetition of a story from oral tradition in that when things are restated it's not really in the sense of emphasis. Like Kings and Chronicles, the repeated statements don't always seem aware that they aren't being completely accurate with one another.
Hades is referenced. Hades is the God of the underworld in Greek mythology. The name has also been used as synonymous with Hell.
Sackcloth and ashes appear again.
The story is also an excellent way to explore a melting pot population and the conflicting results from trying to reconcile cultural differences.
"All-seeing God and Savior," which is an interesting description. God is described as changing the mood of the king, to make him more willing to listen to Esther. Previously in the Bible, whenever God interfered like that, he made the recipient more "hard-hearted."
The changing fortunes of Mordecai might also be interpreted through the lens of Jesus, especially during the Passion. Again, this would cause a considerable digression to more fully explain. Parallels of this kind would have been excellent selling points to intellectuals interested in embracing Christianity as the new state religion, as the Romans did. The poetry and romanticism even in the midst of tragedy would help explain how Jesus could be interpreted as the Greatest Story Ever Told, something far more resonant than the regional faith of a wandering people. It would be naive to assume Constantine at that point in Christian development adopted the emerging religion for anything more than strategic worth. The story of Esther would certainly illuminate the advantages of such a move.
This whole book also establishes the holiday of Purim.
It's interesting that Mordecai begins the book with a vision, and then at the end of it interprets it. The Bible would be easier to read today if all such visions had been explained like that. The very last part of the book also references Ptolemy and Cleopatra, among the last significant remnants of the once-great Egyptian race, following the conquests of Alexander the Great.
Book of Job is famous, too, although the way it's told may be different than most people would expect. "Sons of God," Satan among them, consult with him about the figure of Job, who is good and faithful in the midst of having every earthly advantage. What if they are taken away? Will he curse God?
Leviathan is referenced.
This is the first of the philosophical works in the Bible. It's strong that such things exist and no one really thinks of that, much as they don't think of all the war that happens in it. It also seems to be a theological study.
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Second Book of Kings 11-25, First Book of Chronicles 1-10
We pick right back up with the succession of unfortunate Jewish kings. There's an incidental reference to God sending Israel a savior of some kind. The dying Elisha performs an act out of later Arthurian legend, signaling a destination of some sort with an arrow through a window. His bones are also the first recorded Judeo-Christian relics to serve as the catalyst for a miracle.
Jonah is referenced. Nineveh, separately, is also referenced.
The temple is desecrated. There is a consistency now in the fact that pagans built their altars on high ground. Hebrews generally behaving badly, acting a lot like the ones who came out of Egypt, and even create themselves some molten calves. Second Kings makes it a point to say that they're reverting to former ways. Only Judah remains a bastion of the faith.
Babylon looms heavily.
The phrase "you are now relying on Egypt, that broken reed of a staff," making it clear where that nation now stands. The Aramaic language is specifically referenced.
A lot of this makes me think that this is the period where the Jewish faith began to be reconciled into one tradition, and this is before we Josiah, much less First Chronicles, which I contend may have actually been written first, making both books of Kings another act of prequel, like Genesis and the books of Moses. But we'll get to that.
Isaiah enters the picture! He's extremely instrumental in leading a religious revival under Hezekiah. He also introduces the doctrine of God having a plan rather than humanity goofing up, which supports my predestination theory from earlier, in that Adam and Eve were always meant to fall. No matter how often humanity fails God, he's always leading them in a specific direction, starting with Abraham. You might also say that some of this was shaped in a certain direction by later extrapolation of the historic record.
The angel of the Lord smites the Assyrians.
Hezekiah seems to tempt the Babylonians in much the way Egypt and the Philistines were previously induced to consider the spoils of the Hebrew faith. Isaiah prophesies the exile. Manasseh succeeds Hezekiah, is so bad that God swears holy vengeance against his people no matter what, and "no matter what" happens to mean Josiah, who enacts a greater religious revival than Hezekiah. He reigns in Jerusalem for 31 years. He discovers the book of the law, which is presumably the ark, and by this may have helped solidify Jewish faith to that point. He is given an all but cursory appearance nonetheless. He dies in battle at Megiddo, another reason to associate it with apocalypse.
Jeremiah is referenced!
Then, unfortunately, Nebuchadnezzar, the great king of the Babylonians. He has already taken dominion over the Egyptians, but that only stands to reason at this point. Jerusalem is besieged. The Hebrews become, actually, amicable citizens of Babylon, not like the bondage in Egypt anyway. Second Kings ends.
First Chronicles begins with a real chronicle, all right, a thick tangle of genealogy that does a more thorough job than any biblical precedent before it. Caleb seems to be more significant in this record than Moses, who receives a cursory reference, but at least his descent from Levi is finally completed, unlike in Exodus. This makes it seem like Moses was originally part of a separate tradition, and perhaps indeed he was.
Then the repeats begin. The Philistines start our story here, and Saul's war against them and his suicide. No real distinction is made about where he stands in the tradition except that he was, like most of the kings in the books of Kings, someone who didn't do right by God.
Jonah is referenced. Nineveh, separately, is also referenced.
The temple is desecrated. There is a consistency now in the fact that pagans built their altars on high ground. Hebrews generally behaving badly, acting a lot like the ones who came out of Egypt, and even create themselves some molten calves. Second Kings makes it a point to say that they're reverting to former ways. Only Judah remains a bastion of the faith.
Babylon looms heavily.
The phrase "you are now relying on Egypt, that broken reed of a staff," making it clear where that nation now stands. The Aramaic language is specifically referenced.
A lot of this makes me think that this is the period where the Jewish faith began to be reconciled into one tradition, and this is before we Josiah, much less First Chronicles, which I contend may have actually been written first, making both books of Kings another act of prequel, like Genesis and the books of Moses. But we'll get to that.
Isaiah enters the picture! He's extremely instrumental in leading a religious revival under Hezekiah. He also introduces the doctrine of God having a plan rather than humanity goofing up, which supports my predestination theory from earlier, in that Adam and Eve were always meant to fall. No matter how often humanity fails God, he's always leading them in a specific direction, starting with Abraham. You might also say that some of this was shaped in a certain direction by later extrapolation of the historic record.
The angel of the Lord smites the Assyrians.
Hezekiah seems to tempt the Babylonians in much the way Egypt and the Philistines were previously induced to consider the spoils of the Hebrew faith. Isaiah prophesies the exile. Manasseh succeeds Hezekiah, is so bad that God swears holy vengeance against his people no matter what, and "no matter what" happens to mean Josiah, who enacts a greater religious revival than Hezekiah. He reigns in Jerusalem for 31 years. He discovers the book of the law, which is presumably the ark, and by this may have helped solidify Jewish faith to that point. He is given an all but cursory appearance nonetheless. He dies in battle at Megiddo, another reason to associate it with apocalypse.
Jeremiah is referenced!
Then, unfortunately, Nebuchadnezzar, the great king of the Babylonians. He has already taken dominion over the Egyptians, but that only stands to reason at this point. Jerusalem is besieged. The Hebrews become, actually, amicable citizens of Babylon, not like the bondage in Egypt anyway. Second Kings ends.
First Chronicles begins with a real chronicle, all right, a thick tangle of genealogy that does a more thorough job than any biblical precedent before it. Caleb seems to be more significant in this record than Moses, who receives a cursory reference, but at least his descent from Levi is finally completed, unlike in Exodus. This makes it seem like Moses was originally part of a separate tradition, and perhaps indeed he was.
Then the repeats begin. The Philistines start our story here, and Saul's war against them and his suicide. No real distinction is made about where he stands in the tradition except that he was, like most of the kings in the books of Kings, someone who didn't do right by God.
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