Nadene Goldfoot
In the 2nd millennium BCE, which is over 4,000 years ago, Abram was born to Terah, people of the Ivrim (Hebrew speakers) migrating from the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers westward. They settled in Ur of the Chaldees, a city in today's Iraq. Terah was an idol maker. Idols were being fashioned all over the world as objects giving off protection to the owners from the many dangers in the world that people were constantly facing.
One day when Terah was out of their house, Abram decided to play with the idols stacked up from his father's workshop. He accidentally knocked one over and of coarse, it broke. When his father came home and saw he was going to lose money with a broken idol lying in a heap, he turned on Abram and asked him what had happened. Abram replied that the larger idol in the corner had pushed that one over. Terah lashed out that Abram was lying and that he knew they were just clay objects! It dawned on both at that moment that idols were just clay objects and that they were duping their clients. Any protection was all in their clients' heads.
Abram felt that there was a power in the world. He had many questions in his mind. Who made the world? How did people come to be? The people he knew believed in many gods; gods who controlled the forces in the world. When they were really scared, they would even sacrifice people to these gods. Much of the world thought like this, no matter where they were even though they had no contact with each other.
Abram is only known about through the writings by Moses which is in the Torah, the 5 books of Moses which most people know about in their Old Testament or "Bible." This telling of the history of the Jewish people tells how Abram's name was changed to Abraham after having a flash of understanding. Abram had visions and experiences in his praying to his singular G-d as he came to think of this power controlling the world. We're finding that some physical conditions can cause such experiences. Perhaps this is the way G-d communicates with people, an alteration in the body in some manner. At any rate, what Abram did caused a complete alteration to man's thinking, and we went from a world of polytheism to a world controlled mostly by monotheism.
There was a moment that Abram was asked by G-d to sacrifice his son, Isaac and he prepared to do it, being it was the one and only G-d asking him. He was stopped just in the nick of time in the act, finding out that there was to be no more of sacrificing humans and that this had been a test of loyalty. This was a break in common practice of sacrificing people, at least in this one culture.
Abram decided that the environment he had been surrounded by in Ur was not compatible with his new religious philosophy, so he took his family and moved away. It would take many years before other people came to accept such an utter change in attitude toward understanding the world and beyond.
"Abram had visited Egypt. His wife's handmaiden was Egyptian. That was a polytheistic country. As in the rest of Africa, the people of ancient Egypt were polytheistic throughout the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom, and the New Kingdom. That means that they believed in many gods. Some of these gods were Ra, Anubis, Seth, Osiris, Isis, and Horus."
The Assyrians who attacked Israel in 722-721 BCE also believed in many gods. Our 10 tribes northern tribes were thrust into an environment of polytheism after being freed of slavery for 400 years in Egypt and being freed by Moses who introduced monotheism. About 1341 BCE was the time of the Exodus. Moses died in 1271 BCE. The Israelites had been monotheistic for 620 years before the Assyrian attack. They were going through much temptation already from the surrounding neighbors who were polytheistic and idol worshippers. They were primed for slippage back into this life again.
The Greeks believed in a world above beyond the sky called Olympus over their own Mt. Olympus between Thessaly and Macadonia in Greece, populated by a king, queen and many other gods. They ate ambrosia and drank nectar. They were: Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hestia, Demeter, Hermes, Aphrodite, Ares, Hephaestus, Dionysus, etc. Today this belief is called a mythology. "Around 700 BCE, the poet Hesiod's Theogony offered the first written cosmogony, or origin story, of Greek mythology. This knowledge comes 1,300 years after we know about Abraham's monotheistic belief.
T
The Romans came along and adopted this belief from the act of overtaking the Greeks. Here are the top 5 gods they both believed in:
Resource: https://www.greekmythology.com/Myths/Places/Mount_Olympus/mount_olympus.html
https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-history/greek-mythology
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Roman-religion
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_mythology
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_mythology
https://www.chabad.org/holidays/chanukah/article_cdo/aid/102978/jewish/The-Story-of-Chanukah.htm
http://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2014/10/following-in-footsteps-of-abraham.html
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| Abram with his niece, Sarai who is his wife. Sarai is bringing Hagar, her Egyptian handmaid to Abram. Hagar gives him a son, Ishmael. Sarai then later gives Abram a son, Isaac. From Isaac came the Jews and from Ishmael came the Muslims. |
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| Idol Hadad of Syria with such a face he should scare off any dangers lurking about |
One day when Terah was out of their house, Abram decided to play with the idols stacked up from his father's workshop. He accidentally knocked one over and of coarse, it broke. When his father came home and saw he was going to lose money with a broken idol lying in a heap, he turned on Abram and asked him what had happened. Abram replied that the larger idol in the corner had pushed that one over. Terah lashed out that Abram was lying and that he knew they were just clay objects! It dawned on both at that moment that idols were just clay objects and that they were duping their clients. Any protection was all in their clients' heads.
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| Baal of the Phoenicians |
Abram felt that there was a power in the world. He had many questions in his mind. Who made the world? How did people come to be? The people he knew believed in many gods; gods who controlled the forces in the world. When they were really scared, they would even sacrifice people to these gods. Much of the world thought like this, no matter where they were even though they had no contact with each other.
Abram is only known about through the writings by Moses which is in the Torah, the 5 books of Moses which most people know about in their Old Testament or "Bible." This telling of the history of the Jewish people tells how Abram's name was changed to Abraham after having a flash of understanding. Abram had visions and experiences in his praying to his singular G-d as he came to think of this power controlling the world. We're finding that some physical conditions can cause such experiences. Perhaps this is the way G-d communicates with people, an alteration in the body in some manner. At any rate, what Abram did caused a complete alteration to man's thinking, and we went from a world of polytheism to a world controlled mostly by monotheism.
There was a moment that Abram was asked by G-d to sacrifice his son, Isaac and he prepared to do it, being it was the one and only G-d asking him. He was stopped just in the nick of time in the act, finding out that there was to be no more of sacrificing humans and that this had been a test of loyalty. This was a break in common practice of sacrificing people, at least in this one culture.
Abram decided that the environment he had been surrounded by in Ur was not compatible with his new religious philosophy, so he took his family and moved away. It would take many years before other people came to accept such an utter change in attitude toward understanding the world and beyond.
 |
| "Polytheism and Egyptian religion. Pictured is a god of half man and half animal. |
"Abram had visited Egypt. His wife's handmaiden was Egyptian. That was a polytheistic country. As in the rest of Africa, the people of ancient Egypt were polytheistic throughout the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom, and the New Kingdom. That means that they believed in many gods. Some of these gods were Ra, Anubis, Seth, Osiris, Isis, and Horus."
The Assyrians who attacked Israel in 722-721 BCE also believed in many gods. Our 10 tribes northern tribes were thrust into an environment of polytheism after being freed of slavery for 400 years in Egypt and being freed by Moses who introduced monotheism. About 1341 BCE was the time of the Exodus. Moses died in 1271 BCE. The Israelites had been monotheistic for 620 years before the Assyrian attack. They were going through much temptation already from the surrounding neighbors who were polytheistic and idol worshippers. They were primed for slippage back into this life again.
 |
| Greek gods |
The Greeks believed in a world above beyond the sky called Olympus over their own Mt. Olympus between Thessaly and Macadonia in Greece, populated by a king, queen and many other gods. They ate ambrosia and drank nectar. They were: Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hestia, Demeter, Hermes, Aphrodite, Ares, Hephaestus, Dionysus, etc. Today this belief is called a mythology. "Around 700 BCE, the poet Hesiod's Theogony offered the first written cosmogony, or origin story, of Greek mythology. This knowledge comes 1,300 years after we know about Abraham's monotheistic belief.
T
The Romans came along and adopted this belief from the act of overtaking the Greeks. Here are the top 5 gods they both believed in:
- Zeus (Jupiter, in Roman mythology): the king of all the gods (and father to many) and god of weather, law and fate
- Hera (Juno): the queen of the gods and goddess of women and marriage
- Aphrodite (Venus): goddess of beauty and love
- Apollo (Apollo): god of prophesy, music and poetry and knowledge
- Ares (Mars): god of war.
- The Romans went one step beyond the Greeks. " There arose a body of rules, the jus divinum (“divine law”), ordaining what had to be done or avoided."
- Greek- Roman gods even came down to earth and mated with humans, producing half-gods with extra skills, more like creating a Superman. Such a demi-god was "
- Dionysus: son of Zeus and Semele, a mortal. Later on he became a god, part of the Olympians when Hestia gave up her seat for him.
The Seleucids, a Hellenistic royal dynasty, Greek Syrians, seemed to be a blend of both Greeks and Romans. Their Syrian king Antiochus III, lived from 222 to 186 BCE.
A chanukiah, menorah of 8 candles to celebrate the 8 days of this holiday
commemorating overcoming the Greek Syrians and cleaning out the temple-getting rid of the idol, Jupiter Greek Syrians had placed.- They did such things as put a statue of Jupiter into Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem and expected a monotheistic people to suddenly accept their belief and worship this idol. Thus we have coming up our holiday of Chanukah which commemorates the cleaning out of the Temple and getting rid of that horrible idol, Jupiter and other idols and getting the people back to their own basic beliefs, as they were being submerged in this foreign religious polytheism.
- The Celts: Of what became Great Britain and parts of Europe also believed in this pantheon of gods controlling their world. They were people who had come in contact with the Roman world and the coming Christian one. They all could not conceive of a single power, probably because they had come to realize no man could do everything needed to support their own civilization. They go back to the Iron Age (1200-1000 BCE) with their beliefs. One way they differ from the rest of the world is that the Greek and Roman gods looked like people. Egypt and the rest of the world had rather grotesque science fictional types as gods pretty much. The later the belief, the more human form was prevalent.
The Celts also worshiped a number of deities of which little more is known than their names. Classical writers preserve a few fragments of legends or myths that may possibly be Celtic.
Taranis (with Celtic wheel and thunderbolt), Le Chatelet, Gourzon, Haute-Marne, France - According to the Syrian rhetorician Lucian, Ogmios was supposed to lead a band of men chained by their ears to his tongue as a symbol of the strength of his eloquence.
Scandinavians also were embroiled in a pantheon of gods. "Norse mythology is the body of myths of the North Germanic peoples , stemming from Norse paganism and continuing after the Christianization of Scandinavia and into the Scandinavian folklore of the modern period. ... The cosmos in Norse mythology consists of Nine Worlds that flank a central cosmological tree, Yggdrasil.
They also had a kind of Olympus populated by many many gods.
1. the hammer-wielding, humanity-protecting thunder-god Thor, who relentlessly fights his foes;
2. the one-eyed, raven-flanked god Odin, who craftily pursues knowledge throughout the worlds and bestowed among humanity the runic alphabet;
3. the beautiful, seiðr-working, feathered cloak-clad goddess Freya who rides to battle to choose among the slain;
4. the vengeful, skiing goddess Skaði, who prefers the wolf howls of the winter mountains to the seashore;
5. the powerful god Njörð, who may calm both sea and fire and grant wealth and land;
6. the god Frey, whose weather and farming associations bring peace and pleasure to humanity;
7.the goddess Iðunn, who keeps apples that grant eternal youthfulness;
8.the mysterious god Heimdall, who is born of nine mothers, can hear grass grow, has gold teeth, and possesses a resounding horn;
9. the jötunn Loki, who brings tragedy to the gods by engineering the death of the goddess Frigg's beautiful son Baldr;" and more.
Abraham was one in a million. He had made a quantum leap in faith. Only one Pharaoh before his time had become monotheistic in a way, worshipping the sun as the god. "Akhenaten the Heretic 1352–1336 BC. Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten and defied tradition by establishing a new religion that believed that there is but one god; the sun god Aten." It's interesting that Abram lived in about 1948 BCE, almost 600 years before Akhenaten. One wonders how the belief hadn't reached Egypt by then as things spread today. It was not to be later in the days of communication to hapen.
Abraham's god was unseen, as Moses verified. Abraham believed in kindness and one unseen G-d. He maintained his beliefs and taught them to his family in a world of polytheism, idol worship and human sacrifice. He was selected for his stiff-necked courage to stick to these principals and he changed the world.
https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-history/greek-mythology
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Roman-religion
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_mythology
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_mythology
https://www.chabad.org/holidays/chanukah/article_cdo/aid/102978/jewish/The-Story-of-Chanukah.htm
http://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2014/10/following-in-footsteps-of-abraham.html
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