Tuesday, March 11, 2025

Extensive rule of masterful King Hiram

by Damien F. Mackey Herb Storck concluded the first part of his study by claiming that: “Nine of the 17 tent-dwelling [Assyrian King List] kings can reasonably be identified with … ancestors of Hammurapi. This would appear to be sufficient to establish that these two genealogies drew upon a common ‘Amorite’ tradition”. Abrahamic Connections Herb Storck has shown, in an important article “The Early Assyrian King List ... and the ‘Greater Amorite’ Tradition” (Proc. of the 3rd Seminar of Catastrophism and Ancient History, C and AH Press, Toronto, 1986, p. 43), that there is a genealogical link among: (i) Abraham; (ii) the genealogy of king Hammurabi; and (iii) the Assyrian King List. Storck commenced his article with the following explanation: The Assyrian Kinglist (AKL) is one of the most important chronographic texts ever uncovered. Initially it was thought to represent a long unbroken tradition of rulership over Assyria. A closer look at the AKL by Benno Landsberger (1890-1968) ... however, dispelled this somewhat facile approach to AKL tradition. Subsequent studies by Kraus ... and Finkelstein ... have demonstrated a common underlying Amorite tradition between parts of the AKL and the Genealogy of Hammurapi (GHD). Portions of this section of the AKL containing 17 tent-dwelling kings have also been compared to biblical ... and Ugaritic ... Amorite traditions. …. Storck’s purpose will be “to take a closer look at the 17 Assyrian tent dwellers and the greater Amorite tradition, as evidenced primarily in the genealogy of the Hammurapi [Hammurabi] Dynasty and other minor traditions”. The names of all 17 tent-dwelling kings are preserved in various lists. What is striking is that many of these names can be linked with names in the GHD, which gives the names in couplet form. Thus, for example, names 3 and 4, Janqi (Janqu) and Sahlamu are given in GHD as Ya-am-qu-us-ha-lam-ma. Name 11, Zuabu, may be connected with Sumuabi, an ancestor of Hammurabi. Thus Storck: Poebel sought to connect the name with Su-mu-a-bi, the name of the first king of the first dynasty of Babylon, even though in our list it is written with the sign ZU. .... Kraus, however, expressed his personal doubts as to whether this would work .... But in a recently published fragment of this portion of the AKL (E) this name was indeed written with an initial SU for ZU, thus supporting Poebel's contention somewhat. “Nevertheless, the genealogy edited by J.J. Finkelstein has Zu-um-ma-bu in the apparently parallel line, hinting that the reverse may be the case. The presence of ma as restored eases the interpretation of the name Sumu-abu” .... Storck concluded the first part of his study by claiming that: “Nine of the 17 tent-dwelling AKL kings can reasonably be identified with GHD ancestors of Hammurapi. This would appear to be sufficient to establish that these two genealogies drew upon a common ‘Amorite’ tradition”. That there was still that nomadic inclination amongst the kings of the Hammurabic era may perhaps be gleaned from the fact that Shamsi-Adad I of that time is said to have had no really fixed capital, but moved about from place to place. And we have found that Iarim-Lim (Hiram), though stationed in the coastal west, apparently had a political reach that extended all the way to Elam. Since first writing this, I have come to realise, thanks to Royce (Richard) Erickson: A PROBLEM IN CHALDAEAN AND ELAMITE GEOGRAPHY (10) A PROBLEM IN CHALDAEAN AND ELAMITE GEOGRAPHY | Royce Erickson - Academia.edu that the land of Elam was situated to the NW of the kingdom of Iarim-Lim, and not far away beyond the traditional Sumer in southern Iraq. Strangely, at least initially, Hammurabic (Old Babylonian) Dynasty names appear to recur within the Yamkhad Dynasty of Iarim-Lim (Hiram), names such as Sumu-epuh (Sumuabi?) and the name Hammurabi itself. When the ancient world conventionally dated to c. 1800 BC is shunted downwards and re-set in what I consider to be its proper place, at c. 1000 BC (during the United Monarchy period of Israel), then there emerges from the supposedly earlier period of history a whole galaxy of biblical characters, including King Hiram, who were actual contemporaries of Israel’s great kings, Saul, David and Solomon. Sufficient compelling biblical characters of the United Monarchy period emerge from the historical records of what convention has estimated as c. 1800 BC for me to accept that revisionist historian Dean Hickman had got it right when he, finally solving the problem of the ‘liquid’ chronology of king Hammurabi, re-set his era at the time of David and Solomon (“The Dating of Hammurabi”, Proceedings of the 3rd Seminar of Catastrophism and Ancient History, Uni. of Toronto, 1985, pp. 13-28). A crucial connection in all of this was Hickman’s identification of the powerful king, Shamsi-Adad I, as king David’s Syrian foe, Hadadezer. Now, according to 2 Samuel 8:3, this Hadadezer was the son of Rekhob (Rehob), and Hickman was able to find that name, Rekhob, embedded in the name of the father of Shamsi-Adad I, Ilu kabkabu, or Uru kabkabu (Rukab = Rekhob). Given this revised scenario, then the four-decade long reign of Shamsi-Adad I’s younger contemporary, King Hammurabi of Babylon, must have coincided very closely with the four-decade long reign of the great king Solomon himself. The reign of Shamsi-Adad I’s son, Ishme-Dagan I (anything from 55 years to 11 years) would presumably have coincided with the early part of Hammurabi’s reign. Other biblical links with history also arise from this revised scenario. For instance: Zimri-Lim of Mari, a troublesome foe of king Hammurabi’s, can now be recognized as king Solomon’s foe, Rezon (or Rezin). And once again there is an appropriate match for the father’s name: Iahdulim (or Iahdunlim), the known father of Zimri-Lim, equates with Eliada. 1 Kings 11:23: “And God sent another trouble-maker, Rezon, the son of Eliada, who had gone in flight from his lord, Hadadezer, king of Zobah”. One might also expect, now, that this well-documented era of Hammurabi of Babylon and Zimri-Lim of Mari, revised, could yield up evidence for the great King Hiram of Tyre, a loyal friend of both David’s and Solomon’s. And that is just what we find. A Geography of King Hiram I have previously identified King Hiram with the powerful Amorite king, Iarim-Lim (or Yarim-Lim) of Yamkhad, whose conventional dates are c. 1780 BC – c. 1764 BC, or, according to a Middle Chronology, c. 1735 BC -? {The element, -Lim, in the king’s name, may serve the same purpose as it did in the case above of Iahdu-lim, equating to biblical El-iada (Lim = El)}. The power of Hiram, as Iarim-Lim, extended from Syro-Lebanon, through Babylonia, to Elam. Previously, in Chapter Two of my post-graduate thesis (2007), I had written: A Revised History of the Era of King Hezekiah of Judah and its Background http://hdl.handle.net/2123/5973 … what may perhaps help us to gain some real perspective on potential range of rule at this approximate time in ancient history are the geographical terms of a recorded message from Iarim-Lim – whom we met as a powerful (older) contemporary of Hammurabi – to the prince of Dêr in Babylonia, whom, incidentally, Iarim-Lim calls ‘brother’ [cf. 1 Kings 9:13]. Kupper tells of it: In this message, Iarimlim reminds his ‘brother’ that he had saved his life fifteen years before, at the time when he was coming to the help of Babylon, and that he had also given his support to the king of the town of Diniktum … to whom he supplied five hundred boats. Outraged by the prince of Dêr’s ingratitude he threatens to come at the head of his troops and exterminate him. …. Whatever the circumstances of the [Babylon] expedition were, it says a great deal for the military power of Iarimlim, who had led the soldiers of Aleppo as far as the borders of Elam [modern Iran]. According to a report of the day (Mari Letters), Iarim-Lim’s (Yarim-Lim’s) status was greater than that of Hammurabi …: … there are ten or fifteen kings who follow Hammurabi of Babylon and ten or fifteen who follow Rim-sin of Larsa but twenty kings follow Yarim-Lim of Yamkhad. …. In the same Chapter Two, I had reproduced [Dr. Donovan] Courville’s argument that Iarim-Lim had conquered Alalakh from the Philistines, and that he (his dynasty) had ruled there (Alalakh Level VII) for about half a century, before the Philistines resumed their former occupation there. …. The obvious conclusion was that the people of Iarim-Lim (Amorites) had conquered this city and probably also the surrounding territory, ruling it for a period estimated to have been about 50 years. At the end of this time, the original inhabitants were able to re-conquer the site and reoccupy it. It is perhaps this half century or so of Amorite dominance, extending as far as Elam, as we saw, that pertains also - at least in part - to the time of the First Dynasty of Babylon. This is such an obscure dynasty prior to Hammurabi that we cannot as yet say very much about its origins. But Herb Storck has helped to ease this situation somewhat in his fine article [“The Early Assyrian King List, The Genealogy of the Hammurapi Dynasty, and the ‘Greater Amorite’ Tradition”, Proc. 3rd Seminar Catastrophism and Ancient History, 1986, Toronto, pp. 43-50] in which he is able to posit a link between the earliest Assyrian kings and the early Hammurabic dynasty, thus concluding [p. 45]: Nine of the 17 tent-dwelling [Assyrian King List] kings can reasonably be identified with GHD [Genealogy of the Hammurabi Dynasty] ancestors of Hammurapi. One of these possibly is Zuabu (Assyrian King List) with Su-abu or Sumu-abum (GHD), the apparent founder of the First Babyonian Dynasty. There is also a Sumu’epuh, very similar to this name, Sumu-abum (Su-abu), preceding Iarim-Lim. …. And, most interestingly, the name Iarim-Lim here is followed by the name, Hammurabi. This may, of course, be a different Hammurabi. {In fact there was at the time of Hiram and Solomon a similarly named Huram-abi, a master-craftsman, 1 Kings 7:13, who has become the key figure in Freemasonry, as Hiram-abiff. See below}. In my more recent article: Of Cretans and Phoenicians (10) Of Cretans and Phoenicians | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu I have followed Josephine Quinn in rejecting the “Phoenicians” as a genuine ethnicity (In Search of the Phoenicians, Princetown UP, 2018). They are almost completely missing from the Bible, entirely from the Old Testament. So I would be looking for another ethnic term for the Amorite Iarim-Lim-Hiram, broadly West Semitic, like the Hebrews, whose God Hiram seems to have followed, at least to some degree (cf. I Kings 5:7). King Solomon will refer to Hiram’s highly skilled workers as ‘Sidonians’ (v. 6): ‘So give orders that cedars of Lebanon be cut for me. My men will work with yours, and I will pay you for your men whatever wages you set. You know that we have no one so skilled in felling timber as the Sidonians’. Whilst Dr. Courville’s estimation that the dynasty of Iarim-Lim was chronologically located to “the general era of the Exodus-Conquest” came far closer to reality (about 300 years closer), in my view, than does the conventional estimate, it was still only about halfway right according to this present (Hickman-based) re-setting of it to the time of David and Solomon. My contribution here has been to identify this Iarim-Lim as the biblical King Hiram. This brings Iarim-Lim about half a millennium later than even Dr. Courville’s radical chronological estimation for the king and his archaeological level. I have discussed the latter in detail in my thesis (2007), how Dr. Courville’s wrong placement of Iarim-Lim, in relation to biblical history, has led him to a degree of misalignment with the Alalakh stratigraphy. Given that Iarim-Lim (Hiram) was an ally of King David’s, then we might expect that Iarim-Lim had suppressed (at Alalakh VII) one of David’s major enemies. These were the Syrians (not relevant here) and the Philistines. This may further support Courville’s conclusion that the majority of Alalakh levels pertain to the Philistine peoples. Hiram Abiff The semi-legendary Hiram Abiff (Abif) is loosely based upon a skilful biblical artisan sent by King Hiram to King Solomon, to assist the latter with the building of the Temple of Yahweh. King Hiram tells Solomon about the man (2 Chronicles 2:13-14): ‘I am sending you Huram-Abi, a man of great skill, whose mother was from Dan and whose father was from Tyre. He is trained to work in gold and silver, bronze and iron, stone and wood, and with purple and blue and crimson yarn and fine linen. He is experienced in all kinds of engraving and can execute any design given to him. He will work with your skilled workers and with those of my lord, David your father’. The Hebrew words for what is here rendered as the name Huram-Abi, are: אבי חורם חורם אבי In I Kings 7:13-14, however, the man is simply called “Huram” (Hiram), not Huram-Abi: King Solomon sent to Tyre and brought Huram, whose mother was a widow from the tribe of Naphtali and whose father was from Tyre and a skilled craftsman in bronze. Huram was filled with wisdom, with understanding and with knowledge to do all kinds of bronze work. He came to King Solomon and did all the work assigned to him. C. C. Torrey, long ago, considered that the element, Abi (אבי), was not actually part of the man’s name, but was the Hebrew for a ‘chief counsellor’, hence Huram (Hiram), the king’s “right-hand” man (“Concerning Hiram (“Huram-abi”), the Phœnician Craftsman”, JBL, Vol. 31, No. 4 (1912), pp. 151-155). Torrey would conclude (p. 155): To be sure, the reading ואבי gives a good deal of trouble, and not a few have preferred to regard this as the original form of the ‘second element’ of the name, and to suppose this founder of the Masonic Order to have been called “Huram abiu” … (or perhaps “Hiram abiu”). But the accepted translation of the passage is wrong. Here, again, the noun בא has the same meaning as before. He who had been styled (by the Chronicler) “the right-hand man” of the king of Tyre is now, with one of the Chronicler’s own literary touches, termed “the right-hand man of King Solomon”. [End of quote] It seems that the so-called Hiram Abiff may be regarded as more allegorical than real anyway. According to http://www.ephesians5-11.org/hiram.htm for instance: Although the most important element of Masonic symbolism deals with the death, burial and resurrection of Hiram Abiff, there is nothing in Scripture to support it. Masonic Grand Lodges have stated that the account is not based upon fact, but rather is an allegory, used to teach. …. The ape of Christ? Certainly, the Evangelical Truth site regards it as such (“Hiram Abiff – the false christ of Freemasonry”): http://www.evangelicaltruth.com/hiramabiff.htm Freemasonry substitutes God’s perfect example and man’s only hope of salvation Jesus Christ for a spurious fantasy figure called Hiram Abiff. Instead of using Christ as its model of truth, fidelity and salvation it transfers its loyalty to this phantom figure Hiram. Freemasonry teaches: “If we possess the same painstaking fidelity as our Grand Master did in the hour of tribulation then will our final reward be that which belongs to the just and perfect man.” Hiram here becomes Masonry’s Saviour and following in his footsteps is said to ensure a glorious “final reward.” Rather than viewing Christ as the way, the truth and the life Freemasonry looks to another – Masonry’s Hiram Abiff. The Lodge practices ultimate deception here eradicating man’s great representative and furnishing a foolish non-existence religious alternative. Acts 4:12 says: “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” Jesus Christ is the sinner’s only hope! He is man’s only way. The Lost Word According to the teaching of the 3rd Masonic degree (the Master Mason degree) there was a mystical word which was only known to three people. These were King Solomon, Hiram, King of Tyre and a fictional Masonic character called Hiram Abiff. These three appointed fifteen craftsmen from among those working on rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem to preside over the rest of the workers. The English working of the lecture explains: “Fifteen Fellow-Crafts of that superior class appointed to preside over the rest, finding that the work was nearly completed, and that they were not in possession of the secrets of the Master’s degree … conspired together to obtain them by any means … At the moment of carrying their conspiracy into execution, twelve of the fifteen recanted” (English ritual p. 68). The three remaining plotters (not to be confused with the three who know the mystical word) continued undeterred. The degree records how they confronted Hiram Abiff in the Temple and “demanded of our Grand Master the secrets of a Master Mason, declaring to him that his death would be the consequence of a refusal.” The degree continues, “Hiram Abiff, true to his obligation, replied that those secrets were known only to three, and could only be made known by consent of them all.” One of the scheming Craftsmen struck Hiram with “a violent blow full in the middle of the forehead” whereupon he sunk “lifeless at the foot of the murderer” (English ritual p. 69). In this fable, the Temple in Jerusalem was a temporary resting place for Hiram’s remains after his death, Mount Moriah being his final interment. Hearing of the news, King Solomon is said to have sent out some of his most trusted craftsmen to find the body. In the English working of this Masonic degree there were 15 workmen sent out, in the American version 12 men were sent. Hiram usurps the place of Christ Romans 6:3-6 says, “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.” This is the only religious blueprint that God recognises and has ordained. Salvation involves our identification with Christ. Paul here uses metaphors to depict the nature and significance of salvation. Baptism relates to our spiritual burial with Christ in conversion – representing our dying to self; resurrection refers to our rising with Him into newness of life. This passage reveals Christ’s role as man’s sole Representative, and in particular outlines the victory He secured for us through His glorious resurrection over sin, death and the grave. In turn, it shows the Christian’s direct interest and spiritual involvement in this great transaction. It is showing how Christ became our Substitute in His atoning work. Even though the Lord was sinless, He was condemned on our behalf so that we could be eternally free. He took our sin and guilt in full upon Himself. Finally, when He rose again He did it in our stead. He therefore averted our deserved destiny, which was eternal punishment. Sinners must hence appropriate their part in that central resurrection in order to overcome eternal punishment. The cross is the focal-point of the Christian faith; outside of it there is no salvation. Colossians 2:10-14 and 3:1-4 repeat the great truth we see represented in Romans chapter 6. It is clear that while Hiram (King of Tyre) assisted King Solomon at the building of the first Temple, there is no mention whatsoever in Scripture of any “Hiram Abiff.” This character is in fact a Masonic invention. Accordingly, there is no teaching in Holy Writ relating to Hiram’s murder and discovery, as these secret societies intimate. The teaching embodied in this story is extra-biblical. Plainly the whole thing is one elaborate Masonic fabrication. This whole secret society fixation with Hiram is a problematic area for evangelicals, as they see Christ as man’s sole Redeemer and only perfect exemplar, whereas secret societies seem to be always promoting Hiram as an alternative Christ. Jesus cautions us in John 10:1, “He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.” He then goes on to explain, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture” (John 10:9). If someone wants to experience the favour of God and one day experience eternal bliss, they must come exclusively through Christ. He is the way – the only way. Christ alone is our access to God. How true and solemn the words of Scripture are: “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4). Dr. Albert Barnes explains this matter, where he comments that “The word rendered fable means properly ‘speech’ or ‘discourse’, and then fable or fiction, or a mystic discourse. Such things abounded among the Greeks as well as the Jews, but it is probable that the latter here are particularly intended. These were composed of frivolous and unfounded stories, which they regarded as of great importance, and which they seem to have desired to incorporate with the teachings of Christianity … One of the most successful arts of the adversary of souls has been to mingle fable with truth …. [End of quotes] King Hiram, like his ally, Solomon, had a way with words. I shall be having more to say about that when I come to consider King Solomon’s use of cryptograms in Egypt. King Hiram, completely dissatisfied with Solomon’s payment to him of 20 ordinary towns of Galilee, will rebuke his brother by calling the place the Land of Kabul (Cabul) (אֶרֶץ כָּבוּל) (I Kings 9:12-14): … when Hiram went from Tyre to see the towns that Solomon had given him, he was not pleased with them. ‘What kind of towns are these you have given me, my brother?’ he asked. And he called them the Land of Kabul, a name they have to this day. Now Hiram had sent to the king 120 talents of gold. Commentators immediately pick up from the context that Hiram is meaning worthless towns, despite there being no Hebrew word, Kabul, But the erudite Cyrus Gordon, who provided readers with the key to the riddle of Samson in his great book, Riddles in History, (NY: Crown Publishers. 1974), will also, in that same book, explain what King Hiram was on about when he contemptuously called Solomon’s Galilean cities, Kabul. Kabul – KBWL - as professor Gordon explained, is here to be understood (read) as an atbash: http://www.bible-codes.org/atbash_bible_code_river.htm “An Atbash code occurs when the first letter of the alphabet is substituted for the last and the second for the second to last …”. What Hiram was really saying about those twenty towns in Galilee - with the word Kabul atbash-ed, as LŠPK - was that they resembled a LŠPK: Hebrew meaning: a “Rubbish Heap”. Was this, a cipher, the kind of “mystical word which was only known to three people. These were King Solomon, Hiram, King of Tyre [and Huram-abi]”? The kingdom of Hiram, perhaps - in terms of power - the greatest king of his day, a veritable master-king (though his 20 follower kings will later be overshadowed by the Syrian, Ben-Hadad I, with his 32 follower kings, I Kings 20:1), appears to have extended from Alalakh, through Ugarit (ancient Akkad), Hamath (Yamkhad?), Sidon, and on to Tyre. I have suggested that Diniktum, to where he provided boats, would have been a port. And this is just his coastal influence. His reach appears to have extended through Babylonia (Der) to as far as Elam. Could it be that Hiram also ‘owned’ Babylon, that Hammurabi was none other than Hiram’s brilliant servant, Huram-abi - Hammurabi, a fellow Amorite (not native Babylonian)? King Hiram, in a lucrative partnership with Solomon, had his sailors involved with Solomon’s fleet at Ezion-geber (I Kings 9:26-28): King Solomon also built ships at Ezion Geber, which is near Elath in Edom, on the shore of the Red Sea. And Hiram sent his men—sailors who knew the sea—to serve in the fleet with Solomon’s men. They sailed to Ophir and brought back 420 talents of gold, which they delivered to King Solomon. Elsewhere, I have discussed a potentially further such maritime partnership assisting the Egyptian fleet of Pharaoh Hatshepsut with ships sailing to the exotic land of Punt. Were Ophir and Punt the same place? That was the conclusion reached by “Brugsch Pascha, the famous Egyptologist”, according to Carl Peters (“Ophir and Punt in South Africa”, Journal of the Royal African Society, Vol. 1, No. 2 (Jan., 1902), p. 174). Hiram’s friendship with Solomon’s father, David, may have dated back to when Hiram - potentially as Idrimi of Alalakh - was a refugee Habiru in Canaan, just as David (somewhat like a Robin Hood) had been forced to become in the face of King Saul’s relentless persecution of him. Then David may have endeared himself to Hiram’s family if, perhaps, Hiram was the Joram, son of Tou (Toi) of Hamath (Yamkhad?), of 2 Samuel 8:9-10: When Tou king of Hamath heard that David had defeated the entire army of Hadadezer, he sent his son Joram to King David to greet him and congratulate him on his victory in battle over Hadadezer, who had been at war with Tou. Joram brought with him articles of silver, of gold and of bronze. Presumably Solomon, later, when building the Temple, would have become the beneficiary of this generous gift “of silver, of gold, and of bronze”. Compare I Kings 9:14: “Now Hiram had sent to the king 120 talents of gold”. If Hiram (Iarim-Lim) was essentially a ruler of the kingdom of Hamath (Yamkhad?), then why would the Bible always designate him as the “King of Tyre” (cf. 2 Samuel 5:11; I Kings 5:1; 7:13)? Part of the explanation may be that the biblical scribes always referred to the city closest to Israel, even if a king may have ruled other (even more important) cities. But, also, a colleague in the US (in Virginia), who is sympathetic to my identification of Hiram as Iarim-Lim of Yamkhad, has told me that Josephus writes in one place of Hiram’s leaving Tyre to go home – indicating that Tyre may not, in fact, have been King Hiram’s home base. HIRAM AS IDRIMI OF ALALAKH “Level VII [at Alalakh], which did not contain the [characteristic] pottery, was the level containing the inscribed tablets of the Yarim-Lim dynasty.” To flesh out historically the biblical kings David and Solomon (c. C10th BC) one needs also to: (i) delve right back to a conventionally-estimated Syro-Mesopotamia of the era of c. 1800 BC so as to locate their contemporaries in Rekhob and Hadadezer (historically, Uru-kabkabu and Shamsi-Adad I); Eliada and Rezon (historically, Iahdulim and Zimri-Lim); and Hiram (historically, Iarim-Lim); and then to (ii) dip into the conventionally-estimated Egypt of the era of c. 1500 BC to locate their Eighteenth Dynasty contemporaries in (Thutmose I and II), “Queen of Sheba” and “Shishak” (historically, Hatshepsut and Thutmose III). In what will follow here, that same conventionally-estimated (but quite incorrect) era for the Eighteenth Egyptian Dynasty (c. 1500 BC) will also to found to contain a colourful character who may be yet another face of the biblical king Hiram. Hiram as Idrimi I had previously sought to identify this Idrimi (conventionally dated to c. 1500 BC) with one of King Solomon’s three adversaries (I Kings 11:14-26) namely, Hadad, or Hadar, the Edomite: “That name, Hadar, is the same as Hadoram (Adoram), and, as it seems to me, as Idrimi”. But Hadoram (Adoram), or Adoniram, are also names that can be associated with the Hebrew name, Joram, and also with Hiram, as according to Abarim: http://www.abarim-publications.com/Meaning/Joram.html#.Wi3KHeRlJ9A Associated Biblical names ♂Adoniramאדנירם ♂Ahiramאחירם ♂Hadoramהדורם הדרם ♂♕Hiramחירם חירום חורם ♂♕Joramיורם Moreover, the geography of Idrimi, Alalakh, is, it seems, much more befitting of Hiram, as Iarim-Lim. Thus I would write, in my university thesis the following (very Courville-based) sections regarding Iarim-Lim, the Philistines (Cretans) and the archaeology of Alalakh: The Earlier Philistine History It remains to be determined whether or not the Philistines can be traced all the way back to Crete in accordance with the biblical data; though obviously, from what has been said, to well before the time of the ‘Sea Peoples’, whose immediate origins were Aegean, not Cretan. Courville has looked to trace just such an archaeological trail, back through the era of the late Judges/Saul; to Alalakh (modern Atchana) at the time of Iarim-Lim (Yarim-Lim) of Iamkhad (Yamkhad) and Hammurabi of Babylon; and finally to Crete in early dynastic times. I shall be basically reproducing Courville here, though with one significant chronological divergence, in regard to his dating of the Alalakh sequences. Courville has, according to my own chronological estimation for Hammurabi and Iarim-Lim, based on Hickman … dated the Hammurabic era about four centuries too early (as opposed to the conventional system’s seven centuries too early) on the time scale. Courville had wonderfully described Hammurabi as “floating about in a liquid chronology of Chaldea”, just after his having also correctly stated that: … “Few problems of ancient chronology have been the topic of more extensive debate among scholars than the dates to be ascribed to the Babylonian king Hammurabi and his dynasty …”. And so he set out to establish Hammurabi in a more secure historical setting. This, I do not think he managed successfully to achieve however. Courville’s re-location of Hammurabi to the approximate time of Joshua and the Conquest is still fairly “liquid” chronologically, as it seems to me, without his having been able to establish any plausible syncretisms beyond those already known for Hammurabi (e.g. with Shamsi-Adad I and Zimri-Lim). Revisionist Hickman on the other hand, despite his radical lowering of the Hammurabic era even beyond the standard [Velikovsky-date lowering] scale, by about seven centuries to the time of kings David and Solomon (c. C10th BC), has been able to propose and develop what are to my way of thinking some promising syncretisms, e.g. between David’s Syrian foe, Hadadezer, and Shamsi-Adad I (c. 1809-1776 BC, conventional dates), with the latter’s father Ilu-kabkabu being the biblical Rekhob, father of Hadadezer (2 Samuel 8:3); … and between Iarim-Lim and the biblical Joram (var. Hadoram), son of To’i, and prince of Hamath (cf. 2 Samuel 8:10 & 1 Chronicles 18:10). …. So now, with Hammurabi and his era somewhat more securely located, as I think, than according to Courville’s proposed re-location - and hence with the potential for a more accurate archaeological matrix - we can continue on with Courville’s excellent discussion of the archaeology of the early Philistines: …. VIII. The Culture of the Sea Peoples in the Era of the Late Judges The new pottery found at Askelon [Ashkelon] at the opening of Iron I, and correlated with the invasion of the Sea Peoples, was identified as of Aegean origin. A similar, but not identical, pottery has been found in the territory north of Palestine belonging to the much earlier era of late Middle Bronze. By popular views, this is prior to the Israelite occupation of Palestine. By the altered chronology, this is the period of the late judges and the era of Saul. … That the similar pottery of late Middle Bronze, occurring both in the north and in the south, is related to the culture found only in the south at the later date is apparent from the descriptions of the two cultures. Of this earlier culture, which should be dated to the time of Saul, Miss Kenyon commented: The pottery does in fact provide very useful evidence about culture. The first interesting point is the wealth of a particular class of painted pottery …. The decoration is bichrome, nearly always red and black, and the most typical vessels have a combination of metopes enclosing a bird or a fish with geometric decoration such as a “Union Jack” pattern or a Catherine wheel. At Megiddo the first bichrome pottery is attributed to Stratum X, but all the published material comes from tombs intrusive into this level. It is in fact characteristic of Stratum IX. Similar pottery is found in great profusion in southern Palestine … Very similar vessels are also found on the east coast of Cyprus and on the coastal Syrian sites as far north as Ras Shamra. [Emphasis Courville’s] Drawings of typical examples of this pottery show the same stylized bird with back-turned head that characterized the pottery centuries later at Askelon. … The anachronisms and anomalies in the current views on the interpretation of this invasion and its effects on Palestine are replaced by a consistent picture, and one that is in agreement with the background provided by Scripture for the later era in the very late [sic] 8th century B.C. Courville now turns to the archaeology at the site of Alalakh on the shore of the Mediterranean at its most northeast protrusion, in order “to trace this culture one step farther back in time” (though in actual fact, by my chronology, it will bring him to approximately the same time – though a different place). …. IX. The Culture of Level VI at Alalakh Is Related to That of the Philistines He commences by recalling Sir Leonard Woolley’s investigations at this site in the 1930’s, during which Woolley discovered “seventeen archaeological levels of occupation”: A solid synchronism is at hand to correlate Level VII at Alalakh with the era of Hammurabi of the First Dynasty at Babylon …. The basis for this synchronism is found in the Mari Letters where it is stated that “… there are ten or fifteen kings who follow Hammurabi of Babylon and ten or fifteen who follow Rim-sin of Larsa but twenty kings follow Yarim-Lim of Yamkhad”. Investigations at Alalakh revealed numerous tablets inscribed in cuneiform, most of which are by the third of the three kings of the dynasty, Yarim-Lim by name. …. Since the First Dynasty at Babylon was of Amorite origin, then so also was the Yarim-Lim dynasty of Amorite origin. In the reports by Woolley, he indicates the find at Alalakh of two characteristic pottery types which were designated as “White-Slip milk bowls” and “Base-Ring Ware”. As the digging proceeded downward, he found that such types of pottery were plentiful in Level VI, all but disappeared in Level VII, and then reappeared in all levels from VIII to XVI. Level VII, which did not contain the pottery, was the level containing the inscribed tablets of the Yarim-Lim dynasty. The obvious conclusion was that the people of Yarim-Lim (Amorites) had conquered this city and probably also the surrounding territory, ruling it for a period estimated to have been about 50 years. At the end of this time, the original inhabitants were able to reconquer the site and reoccupy it. Courville now turns his attention to seeking an identity for the people from whom the city of Alalakh was taken for about half a century, but who then reoccupied it: …. What then was this culture like …? We let Woolley tell us about the culture: … We do indeed know extremely little about the Level VI buildings. It is to the pottery that we must look for information about Level VI, and the pottery can tell us a good deal. On the one hand we have what I have called the “nationalist revival” of the traditional painted ware which had been suppressed under the late regime, and some examples of this are perfect replicas of the old both in form and in decoration, but as time goes on, there appear modifications of the long-established types – instead of the isolated and static figures of birds or animals these become active and are combined in running scenes surrounding the whole pot without the interruption of the triglyph-like partitions which were once the rule … For the first time we get a polychrome decoration in red and black paint on a buff surface, and the design includes not only birds but the “Union Jack” motive which is specially characteristic of contemporary Palestine … [Emphasis Courville’s] As one examines this pottery description, he will be struck with the notable similarities of decoration found on the pottery at Megiddo for the era of Philistine occupation in the time of Saul. There is the same use of red and black paint, the similar use of birds as a decoration motif, and the same use of the “Union Jack”. Finally, Courville traces this distinctive archaeological path all the way back to Crete. I am giving only the barest outlines of his discussion here: …. X. The Sea Peoples of Crete With the evidences thus far noted before us, we are now in a position to examine the archaeological reports from Crete for evidences of the early occupation of this site by the Caphtorim (who are either identical to the Philistines of later Scripture or are closely related to them culturally). We now have at least an approximate idea of the nature of the culture for which we are looking …. … we can hardly be wrong in recognizing the earliest occupants of Crete as the people who represented the beginnings of the people later known in Scripture as the Philistines, by virtue of the stated origin of the Philistines in Crete. This concept holds regardless of the name that may be applied to this early era by scholars. The only site at which Cretan archaeology has been examined for its earliest occupants is at the site of the palace at Knossos. At this site deep test pits were dug into the earlier occupation levels. If there is any archaeological evidence available from Crete for its earliest period, it should then be found from the archaeology of these test pits. The pottery found there is described by Dr. Furness, who is cited by Hutchinson. “Dr. Furness divides the early Neolithic I fabrics into (a) coarse unburnished ware and (b) fine burnished ware, only differing from the former in that the pot walls are thinner, the clay better mixed, and the burnish more carefully executed. The surface colour is usually black, but examples also occur of red, buff or yellow, sometimes brilliant red or orange, and sometimes highly variegated sherds”. A relation was observed between the decoration of some of this pottery from early Neolithic I in Crete with that at the site of Alalakh …. Continuing to cite Dr. Furness, Hutchinson commented: Dr. Furness justly observes that “as the pottery of the late Neolithic phases seems to have developed at Knossos without a break, it is to the earliest that one must look for evidence of origin of foreign connections”, and she therefore stresses the importance of a small group with plastic decoration that seems mainly confined to the Early Neolithic I levels, consisting of rows of pellets immediately under the rim (paralleled on burnished pottery of Chalcolithic [predynastic] date from Gullucek in the Alaca [Alalakh] district of Asia Minor). [Emphasis Courville’s] While the Archaeological Ages of early Crete cannot with certainty be correlated with the corresponding eras on the mainland, it would seem that Chalcolithic on the mainland is later than Early Neolithic in Crete; hence any influence of one culture on the other is more probably an influence of early Cretan culture on that of the mainland. This is in agreement with Scripture to the effect that the Philistines migrated from Crete to what is now the mainland at some point prior to the time of Abraham. …. HIRAM IN AD ‘HISTORY’ Previously I wrote: A Note: During the Covid lockdown I was in the process of writing a highly ambitious history of the world which included the AD era as well, I being aware that that, too, was in need of a radical revision. This ‘book’ I had entitled: From Genesis to Hernán Cortés. Some of AD so-called ‘history’ is actually non history, BC history projected into an alleged AD world. Now here is an example of this BC to AD projection pertaining to Chedorlaomer, king of Elam, of Genesis 14. Previously I have written about this: “… Chlodomer shared in the fourfold partition of his father’s kingdom in 511 …”. Encyclopaedia Britannica The name of the supposed C6th AD Frankish king, Chlodomer (Clodomir or Clodomer, c. 495 - 524 AD), immediately hit me - on first hearing of it - as being almost identical to the biblical name, Chedorlaomer. And the belief that the kingdom which Chlodomer “shared” involved, as in the above quote, a “fourfold partition”, has not done anything to diminish this first impression. For Chedorlaomer, too, was part of a fourfold coalition of kings (Genesis 14:1-11) …. [End of quotes] Now, here, I intend briefly to consider a potential AD projection of King Solomon’s ally, King Hiram, as the exotic Harun al-Raschid, the ally of the emperor Charlemagne. Harun al-Raschid Finally, the whole Charlemagnian scene does shift to the east. H. Daniel-Rops introduces this exotic phase in the life of Charlemagne as follows, once again making allusion to Solomon (and also now to “the Queen of Sheba”) (The Church in the Dark Ages, 1959, p. 410): Another aspect of Charlemagne’s ‘Christian policy’ struck his contemporaries very strongly; it is almost unbelievable, and brings into his career, which is almost devoid of poetic quality, a note of exotic charm similar to that which the visit of the Queen of Sheba casts upon the reign of Solomon; in other words, his relations with Haroun-al-Raschid, the Caliph of Bagdad. …. I would be more emphatic here and suggest that it is more than “almost unbelievable”. It is unbelievable! Harun al-Raschid (Haroun-al-Raschid) belongs to the world of fairy tales! “Harun al-Raschid has become famous as protagonist in tales from One Thousand and One Night[s]”. Relations Charles exchanged diplomats with Harun al-Raschid, the Caliph of Baghdad, who sent him the white elephant Abul Abbas, which took part in all journeys and military actions of Charles between 802 and 810 AD. Arab sources do not mention these relations. Harun al-Raschid has become famous as protagonist in tales from One Thousand and One Night[s]. In a Solomonic context, Harun is not unlike the king of Israel’s great Levantine ally, Hiram, king of Tyre. Though Hiram’s power extended much further than Tyre; for he, as I have argued earlier, was also the mighty merchant-king Iarim-Lim of the Aleppo region, who was able militarily to threaten with extermination rulers as far away as Babylonia (the region of the exotic Harun), if they failed to pay for his shipbuilding services. King Hiram had told Solomon that the Galilean towns that the latter had given him in payment for his services were “Cabul” (1 Kings 9:13), virtually “rubbish dumps”. According to Daniel-Rops (ibid.), Harun “was an intelligent, well-educated, and relatively sympathetic man …”. And Daniel-Rops continues with his account of Harun: Probably no Eastern ruler ever equalled the glory of this great caliph: he lived in the palace of the ‘Golden Gate’, whose famous green dome dominated the Mesopotamian plain, amongst his priceless carpets and tapestries, in the midst of a gigantic court of servants, concubines and eunuchs, and he was worthy indeed to become the hero of the Arabian Nights. But he was also a skilful diplomat and a soldier. The architecture, the lavish courts and the multitudes of servants, as well as the skill factor in ruling and conquering, all are perfectly true of Hiram, too, especially in his partnership with the magnificent Solomon. The royal pair had fleets of ships visiting the most exotic regions, for gold, slaves, precious myrrh and rare spices, and other quite unique flora and fauna. I have suggested elsewhere that Solomon and Hiram were turning Palestine at the time into a zoo and a botanical gardens; a lot of which atmosphere is reflected in the exotic “Song of Songs”. It is such a pity that the archaeologists have been looking at the wrong strata levels for the cosmopolitan Late Bronze phase of king Solomon. “The harmonious relations between the two sovereigns were marked by exchanges of gifts, which the Carolingian chroniclers enlarge upon charmingly and freely. Everyone at Aix-la-Chapelle was enraptured by the arrival of a chess set with the figures finely carved in ivory, of spices with unknown scents, of a clock which moved by means of a cunning hydraulic mechanism, and even of elephants and other strange animals!” Hārūn al-Rashīd | ʿAbbāsid caliph | Britannica ʿAbbāsid wealth under Hārūn The fabulous descriptions of Hārūn and his court in The Thousand and One Nights are idealized and romanticized, yet they had a considerable basis in fact. Untold wealth had flowed into the new capital of Baghdad since its foundation in 762. The leading men, and still more their wives, vied in conspicuous consumption, and in Hārūn’s reign this reached levels unknown before. His wife Zubaydah, herself a member of the ʿAbbāsid family, would have at her table only vessels of gold and silver studded with gems. Hārūn’s palace was an enormous institution, with numerous eunuchs, concubines, singing girls, and male and female servants. He himself was a connoisseur of music and poetry and gave lavish gifts to outstanding musicians and poets. The brilliant culture of the court had certain limits, however, since, apart from philology, the intellectual disciplines were in their infancy in the Arabic world. There was also a rougher and more sombre side. Instead of listening to music, Hārūn might watch cocks and dogs fighting. As caliph he had power of life and death and could order immediate execution. In the stories of his nocturnal wanderings through Baghdad in disguise, he is usually accompanied by Masrūr the executioner as well as friends like Jaʿfar the Barmakid and Abū Nuwās, the brilliant poet. …. But see my article: Original Baghdad was Jerusalem (7) Original Baghdad was Jerusalem

Monday, February 10, 2025

Fictitious versions of King Solomon

by Damien F. Mackey “Moreover, for all their reported wealth and power, David nor Solomon is mentioned in a single known Egyptian or Mesopotamian text. And the archaeological evidence in Jerusalem for the famous building projects of Solomon is nonexistent” (The Bible Unearthed, 2001, p. 128)”. Israel Finkelstein If Dr Stephen C. Meyers is correct about King Solomon, then I have completely wasted my time writing my articles on historical reconstructions of the great and wise king, including these latest ones: King Solomon looming large in a reconstructed ancient history (7) Reconstructing King Solomon's Ancient History and: House of Solomon (7) House of Solomon For Dr Stephen C. Meyers has written as follows in the Introduction to his 2020 article: Solomon and Ramses II (7) Solomon and Ramses II Introduction Solomon is said to have a great kingdom (from Egypt to the Euphrates River), great wealth, great wisdom, be a great builder and have many wives, yet there is no trace of Solomon in any ancient texts, or in the archaeological remains. This is a big problem if one follows the strict biblical chronology that Solomon ruled 971 to 931 b.c. There are at least four different possibilities for understanding these stories of Solomon. The stories about Solomon can be taken literally, exactly as stated in the Bible, and then we say archaeologists just have not uncovered the evidence yet. The stories could be exaggerations of Solomon’s reign. This would mean the Bible is lying about Solomon’s greatness, and the stories of Solomon were all invented. Another possibility is that these stories are based on the real stories about Ramses the Great and the Ramesside era. We will look at each possibility and see which is the most likely. The best solution to this problem is to move Solomon to the Late Bronze Age where there is great peace and prosperity under the Ramesside rule in Egypt and the Levant, specifically under Ramses the Great. I will lay forth evidence to show that the best ft for the archaeological remains and oral stories behind Solomon is Ramses II (the Great). [End of quote] The ‘possibility’ above that best fits my reconstructions is the one according to which: “The stories about Solomon can be taken literally, exactly as stated in the Bible, and then we say archaeologists just have not uncovered the evidence yet”. It’s as simple as that! For the received archaeology is completely out of kilter with the dates. See, for example, the references in certain El Amarna [EA] letters to Bit Shulman, the “House of Solomon”, but mis-dated to half a millennium before King Solomon. No need to follow Dr. Meyers’ “… best solution to this problem … to move Solomon to the Late Bronze Age where there is great peace and prosperity …”. For Solomon is already there in the Late Bronze II Age, as I have shown in my articles. Nor is Dr. Meyers’ era of Ramses II ‘the Great’ at all suitable for King Solomon, glorious as it may have been for Egypt. Pharaoh Ramses II does not belong to the Late Bronze. Moreover, he lived some several centuries after King Solomon. See e.g. my article: The Complete Ramses II https://www.academia.edu/108993634/The_Complete_Ramses_II Dr Meyers then continues on to consider what he calls “The Great Problem” - great only in the minds of such biblical minimalisers as professor Israel Finkelstein: The Great Problem No archaeological evidence exists of a great Israelite kingdom in the 10th century. Israeli archaeologist Israel Finkelstein summarizes the problem: “Moreover, for all their reported wealth and power, David nor Solomon is mentioned in a single known Egyptian or Mesopotamian text. And the archaeological evidence in Jerusalem for the famous building projects of Solomon is nonexistent” (The Bible Unearthed, 2001, p. 128). The famous gates attributed to Solomon at Megiddo, Hazor, and Gezer have now been dated to a century later. The pottery finds at Megiddo actually date to the 9th century, and Carbon 14 dating “now seems to clinch the case” (Ibid., p.141). Even if we do assume they are Solomonic gates, there is still the problem of the Bible exaggerating his rule. It is also problematic that King Hiram ruled both during David and Solomon’s reign (see Giovanni Garbini, 1988, pp. 22-23). Finkelstein states, “The only certain historical Iron Age Hiram of Tyre was a king named Hirummu, who appears twice in the annals of the great Assyrian monarch Tiglath-pileser III in the 730s b.c. as paying tribute to Assyria” (David and Solomon, 2006, p. 173). Peter James states that the Megiddo Late Bronze Age Stratum VIIA has luxury finds, but Stratum IV, Iron Age IIA, which is Solomon’s time [sic], is devoid of luxury—not a single gold item was found (Centuries of Darkness, 1993, pp. 191, 200). The excavations at Tyre did not find anything great at the time of Solomon (p. 192). The famous Solomonic Gates are also found at Ashdod, a Philistine city (p. 190). Solomon’s Temple matches the Late Bronze Age (p. 197). Ashlar masonry was also Late Bronze Age (p. 198), and the description of the furnishing of Solomon’s Temple corresponds to the 12th century (p. 198). Trade with Egypt and the Hittites described in I Kings 10:29 fts the Late Bronze Age. Mining at Timna with an Egyptian temple and materials are from 19th and 20th dynasties (p. 201). Sir Mortimer Wheeler stated concerning the Timna or Solomon’s mines, “In spite of traditional associations of King Solomon with the mines and landscape, the great king is probably the most eminent absentee from the archaeological sequence” (James, 1993, p. 202). Some minimalists go to the extreme and say David and Solomon never existed, the stories are all made up, but in 1993, they found at Tel Dan a stela that mentions the “house of David.” Finkelstein takes the middle ground and concludes, “For the now familiar story of David and Solomon is neither a straightforward historical record nor a wholly imaginary myth” (David and Solomon, 2006, p. 22). If we follow strict biblical chronology that Solomon ruled 971 to 931 b.c., the archaeological evidence shows the stories of Solomon are not true. There was no great kingdom from Egypt to the Euphrates River, and there is no evidence of great buildings or great wealth. So is the Bible completely wrong? The key is chronology. If we adhere to a strict chronology, we are in big trouble. [End of quote] We certainly “are in big trouble” if “we adhere to” the conventional Sothic-based chronology. Using that faulty alignment we are going to find virtually nothing. Apart from the C10th BC King Solomon, well-known to us from the Scriptures, who belonged to the Late Bronze II Age of archaeology, we have various other historical manifestations of him as shown in my first two mentioned articles above. He was: Gudea of Lagash (Lachish); Ibal-piel, son of Dadusha (David); Senenmut (Solomon) in Egypt; Jabin (Ibni), perhaps, of Hazor; Qoheleth of the OT. Plus there are those all-important EA references to Bît Šulman, “House of Solomon” – these being on a scientific par with the Tel Dan evidence for the “House of David”. The fictitious versions of King Solomon While there are probably numerous of these, several have struck me. The first one is a supposed BC character, and the others are supposed AD entities. (i) Solon of Athens In my article, “Solomon and Sheba”, written for: Society for Interdisciplinary Studies CHRONOLOGY AND CATASTROPHISM REVIEW 1997:1 I proferred this suggestion: APPENDIX B SOLOMON IN GREEK FOLKLORE There is a case in Greek ‘history’ of a wise lawgiver who nonetheless over-organised his country, to the point of his being unable to satisfy either rich or poor, and who then went off travelling for a decade (notably in Egypt). This was Solon, who has come down to us as the first great Athenian statesman. Plutarch [115] tells that, with people coming to visit Solon every day, either to praise him or to ask him probing questions about the meaning of his laws, he left Athens for a time, realising that ‘In great affairs you cannot please all parties’. According to Plutarch: ‘[Solon] made his commercial interests as a ship-owner an excuse to travel and sailed away ... for ten years from the Athenians, in the hope that during this period they would become accustomed to his laws. He went first of all to Egypt and stayed for a while, as he mentions himself ‘where the Nile pours forth its waters by the shore of Canopus’.’ We recall Solon's intellectual encounters with the Egyp¬tian priests at Heliopolis and Saïs (in the Nile Delta), as described in Plutarch's ‘Life of Solon’ and Plato's ‘Timaeus’ [116]. The chronology and parentage of Solon were disputed even in ancient times [117]. Since he was a wise statesman, an intellectual (poet, writer) whose administrative reforms, though brilliant, eventually led to hardship for the poor and disenchantment for the wealthy; and since Solon's name is virtually identical to that of ‘Solomon’; and since he went to Egypt (also to Cyprus, Sidon and Lydia) for about a decade at the time when he was involved in the shipping business, then I suggest that ‘Solon’ of the Greeks was their version of Solomon, in the mid-to-late period of his reign. The Greeks picked up the story and transferred it from Jerusalem to Athens, just as they (or, at least Herodotus) later confused Sennacherib's attack on Jerusalem (c. 700 BC), by relocating it to Pelusium in Egypt [118]. Much has been attributed to the Greeks that did not belong to them - e.g. Breasted [119] made the point that Hatshep¬sut's marvellous temple structure was a witness to the fact that the Egyptians had developed architectural styles for which the later Greeks would be credited as originators. Given the Greeks' tendency to distort history, or to appropriate inven¬tions, one would not expect to find in Solon a perfect, mirror-image of King Solomon. Thanks to historical revisions [120], we now know that the ‘Dark Age’ between the Mycenaean (or Heroic) period of Greek history (concurrent with the time of Hatshepsut) and the Archaic period (that commences with Solon), is an artificial construct. This makes it even more plausible that Hatshepsut and Solomon were contemporaries of ‘Solon’. The tales of Solon's travels to Egypt, Sidon and Lydia (land of the Hittites) may well reflect to some degree Solomon's desire to appease his foreign women - Egyptian, Sidonian and Hittite - by building shrines for them (I Kings 11: 1, 7-8). Both Solomon and Solon are portrayed as being the wisest amongst the wise. In the pragmatic Greek version Solon prayed for wealth rather than wisdom - but ‘justly acquired wealth’, since Zeus punishes evil [121]. In the Hebrew version, God gave ‘riches and honour’ to Solomon because he had not asked for them, but had prayed instead for ‘a wise and discerning mind’, to enable him properly to govern his people (I Kings 3:12-13). (ii) King Charlemagne Here I can include only a small amount of what I wrote on the subject in my article: Solomon and Charlemagne (2) Solomon and Charlemagne Emperor Charlemagne’s life bears some uncanny likenesses to that of the ancient King Solomon of Israel and his family. The emperor Charlemagne has indeed been likened to King Solomon of old, e.g. by historian H. Daniel-Rops (The Church in the Dark Ages, p. 395), who calls him “a witness of God, after the style of Solomon …”, and he has been spoken of in terms of the ancient kings of Israel; whilst Charlemagne’s father, Pepin the Short, was hailed as “the new king David”. Charlemagne, too, appears sometimes as a larger-than-life king, almost too good to be true. His coronation on Christmas Day of 800 AD can seem to be just too neat and perfect. He was, according to Daniel-Rops (ibid., p. 390), “… the heaven-sent man, for whom Europe was waiting …”. And: (p. 401): “Who in the world fitted this role more than this glamorous personage, who set every man’s imagination afire and who seemed so much larger than life?” Charlemagne is assigned to the period known as the Dark Ages (c. 600-900 AD); a period somewhat lacking in archaeology – and there is precious little evidence for the many buildings that this famous king is supposed to have had erected. (See further on) Admittedly, the anomalies and contradictions associated with virtually every aspect of the life of Charlemagne, from his birth to his death, are evident for all to consider. Other striking likenesses to the persons of the Old Testament, apart from that of Charlemagne’s father king Pepin’s being like king David; are his mother, Bertha or Bertrada, reminding of Bathsheba; Charlemagne’s wife, “Desideria”, reminding of the “Queen of Sheba”; and Charlemagne’s colourful eastern friend and ally, Harun al-Raschid, most definitely like Solomon’s ally, King Hiram of Tyre. The last I believe to have been - as King Solomon most certainly was - a real historical person. See how King Solomon’s glorious Jerusalem, with the technical assistance of the great King Hiram, became medieval Baghdad, under the direction of Harun al-Raschid: Original Baghdad was Jerusalem (4) Original Baghdad was Jerusalem This archaeologically non-existent Baghdad, Madinat-al-Salam, “City of Peace”, was merely an appropriation of Solomon and Hiram’s Jerusalem, meaning “City of Peace”. Charlemagne’s Father, Pepin, “the new David” D. Fraioli tells of Pepin at his peak (Joan of Arc and the Hundred Years War, p. 46): “An aura of prestige now surrounded the king, whom the pope called the “new king David” …”. Gregory of Tours had, as we shall read below, spoken similarly of king Clovis I, of the Merovingian dynasty. This traditional likening of Frankish kings to the ancient Davidic kings immediately raises the important point to be considered in this article concerning a sacred attitude held in regard to French kings, and this might go a long way towards accounting for the phenomenon of Charlemagne. Let us take a relevant section on this from Fraioli’s book (pp. 43-45): THE FRENCH TRADITION France developed by far the most sacred mythology around its kingship of all the kingdoms in western Europe, although the earliest known coronations occurred in Visigothic Spain and Ireland. The sacred mythology of French kingship, which became known as “the religion of the monarchy”, first emerged during the Merovingian dynasty, in the context of a baptismal anointing rather than a sacred coronation, when Clovis, king of the Franks, converted to Christianity. …. Fraioli will however, in a later section on Hincmar (d. 882), suggest that this whole notion of sacred kingship was a late tradition, both mythical and “fabricated”. Here is what she has to say about it there (pp. 47-48): Hincmar, archbishop of Reims from 845 to 882, was a learned theologian and nimble politician, whose fame in the development of sacred kingship rests on his introduction of the legend of the Holy Ampulla into the history of Clovis, four centuries after the fact. In an effort to prove the continuity of Frankish kingship and, it is commonly believed, to challenge the influence of the abbey of Saint Denis – then successfully fusing its own history with that of the monarchy – Hincmar authorized a new myth. He is often believed to have fabricated the story himself in an attempt to expand the importance of the see of Reims. In all likelihood, he did not invent it, although he had confessed to forging other documents. The myth made the astonishing assertion that the liquid used to consecrate Frankish kings was of divine origin. A dove, the Christian symbol of the Holy Spirit, had allegedly delivered the Ampulla, or vial, of sacred liquid in its beak, when the bustling crowd at Clovis’ baptism had prevented the bearer of the baptismal oil from a timely arrival at the ceremony. Through this myth the election of French kings was seen as the will of God. Furthermore, the continuity of their rule was guaranteed by an inexhaustible supply of anointing balm in the Holy Ampulla, which could anoint French kings to the end of time. [End of quote] This charming story may have Old Testament origins in the miraculous preservation, in liquid form, of the sacred fire as recorded in 2 Maccabees 1:18-36, for the time of the biblical Nehemiah, whom we have found apparently making an anachronistic ‘return visit’ at the time of the Prophet Mohammed, BC dragged into AD time: Two Supposed Nehemiahs: BC time and AD time https://www.academia.edu/12429764/Two_Supposed_Nehemiahs_BC_time_and_AD_time The legend of Hincmar may perhaps have arisen out of a confused transmission of the original true historical account relating to the governor Nehemiah. I continue now with Fraioli’s earlier section on The French Tradition, where she briefly considers Clovis I (pp. 44-45), and then proceeds on to Pepin (p. 46): Clovis I (d. 511) and the Franks …. At his baptism, King Clovis was anointed with a holy balm, or salve … in a ceremony blending kingship and religion. According to the contemporary chronicle of Gregory of Tours, the anointing of Clovis occurred by the grace of God, prompting Gregory to draw an analogy between Clovis and the sacred kingship of David in the Old Testament. …. Pepin the Short (d. 768) …. Pepin the Short … receives the credit for introducing the ritual of sacred anointing, or consecration, into the installation ceremony for French kings. …. As Patrick Simon has stated, Pepin’s innovation consisted of “legitimizing through a religious ceremony a power obtained by force ...”. …. The union of king and clergy provided mutual benefit …. An aura of prestige now surrounded the king, whom the pope called the “new David” …. [End of quotes] Again, we recall the famous anointing with “the horn of oil” of David the shepherd, the youngest son of Jesse, by Samuel the high priest and prophet, after Samuel had rejected one by one David’s seven older brothers (1 Samuel 16:1-13). After the death of Saul (Samuel was also dead by now) David was anointed again, at Hebron, as king of all Israel (2 Samuel 5:3). Now Pepin, likewise, was twice crowned (Fraioli, p. 46): “The second coronation, celebrated at Saint-Denis in 754 [AD], cleverly reconnected Pepin’s reign to the Merovingians through his wife, big-foot Bertha, a descendant of Clovis, which provided fictional continuity to French kingship”. King David is sometimes found going so far, it seems, as to act out the priest’s rôle, as for example when he had triumphantly returned the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem, and he subsequently offered “burnt offerings and the offering of well-being before the Lord” (2 Samuel 6:17). Both David and Pepin were warrior-kings and men of great personal courage. Pepin is famous, in his youthful days, like David, for his courage against wild animals, including lions. Daniel-Rops (op. cit., p. 387) tells of it: “A well-known picture, which was already very popular in the Middle Ages, has impressed on our minds the features of this thickset, broad-shouldered little man who, for a wager, amused himself by separating a lion and a bull who were in the middle of a fight in the circus arena”. In the case of David, this courage is manifest, not “in the circus arena”, but in the field. More serious, and we might say less frivolous, was David’s situation, when the giant, Goliath, was challenging the armies of Israel. Then David said to Saul (1 Samuel 17:34-36): ‘Your servant used to keep sheep for his father; and whenever a lion or a bear came, and took a lamb from the flock, I went after it and struck it down, rescuing the lamb from its mouth; and if it turned against me, I would catch it by the jaw, strike it down and kill it. Your servant has killed both lions and bears; and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, since he has defied the armies of the living God’. Pepin was nicknamed “the Short”. Was David also short? He probably was not of very tall stature. When the prophet Samuel came to Jesse’s boys, to anoint the one amongst them whom God had chosen, Samuel had been most impressed by Eliab, who was apparently of a good height (1 Samuel 16:6-7). So, we could probably draw the conclusion that, when the Lord advised Samuel not to look on “the height of [the candidate’s] stature” in making his choice, that David, the youngest of the boys, who eventually was chosen, was not that very tall. But David was of fine appearance, nonetheless: “Now he was ruddy, and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome” (v. 12). Charlemagne, “after the style of Solomon” His Beginnings Like Solomon, the young son, Charlemagne (said to be 26 at the time), succeeded his father. But some hazy legend seems to surround Charlemagne’s mother and the king’s own early years. Thus Daniel-Rops (op. cit., p. 391): What had he done, this boy who was promised to such a lofty destiny, between that day in 742 when Bertha, the daughter of the Count of Laon – the ‘Bertha of the big feet’ of the chansons de gestes – brought him into the world in some royal villa or other in Austrasia, and the premature hour of his succession? No one really knows, and Einhard of all people, who faithfully chronicled his reign, is strangely discreet about his hero’s early years. [End of quote] In the case of Solomon, he was not born out of wedlock, as it is thought of Charlemagne. Rather it was Bathsheba’s child who had died as a result of king David’s sin of adultery with her (2 Samuel 12:16-23). Solomon himself was the child of ‘consolation’ for the pair after the sad death of this un-named child (v. 24). Now were, perhaps, the French 'Songs' (or Chansons), the Song of Roland (La Chanson de Roland) and the "Songs of heroic deeds [or lineages]" (Chansons de gestes), inspired by, or even in part based upon, the biblical “Song of Songs” or “Canticle of Canticles” (also known as the “Song of Solomon”); a love poem that could well have inspired some of the famous French chivalric notions? Was the ‘wisdom of Oliver’ in the Song of Roland inspired by the Wisdom of Solomon? “Oliver urges caution; wisdom and restraint are part of what makes him a good knight”: http://www.gradesaver.com/song-of-roland/study-guide/section2/ Did the “giants” in these Chansons perhaps arise from the encounter between David and the giant Goliath? Wikipedia tells (article “Chanson de geste”): Composed in Old French and apparently intended for oral performance by jongleurs, the chansons de geste narrate legendary incidents (sometimes based on real events) in the history of France during the eighth and ninth centuries, the age of Charles Martel, Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, with emphasis on their conflicts with the Moors and Saracens. To these historical legends, fantasy is gradually added; giants, magic, and monsters increasingly appear among the foes along with Muslims. …. [End of quote] His Birthplace More than a dozen places are claiming the honour to be the birthplace of Charles. The year of birth varies between 742 and 747 AD. Bertrada, the mother of Charles, was said to be a Bretonian princess, an Hungarian noble woman, or a member of the imperial family of Byzantium. The competition for the throne between Charles and his brother, Carloman, is also very much like what we find in the biblical account of the challenge to the throne by Solomon’s brother, Adonijah (1 Kings 1:5-10). The mother may perhaps have been complicit in this (cf. 2:9). According to Daniel-Rops (op. cit., p. 395): “At the time of [Charles’] accession this question [of Italy, Rome and the Lombards] had been considerably confused owing to the political mistakes of Queen Bertha, his mother”. Solomon, like Carloman, seems to have been twice elected king (accession and coronation), and in the first case, in both instances, the mother appears to have played an ambiguous part. Again, when Adonijah’s bid for the throne had failed, he cunningly approached Bathsheba to ask Solomon to give him the beautiful Abishag for his wife (2:13-18). When Bathsheba did approach Solomon, the latter acted out the pretence of complying with his mother’s request (2:2): “King Solomon answered his mother, ‘And why do you ask Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Ask for him the kingdom as well! For he is my elder brother; ask not only for him but also for the priest Abiathar and for Joab the son of Zeruiah!’ [both of whom had supported Adonijah in his revolt against David and Solomon]”. This situation can perhaps be likened to the case of what Daniel-Rops (op. cit., ibid.) has referred to as “these manoeuvres when Queen Bertha had married her elder son … to Desiderius’s [King of Pavia’s] daughter, Desideria”. Though, in the biblical story, Adonijah apparently was not actually a son of Bathsheba’s (1 Kings 1:5), nor of course did he manage to fulfil his wish of marrying Abishag, despite his desire for her. “Desideria” is certainly a most appropriate appellation for the much-desired Abishag. And soon I shall be showing, from another parallel situation between Solomon and Charlemagne, that Desideria well equates with this Abishag. Of course Solomon was being completely sarcastic in his reply to Adonijah’s request via Bathsheba. The wise king fully appreciated the implications of the scheming Adonijah’s attaining the hand of David’s favourite, Abishag. Thus he added, chillingly (vv. 23-25): ‘So may God do to me, and more also [a typical idiom of the time], for Adonijah has devised this scheme at the risk of his life! Now therefore as the Lord lives, who has established me and placed me on the throne of my father David, and who has made me a house as he promised, today Adonijah shall be put to death’. So King Solomon sent Benaiah son of Jehoiada; he struck him down, and he died. Conveniently, likewise, Charlemagne’s brother died suddenly (Daniel-Rops, p. 391): “But scarcely three years had elapsed when an unexpected death completely broke these shackles …. Charles claimed his brother’s heritage and thus rebuilt the unity of the paternal realm under his leadership”. Solomon’s sarcasm in the face of Bathsheba’s request may even have its faint glimmer in the case of the chaffing compliance of the young Charles towards his own mother (ibid., pp. 394-395): “Despite his twenty-five years Charles had appeared to defer to his energetic mother’s wishes. But he fretted under the restraint”. His Natural Qualities Like Solomon, Charlemagne was a most gifted individual, and the perfect king material (Daniel-Rops, p. 392): Charles was … throughout his life – quick, far-sighted, and energetic. In these instinctive qualities lies the secret of his incomparably fruitful labour, and, to their service, a never-failing vigour lent an activity which was truly prodigious. …. And he had other complementary qualities, which decisively defined his grandeur: prudence, moderation, a realistic appreciation of the possible, a mistrust of unconsidered actions. It is the Emperor Augustus whom Charlemagne recalls, rather than Caesar or Alexander. Or is it rather king Solomon “whom Charlemagne [most closely] recalls”? As for “prudence” and his other cardinal virtues, as mentioned in the quote above, well, was not Solomon the first person to list these virtues (Wisdom of Solomon 8:7)? …. Archaeological considerations For AD history to be fully convincing and to be made to rest on firm foundations, it will need to undergo a rigorous revision similar to the one that scholars have been undertaking for BC history, with the application of a revised stratigraphy. There may be some indications that the history of Charlemagne is yet far from having been established on such firm stratigraphical foundations. The following will be based upon the research of some pioneering European revisionists (Illig; Niemitz; Topper) who have bravely embarked upon a re-assessment of AD time. Whilst I may not necessarily agree with all of their conclusions, or their revised models, I would applaud them for having undertaken so necessary a revision. Charlemagne’s Economy The findings of historians regarding Charles’ economy show extreme contradictions: Some concede abundant wealth to Charles, while others have to complain economic decay. Jan Beaufort writes (“Illig’s Hypothesis on Phantom Times – FAQ”: http://www.cybis.se/forfun/dendro/hollstein/hollstein0/beaufort/index.htm): Economy: The findings of historians regarding Charles' economy show extreme contradictions: Some concede abundant wealth to Charles, while others have to complain economic decay. [DeM 161 ff.] As Heinsohn has shown recently, coins attributed to Charles (or, likewise Charles the Bald-head) cannot be distinguished from the coins of Charles the Simple (898-929). According to Illig, Carolus Simplex has been a real Carolingian and the model for Charlemagne. The attribute "simplex" (= stupid, but likewise single, not-duplicated) has been used for the first time following the turn of the millennium. [Heinsohn (2001)] Charlemagne’s Capital City and His Cultural Achievements ‘The Carolingian Renaissance’, as Daniel-Rops calls it (The Church in the Dark Ages, p. 422), centred on Aix-la-Chapelle. But Aix-la-Chapelle is considered to have been a rather unusual geographical choice anyway: The vital centre of this Renaissance was Aix-la-Chapelle, the ancient ‘villa’ of Pepin the Short’s time, which was situated some distance off the great Roman roads. From 794 onwards Charlemagne made it into a Carolingian Versailles, judging from its intellectual atmosphere and the splendour of its appearance. The geographical position of this new capital has given rise to much discussion: why was this Rhineland area chosen, rather than some town in Gaul, or even Rome itself? …. Aix was the centre of the intellectual Renaissance; and the centre of Aix, and especially the Palatine school, was a kind of general headquarters of the mind, which influenced the entire empire …. [End of quote] Amongst this august group was Charlemagne himself, now “known as David”; this being about the only seemingly eastern factor in what comes across as a very European ‘club of gentlemen’ (ibid., p. 424): The leaders of this pleiade of scholars and cultured men formed a sort of club, a small, self-contained group. Historians are accustomed to call this group the Palatine Academy. Each of its members bore a pseudonym borrowed from antiquity. Charlemagne himself, who was not a whit averse to residing over this learned assembly, was known as David, which overestimated the power of the cantor of the Psalms and overrated even more outrageously the poetic talents of the son of Pepin! [End of quote] Charlemagne is also, like King Solomon, famed for his architectural achievements. Thus Daniel-Rops, p. 425: …. Because the building, decoration, and beautifying of the House of God was one of the major preoccupations of the master, architecture and the plastic arts developed so much that Dawson has been able to write: ‘Charlemagne founded a Holy Roman architecture as well as a Holy Roman Empire’. In fact, it was not only Roman, but followed tendencies which we have already noticed in the Merovingian epoch, mingling Eastern and remote Asiatic influence with the revival of classical features. But sadly - as somewhat also with king Solomon (but in his case due to centuries of destruction and looting, and also to the failure by archaeologists to identify Solomon’s era stratigraphically): “We no longer possess many examples of the architecture of this great reign”. [End of quote] Beaufort would concur with the fact of this dearth of architectural evidence (op. cit.): Buildings: As we know from the ancient texts, between 476 and 855 AD more than 1695 large buildings were erected, including 312 cathedrals, 1254 convents and 129 royal palaces. The historian Harald Braunfels: "Of all these buildings [until 1991] only 215 were examined by archaeologists. Artefacts were found only at a fraction of these buildings. One may count with ten fingers the number of buildings that still exist as a whole or as a significant fraction." [DeM 208] Publisher Heribert Illig, who has advanced the historical conspiracy theory known as the phantom time hypothesis, has made this observation about the “masterpiece of Carolignian architecture” (as told by Beaufort): Pfalzkapelle Aachen: The masterpiece of Carolingian architecture, the Chapel of St. Mary at Aachen (about 792-799) is unique. Its direct predecessor (Ravenna's San Vitale) had been erected some 200 years earlier. Buildings comparable to Aachen in style and technology were not erected until the advent of the Romanesque style in the 11th century. Consequently, Illig assumes the Pfalzkapelle to be a Romanesque building of the 11th century. [End of quote] In other words, Illig claims it to be quite anachronistic. His Burial and Tomb Jan Beaufort tells about this (op. cit.): Burial: Charles' burial place is the Pfalzkapelle at Aachen (his explicit will to find his grave beneath his father at Saint-Denis had been ignored). This contradicted the general prohibition of burials within churches, proclaimed by councils held under Charles at Aachen (809) and Mainz (813). [DeM 44 f.] And again: Tomb: Charles' tomb had been camouflaged so well (in fear of the raiding Normans) that it could not be localized for two centuries. In the year 1000 the emperor Otto III discovers the tomb. He finds Charles sitting on his throne. Again the tomb became forgotten until it was found once more and reopened by Friedrich Barbarossa. Then again, the tomb disappeared and was never found again. For comparison: The tomb of Otto I in the dome of Magdeburg has always been honoured - despite of all destructions and rebuilds of this church. [DeM 44 ff.] (iii) Suleiman the Magnificent As I wrote in my article: King Solomon and Suleiman (4) King Solomon and Suleiman King Suleiman I as “a second Solomon”, and “a new Solomon”. Suleiman the Magnificent, King of the Ottoman Turks --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “Suleiman … is therefore called the second Solomon by many Islamic scholars …”. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- King Suleiman ‘the Magnificent’, a supposedly C16th AD Ottoman emperor, was, according to this source http://everything2.com/title/Suleiman+the+Magnificent “a new Solomon”. And, similarly, Suleiman was “the second Solomon”. A new Solomon is risen Süleyman I was everything a magnificent ruler should be. He was just, making the right decisions in cases set before him. [Cf. I Kings 3:16-28] He was brave, leading his armies in battle until he had greatly expanded his sultanate. He was wealthy, living in luxury and turning his capital Istanbul into a splendid city. And he was cultured, his court teeming with philosophers and artists, and the Sultan himself mastering several arts, especially that of poetry. …. Süleyman ascended to the throne in 1520 and stayed there for all of 46 years. During his reign he furthered the work of his forefathers until he had made the empire of the Ottomans into one of the world’s greatest. The Sultan was named after Solomon, who was described as the perfect ruler in the Quran. Like the legendary king of the Jews, Süleyman was seen as just and wise, and a worthy follower of his namesake. He is therefore called the second Solomon by many Islamic scholars, although he was the first of that name among the Ottomans. Like the Solomon of old, this ruler was surrounded by splendour and mystery, and his time is remembered as the zenith of his people. …. [End of quote] Problems with Islamic ‘History’ In some cases, Islam and its scholars have shown a complete disregard for historical perspective. I had cause to discuss this in my review of Islamic scholar Ahmed Osman’s book, Out of Egypt. The Roots of Christianity Revealed, in my series: Osman's ‘Osmosis’ of Moses (4) Osman's Radical Reinterpretation of Moses (4) Osman's 'Osmosis' of Moses. Part Two: Christ The King his books being a diabolical historical mish-mash in which the author, Osman, sadly attempts to herd a millennium or more of history into the single Eighteenth Dynasty of ancient Egypt. But getting right to the heart of the situation, the historical problems pertaining to the Prophet Mohammed himself are legendary. My own contributions, amongst many, to this subject, are, for example: Biography of the Prophet Mohammed (Muhammad) Seriously Mangles History (4) Biography of the Prophet Mohammed (Muhammad) Seriously Mangles History Scholars have long pointed out the historical problems associated with the life of the Prophet Mohammed and the history of Islam, with some going even so far as to cast doubt upon Mohammed’s actual existence. Biblico-historical events, normally separated the one from the other by many centuries, are re-cast as contemporaneous in the Islamic texts. Muslim author, Ahmed Osman, has waxed so bold as to squeeze, into the one Egyptian dynasty, the Eighteenth, persons supposed to span more than one and a half millennia. Now, as I intend to demonstrate in this article, biblico-historical events that occurred during the neo-Assyrian era of the C8th BC, and then later on, in the Persian era, have found their way into the biography of Mohammed supposedly of the C7th AD. Added to all this confusion is the highly suspicious factor of a ‘second’ Nehemiah, sacrificing at the site of the Temple of Yahweh in Jerusalem during a ‘second’ Persian period, all contemporaneous with the Prophet of Islam himself. The whole scenario is most reminiscent of the time of the original (and, I believe, of the only) Nehemiah of Israel. And so I wrote in an article, now up-dated as: Two Supposed Nehemiahs: BC time and AD time https://www.academia.edu/12429764/Two_Supposed_Nehemiahs_BC_time_and_AD_time This … later Nehemiah “offers a sacrifice on the site of the Temple”, according to Étienne Couvert (La Vérité sur les Manuscripts de la Mer Morte, 2nd ed, Éditions de Chiré, p. 98. My translation). “He even seems to have attempted to restore the Jewish cult of sacrifice”, says Maxine Lenôtre (Mahomet Fondateur de L’Islam, Publications MC, p.111, quoting from S.W. Baron’s, Histoire d’Israël, T. III, p. 187. My translation), who then adds (quoting from the same source): “Without any doubt, a number of Jews saw in these events a repetition of the re-establishment of the Jewish State by Cyrus and Darius [C6th BC kings of ancient Persia] and behaved as the rulers of the city and of the country”. [End of quote] So, conceivably, the whole concept of a Persian (or Sassanian) empire at this time, with rulers named Chosroes, again reminiscent of the ancient Cyrus ‘the Great’, may need to be seriously questioned. Coins and Archaeology And how to “explain inscriptions on early Islamic coins – the ones that showed Muhammed meeting with a Persian emperor [Chosroes II] who supposedly died a century before”? http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/place-london/plain/A85654957 Emmet Scott, who asks “Were the Arab Conquests a Myth?”, also points out major anomalies relating to the coinage of this presumed period, and regarding the archaeology of Islam in general, though Scott does not go so far as to suggest that the Sassanian era duplicated the ancient Persian one: http://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm/frm/160197/sec_id/160197 Note the remark [in Encyclopdaedia Iranica]: “The Arab-Sasanian coinages are not imitations,” but were “designed and manufactured by the same people as the late Sasanian issues.” We note also that the date provided on these artefacts is written in Persian script, and it would appear that those who minted the coins, native Persians, did not understand Arabic. We hear that under the Arabs the mints were “evidently allowed to go on as before,” and that there are “a small number of coins indistinguishable from the drahms of the last emperor, Yazdegerd III, dated during his reign but after the Arab capture of the cities of issue. It was only when Yazdegerd died (A.D. 651) [in the time of the Ummayad Caliph Mu'awiya] that some mark of Arab authority was added to the coinage.” (Ibid.) Even more puzzling is the fact that the most common coins during the first decades of Islamic rule were those of Yazdegerd's predecessor Chosroes II, and many of these too bear the Arabic inscription (written however, as we saw, in the Syriac script) besm Allah. Now, it is just conceivable that invading Arabs might have issued slightly amended coins of the last Sassanian monarch, Yazdegerd III, but why continue to issue money in the name of a previous Sassanian king (Chosroes II), one who, supposedly, had died ten years earlier? This surely stretches credulity. The Persian-looking Islamic coins are of course believed to date from the time of Umar (d. 664), one of the “Rightly-guided Caliphs” who succeeded Muhammad and supposedly conquered what became the Islamic Empire. Yet it has to be stated that there is no direct archaeological evidence for the existence either of Umar or any of the other “Rightly-guided” Caliphs Abu Bakr, Uthman or Ali. Not a brick, coin, or artifact of any kind bears the name of these men. Archaeologically, their existence is as unattested as Muhammad himself. …. [End of quote] But surely what Scott alleges about these early Caliphs, that: “Not a brick, coin, or artifact of any kind bears the name of these men”, cannot be applied to Suleiman the Magnificent himself, evidence of whose building works in, say Jerusalem, are considered to abound and to be easily identifiable. A typical comment would be this: “Jerusalem’s current walls were built under the orders of Suleiman the Magnificent between the years 1537 and 1541. Some portions were built over the ancient walls from 2,000 years ago. The walls were built to prevent invasions from local tribes and to discourage another crusade by Christians from Europe”: http://www.generationword.com/jerusalem101/4-walls-today.html Previously, I have discussed Greek appropriations of earlier ancient Near Eastern culture and civilization. But might Arabic Islam have, in turn, appropriated the earlier Byzantine Greek architecture, and perhaps some of its archaeology? There appears to be plenty written on this subject, e.g.: “The appropriation of Byzantine elements into Islamic architecture”, by Patricia Blessing, “art and architecture of the Muslim World, focusing on trans-cultural interactions in the Middle Ages, the appropriation of Byzantine elements into Islamic architecture, the transfer and authentication of relics in East and West, historical photographs of architecture and urban spaces”: http://cmems.stanford.edu/tags/appropriation-byzantine-elements-islamic-architecture And, again: http://www.daimonas.com/pages/byzantine-basis-persian.html “This page is related to the Byzantine origins of what are claimed to be "Islamic" ideas. This page is limited to showing the Byzantine/Greek basis of Sassanian ideas which were absorbed by the even less original Arabs who replaced the faith of Zoroaster with one more brutal; that of Mohammed”. A rock relief of Chosroes II at Taq-I Bustan “clearly shows the symbol which was to be appropriated by Islam, the crescent moon …”. As for the archaeology of the walls of the city of Jerusalem itself, relevant to Sultan Suleiman the supposed wall builder there, the exact identification of these various wall levels is highly problematical, as attested by Hershel Shanks, “The Jerusalem Wall That Shouldn’t Be There. Three major excavations fail to explain controversial remains”: http://members.bib-arch.org/publication.asp?PubID=BSBA&Volume=13&Issue=3&ArticleID=5 So perhaps art and architecture attributed to the direction of Suleiman the Magnificent might need to be seriously re-assessed for the purposes of authentication. Words are put into the mouth of a supposed Venetian visitor to the glorious kingdom of Suleiman the Magnificent that immediately remind me of the remarks made by the biblical Queen of Sheba upon her visit to the court of the truly magnificent King Solomon. Compare (http://everything2.com/title/Suleiman+the+Magnificent): “I know no State which is happier than this one. It is furnished with all God’s gifts. It controls war and peace; it is rich in gold, in people, in ships, and in obedience; no State can be compared with it. May God long preserve the most just of all Emperors.” The Venetian ambassador reports from Istanbul in 1525 with (I Kings 10:6-9): Then [Sheba] said to the king [Solomon]: “It was a true report which I heard in my own land about your words and your wisdom. However I did not believe the words until I came and saw with my own eyes; and indeed the half was not told me. Your wisdom and prosperity exceed the fame of which I heard. Happy are your men and happy are these your servants, who stand continually before you and hear your wisdom! Blessed be the Lord your God, who delighted in you, setting you on the throne of Israel! Because the Lord has loved Israel forever, therefore He made you king, to do justice and righteousness.” And in the article, “How Sultan Süleyman became ‘Kanuni [Lawgiver]’”, we find Suleiman likened to, not only King Solomon, again, but also to King Solomon’s law-giving alter ego, Solon, and to Solomon’s contemporary (revised) Hammurabi: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/how-sultan-suleyman-became-kanuni.aspx?pageI The first written, complete code of laws is nearly 4,000 years old, from the time of Hammurabi, the king of Babylon (r. 1792 B.C. to 1750 B.C.), although fragments of legal codes from other cities in the Mesopotamian area have been discovered. Hammurabi is still honored today as a lawgiver. In the Bible, it was Moses whom the Jews singled out as a lawgiver and among the ancient Greeks, Draco and Solon. …. …. Süleyman oversaw the codification of a new general code of laws. Not only were previous codes of law taken into account, new cases and analogies were added. Fines and punishments were regularized and some of the more severe punishments were mitigated. …. The kanunnames are collections of kanuns or statutes that are basically short summaries of decrees issued by the sultan. The decrees in turn were made on the basis of a particular individual, place or event but when issued, these particular details were not included. The publication of such a general kanunname throughout the empire was the responsibility of the nişancı, an official whose duty it was to attach the sultan’s imperial signature on the decrees issued in his name. …. The sultan held the judicial power and judges had to follow what he decreed. …. What Kanuni Sultan Süleyman did to earn his sobriquet as ‘lawgiver’ has often been compared to the just ruler King Solomon, from the Old Testament. [End of quote]

Wednesday, February 5, 2025

House of Solomon

by Damien F. Mackey “‘House of Solomon’ meant not merely the capital [i.e., Jerusalem], but the whole kingdom of Judah, approaching even more closely the use of ‘House of Omri’ for the kingdom of Israel”. P. Friedman A broad range of surprising characters was presented for the historical King Solomon in my recent article: King Solomon looming large in a reconstructed ancient history (4) Reconstructing King Solomon's Ancient History These proposed alter egos for King Solomon were: (i) Gudea of Lagash (Lakish), or Lachish; (ii) Ibal-piel of Eshnunna (Ashnunna), or Ashduddu/Ashdod, again, Lachish; (iii) Jabin (Ibni) of Hazor, Mari letters era; (iv) Senenmut, in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt; (v) Qoheleth, Old Testament Book title. Of these five, (iii) Jabin is only a tentative suggestion. Now, I would like to add here the striking archaeological evidence for King Solomon that the intuitive Dr. Immanuel Velikovsky was able to uncover within the context of his revision, according to which Abdi-hiba (-heba), King of Urusalim (Jerusalem) in the El Amarna (EA) letters, belonged to the mid C9th BC. This was already a huge step (half a millennium, in fact) away from conventional ancient history which dates EA to the c. 14th BC. What we find is on a par with the famous Tel Dan evidence, telling of the House of David, the father of King Solomon. Reference is made in EA letters 74 and 290 to a place that professor Julius Lewy read as Bet Shulmanu - House (or Sanctuary) of Shulman (“The Sulman Temple in Jerusalem”, Journal of Biblical Literature LIX (1940), pp. 519 ff.). EA 290 was written by the King of Urusalim, Abdi-Hiba, who had to be, according to the conventional chronology, a C14th BC pagan ruler of what we know as Jerusalem. This standard view of Abdi-Hiba is summed up by Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdi-Heba: Abdi-Heba (Abdi-Kheba, Abdi-Hepat, or Abdi-Hebat) was a local chieftain of Jerusalem during the Amarna period (mid-1330s BC). Abdi-Heba's name can be translated as "servant of Hebat", a Hurrian goddess. Whether Abdi-Heba was himself of Hurrian descent is unknown, as is the relationship between the general populace of pre-Israelite Jerusalem (called, several centuries later, Jebusites in the Bible) and the Hurrians. Egyptian documents have him deny he was a ḫazānu and assert he is a soldier (we'w), the implication being he was the son of a local chief sent to Egypt to receive military training there. …. Also unknown is whether he was part of a dynasty that governed Jerusalem or whether he was put on the throne by the Egyptians. Abdi-Heba himself notes that he holds his position not through his parental lineage but by the grace of Pharaoh, but this might be flattery rather than an accurate representation of the situation. …. [End of quote] From a revisionist point of view, this is all quite incorrect. Dr. Immanuel Velikovsky was able to show in his Ages in Chaos, I (1952), that the EA era actually belonged to, not to the C14th BC, but the C9th BC era of Israel’s Divided Kingdom. And it is from such a revised perspective that Dr. Velikovsky was able to make this epochal comment about professor Lewy’s reading: [http://www.varchive.org/ce/sultemp.htm] The Šulmán Temple in Jerusalem …. From a certain passage in letter No. 290, written by the king of Jerusalem to the Pharaoh, Lewy concluded that this city was known at that time also by the name “Temple of Šulmán.” Actually, Lewy read the ideogram that had much puzzled the researchers before him. …. After complaining that the land was falling to the invading bands (habiru), the king of Jerusalem wrote: “. . . and now, in addition, the capital of the country of Jerusalem — its name is Bit Šulmáni —, the king’s city, has broken away . . .”…. Beth Šulmán in Hebrew, as Professor Lewy correctly translated, is Temple of Šulmán. But, of course, writing in 1940, Lewy could not surmise that the edifice was the Temple of Solomon and therefore made the supposition that it was a place of worship (in Canaanite times) of a god found in Akkadian sources as Shelmi, Shulmanu, or Salamu. The correction of the reading of Knudtzon (who was uncertain of his reading) fits well with the chronological reconstruction of the period. In Ages in Chaos (chapters vi-viii) I deal with the el-Amarna letters; there it is shown that the king of Jerusalem whose name is variously read Ebed-Tov, Abdi-Hiba, etc. was King Jehoshaphat (ninth century). It was only to be expected that there would be in some of his letters a reference to the Temple of Solomon. Also, in el-Amarna letter No. 74, the king of Damascus, inciting his subordinate sheiks to attack the king of Jerusalem, commanded them to “assemble in the Temple of Šulmán.”…. [End of quote] Dr. Velikovsky’s identification of the idolatrous Abdi-Hiba of Urusalim with the extremely pious King Jehoshaphat of Judah needed the slight modification, as provided by P. James, that Abdi-Hiba was actually King Jehoshaphat’s evil son, Jehoram - a modification that I fully supported in my article: King Abdi-Hiba of Jerusalem Locked in as a ‘Pillar’ of Revised History (1) King Abdi-Hiba of Jerusalem Locked in as a ‘Pillar’ of Revised History Apart from that, though, the EA evidence completely favoured Dr. Velikovsky’s revision, as he himself hastened to point out (op. cit., ibid.): It was surprising to find in the el-Amarna letters written in the fourteenth century that the capital of the land was already known then as Jerusalem (Urusalim) and not, as the Bible claimed for the pre-Conquest period, Jebus or Salem…. Now, in addition, it was found that the city had a temple of Šulmán in it and that the structure was of such importance that its name had been used occasionally for denoting the city itself. (Considering the eminence of the edifice, “the house which king Solomon built for the Lord” … this was only natural.) Yet after the conquest by the Israelites under Joshua ben-Nun, the Temple of Šulmán was not heard of. Lewy wrote: “Aside from proving the existence of a Šulmán temple in Jerusalem in the first part of the 14th century B.C., this statement of the ruler of the region leaves no doubt that the city was then known not only as Jerusalem, but also as Bet Šulmán.”—“It is significant that it is only this name [Jerusalem] that reappears after the end of the occupation of the city by the Jebusites, which the Šulmán temple, in all probability, did not survive.” [End of quote] The conventional system has the habit of throwing up such “surprising” historical anomalies! On this, see my article: Dumb and Dumbfounded archaeology (4) Solomon and Middle Bronze in Archaeology Dr. Velikovsky continues here: The late Professor W. F. Albright advised me that Lewy’s interpretation cannot be accepted because Šulmán has no sign of divinity accompanying it, as would be proper if it were the name of a god. But this only strengthens my interpretation that the temple of Šulmán means Temple of Solomon. In the Hebrew Bible the king’s name has no terminal “n”. But in the Septuagint — the oldest translation of the Old Testament — the king’s name is written with a terminal “n”; the Septuagint dates from the third century before the present era. Thus it antedates the extant texts of the Old Testament, the Dead Sea Scrolls not excluded. Solomon built his Temple in the tenth century. In a letter written from Jerusalem in the next (ninth) century, Solomon’s Temple stood a good chance of being mentioned; and so it was. [End of quote] P. Friedman, however, writing for a British revisionist journal, soon insisted upon another necessary modification of the Velikovskian thesis. The description, “Temple of Solomon”, he explained (in “The Temple in Jerusalem?” SIS Review III:1 (Summer 1978), pp.7-8), is in fact a modern English rendition which is never actually found in the Hebrew as used in the Old Testament. There, King Solomon’s Temple is constantly referred to as the “House of Yahweh” or, simply, the “House of the Lord”. Friedman also drew attention to the fact that, in Assyrian records, the Kingdom of Israel is called the “House of Omri” in deference to Omri’s dynasty. He therefore suggested that Bet Shulman should, in like manner, be understood to refer to the Kingdom of Judah in deference to King Solomon’s dynasty (p. 8): “‘House of Solomon’ meant not merely the capital [i.e., Jerusalem], but the whole kingdom of Judah, approaching even more closely the use of ‘House of Omri’ for the kingdom of Israel”. Another possible interpretation of the phrase Bet Shulman is, as S. Dyen would later argue, that it should be understood literally as “the House”, that is the Palace, of King Solomon (“The House of Solomon”, KRONOS VIII:2 (Winter 1983), p. 88). This, I think, is a reasonable possibility. The apparent reference back to his great (x 3) grandfather, King Solomon, by Abdi-hiba/ Jehoram of Urusalim/Jerusalem – [e.g., Matthew 1:7-8: Solomon the father of Rehoboam, Rehoboam the father of Abijah, Abijah the father of Asa, Asa the father of Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat the father of Jehoram …], serves to vindicate the Old Testament against the reckless biblical minimizing of the likes of Israeli archaeologist, Israel Finkelstein. (First written) Easter 2015