ORIGINS OF ABRAHAMIC RELIGIONS
Critics of Judaism and Christianity often claim that they are nothing more than reincarnations of ancient pagan mythical religions. Jews and Christians do not take kindly to these criticisms even though the Bible provides much evidence that the religious beliefs and practices Egypt and Babylon influenced both religions.
STUDY NOTE: See Religion in the Ancient World for a scholarly review of the origins of religion.
When Jews and Christians look at the Biblical record of Egypt and Babylon, however, they will see that the critics’ claims are surprisingly and uncomfortably valid. Jews and Christians can only come to awareness of the origins of their religions if they accept three important Biblical truths:
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STUDY TIP: See this link for the story of Ham and his descendants.
It is not easy for Jews, Christians or Muslims to accept that their religions have their origins in pagan religions. Such are the powerful effects of spiritual pride. But, if God opens their spiritual eyes, they might learn to understand the symbolism of Egypt and Babylon and apply it to their own lives.
To understand the symbolism of Egypt and Babylon, we must begin by reviewing the story of Noah and Ham in Genesis 9. Because Ham sinned, Noah cursed Canaan, Ham’s son. This is a deeply symbolic story that needs unpacking which we will do in the following commentary.
COMMENTARY: Ham was the son who looked at his father Noah’s nakedness. To understand the story of Ham and Noah, however, it is critical to first understand the symbolism of nakedness which is first introduced in Genesis 3 where eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is symbolically represented as tasting religion by listening to false prophets and practicing the religion that they preach.
Before tasting of religion, Adam and Eve had no shame. After eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, however, they were afraid of God because they knew they were naked (i.e. they knew they had sinned).
STUDY TIP: See this link for understanding of nakedness.
They knew that they had sinned by participating in the sin of religion, and they knew that God was displeased with them. In their shame, they hid from God and attempted to cover themselves up with fig leaves that will waste away. Here the fig leaves represent religion which is in a constant state of decay. In effect, they tried to cover their sin up with more religion with hopes that their nakedness would be hidden from God. This does not work because God looks at the heart — not the outer man. What God saw was that Adam and Eve had evil, impure hearts that were expressed through religion.
The reason Adam and Eve were in this situation, of course, was that they had eaten the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The result of that choice was that they died spiritually. If they had chosen to eat the fruit of the Tree of Life, (i.e. God’s spoken voice) they would have enjoyed spiritual life.
Before they ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, they ate from the Tree of Life and were spiritually alive (i.e. they knew how to hear God’s spoken voice.) Then they noticed that the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil also appeared to be good for food. A serpent (i.e. religious leader, which is a false prophet) came along and tempted them to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
STUDY TIP: See this link for understanding of temptation.
They yielded to the arguments of the religious leader and symbolically ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. What this means is that they choose to sin by practicing religion. This choice is a parable for choosing to listen to religious leaders instead of listening to God’s spoken voice. The story is a parable that has meaning for all people who have the choice to listen to God’s voice or religious leaders. It is a life or death choice.
Adam and Eve made the wrong choice and suffered the consequences of their choice: They suffered spiritual death, which means that they could not hear God’s spoken voice. But God also had to live with the consequences of their choice. As long as they listened to his voice, he enjoyed intimacy with them. By making the wrong choice, Adam and Eve disrupted the intimacy that they and God enjoyed.
Because God values intimacy with his people, he is compelled to create a way for the intimacy to be restored for his benefit and the benefit of his people. Restoration of intimacy is also called “doing justice.”
STUDY TIP: See Religion is Injustice, Slavery, Oppression and Affliction for understanding of what it means to do justice.
God’s remedy for injustice was to cover Adam and Eve with animal skins which are symbolic of blood which is symbolic of God’s spoken word. This story symbolically represents and anticipates the blood (i.e. God’s spoken word) of the New Covenant replacing decaying Old/Covenant religion which is fading away. The symbolism here is that life is in the blood (i.e. God’s spoken word) and that man lives by word that comes from the mouth of God.
The parable of Adam and Eve is very deep, very subtle, and hard to understand. When we read about nakedness, we interpret it naturally, according to cultural standards that guard against nakedness. Therefore, we do not need Biblical laws to tell us about cultural laws that we already know, understand, and, for the most part, try to obey. What we do need to understand, however, is the symbolism of blood as God’s spoken word which gives life.
It is because nakedness is symbolic language for the sin of religion that God warns his people not to look on the nakedness (i.e. religion) of others. Because people have been successfully tempted by religion, God promises to cover their nakedness (i.e. religion) with blood (i.e. his spoken word). This is how he restores them to intimacy with himself.
Restoration to intimacy is the basic theme of the Bible: People sin by listening to false prophets and the sin of religion is covered (i.e. replaced, concealed, washed away) by God’s spoken word. Thus the Bible says that our sins are washed away (i.e.forgiven) by the blood. When that happens, people return to listening to God’s spoken voice with their hearts, and intimacy is restored.
Understanding of the story of Adam and Eve hinges on the fact that nakedness symbolically refers to religion and covering refers to the blood (i.e. spoken word of God) of the New Covenant. Thus we see that Adam and Eve’s sin was covered with God’s spoken word. It is a very short, symbolic picture of Old/First Covenant religion being replaced with the New Covenant. The symbolism of blood and forgiveness of sin is covered in more detail in Blood, Swords and Arrows.
STUDY TIP: Restoration to intimacy with God is also called salvation. See this link for understanding of salvation.
Understanding of the story of Adam and Eve is necessary to understanding the story of Noah which is a parable of how religion grows.
We begin by looking at what Noah did to become drunk: he planted a vineyard. In Biblical symbolism, a vineyard is like a religious organization (e.g. church, synagogue, ministry, etc.).
The vineyard that Noah planted symbolizes religion. It could be compared to planting a church. It was Noah’s church, he was the pastor, and he got drunk on the strong drink of religion. Noah created a religious organization and then got intoxicated on the power and influence he had as a religious leader. When he did this, he symbolically exposed his nakedness.
Then, along comes Ham who saw Noah’s religion when he saw him naked and was affected by it to the degree that he wanted the religious power and influence that his father had. Symbolically speaking, he wanted to grow the religion for his own benefit. He wanted to be the pastor of a church. We see his intentions in the fact that he told his brothers about Noah’s nakedness (i.e. his religion.)
For all of this, Ham earned a curse which God later details in Deuteronomy 28. This is what happens when people look at religion. Just like Eve who saw that the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was good for food, religion appears to satisfy man’s longing for a relationship with God. But, it does not satisfy, and it turns out to be a curse instead of a blessing.
Ham’s problem was that when he looked at Noah’s nakedness (i.e. religion), he was inspired to become religious himself. This is because there is something about physical nakedness that arouses people to participate in sexual activity, just like there is an intoxicating lure to religion that inspires people to want to become religious.
Sexual activity in the Bible is symbolic language for the fleshly stimulation and excitement that religion, especially the music, and group rituals inspires. Thus, the story tells us that Ham was inspired to become religious and powerful when he saw Noah’s nakedness (i.e. religion). This is the context in which the curse on Ham’s children was made. We conclude, therefore, that all of the children of Ham and Canaan carry that inspiration to become involved in religion — especially as religious leaders.
MORE COMMENTARY: How Ham’s descendants and Israel are related is shown in the Bible family tree where we find Nimrod (i.e. Babylon) and Mizraim (i.e. Egypt) who both became mighty religious nations.
The reason for reviewing this history is to make the point that Egypt and Babylon are estranged, distant cousins of Abraham and Israel. They became enemies (i.e. Siblings in Conflict) when God cursed Canaan. Therefore, Egypt and Babylon, as grandchildren of Ham, share in the effects of the curse which places them under subjugation to Israel which is the offspring of Shem through Abraham. This another way to symbolically represent the New Covenant overcoming Old/First Covenant religion.
All the nations with which Israel had to contend in its journey to the Promised Land and in the Promised Land were descendants of Ham — including Egypt (Mizraim), Babylon (Cush/Nimrod), and Canaan. Because the false religions of these nations represent the antithesis of true religion that God wanted to establish in Israel, religion has always been God’s enemy. That is why the Bible reports so many conflicts between Israel and Ham’s descendants.
But there is more to Israel’s relationship with Egypt and Babylon than the fact that their religion was different. God actually used these and other pagan nations to discipline Israel. We see this in stories where Israel is exiled to a pagan nation and then rescued and returned to the Promised Land (i.e. intimacy with God.) These are all prophetic images of religious people spending time in Old/First Covenant religion before they are rescued and converted into New Covenant disciples.
Reading carefully, we see that the relationships between the ancient religions of Egypt and Babylon and Judaism and Christianity appear early in the Bible in the story of Noah and the genealogical history of Noah’s Descendants:
Genesis 10: 1 Now these are the records of the generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah; and sons were born to them after the flood.
The sons of Japheth were Gomer and Magog and Madai and Javan and Tubal and Meshech and Tiras. 3 The sons of Gomer were Ashkenaz and Riphath and Togarmah. The sons of Javan were Elishah and Tarshish, Kittim and Dodanim.
From these the coastlands of the nations were separated into their lands, every one according to his language, according to their families, into their nations. 6 The sons of Ham were Cush and Mizraim and Put and Canaan.
COMMENTARY: Noah’s curse on Ham’s son Canaan also applied to Mizraim (i.e. Egypt).
The sons of Cush were Seba and Havilah and Sabtah and Raamah and Sabteca; and the sons of Raamah were Sheba and Dedan.
COMMENTARY: We interpret Nimrod to be a powerful religious leader.
At first glance, these scriptures might appear to be just one of several Biblical lists of boring genealogy with no application to us who live in these modern times. This shortsighted way of thinking violates and ignores what God said about all scripture training us for righteousness.
When we give God credit for being true to his word, however, we see that Genesis 10 informs us about the origins of both Judaism and Christianity. Such analysis is aided greatly by organizing the scriptures into genealogical charts. The Wikipedia chart which details the sons of Ham is very useful. In this chart, we see that Mizraim (Egypt) and Canaan were sons of Ham and that Nimrod (the one who created the kingdom of Babylon) was a grandson of Ham. Looking further down the chart we see that Canaan’s children include the several nations that occupied the Promised Land and with whom Israel engaged in warfare almost constantly. In particular, Canaan’s offspring includes the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Hivites and Jebusites, which God sometimes conveniently lumps together as Canaanites or as Philistines who are descendants of Mizraim (i.e. Egypt).
To come to the spiritual meaning of the Canaanites we must pause to ask the following questions about scriptures which are conveniently overlooked in Jewish and Christian doctrines:
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STUDY NOTE: If we don’t ask these kinds of questions about the Promised Land (i.e. the land occupied by the Canaanites), and similar questions about Egypt and Babylon we will never understand the Bible. These stories are not in the Bible only for historical reference, nor are they exceptions to the truth that all scripture is useful for training in righteousness. They are there to teach us about religion. But, to be taught, we must first learn to interpret the Bible symbolically — not literally.
The simple, all-inclusive, answer to these questions is that Canaanites symbolically represent all kinds of religions — including religions with Abrahamic origins. They were all under the curse of religion that was placed on Ham’s child Canaan. With this understanding, we see that God purposely placed his people in religious environments that offered temptations to sin by adopting those religions when he sent them to the land of
Canaan. But, because the Israelites did not separate themselves from those religious people but actually intermingled with them (i.e. adopted their religious practices), God considered those religions to be his enemy. That was true then and is still true today.
With this understanding we see that the Promised Land is a very competitive, tempting, spiritual environment in which God uses a multitude of religions to test his people. They pass the test and show that their hearts are inclined toward God when they do not join other religions. They fail the test when they adopt the religious beliefs and behaviors of the people among whom they live. God does not want his people to fail, so he warned Israel not to serve their gods or follow their religious practices.
Despite the Biblical record found in Genesis 10 and despite God’s warnings not to follow the customs of other religious nations, Jews and Christians have trouble accepting that that their religions have their origins in Egyptian and Babylonian religions. Scholars who feel very strongly about these accusations argue publicly for the legitimacy of their religions. These apologists defend against criticisms that their religions are influenced by ancient, pagan myths and religions, despite clear evidence to the contrary that are exposed later in this series of pages.
Jews and Christians reject and deny this evidence because they do not understand that God purposely modeled every aspect of the Law of Moses on the physical, visible features of ancient, pagan religions. He did this, of course, as he did throughout the Bible, following the “first the natural and then the spiritual” principle where he used examples found in natural religion to represent spiritual truth.
STUDY TIP: See Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 1, Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 2, and Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 3 for understanding of how God symbolically represents spiritual truth through things, including religious beliefs and practices, that exist in the physical world.
There are many reasons why Jews and Christians cannot see that their religions are influenced by Egyptian and Babylonian religions. Perhaps the main reason, however, is that they have ignored God’s commands that they should not follow the customs of other religions. Locked securely in their strongholds of wrong thinking, they pridefully think that the enduring history and purity of their religious beliefs insulates them from making the same mistakes the ancient Israelites made. Nevertheless, they make the same mistakes that Biblical Israel made because they do not understand that Israel’s story is a prophetic parable of their own religious experience. In other words, they do not understand that everything that written in the Bible, including stories of Israel’s idolatry and harlotry, is there to teach and warn about the temptations to practice religion and consequences of practicing religion.