Hello

[Michael]

I was a BAR reader and subscriber until they started wasting ink on the James ossuary.  I got tired of reading about it three to four times in every issue without no one from the other side given one iota of ink.  I have started subscribing again, but if BAR goes back to every issue being devoted to the Ossuary, I will stop again.

I have attended 2 of BARs week long seminars.

My belief is that the Bible is the same as all religions of its region in that it was basically a cosmic "myth," that is a story which combined elements of history with hopelessly fictional material.

I not only believe this but have worked out the details, relating every major story to specific constellations and stars.  I will try not to spam the boards, but will say some of my replies are cut and pastes from my own book.

Currently I read BAR for the humor aspect of it. It seems the scholars are really clueless as to the origins of stories, how they were written, by whom, why, and even when. Right now I believe I am the only person in the world who has it right, pardon my arrogance.


So far I am disappointed in the context of the BAR forum and had hoped for a higher level of discussion. Since it is new, I will wait around for some heavy hitters.

[Admin1]

Hi Michael.  Welcome!

Despite your disappointment in both BAR and this Forum, I know why you subscribe to both:

They're the best there is 

[stilgar]

Michael, I am curious.  Who do you consider "heavy hitters"?

[Michael]

Michael, I am curious.  Who do you consider "heavy hitters"?

If you read my intro it is obvious I don't have anyone on the "heavy hitters" list who is contemporary. Richard Elliot Freidman comes close as he has been able to at least break away from standard Wellhausen theory and has been able to properly identify the real starting and stopping points of the orginal text. However, he fails to edit it properly. nor does he realize what he has.

I give points to Tigay for his work on Gilgamesh, but have to ask the question,  "Once he discovered how Gilgamesh was composed, why didn't he apply the same techniques to the Bible?"  He could have easily deconstructed the Bible text and blown Freidman away.

Thomas Thompson as a minimalist is on the list, but his writing is dry and vague. He at least has the kahaunas to state what the scholars really know, "there was no United Monarchy."

I like two dead people. One is Richard Hinckly Allen who wrote about how the ancients viewed the stars and constellations. I use him as "my Bible" in order to construct my work on cosmic myth interpretation.  Anne Wright has a constelltion web site which quotes much of his work.  His dating is way off as he wrote before the modern era of carbon dating etc.

Also A.H. Sayce was a fantastic author of ancient Babylon. I consider his views on the origin of Hebrew words and Bible persons to be the best out there, although modern scholarship has either ignored or rejected his ideas. His Lectures book is available in pdf. as a free download. I also sell printed copies at my lulu web page, if you are like me and need a book to hold in your hand and high light.

There are current authors who write about the Bible and astrology, but their work is amateur compared to my own. They primarily use the works of Gerald Massey. Massey was wrong in a number of areas, so where he makes mistakes, modern authors have failed to correct them, simply because they haven't bothered to research every regional myth about every star and constellation and come together with a viable story with respect to archaeology, and most important. "what did they believe and when did they believe it."  They ignore the fact the Hebrews had a 10 zodiac signs, not 12 and the Hebrews considered the Pleiades as part of Aries and not Taurus. These are amateur mistakes you can find in other author's works, but not mine.

[stilgar]

Michael -- Interesting that a number of your "heavy hitters" are dead; it will be hard for them to join this discussion, so you may be waiting around (as you say) for a very long time.  You certainly don't lack for hubris; can you tell us a bit about your formal academic training and background that makes you so confident that you are correct where others have failed, gone astray, or are amateurish compared to yourself (to use your own words)? 

[Michael]

Michael -- Interesting that a number of your "heavy hitters" are dead; it will be hard for them to join this discussion, so you may be waiting around (as you say) for a very long time.  You certainly don't lack for hubris; can you tell us a bit about your formal academic training and background that makes you so confident that you are correct where others have failed, gone astray, or are amateurish compared to yourself (to use your own words)? 

There is the rub. I have no formal background or training, but I do read a lot of books. In addition to the books recommended and written by scholars, I also read those which contain occult or New Age type of material. This is something scholars do not do, nor are they even familiar with the information.

Modern scholarship has a lot of problems which is why things are so divided. They can't even come up with one good solid idea on how the Bible was constructed without creating an anomoly. My theory has no anomolies and corresponds to what we actually see. My cosmic myth idea likewise explains many passages in the Bible that scholars stumble over. It also explains certain midrashim and it also explains why the symbol of Pisces is on the floor at the oldest Christian church (prayer hall) at Meggido. This is a topic which should be debated in BAR, but the scholars are too dumb to even recognize it as a zodiac sign. Dr. Jim Tabor descibed it simply as "two fish" not even realizing it was a zodiac sign. It isn't until complete zodiacs appear in synagogues do scholars even know they are there, and then they ignore them.

I know my solution is the correct one, because it "checks." It works out problems. I remember taking a national multiple choice math test. Now I was good at math, but not the best in my school. While I may not have been able to figure out a certain problem, I was smart enough to take the answers and see which one worked, or checked. I was able to score twice as high as anyone in my school on the exam and finished first in the county and fourth in the state. A math genius? Hardly, but I can tell right answers from wrong answers simply because of how they fit into the overall picture. In that regard I am superior to all currect scholars who are satisfied with the status quo of anomolies and contradictions. While they may have learned Hebrew, Greek,  and memorized most of the Bible, they haven't learned to do the detective work necessary to work out a solution which fits the facts.  An example is my recent letter to BAR. Freidman doesn't know why the ancient scholars believed there was something cryptic in the Bible, or why they thought it was prophecy for their own time or why it was from god and had no errors, when clearly it does contain contradictions. So what he does is dismiss the whole issue.

That still doesn't explain why they belived that way. My cosmic myth idea explains exactly why the ancient rabbis believed what they did and reveals the code.

My job and training is the nuclear industry primarily in nuclear chemistry and radilogical controls. I currently work at the Savannah River Site National Laboratory in radiological controls.