"Thou Shall Have No Other Gods Before Me"

[SlowwHand]

Yeah, I guess. Hell.

[BlackCat]

DanSing

Yeah, proof of current act doesn't say anything about previous behaviour.

[SlowwHand]

I pulled a quick one on you.

[BlackCat]

Yep, but you lost the argument

Dammit, I need to sleep

[SlowwHand]

Then go. Later.

[Kitschum]

I agree with the first part, not the latter part.

Before me is actually written as 'over my face" in hebrew, and it is a standard expression that means "over me" as in "preferred over" or "chosen instead" and is never read into literally.

the expression should be read as "better than me" or "preferred over me" but is acceptable to use "instead of me", since that's a standard meaning as well. not versed enough how old is that use compared to the bible use.

That's pretty neat. In Persian the same word means face and over.

For what little it's worth the Swedish translation has "equal to" or "next to" (the word covers both meanings)

[Berzerker]

Are you claiming that Abraham, the father of the Israelites was a polytheist?

I believe you will find your answer in Joshua 24:2-6. Upon entering the Promised Land Joshua gives a speech about their history and he tells the Israelites their Fathers served other gods in the land between the two rivers - thats Abram and his lineage, Terah, etc... Of course that was before Abraham was called to participate in a war and the covenant with God.

Matt

In regards to the golden calf cult around Moses time, I thought that the destruction of the golden calf was symbolic of Moses saying that it was the end of the age of Taurus, with the sacrificing of rams being the symbolic start of the beginning of the age of Aries.

yup, but it all goes back to the Sumerian pantheon of 12 gods and division of the sky... Taurus is a large constellation, larger than the mathematical age it represents (1/12 of 360 degrees or 2160 years) while Aries the Ram is small. Technically (mathematically) Aries began while Taurus was still being observed - kinda like we're in Pisces but we look forward to the age of Aquarius. This led to conflicts, not just the example with Moses, but since peoples believed the gods had their own constellations the followers of the Bull gods were being pushed out by the Ram's followers, I mean the god of Aries. The Sumerian myths talk about the wars between Marduk (the Ram) and Enlil and his son Ninurta (Taurus). Ea is Aquarius I think, or Pisces - the Sumerians depicted him as a fish but he's also shown with streams of water pouring from him.

I don't mean to mean this as Moses or the others being believers in occultic astrology, but the use of zodiac constellations as like a large way of recording time periods for history. Note that when Jesus sacrifices himself he becomes the lamb, a symbol of the end of the age of Aries, and his teaching his disciples to be 'fishers of men' and feeding people with 'loaves and fishes' being symbolic teaching of the beginning of the age of Piecses, fishes in that constellation also being the old symbol for Christians in later time periods.

Nice, and we keep finding fish on the floors of temples etc from that era. All those people were into the Zodiac and the notion of heavenly fate...

[SlowwHand]

Heavenly plan, not fate. Semantics.

[Berzerker]

fate, destiny - they did have slightly different meanings back then. One could be changed, the other could not. Not sure which "plan" would be associated with today, I cant even remember which one could be changed and I just read it a few days ago

[Alinestra Covelia]

because women are supposed to suffer for all time because of some dumb **** some umpteenth-thousand year old dead chick did

Come on, have some respect for Anna Nicole Smith.

[Zkribbler]

Come on, have some respect for Anna Nicole Smith.

Heavens, no!! Never!!!

[MattBowron]

I thought women were blamed because of famine and plague and crime being based on too many mouths to feed, and so women were blamed because men thought that only women were the reason why children came into being. And hence since a woman's menstrual cycles were seemingly 'controlled' by the moon goddess Sin, when this happened in Sumeria, thus it was because of the Sin of the first woman that led to the problems in the world.

Note also in Greece, the problem of the opening of Pandora's "box". Coincidence?

[FrostyBoy]

I thought women were blamed because of famine and plague and crime being based on too many mouths to feed, and so women were blamed because men thought that only women were the reason why children came into being. And hence since a woman's menstrual cycles were seemingly 'controlled' by the moon goddess Sin, when this happened in Sumeria, thus it was because of the Sin of the first woman that led to the problems in the world.

Note also in Greece, the problem of the opening of Pandora's "box". Coincidence?

hehe, yeah, women suck

[Nikolai]

I simply said I am unaware of any evidence showing that Rachel and her family prayed to idols, and would appreciate seeing the attested evidence.

Genesis mentions thar Rachel stole her father's idols, I don't remember any explicit mention of praying towards them.

[trev]

Rachel stole Laban's (her fathers) idols when Jacob left Laban's house to settle again in Canaan. The possessor of household idols at that time was considered the inheritor of the families assets at the death of the patriarch, so she was trying to get Laban's farm for Jacob when Laban passed on. Soon after Jacob insisted that all idols were thrown out and destroyed so they were never kept for long.
It is probable Rachel did worship the idols also, otherwise it is not likely she would have stolen them, but later Jacob insisted the whole family worship the monotheistic God.