Neo-Babylonian Judaism: Approaching a Theology of Transcendence – discovering the Creator-Godhead Exists beyond ‘Time and Space’
by sprincipe2012
Introduction
Irrespective of religious affiliation, modern Bible readers appreciate that The Hebrew Bible centres around the One Lord God, and how He revealed His mysterious being to His people. It wasn’t until the people of Judah were forced into exile during the 6th century BCE that priests proclaimed the Godhead’s higher metaphysical Being, or, to quote Ezekiel, “ the Glory of the Lord.” This was how God appeared in Ezekiel’s first faint vision. Let us call their new theological perspectives on the Divine Being of their Lord God – Transcendent Monotheism. As part of Transcendent Monotheism, the priests and people realized that their ancestors’ God was the Creator of the heavens and the earth, and his dwelling-place was Eternity. They believed that since God continued generating life on earth, there was still a divine possibility of restoring earth’s natural balance through prayer and worship.
Timeless Dimensions of the Eternally Existing Godhead – Far-Seeing beyond the predicaments of everyday earthly life
As we see in the mid-6th century BCE writings of the Second Isaiah, the Transcendent Godhead’s higher purpose for his people is often hidden from them. Specifically, our human anxieties and frailties obscure our understanding, and the result is texts like Second Isaiah, which are full of the unfathomable mystery of God’s perceived oversight of their hardships.
As quoted below (Isa 55:6-9), prayerful appeals to God are encouraged, especially ‘whenever he is near’ to overcome our fears and enhance our Godly understanding.
“ Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near… return to the Lord, that he may have mercy.. and to our God for he will abundantly pardon…’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Ancient Visions of God, still alive today
As we shall see, chronological indications are important to modern biblical scholars, whether Judaist or Christian. Major sections of the Hebrew Bible consist of histories of the people of Israel (descendants of the patriarch Jacob renamed ‘Israel’ by an angel), which went back to Moses and even further back to Abraham (ca. 2000 BCE). These scriptural records were put together by two sets of Judaist scholars: Deuteronomists in the 7th-6th centuries BCE, and then Priestly writers/editors, mid-6th-mid-5th centuries BCE (Babylonian exile). Surprisingly, the latter group recovered more archaic, patriarchal materials, perhaps legendary rather than entirely accurate historically. Yet, the One God who was first known to Abraham in Canaan, as the legacy of Sinai wanderings became known to Moses as YAHWEH, 2nd millennium BCE. Then the Lord God began to shape them into becoming “a kingdom of priests, a holy nation” (Exodus 19:3-4, sourced in Yahwist and Elohist older traditions ).
Deuteronomist historians did not anticipate the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem and deportations of Judahites in the 6th century BCE. Deuteronomist pre-histories from Moses through to the era of kings may have largely fabricated Joshua’s numerous conquests in Canaan. Yet the Book of Joshua recorded an event which spoke to the enduring sanctification of the Land of Canaan – blessed by the Lord God, with the performance of worship of the Lord at Mount Ebal in Canaan (as instructed by Moses Deut. 27).
Here is some personal testimony to the above biblically memorable event, which I relate to a vision (Christmas 2004) while traveling through the West Bank on the road leading up to Palestinian Jenin. Somewhere along that road, empty of traffic, from the back of the taxi when I happened to look up, amazingly – I saw, in faint outline, a Giant Hand with arm extend into the higher rockface of the mountain cliff – effectively dissolving the top of the mountain into brilliant light. Quite overcome, I had no insight into any meaning.
Now, by applying some study to the approximate location of that mysterious vision of light up on the mountain top, I would like to suggest that ‘the Hand of God’ continues to imprint blessings upon the ‘Holy Land’ of Israel-Palestine. I found some confirmation as follows, starting with a quotation from Joshua 8:30-35, of the inclusiveness of God’s blessings.
“Then Joshua built on Mount Ebal an altar to the Lord, the God of Israel, just as Moses had commanded … an altar of unhewn stones, no iron tool .. and they offered on it burnt offerings … All Israel, alien as well as citizens, stood on opposite sides of the ark in front of the Levitical priests carrying the ark of the covenant, half of them in front of Mount Gerizim and half in front of Mount Ebal … that they should bless the people of Israel…”
The Book of Deuteronomy (written 7th century BCE) does not include others than the twelve tribes of Israel (Deut. 27). But Joshua’s text refers to “all Israel, alien as well as citizens.” those present for the ceremonial blessing upon the land. Does this not argue for the Lord God’s view of the ‘unitary character’ of these lands (modern Israel-Palestine), which, as in David’s time, continue to be inhabited by peoples of differing ethnicity, even of differing religious affiliations?
The New Oxford Annotated Bibe (NOAB 2010: 332) in a footnote, identifies Ebal and Gerizim as two mountains that flank the pass of Shechem.in central Canaan.In Rasmussen’s Essential Atlas of the Bible (2013:36-37) he notes thatat Shechem, in Genesis 12:6-7, the patriarch Abraham (then Abram) built an altar and worshipped the Lord, receiving God’s promise to give him this land. And later, Jacob when travelling the same country heading north, in flight from his brother, at Bethel dreamed in the night of angels ascending and descending a staircase to heaven (Gen. 28:12). I looked up on the Internet the location of ‘Jacob’s Well,’ geography also associated with ancient Shechem in the West Bank, Palestine today, which was near the entrance to the pass between Mounts Ebal and Gerizim. I recall that sometime before the above vision, I noticed in the distant fields a sign in Hebrew and English denoting ‘Jacob’s Well.’
Another biblical geographic setting hallowed by the Lord God lies somewhere in the Sinai Desert. Returning to the Lord God of the Hebrew Scriptures, we find YHWH, speaking to Moses at the Burning Bush, “Holy Ground” in that desert land. The Lord God declared His Name using the Hebrew verb for ‘to be,’ which is curiously obscure in meaning. “I AM THAT I AM,” ehyeh asher ehyeh… translated by some into English as ‘God’s self-existence.’ ‘Judaist scholar Norman Gottwald (The Hebrew Bible 1985:211) sees the Divine Name, Yahweh enlarged in these passages, connecting further“with the Elohim of Abraham, Isaac and Joseph..”
This One God, Who came to be thought of transcendent, eternal ‘Being,’ remains the foundation of the faith of Israelites/Jews, Christians and Muslims. Long after Moses, the One God known to both Moses and Abraham inspired ‘the Priestly Writer/s of the Exile,’ or ‘P’ as modern scholars’ refer to this unknown, neo-Babylonian Theologian. In Genesis1, P thought upon the Lord God as the Original Creator, the ‘Designer’ of the cosmos, sun, moon and stars, the earth and every living thing on it. Thus the Original Creator existed beyond all earthly time.
Judahite deportees at Babylon (exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon from 586-539 BCE), especially the priesthood, couldn’t pursue daily temple observances. They must have looked up into the swirling skies, like the young priest Ezekiel, soon flown in the spirit to the Jerusalem Temple to see its coming fiery destructions. Ezekiel at Babylon still professed allegiance to an ancient ‘Zion Theology.’ This was the belief that God had dwelt especially in the Jerusalem Temple. But he learned from further heaven-sent visions that the Lord God, Whom he envisioned as “the Glory of the Lord,” was departing from Jerusalem to be with His people in Babylon. Nevertheless, as we shall see, Ezekiel stayed away as far as possible from ascribing human form to the Divine Apparition, describing the “appearance of the Glory of the Lord” in keeping faith with Ex. 33:22, the Lord warning Moses he could not see His ‘Face’ and live, which chapter Gottwald (1985:184) assigns to an old Elohist tradition.
The Priestly Writer’s Recovery of the Garden of Eden, Babylonian Context
P retrieved the genealogy of Abraham and Sarah, writing in Genesis 11:27-31,“… who went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan.” They settled at Haran first, after fleeing the chaos of their native Ur. The Lord guided Abraham through the Fertile Crescent to settle in the Land of Canaan. By going far back in historic times, Judaist scholars expanded not just their history as a people guided by God, but their conception of the Divine oversight of generations of lives. P incorporated into Genesis 15: 4-6, the famously symbolic vision from God to Abraham of the stars in the sky, representing his innumerable descendants
As Judaist scholars at Babylon compiled their collections of disparate writings of the Hebrew Scriptures, they recovered the mythic tale of the Garden of Eden, Genesis 2-4. Modern scholars attribute this version, which represents its own literary creationist ideas, to a Yahwist historian of David and Solomon’s time. It builds on P’s Genesis 1 account of the Divine Creation, and could well have applied to the landscape of southern Mesopotamia, then a paradise of burgeoning growth. Abraham’s birth at Ur (ca. 2000 BCE) has helped anchor archeological understanding of Mesopotamian history. They see that the region was once lush with vegetation. Fourth millennium Sumerians cultivated grain, orchards, and grasslands to raise livestock. The result was a fully-fledged Sumerian civilization that lasted from ca. 3,500 to 2000 BCE.
Uncovering evidence of this civilization has been a goal of archeologists for years. There is extensive evidence of its ruined palaces, temples and ziggurats dedicated to specific deities. Modern scholars think that ca. the mid-fourth millennium BCE, geological changes occurred next to the Persian Gulf which enabled the growth of each different city-state sustained by productive agriculture. Sumerians originated in the far east; Woolley ( 1965:7-8) posits that they were likely incomers into the Delta “from the sea,” perhaps from as far away as the Valley of the Indus. Under Sumerian governance, the region’s civilization accelerated. For instance, a pair of temples in one city were the focal point of agricultural dedication to the gods during autumn festivals. Then, ca. 2000 BCE, the city of Ur was overthrown by Semitic invaders from the north and west, and around 1800 BCE, Semitic Old Babylonia emerged as a regional power.
Geophysicist Lance Weaver (Internet paper ‘’Could the Ice Ages have been True Polar Wandering Events,’ Sept. 2020) reports that the growth of early Mesopotamian civilization, as well as in Egypt, was possible after the rapid deglaciations in the northern continents. Sometime roughly 13,000 years ago, the inception of milder and warmer conditions caused the melting of ice fields. Weaver attributes this to the northern geographic pole shifting northwards, and suggests it could have been triggered by an asteroid strike.
With Weaver’s theory we might suppose the whole Fertile Crescent enjoyed something like the mid-latitude, climate zones of Europe with heavily forested landscapes. In this 21st century, the 40° north parallel latitude runs through the Mediterranean Sea as it heads into regions like Israel-Palestine to the east, lands generally facing desertification, like Iraq, for instance. Along with global warming, many other parts further in eastern, southern and western continents suffer from overheating and drought or wildfires. Coastal areas suffer excessive flooding, and mountain glaciers send rivers of melt-water into flood plains.
Restorations? Oracular Prophecies from Post-Exilic Second Zechariah
The post-exilic Book of Zechariah features writing by an unknown prophet, Chapters 13-14 ascribed to the Second Zechariah. He delivered the Words of the Lord in phrases like, “The day of the Lord to come … so many unsettling geological changes, floods, .. warfare…plagues… panic… But survivors will still go up year after year to worship the “King, the Lord of Hosts, and to keep the festival of booths.” (Zech, 14:16). During the autumn festival of Booths, Jews lived in forest-huts for days, remembering ancestors’ sojourn in the desert of Sinai. In Zechariah 14:2-21, his prophecy of ‘restorations’ used simple motifs: “On that day there shall be inscribed on the bells of the horses, ‘Holy to the Lord’…. And every cooking pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be sacred to the Lord of hosts…. For all the sacrifices of boiled flesh in every household.”
In view of the antiquity of Ezekiel’s Zion Theology, at pilgrimage-festivals such as Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles (Booths), the Jews recited a prayer for the peace of Jerusalem taken from Psalm 122:6-9. They gathered from everywhere to approach the Temple as “the house of the Lord… where the thrones of judgment were set up …” reciting this prayer.
“Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: May they prosper who love you. Peace be within your walls, and security within your towers. For the sake of my relatives and friends I will say, ‘Peace be within you. For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your good.”
Jerusalem, as Jesus observed, was the City of the Great King (in view of its ethnic diversity?)
“Do not swear, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King [David].” (Mt. 5:35)
See the above phrasing of Jesus’ language taken from Psalm 110, “…[David’s] enemies made a footstool,” plus other lines, David “.. a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” Matthew begins his gospel, 1:1-17. with Jesus’ genealogy, starting with Jesus, “son of David.” One wonders if Matthew, the gospeler rooted in Judaist traditions, was tempted to quote Jesus’ views on the social-political idealism of David’s kingdom. Both the books of Samuel and Kings describe cross-ethnic relationships under David and Solomon’s monarchies. Considering differing ethnicities that prevailed in David’s city, Jesus’ words may have anticipated the early Christian conversions throughout the broader region.
Modern scholars use the term ‘inter-textuality’ to compare an idea from one text with a similar idea in the literature preceding it. Within modern scholars’ studies of the Hebrew Scriptures, we find important themes recur, despite revisions to our understanding of texts and translations. On the founding of Jerusalem, which David devoted to YHWH’s cult, he took the Ark of the Covenant into the city so that Jerusalem was made holy- ‘The City of God’ – its historic sanctity implied by Jesus.
Moreover, regarding Jerusalem, ‘Inter-textuality’ takes us back to the patriarch Abraham’s visit to the site then called ‘Salem.’ Melchizedek ruled Salem as priest-king, and offered hospitality to Abraham. (See the New Testament work, ‘Letter to the Hebrews’(5:5-6), by referring back to Psalm 110:4, he calls Jesus as “ a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.” Within David’s kingdom, Jerusalem as the new centre of Israelite faith, was home to all indigenous inhabitants, Israelite or non-Israelite. Deuteronomist historians contemporaneous to the Judean King Josiah (late 7th century BCE) bear this out.
This isn’t surprising; King David was descended from a non-Israelite grandmother, Ruth. She was a Moabite who married into the tribe of Judah and kept her husband’s faith after his death, and famously followed her mother-in-law, Naomi, to Canaan. So it’s unlikely that David was perturbed by the intermingling of Israelites and non-Israelites in Jerusalem. When David became king over Jerusalem, his royal court involved relationships with various peoples. One story (unfortunately) tells that David sent the Hittite, Uriah, into the fore-front of the Israelite battle lines to his certain death. Then David took the widow Bathsheba to wife, and she became mother of David’s son, King Solomon. Later Deuteronomist historians criticized Solomon for going too far with marrying foreign wives/concubines and for building temples to their gods and worshiping in their temples. The Deuteronomists believed this was why the United Monarchy fell apart and became two separate kingdoms when Solomon died.
Notably, David appointed two state priests, Abiathar and Zadok, who, according to Gottwald (1965:321) “may have represented respectively the old Israelite and new Canaanite components of the territorial state of Israel.” Zadok is best known to the lay-person because of his prominence in an anthem written by Handel based on 1Kings: 34-45 and dedicated to a British king’s coronation. Interestingly, the exilic period Ezekiel was a Zadokite priest, although there is minimal discussion of this by historians.
During the Babylonian Exile of the sixth century, ‘Priestly’ writers retrieved archaic accounts of their original ancestor Abraham. According to modern Mesopotamian archaeological historians, since Abraham came from Ur, he was likely of Sumerian ethnicity. Woolley notes (1965:6) “Judging by their physical type, they were of the Indo-European stock, in appearance not unlike the modern Arab, and were certainly well developed intellectually.” Abraham, Sarah and family may not have been ‘Semites’ like others: e.g. Canaanites, Assyrians and Babylonians.
Historicity of the Abrahamic Covenant: Jewish and Arab Descendants
Genesis 16 says Abraham’s paternity passed on to the Arab peoples through Abraham’s mating with his wife Sarah’s hand-maiden, the Arab woman Hagar. Archaeologist Leonard Woolley explains it was Sumerian practice to substitute a servant-woman for a barren wife, enabling men to produce heirs. So, Ishmael, son of Hagar and Abraham, became an ancestor of modern-day Arab people. Whereas, Isaac, son of Sarah and Abraham, became the progenitor of Jewish descendants. An angel rescued Hagar and Ishmael perishing for lack of water in the Arabian desert; Abraham and Sarah were blessed with birth of Isaac by angels who appreciated their offering of hospitality. Jews and Arabs adhere to the Abraham Covenant regarding circumcision of male infants, and are fervent monotheists deriving from patriarchal times.
With all of that in mind, the question arises as to why Judaist leaders, Ezra and Nehemiah, decried Judahites inter-marrying (as had been the case in David-Solomon’s time) with non-Jews? They didn’t just disapprove; They forbade it. Coming from Judahite exile in Babylonia, they were familiar with Abraham’s legendary origins in Mesopotamia, “born at Ur.” In other words, they realized Abraham was a Sumerian belonging to that ancient noble civilization. Did they wish to preserve the historicity of their Abrahamic ancestry sanctified by God and His angels?
Furthermore (according to archaeological assumptions ), Abraham would have been raised within the Lands of Sumer, a citizen of a theocratic state. Each city-state honoured the supremacy of their deity, e.g. the moon-god Nannar ruled the Third Dynasty of Ur. This idea that the gods of the cosmos and nature ruled people’s lives was subsequently transposed onto Judaism. P’s writings in the Torah emphasize ‘the Sovereignty of their Lord God’ over their lives, and the emphasis remains across a variety of monotheist traditions today.
Melchizedek, king of Salem, gave Abraham the beautiful ancient Semitic name, El Elyon, meaning “God most High,” the deity worshipped at Salem. Sometimes, the later Hebrew writers attached ‘Elyon’ to speak of the ‘Most High’ – YHWH. Abraham, through his trust in the higher guidance of God, was moving towards Monotheism, and away from the Sumerian practice of worshiping a pantheon of gods. Once Old Babylonia was established ca, 1800 BCE, a Semitic power in the region, they retained inheritance of most Sumerian institutions, including polytheism. Later neo-Assyrians, and then neo-Babylonians, branched out into astronomical studies, developing systematic astronomical record-keeping in view of their belief that stellar patterns and changes signalled divine messages or signs from the gods. Star-gazers constantly watched celestial changes, especially eclipse and recorded them for the emperor. For this reason, they developed their exacting calendrical methods of time-keeping.
Identifying authors of the Hebrew Scriptures with the modern Documentary Hypothesis
The Documentary Hypothesis of modern scholars identifies four major authors of Scriptures:
The Yahwist, ‘J,’ goes back to the United Monarchy, 1000 -9th centuries BCE.
The Elohist, ‘E,’ slightly later dating, 9th century BCE.
The Deuteronomist, ‘D,’ wrote (or edited) Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings, up to the late 7th century BCE (with some revisions, up to 561 BCE)
The Priestly Writer/s of the Exile, ‘P,’ are credited with major contributions to Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers (four of the five Books of Moses), dates 550-450 BCE.
Modern scholars compare language usage in Deuteronomy (the fifth Book of Moses) to the modeling of neo-Assyrian treaty obligations between ruler and vassals. They surmise that Deuteronomist Historians, ‘DH,’ compiled the histories that form ‘the Former Prophets:’ end-of life Moses, Joshua’s leadership, period of the judges through kings to the post-Samaria era. Earlier in the late 8th century BCE, neo-Assyrians had captured Samaria, capital of the Northern Kingdom, Israel, which came to an end. During the 7th century BCE, DH, perhaps refugees from the north, encouraged King Josiah in Judah to undertake religious reform, who responded by centralizing the cult at Jerusalem. When Josiah led an army up to Megiddo to recover some northern lands, he was shot in the eye by an arrow and died. Shortly afterwards, a neo-Babylonian army came to Jerusalem, in 586 BCE, they burned the Temple created by Solomon.
The Torah works put together by the Priestly tradition at Babylon are extraordinarily rich with fruitful and inspirational depictions – for, in keeping with Ezekiel’s term, “The Glory of the Lord” the Lord God was invisibly Present among them. YHWH-Elohim known to Moses still endured in the minds of the Judaist exiles. Thus P went back into the Israelite times in the Sinai, and then farther back to Abraham, the patriarch. In the end, going farther back in time, as we see in Genesis 1, P conceived of the Godhead in primordial time, envisioning the Creation of sun, moon, stars and all living creatures on earth, including humankind. This was P’s answer to the neo-Babylonian Epic… “when on high … a crudely fashioned mythic treatment of a divine-warrior Marduk splitting apart the body of a sea-monster to separate out heaven from the earth.
P’s intellectual and spiritual journey took him up into eternal realms of the Lord God. It was as though he were viewing the Creation of life on earth by this Highest Divinity, dwelling in heavenly spheres beyond ‘human time’ in ‘Timelessness’ itself, attainable in moments of quieted consciousness when ‘Time’ seemingly stands still. This Being, metaphysically Divine and invisible to human eyes, surpassed neo-Babylonian astronomers’ maps of changes observed in the sun, moon, planets and stars that they identified symbolically with deities.
Spiritual Inspirations: The Words of God for humanity found in Genesis 1:26-27
P marvelled at the Divine Creation by the Lord God of all heaven and earth, which held at its heart, a metaphysical mystery for the human Spirit, and illuminated in Genesis 1:26. It was as if P over-heard the Voice of speaking; at one moment, God said to the assembled hosts of heaven regarding the newly created humankind, “Let us make mankind in our image …So God created humankind in his image..” The New Oxford Annotated Bible (2010:12), in a footnote observes, “Image, likeness is often interpreted to be a spiritual likeness between God and Humanity.” Another view is that the text builds on the king with authority to rule; “This appearance equips humans for god-like rule over fish, birds and animals.” Nevertheless, in contrast, the NOAB editor on the Primeval History finds the theme of “Prevention of god-like immortality… or spreading of peoples (Gen. 10:1-11) as the divine preventing people gaining godlike power..”
I think of P as the singular author of the masterpiece Genesis 1: 1-26, and as someone aspiring to commune with the Spirit of the Supremely Divine, Being of God. What’s more, he conceived that the Godhead gave humanity the potential for attaining, however rarely, the ‘over-sight’ to view earth with the same heavenly gaze as the Creator, if we can look past our earthy affairs.
Neo-Assyrian Inspirations: Divided Monarchy Period of Israel and Judah
During the 7th century BCE, Deuteronomists incorporated Joshua’s presumed conquests over most of Canaan; regarding Joshua 11:16-23, archaeologists specify perhaps Jericho, Ai and Hazor. Paradoxically, the Deuteronomists added into the Book of Judges several battles of Israelites with indigenous peoples and Transjordanian people, clearly not fully conquered by Joshua. (Judges 6, Gideon questioned the Lord, why Midian, needed re-claiming.) A quasi-astronomical theme appears in Joshua. After his army destroyed the soldiers of ‘five kings of the Amorites,’ including Jerusalem; then Joshua, 10:12, exulting over his victories, sang, “Sun, stand still at Gibeon and the Moon stop in the valley of Aijalon.. 10, 12…” Did this poetic appeal to celestial bodies relate to Assyrian astronomers, pre-occupied with lunar eclipses interpreted as possible demise of a king?
Deuteronomist historians could not forget the ruthless seizure of Samaria by neo-Assyrian commanders, Shalmaneser V and son, Sargon II. Perhaps DH began to assimilate ideas of neo-Assyrianism – driven towards systematic conquests of lands beyond their own geography. In the north Semitic region (Iraq today) each conqueror built a new city to glorify his victorious gains. The king of the Northern Kingdom, Jehu (842-815 BCE) is depicted in a neo-Assyrian tablet kneeling in obeisance to the reigning emperor, vassal to Shalmaneser III.
Neo-Assyrian conqueror, Ashurnasirpal II, a ruthless killer, perhaps a landscape visionary
At the beginning of Neo-Assyrian rise to power, Ashurnasirpal II (his dates are not far from Solomon) was notable. There is mention in the Hebrew Bible of Ashurnasirpal II’s city, Nimrud (Nimrod), Kalhu in Assyrian. Nimrod is described as a mighty hunter before the Lord. Elsewhere, there is reference to Nimrod, as though using the neo-Assyrian conqueror’s biblical-name to people he encountered on his way to the Mediterranean Sea. At his city, Kalhu he built a wonderful palace and highly decorated temple, ostensibly to the sun and moon, but actually to Ashur, the deity he served. Far from being a celestial being, Ashur was a war god, considering Ashurnasirpal II’s predilection for warfare. Archeologists were shocked to find records of the people and livestock killed by Ashurnasirpal under the temple; these deaths were offerings by the king to his chosen and blood-thirsty deity.
On the Internet, images are shown of ‘the Winged Genie of Assyria,’ with particular mention of examples from Ashurnasirpal II and Sargon II. An angelic being bears a rather stern visage, in contrast with his wonderous beneficence to all nature. This figure wears great wings and it’s as though he gazes down on us. In one hand he carries a water bucket and in the other an acorn. Is he a kind of ‘tree-planter,’ emblematic of tall forests existing in lands of the Fertile Crescent?
Norman Gottwald on the Documentary Hypothesis: (J), €, (D) and (P)
Scottish historian, Diarmaid MacCulloch (2009:63), reflects on the neo-Babylonian context that became an important influence on Judahites at Babylon. He supposes P writers would have been impressed by neo-Babylonian astronomical ideas.
“Regarding the increasing volume of sacred writings added in this Second Temple period… for the exiled community in Babylon… it mat have been the fact that the scene of their exile was Babylon on the River Euphrates that led them to cherish the idea that the Patriarch Abram had come to their Promised Land from Ur, a city then near the mouth of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. They learned ancient tales, like the story well known throughout the Middle East about a great flood, and incorporated them into their own narrative of the ancient past. Jews still in Babylon picked up an interest in the long Babylonian tradition of observing and speculating on the stars and planets, and began contributing their own thoughts on the subject.” [Emphasis mine.]
It is worthwhile to rehash some of the Documentary Hypothesis, which Gottwald (The Hebrew Bible1985:137-141) sees as connecting the four different authors: J, E, D and P. He begins by acknowledging that “Historical-critical study has identified four major literary hands at work in the growth of the traditions…” pertaining to the ‘Law and the Former Prophets’ [the latter consisting of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings].
The Yahwist (J, for German Jahwist) is the source for the Garden of Eden tale, dating to 960-930 BCE, and such J literary sources are found in Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, and may also exist in Joshua and Judges. In David and Solomon’s time these writings may have constituted a national or Judean epic. It’s possible J was in government service, identified by his calling the God of Israel by the name YAHWEH.
The Elohist (E) wrote at the start of the divided monarchy, ca. 900-850 BCE, and he recounted stories of the patriarchs. E is sourced in Genesis, Exodus and Numbers, and perhaps Joshua (conquests) and Judges. E used the name Elohim for the God of Israel in the period before Moses, who received God’s Name as YAHWEH. This author, E. lived in the northern kingdom of Israel, and likely had close connections to the circles of Elijah and Elisha.
Gottwald thinks that Deuteronomist historians, he calls (DH) (or D, author of Deuteronomy), perhaps began in the north as early as E. As traditionalists, they impressed obedience to the covenant with YAHWEH on the people. By the end of the northern kingdom in 722 BCE, sympathizers in Judah held onto to Deuteronomic traditions, encouraging King Josiah’s reforms. Once in Babylonian exile, D, or DH, began revising history again: Moses’ laws before his death, the conquest of Canaan, histories of the united and divided kingdoms, and ending in the exile, a date identified as 561 BCE (prior to P).
Gottwald believes the Priestly writer (P, his dates 550-450 BCE) made a major contribution to the “national epic,” evident from Genesis through Numbers. P supplemented older traditions with materials that “underscore the institutional and ritual constitution of Israel as a religious community uniquely separated from all other peoples.” Likely Gottwald is thinking of Ex.19:3-4, when God told Moses his people would become “a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.” Gottwald says, P wrote: “A well-ordered account of creation [i.e. Genesis 1]… sabbath observance … instructions on the priesthood and sacrifices.” Most of the last half of Exodus comes from P, and all of Leviticus, “to strengthen a Priestly tradition in late monarchic, exilic and postexilic Israel.”
Unlike MacCulloch, quoted above, who believes the astronomical context at Babylon stimulated P’s thoughts on celestial phenomena, as in Genesis 1, Gottwald does not credit neo-Babylonians’ perspective on the cosmic systems as particularly significant. In Ezekiel’s visions, Gottwald, reflecting probably on the winged cherubim sees this cosmology as related to “Assyro-Babylonian traditions.” (1985:487)
Missing from Gottwald’s socio-historic theory is ‘the Supernatural,’ as in Ezekiel I-II
We read Ezekiel Chapter 1, lines 1-28, as his vision of the supernatural appearance of Divinity – as supra-cosmic imagery of greater radiance he called the Glory of the Lord. (See in Sinai times, “.. the Glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.. ”, Ex. 40:34, which Gottwald assigns to P). The representation of the Spiritual essence of the God of Israel is in keeping with Ezekiel’s ‘Zion Theology.’ Editor Stephen Cook in the NOAB (2010: 1159-1162) introduces Ezekiel’s prophetic writings as adopted by his school of followers “the Zadokites.” (See the previous reference by Gottwald to Zadok the state priest in David’s and Solomon’s kingdom, likely a Canaanite.) Cook says that the Zadokites controlled the Israelite high priesthood. Cook views the theology of ‘the Holiness School’ infusing Ezekiel’s writing. Ezekiel’s Holliness material can be found in the Pentateuch, and extends beyond the Priestly Writer/s Leviticus “ Holiness Code.’
Ezekiel’s period of prophecy extended from 593-571 BCE. He was one of the early Judean elite deported to Babylon in 597 BCE, and he remained passionately concerned for Jerusalem and its Temple. He foresaw its fiery destruction by Nebuchadnezzar, happened in 586 BCE. By his Zion Theology, he foresaw the temple’s reconstruction in his later chapters. We quote Cook,
“There are clear indications of an originally written composition and intention to preserve the text…. To demonstrate the timeliness and veracity of Ezekiel’s oracles…. The preservation of the Holiness School material mark a breakthrough in the development of written scripture in Israel…”
Furthermore, Cook points out that Ezekiel’s visionary prophecies anticipated writings such as Daniel 7-12 and the Book of Revelation.
What do we see in Ezekiel’s Chapter 1, his vision, which, at first reading, was grounded strongly in cosmic imagery? There’s a storm cloud, great winds in the north, and flashing fire that could be lightening. Some visionaries report that the electric energy from storms can evoke the appearances of otherworldly images and expressive, realistic and colourful figures that would otherwise be invisible to the human eye. Ezekiel records seeing “a vision of God,” over the Chebar river in Babylonia. He saw a bright cloud flashing fire reveal four winged creatures. Each symbolized a change in time, typically associated with the Babylonian calendar and seasons.
As part of the winged cherubim and wheeled assemblage upholding the platform, above which stood Ezekiel’s “vision of God,” each living creature (or cherubim) was given a differing face: a human, an eagle, lion and ox. Apparently two golden sphinxes, carved of olive-wood stood in the Holy of Holies of Solomon’s Temple, with their great wings cast over the Ark of the Covenant (1 Kings 8:21). Likely they were shaped as winged lion, maybe an ox, with humanized faces – Phoenician styled iconography introduced by Solomon’s artists and sculptors.
Modern scholars assume that P inserted into Exodus 25:18 (credited to P by Gottwald) a description of two little gold-covered sphinxes attached to either end of the Ark of the Covenant. The thing is, with respect to the First Commandment’s denial of importance such to animal imagery, in Exodus 25, the Lord God was invisibly Present above the ‘mercy-seat’ between the wings of cherubim – dwelling in that emptiness as His ‘Oracular Presence.
“There I will meet with you, and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the ark of the covenant, I will deliver to you all my commands for the Israelites.”
Accordingly P may have taken from Ezekiel’s vision the corresponding sense that if the Lord God’s Glory was with them, even in Babylonia, it was in the invisible form of His Supernatural Being – above the cosmos. Summarizing Ezekiel 1:22-29 – 2:1-10. He describes the sublime image that he calls “the splendour …the appearance of the glory of the Lord.” He falls on his face but is told to stand up to receive his commission. He is to go to the people of Israel, who have become “a rebellious house.” A scroll unrolls or descends and bears the words, “lamentation, doom and woe.” The glory of the Lord had been shown to Ezekiel in the faintly seen figure above the four creatures. He saw a crystalline dome, sky-like, resembling, “something like a throne, in appearance like sapphire, seated above the likeness of a throne – something like a human form.”
John J. Collins notes (2014: 225) that the latest date in Ezekiel, 571-570 BCE, “is one of the features that relate the book of Ezekiel to the Priestly tradition.” Collins also observes that “the glory of the Lord … glory the symbol of the presence of God in Ezekiel was at pains to emphasize the transcendent, surpassing nature of this God, who cannot be perceived clearly by human eyes.” (2014:227).
Ezekiel’s extraordinary visions of God’s Departure from Jerusalem for Babylon
On the next occasions of Ezekiel’s visions of the Glory of the Lord, 9:3, 10:4, and 11:22-24 (as quoted below), he watched, while still in spirit, the Lord was carried by the cherubim away from Jerusalem, flying on to Babylon.
“Then the cherubim lifted up their wings, with the wheels beside them, and the glory of the God of Israel was above them. And the glory of the Lord ascended from the middle of the city and stopped on the mountain east of the city. The spirit lifted me up in a vision by the spirit of God into Chaldea, to the exiles. Then the vision left me.”
The Presence of the Glory of the Lord with the exiles transformed and enlarged consciousness of space and time, especially priestly groups like Ezekiel’s Holiness School and P’s priestly cult. Judaist historians and scribes were induced, e.g. Ex. 3:6, the Lord God’s words to Moses regarding the God of the patriarchs to explore a deeper religious history back into pre-patriarchal times, Noah’s Flood, and the earth’s original creation.. MacCulloch observes:
“There is little reference to the Patriarchs in the pronouncements of ‘later’ great prophets like Jeremiah, Hosea, or the first prophet known as Isaiah, whose prophetic words date from the 8th and 7th centuries BCE. It is as though these basic stories of Israel’s origins a thousand years before were largely missing from the consciousness of Jeremiah, Hosea and Isaiah, whereas references to the Patriarchs appear abundantly in the material which is of sixth-century or later date. The stories of the Patriarchs post-date [these prophets]… though stories embedded in Genesis are undoubtedly very ancient.” (MacCulloch 2009:51)
Sumerian Priestly Legacy passed on through succeeding Babylonian civilizations
In The Sumerians (1965:192), Mesopotamian archaeologist, Leonard Woolley writes:
“The Jewish religion, as it owed not a little of its origins to the Sumerian, so also was throughout the period of the Kings and the Captivity brought into close contact with the Babylonian worship taken over from Sumer… and partly in opposition to it [the Jewish religion] attained higher growth….The laws of Moses were largely based on Sumerian codes … [see the laws of Hammurabi]… and so from the Sumerians the Hebrews derived the ideals of social life and justice …the modern world owes to this race [the Sumerians], rescued from complete oblivion.”
Talking about pre-Sumerian origins, Woolley’s chapter on ‘The Beginnings,’ (1965:3-4), he quotes from Genesis on the creation of the earth. “Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let dry land appear, and it was so…. earth brought forth grass… herb yielding seed… tree yielding fruit …” Woolley describes how river deposits of soil/silt at the mouth of the Tigris and Euphrates, and other river systems, built up a barrier against salt water, sea surges, so that gradually the marshy waters near the Persian Gulf freshened, and then land appeared like little islands. The soil was extraordinarily fertile, and consequently, Sumerian settlers monitored the rise of floodwaters. This was especially important during the spring, when they held festivals to honour the gods of nature for the fruitful land.
In discussing the theocratic organization of ancient Sumer, Woolley illustrates how the Priestly Writer revived pre-Babylonian traditions that dated back to at least the third millennium BCE. Woolley (1965:129) writes,
“Considering the priesthood … the Sumerian state was essentially theocratic. The god of the city was in reality its king; the human ruler, patesi, was simply his representative – ‘the tenant farmer’ of the god. The king was himself a priest …. deification of kings carried to conclusion the theory they ruled in the name of the god. ..the high priest of one of the larger temples was a person of political importance… Church and state were so intermingled that the State was a theocracy… “
It’s possible that Gottwald rightly argues, some priestly cult existed in Israelite society before its exile. Nevertheless P is credited with writing all of Leviticus, and Chapters 17-26 of the Holiness Code became theologically fundamental to the development of later Judaism, particularly considering its post-exilic governance by the Persians’ appointment of high-priests as governors. Here is one quote of the Words of God, written by P into Leviticus 25:23, which has Sumerian language regarding the Godhead’s ownership of the lands.
“The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants. Throughout the land you hold, you shall provide for the redemption of the land.”[Emphasis mine]
Another instance where P recorded the Lord’s instructions to insure agricultural abundance:
“ You shall make for yourselves no idols and erect no carved images and pillar, and you shall not place figured stones in your land; for I am your Lord God. You shall keep my sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord. If you follow my statues and keep my commandments and observe them faithfully, ‘I will give you rains in their season, and the land shall yield its produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.” (Lev. 26:1-4)
Post-Exilic Jerusalemites learn the Sovereignty of God over the lands;
During 520 BCE, the Judahites return to a ruined Jerusalem, and find the lands largely uncultivated. A minor prophet, Haggai, taught them cautionary Words of the Lord God, recapitulating P’s Leviticus 26:1-4 above. Richard Hess, in his Presbyterian-oriented text on The Old Testament (2016:683-689), views the lines in Haggai, 1;5- 2-8, reveal “the theme of transformations.” In Hess’ words: “God asserts he controls all and will turn the world upside down… God can do great things with small resources that are obedient and dedicated. Holiness and cleanliness were important tenets of agricultural success since the popular belief was that disobedience led to crop failure. Haggai points out that once the people started rebuilding the Second Temple, its presence as the House of the Lord marked the restored fertility of the lands.
In Conclusion:
P’s Transcendent Monotheism introduces the biblical-reader to the enhanced global perspective, as if that of the hosts of heaven in Genesis 1:26, inventively creating and re-creating generations of earthly existences. Let us pause here to remember the Winged Genie of Assyria, as ‘Tree-Planter iconography of the neo-Assyrian era. The image of some richly robed winged being – some angelic-like spirit –the nurturer of forests, trees and natural vegetation. It’s a comforting thought, particularly these days as the world struggles against wildfires, deforestation, animal endangerment, droughts, and frequent, unbearable heatwaves.
Bibliographic Sources
The Holy Bible containing the Old and New Testaments, New Revised Standard Version: Catholic Edition. NRSV. Catholic Bible Press, 1993.
The New Oxford Annotated Bible, New Revised Standard Version With the Apocrypha, An Ecumenical Study Bible. NOAB. Michael Coogan, Editor, Oxford University Press, 2010.
John J. Collins. A Sort Introduction to the Hebrew Bible and Deutero-Canonical Books, Second Edition, Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014.
Norman Gottwald. The Hebrew Bible- A Socio-Literary Introduction, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.
Richard Hess. The Old Testament, A Historical, Theological and Critical Introduction, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2016.
Diarmaid MacCulloch. Christianity, The First Three Thousand Years, England: Penguin Books, 2009.
Carl Rasmussen, Essential Atlas of the Bible Zondervan, 2013 Leonard Woolley. The Sumerians, New York: W.W. Norton and Company, Inc, 1965.
Historical Visions 