Posted on 11/23/2004 6:11:43 PM PST by blam
Tomb may shed light on 10th plague
By Charles M. Sennott, Globe Staff | November 23, 2004
LUXOR, Egypt — Out of the blinding light of a fall morning here in the Valley of the Kings, American archeologist Kent Weeks led the way down a narrow, stone passageway and into the entrance of a tomb.
Weeks peered his flashlight into the enveloping darkness of ‘‘the hidden tomb,’’ as he calls it, and pressed on through the damp, winding passages toward what may be his archeological team’s most significant find after years of methodical digging, scraping, and brushing.
At the end of a long hallway a human skull rested, propped up in a wooden box, and framed in the bleak light of a bare bulb powered by a generator that rumbled through the stony silence of the tomb.
This skull — Weeks believes, and new scientific evidence suggests — may be that of the oldest son of Rameses II, the pharaoh who most historians agree was the ruler of ancient Egypt more than 3,000 years ago at the time of the biblical story of the Exodus.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Little wonder the jewish slaves were warned to mark their homes with a sign...
That way, you are insured against a sudden, midnight attack of your homes, and the murder of your eldest male children..
( Just brainstorming, I still prefer the "ergot poisoning" theory.. )
Genesis 11 has Abraham coming from Ur, which is usually identified with the city by that name in southern Iraq. In the Septuagint version Abraham is said to be from "the land of the Chaldaeans" but no city name is given. The Chaldaeans or Chaldees were the later (1st millennium B.C.) inhabitants of Babylonia (southern Iraq).
A damp tomb, huh? In the Valley of the Kings?
Lots of rot, then. Not likely much remained.
Is this just ''colorful'' language, or is it accurate?
The ''Valley'' was picked for it's arid conditions, which
kept the mummies as mummies...not black squash.
Lot of writer's imiagination to sift through.
Speaking of Cheops Burial chamber, you had to climb up
a wooden ladder laid along the floor and once in the room,
devoid of ventilation except for two miserable fans, you
could hardly breathe. No wonder you laid prone.
And until the Bible can tell me where Adam's sons got their wives....
"If indeed the skull discovered by Weeks is that of the crown prince of Rameses II, historians and archeologists are left to ponder how the deep fracture in his skull occurred."
God smacked him in the head.
The secular community has long attacked the biblical date for Exodus as part of an overall effort to refute the Bible. The chronological schedule is important and the accurate date is significant because as archological discoveries appear they confirm the accuracy of the biblical record--we have the opportunity to fit correctly dated information into the schedule.
The Bible chronology puts Exodus at 1461 BC (in early April). No doubt. No argument. I Kings 6:1: Solomon commenced construction of the Temple 480 years after Exodus. Solomon's date (fixed by counting backwards from destruction of the Temple by Nebuchadnezar in 588 BC through the Kings) was 981 BC (less 480 years is 1461 BC). The Exodus date also can be linked through extrinsic evidence and Biblical events which can be accurately dated to the same 1461 BC date.
Thus the pharaoh of the Exodus was Amenhotep II (1462 BC-1438 BC) son of Thutmose III; the pharaoh's daughter who raised Moses, Hatshepsut gave him a name associated with the dynesty of Thutmose.
The "Habiru" referenced in the Amarna tablets (communications between local sub kings in Cannan and Amenhotep III and Amenhotep IV--Akhenaton, 1429 through 1364) are the Hebrew invaders.
There is no evidence to support a date as late as the 13th century (1200-1299) for the events in Egypt or the conquest of Cannan. Didn't happen then--as the revisionsts concede; that is the purpose for putting it there. Only time the Exodus fits the geopolitical and physical history of the area is the first half of the fifteenth century.
Ramses II was of course a 13th Century Pharaoh--his kid got hit in the head and died; nothing to do with the tenth plague.
Interestingly enough, if Amenhotep II, pharaoh of the Exodus, had been firstborn son of Thutmose III, Amenhotep II would have died in the tenth plague--identification of the mummy of Amenemhat at Deir el-Bahri as the first born son of Thutmose III, in a coffin bearing the title "king, Lord of Two Lands, Amenemhat" confirming him as the first born son, identified by xrays as having died about two years of age, confirms this thesis also.
The Sphinx Stela identifies Thutmose IV as a son of Amenhotep II not in the direct line to succede him, confirming that another son was the then successor under circumstances where Thutmose IV in fact succeded Amenhotep II--Amenhotep II was not succeded by his first born son.
See we don't need secular explanations for how the wind parted the sea; or somebody hit the first born son in the head--God did this stuff exactly as He tells us He did it in His Word. Do we think that God would not have the power to do these things? Of course He does.
I was there in the early 60's.
Ur is a hundred miles inland today, when Abraham lived there, it was a seaside town.
Based on that possibility, do I really want scientists opening and messing around with an otherwise sealed tomb containing remnants from that event?
kinda like how I felt when scientists announced that they were trying to dig up victims of the Spanish Flu to "investigate" that little event. OK, just 18 to 20 million people died in 1918. No big deal. That was without jet travel. How much of the population of Egypt died in this little biomedical/Biblical event? You think maybe a person getting on a plane with the 10th plague of Egypt and changing planes in Atlanta might be an issue!
A little!
If you're alive today, you're immune to it. What-ever the plague was is still with us...we survived.
It's the new stuff that is mutating in Asia that you should worry about...Bird Flu's and such.
Genesis 5:4 And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:
Adam (and probably Eve) lived over 900 years. They had sons and daughters. Brothers would have married sisters (or cousins or nieces). Given the long lifespans, brothers and sisters would not necessarily have grown up with each other. Assuming the Ante-Diluvian folks had less defects in their chromosomes - marriage between close relatives would not have caused the birth defects that they would cause today. And given the long lifespans prior to the Flood, the assumption that there were defects in the genetic material is plausible.
One of the most feared scenarios in the study of diseases is stumbling across an ancient plague victim who was the last of the 100% to die of that disease. This thinking is even part of the model for why things like Ebola haven't spread worldwide. Besides being too fragile they are, more importantly, too efficient at killing their hosts. Put bluntly the poor buggers who get Ebola and related diseases die before they can get far enough to spread the disease.
Well, there are plagues far more deadly than Ebola, but like that disease they killed their victims before they coukd spread it far. What if we dig up victims of such a plague and decide we should examine them at Columbia Pres or in Paris?
Folks who study this even use the phrase The 10th Plague as shorthand for this happening.
I'll never forget the one lecture I took in, Crete was a prominant aspect of the topic (I forget what it was), but during the question and answer session afterwards, I posed a highly technical archeaological question to the speaker (could've been Weeks for all know). When to my suprise, one of the audience members, who happened to be my former history teacher at the local community college (later becoming the head of the History Department there) and a quite avid Egyptologist (although her doctorate thesis was on the affect of secret societies in France on Frencch government during the period June of 1781 to April of 1783), who unbeknownst to me was present at that lecture.
Anyways, she felt compelled to interject, during the utter silence audible throughout the audience and from the speaker, "Mr. Speaker, do not feel compelled to answer the question. The person who asked it was a former pupil of mine and knows full well what people that live on Crete are called They are Cretans, Ray." She said that from the front row, directly in front of the speaker, and turning around and looking right at me about 10 or twelve rows back. Man the audacity of that woman. About two seconds of silence remained, before the whole place was in an uproar of laughter.
Anyways, here's Kent Weeks' web-site:
art bell ping
That only affects the firstborn? I mean, if you are going to throw out the main details of the story, why not throw out the whole thing?
Isn't there a waterline on that pyramid and the Sphinx?
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
The GGG Digest -- Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.