A Tale of Two Migdals ...

Josephus tells us, Nimrod and some of his men had planned to build the tower high enough and then defeat God with their army ....

Jesus seems to be very well aware of this:

Luke 14:28 For which of you having a mind to build a tower, doth not first sit down, and reckon the charges that are necessary, whether he have wherewithal to finish it 29 Lest, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that see it begin to mock him, 30 Saying: This man began to build, and was not able to finish. 31 Or what king, about to go to make war against another king, doth not first sit down, and think whether he be able, with ten thousand, to meet him that, with twenty thousand, cometh against him? 32 Or else, whilst the other is yet afar off, sending an embassy, he desireth conditions of peace.

Now, let's recall what Josephus said about Nimrod's motivations. He was trying to save man from another Flood. So, this is in a way a tale of two saviours.

We are waiting for the celebration of the birth of the true one. We are also waiting for His return.

It's a false one who is in Genesis, and another (or according to Rob Skiba even same) false one who'll be on the scene in Apocalypse before Christ returns.

Now, because this blog is very Genesis oriented, just barely strays into Exodus and Joshua for chronology reasons, I have more than once spoken about that first post-Flood false saviour.

What was the exact word used for the tower structure of Nimrod ? It's Migdal.

I looked it up in Hebrew English interlinear, but I already was sure that was the word I would find.

There is a tower in the life of Jesus too. Some say that He was born in Migdal Eder, my friend Damien Mackey being one of them. I am not sure, but it would be fitting, for this very definite anti-Nimrod to also have His own migdal. When I looked up a cross-reference in Genesis 35:21, I saw this is translated as "Flock tower" — a very fitting place of birth to the Shepherd of our souls.

Departing thence, he pitched his tent beyond the Flock tower.

But, I also find it interesting, the present day ruins of this tower and perhaps even the original tower itself, are the right size for ... a rocket. What I think Nimrod's tower was intended to. Let's prefer Bethlehem over Cape Canaveral, Bajkonur and Babel.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
III Lord's Day of Advent, Gaudete
17.XII.2023

PS, if you prefer the Church of the Nativity, consider that a tower meaning "tower of the herd" could have been where the shepherds saw the angels./HGL

Credits: Nativity and the Migdal Eder
Damien Mackey
https://www.academia.edu/111586247/Nativity_and_the_Migdal_Eder

When were those Dinosaurs From?

Radiocarbon in dino bones
International conference result censored, by Carl Wieland
https://creation.com/c14-dinos

A team of researchers gave a presentation at the 2012 Western Pacific Geophysics Meeting in Singapore, August 13–17, at which they gave ¹⁴C dating results from many bone samples from eight dinosaur specimens. All gave dates ranging from 22,000 to 39,000 years, right in the ‘ballpark’ predicted by creationists.

I am no longer predicting a ball park like that for the Flood.

22,000 BP = 20,000 BC = the carbon date, according to my tables, of sth like 2850 BC, a bit more than a century after the Flood.*

39,000 BP = the actual carbon date for the Flood year itself, for 2958 BC.**

A creature as big as a typical dinosaur (typical to our imagination, not average), would have carbon that's decades old. This means, if the dinosaurs a) were from the Flood, and b) not contaminated, then they would carbon date older than 39,000 years.

However, before we totally dismiss these bones from being from the Flood itself, how about ... at least Morrisson Formation or Hell Creek Formation is at a Uranium ore deposit. And that's where many of the dinosaurs of the US were found.

Uranium near Carbon 12 can send off neutrons, which augment the neutron content into the carbon and make for more Carbon 14.

Barring that, I suggest, the dinosaurs could be post-Flood specimens.
/Hans Georg Lundahl

*Creation vs. Evolution: New Tables
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2020/08/new-tables.html

**Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: So Far Confirming my Theories
https://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2022/09/so-far-confirming-my-theories.html

Haydock Bible, and Catholic Young Earth Creationism

When Protestant Young Earthers are asked to explain why so many have heard of Old Earth Creationism, they pick out Darby and the Scofield Bible.

The influence of John Nelson Darby (1800–1882), and the Scofield Reference Bible (1909, 1917), led many members of the Plymouth Brethren movement to adopt belief in old-earth creation, as opposed to young-earth creation, or theistic evolution. The preferred old-earth view was the gap theory, with less willingness to accept belief in pre-Adamic races, or the day-age position.

John Nelson Darby, the Scofield Reference Bible, and the rise of old-earth creationism
by Andrew Sibley | This article is from
Journal of Creation 36(3):123–128, December 2022
https://creation.com/darby-and-scofield-bible

Catholics in France were on the bridge between Day-Age (Fulcran Vigouroux) and Young Earth (P. Laurent and A. Saignet).

Catholics in England between Gap Theory (Cardinal Wiseman) and Young Earth (see below).

Catholics in Germany and Austria has pretty equal preferences for Young Earth (C. F. Keil, J. E. Veith, A. Bosizio, A. Trissl, G. J. Burg) and he other too.

I think this extended into Italy, unless it was a more pure Young Earth preference (V. M. Gatti).

Those deviating from Young Earth were pretty much in the same area as the episcopates which at Vatican II pressed for changes. Here's* a little list:

Ulm, Lemgo, Edinburgh, Paris, London, Petit-Montrouge, Brunswick, Leipzig, Vienna, Mainz, Munich, Regensburg, Trier, Quedlinburg, Louvain, Kœnigsberg, Freiburg im Breisgau, Frankfurt am Main, Lyon, Rouen, Rodez, Clermont-Ferrant, Ghent, Brussels, Madrid (twice), Munster, New York (once), Florence (once), Rome (once), Siena (once), Valladolid (once), Brixen, Barcelona (once ), Steyl, Alessandria (once), Paderborn, Bonn, Linz, Friborg (Switzerland), Geneva, Graz, Cologne, Stuttgart, Berlin, Profnitz.

Whichever the solution, 19th C. Roman Catholic orthodoxy felt like the Haydock Bible that genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 and therefore the spectrum of Biblical chronologies deserved at least quasi-integrity from the Creation of Adam on.

Both United Kingdom (back then extending over Ireland too) with Commonwealth and the US used an edition of Douay Rheims (NT published 1582, OT published 1609–1610) in a revision by Bishop Challoner (Revised in 1749, 1750, and 1752 by Richard Challoner (DRC)). One very famous edition of it was probably the model of the Scofield Bible. I mean of course the Haydock Bible.

As a sample of how it would** have looked, I'll give you first and last verses of Genesis 3, and after that footnotes, which are actually below the Bible text, as are, when given, the Ussher years.

Ver. 1. Why hath God? Hebrew, "Indeed hath God, &c." as if the serpent had overheard Eve arguing with herself, about God's prohibition, with a sort of displeasure and presumption. St. Augustine thinks, she had given some entrance to these passions, and the love of her own power, and hence gave credit to the words of the serpent, de Gen. ad lit. xi. 30.		1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any of the beasts of the earth which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman: Why hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?
She might not know or reflect that the serpent could not reason thus, naturally; and she had as yet, no idea or dread of the devil. (Lombard, 2 Dist. 21.) This old serpent entered into the most subtle of creatures, and either by very expressive signs, or by the motion of the serpent's tongue, held this delusive dialogue with Eve. Moses relates what happened exteriorily; but from many expressions, and from the curse, ver. 15, he sufficiently indicates, that an evil spirit was the latent actor. (Haydock) --- Of every tree. Satan perverts the word of God, giving it an ambiguous turn: in doing which, he has set heretics a pattern, which they follow. (Menochius)
Ver. 24. Cherubims. Angels of the highest order, and of a very complex figure, unlike any one living creature. Theodoret supposes that God forced Adam to retire from that once charming abode, by the apparition of hideous spectres. The devils were also hindered from coming hither, lest they should pluck the fruit of the tree of life, and by promising immortality, should attract men to their service.		24 And he cast out Adam: and placed before the paradise of pleasure Cherubims, and a flaming sword, turning every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
The flaming sword, might be a fire rising out of the earth, of which Grotius thinks the pits, near Babylon, are still vestiges. These dreadful indications of the divine wrath would probably disappear, when Paradise had lost its superior beauty, and became confounded with the surrounding countries --- Thus we have seen how rapidly Moses describes the creation of all things, the fall of man, and the promised redemption. But in these few lines, we discover a solution of the many difficulties which have perplexed the learned, respecting these most important subjects. We know that the world is not the effect of chance, but created and governed by divine Providence. We are no longer at a loss to explain the surprising contrast of good and evil, observable in the same man. When we have attentively considered the Old Adam and the New[New Adam, Jesus Christ], we find a clue to lead us through all the labyrinths of our Holy Religion. We could wish, perhaps, for a greater detail in Moses, but he left the rest to be supplied by tradition. He has thrown light enough upon the subjects, to guide the well-disposed, and has left sufficient darkness to humble and to confound the self-conceited and wicked, who love darkness rather than the light. (Calmet) --- Concerning the transactions of these early times, parents would no doubt be careful to instruct their children, by word of mouth, before any of the Scriptures were written; and Moses might derive much information from the same source, as a very few persons formed the chain of tradition, when they lived so many hundred years. Adam would converse with Mathusalem, who knew Sem, as the latter lived in the days of Abram. Isaac, Joseph, and Amram, the father of Moses, were contemporaries: so that seven persons might keep up the memory of things which had happened 2500 years before. But to entitle these accounts to absolute authority, the inspiration of God intervenes; and thus we are convinced, that no word of sacred writers can be questioned. (Haydock)
4: 2 Corinthians xi. 3. 6: Ecclesiasticus xxv. 33.; 1 Timothy ii. 14. 14: Isaias lxv. 25.; Micheas vii. 17.; Isaias xlix. 23.; Psalm lxxii. 9.		15: Apocalypse xii.; Genesis xlix. 17.; 1 Corinthians xiv. 34. 19: Genesis xviii. 27. 20: Psalms cii. 14. and xxii.[xxi.?] 16.; Ecclesiastes vii. 12.[xii. 7.?]

So, it would be ridiculous if a Catholic, having failed to link my Young Earth Creationism to the Watchtower Society (who are Day-Agers, basically) tried to link it now to Darby.

We Catholics have no reason to tell Protestants (even as gentle ones as Andrew Sibley) that Young Earth Creationism is theirs.

Our English reference Bible is clearly more Young Earth than their Scofield, if you go to GENESIS - Chapter 1 and see for yourself that neither verse 2 nor "first day" and so on are marked out in any Old Earth manner. It may of course have helped that George Leo Haydock commented and his brother Thomas got re-published in 1859, fifty years before the Scofield Bible (1909). Thomas first published in 1811—1823.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Andrew, Apostle and Martyr
30.XI.2023

Apud Patras, in Achaja, natalis sancti Andreae Apostoli, qui in Thracia et Scythia sacrum Christi Evangelium praedicavit. Is, ab Aegea Proconsule comprehensus, primum in carcere clausus est, deinde gravissime caesus, ad ultimum suspensus in cruce, in ea populum docens biduo supervixit; et, rogato Domino ne eum sineret de cruce deponi, circumdatus est magno splendore de caelo, et, abscedente postmodum lumine, emisit spiritum.

* Previously (as the list of Young Earth authors) given in:

Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : Les Prédécesseurs catholiques de Henry Morris (jusqu'à 1920)
https://filolohika.blogspot.com/2019/11/les-predecesseurs-catholiques-de-henry.html

** I had to change the html, so it is no longer two columns all through, but the left hand column is on this page extended to full page width below the right hand column Bible verse. Otherwise, the table would have looked hopelessly narrow on the far right with the actual Bible text.

In Portugal, the Dogma of the Faith Shall Not Be Lost

Creation vs. Evolution: In Portugal, the Dogma of the Faith Shall Not Be Lost · Great Bishop of Geneva!: Another Reason to Believe Novus Ordos are NOT All Apostates

The title is a prediction about the country in which Fátima is located, in the diocese of Ourém. The city is named for an Moorish princess called that after Mohammed's daughter, who converted and married a Christian.

It is the place of a Marian Apparition (or series of them, to be precise) in 1917, the last apparition being the day before the last day on which the Czar was celebrating (still freely) the Protection of the Theotokos.

And the apparitions contained the prediction.

As Portuguese Protestants lack pretty many dogmas of the faith, and as Portuguese Catholics seemed to me totally sold out on believing Evolution, I was starting to have misgivings about Fátima.

Now, look at this map:

Credit: Eupedia.
Shared by Ceres Science.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=832473265548499&set=a.488532063275956

20 to 24 % pf the Portuguese would be far more than the Protestant minority.

This means, Portugal still has Catholics who correctly believe that God created Adam without biological ancestry.

The dogma of the faith is NOT lost. Vivat Lusitania!

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Vigil of St. Andrew
29.XI.2023

Vigilia sancti Andreae Apostoli.

PS, it can be added that Austria is more prone to Creationism than Germany. Thank God for Austria! Ein zweites aber besseres Deutsches Land./HGL

Ah, Griffith and White Provided the Source Too

Are CMI Hearing Me? · Does Sennaar mean Sumer? · Ken Griffith and Darrell K. White considered Judi, but not Göbekli Tepe · Ah, Griffith and White Provided the Source Too · Sumeria, Damien Mackey, Intellectual Honour · Damien Mackey Has His View on Shinar, Nimrod and Babel

An Upper Mesopotamian location for Babel
Ken Griffith and Darrell K. White
VIEWPOINT || JOURNAL OF CREATION 35(2) 2021
https://dl0.creation.com/articles/p149/c14992/j35_2_69-79.pdf

The tablet known as ABC 20 “The Chronicle of Early Kings”32 relates Sargon’s last campaign of conquest to Subartu as follows:

“Afterwards, Subartu attacked Sargon in full
force and called him to arms.
Sargon set an ambush and completely defeated them.
He overpowered their extensive army
and sent their possessions into Akkad.
He dug up the dirt of the pit of Babylon and
made a counterpart of Babylon next to Agade.”

...

However, we see a different solution to the puzzle. The Chronicle of Early Kings relates that Sargon dug dirt from Babylon and built a new Babylon near Akkad in the section describing how he looted and humiliated Subartu after defeating them.

32. Grayson, A.K. (Ed.), Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (Texts from Cuneiform Sources), Eisenbrauns, Ann Arbor, MI, 2000.

I also find that, like me, they know of Anne Habermehl:

Anne Habermehl5 proposed that Babel and the other three cities of Nimrod were located in the Khabur Triangle of Syria adjacent to the Sinjar Mountains.

...

The fact that the PPNA is known to be older than the Halaf culture of the Khabur Triangle, by Habermehl’s standard, suggests that the PPNA is where Babel should be found. No PPNA sites have been found in the Khabur Triangle.

5 probably 6. Habermehl, A., Where in the world is the Tower of Babel? ARJ 4:25–53, 2011.

I'd like to know if Göbekli Tepe is included in Subartu, as it certainly is in PPNA (Pre-Pottery Neolithic A), as well as in PPNB. In fact, the identity of Subartu is, according to wiki, disputed.

Obviously, their three candidates for Babel are further east than Göbekli Tepe:

a. Small structure under lava flow: 37°40’27.62”N, 40°2’13.81”E
b. 600 x 1000 m rectangle canted 23° east of north: 37°44’57.88”N, 40° 6’30.17”E
c. Tel along old river terrace: 37°47’48.84”N, 40°22’45.39”E.

Göbekli Tepe is 37°13′25″N 38°55′18″E — a bit longer than one degree further West than each of the candidates. I think it's bigger than all three of them, and since I place the time period of the Babel building into between 350 and 401 after the Flood, I can so to speak "afford more workers" than they can. Not that either they or I would be eager to give workers to Nimrod.

I could not find any dates for any of these, carbon dates that is, but for C I found two sources, one being the pdf already linked to and another being a book from Cambridge University Press — which has the title 6000 BC.

Obviously, titles like that can be misleading, but if this one isn't, I think Göbekli Tepe trumps it in age, as per the carbon dates of charcoal layers.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Georges Pompidou Library
Sts Basil, Auxilius and Saturnine
Martyrs of Antioch
27.XI.2023

Antiochiae sanctorum Martyrum Basilei Episcopi, Auxilii et Saturnini.

Ken Griffith and Darrell K. White considered Judi, but not Göbekli Tepe

Are CMI Hearing Me? · Does Sennaar mean Sumer? · Ken Griffith and Darrell K. White considered Judi, but not Göbekli Tepe · Ah, Griffith and White Provided the Source Too · Sumeria, Damien Mackey, Intellectual Honour · Damien Mackey Has His View on Shinar, Nimrod and Babel

Candidate site for Noah’s Ark, altar, and tomb
by Ken Griffith and Darrell K. White | This article is from
Journal of Creation 35(3):50–63, December 2021
https://creation.com/karaca-dag

We analyzed the traditions of the church fathers, Midrash, Book of Jubilees, and other historical sources for the Ark, with gratitude to Bill Crouse9 who did an excellent job compiling those sources in order to justify Mt Judi as the Ark site. For this comparison we used the following pairings of Ark and Babel sites: Ararat-Babylon, Durupinar-Babylon, Judi-Tel Brak, Karacadag-Çınar. Table 1 compares proposed Ark sites using these criteria. For each of 35 claimed facts, one point was awarded for a strong positive, one half point for a weak positive, and zero points for a negative.

Ararat-Babylon,
Durupinar-Babylon,
Judi-Tel Brak,
Karacadag-Çınar.

No comparisons for Judi-Göbekli Tepe ...

Also no comparisons about claims in or around Genesis 11 in the Bible itself.

It may be mentioned that some features on top Karacadag are pretty sound candidates as possible archaeological objects. Since Karacadag is in the Siverek district of the Urfa province and Göbekli Tepe is 15 km from Urfa itself, SSW of Siverek, it is arguable that Karacadag as well as Judi are compatible with "them" removing from the landing place as from the East to where they came. Especially if they had first descended a slope Southward before then turning West./HGL

PS, Yes, Karaca Dağ is further East than Göbekli Tepe:

Karaca Dağ
37°40′12″N 39°49′48″E
Göbekli Tepe
37°13′25″N 38°55′18″E

PPS, Karahan Tepe is further West than Karaca Dağ, further East than Göbekli Tepe.

Karahan Tepe
37°05′33″N 39°18′13″E

Unlike Karaca Dağ, it is also about the same parallel as Göbekli Tepe, even a bit further South.

And when they removed from the east,

could refer to leaving Karahan Tepe for the Harran Plain and Göbekli Tepe. Karahan Tepe is not in the plain, but in the Tek Tek Mountains./HGL

Is Spanish Military Starting to Persecute Creationism?

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: Béa Tremblay Blocked Me After Responding · EN LENGUA ROMANCE EN ANTIMODERNISM Y DE MIS CAMINACIONES: Eso es fanatismo anticristiano, Béa ...

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: Fake News sobre los Testigos ...

¿Que es el Creacionismo? · La datación carbónica—¿en conflito con la cronología bíblica? · Denisova en Atapuerca y otras cosas · ¿Y las dudas sobre los faraones eligidos? · Babel y Göbekli Tepe