The Beginnings (ePub)

It was found that Ezra claimed that the Torah was burned during the destruction of Jerusalem, c., 597 BC, and he saw the need to rewrite their foundation documents to show what God purportedly did from the beginning (2 Esdras 14:19-22). At this time the Israelites were in captivity in Babylon with the threat of losing their national identity and decided to rewrite their foundation documents with a survivalist agenda to ensure their posterity. Evidence shows that they not only rewrote what appeared in their prior writings but revised their history to include additions which would give them their best chance of surviving as a nation. They styled many of their early accounts on Sumerian and Babylonian myths and wanted to show that God purportedly gave them an everlasting covenant for the land of Canaan and that God undertook to send His angels to drive out and annihilate the tribes in Canaan. The Jewish priests adopted the motif of having God speak in the first person in their revised writings as was the custom in the Levant and Mesopotamia at that time. Research reveals how the Israelites left Avaris in Egypt unimpeded and how their supposed spectacular exodus from Egypt was created to provide the backdrop for them purportedly being given an everlasting Covenant for a Land of Milk of Honey. It becomes evident that this was a misinterpretation of Exodus 19:5-6, made by Jeremiah shortly before their Babylonian captivity. That this alleged covenant and God driving out the inhabitants from Canaan is mentioned in excess of forty times in their Pentateuch, shows that this was the focus of the rewrite of their foundation documents. These included their genealogies, the legendary giants of Anak, the flood story and the repopulation of earth. We show how many of their rewritten accounts were written back through Moses purportedly at the instigation of God, to give these fabrications greater authority in the eyes of their people and their captors.