Книга вторая. Мир послепотопный

The extraordinary longevity of the antediluvian patriarchs was a special gift, which was very important in the primitive history of mankind, both for the rapid population of the earth and the dissemination of useful knowledge, and especially for the preservation of the purity of worship and faith in the promise of the Redeemer given to the first people. But this great gift, once deviated from the true path, could serve as a convenient means of multiplying and spreading evil in humanity. The extraordinary rarity of death, with its horrors, deprived people of one of the most terrible warnings for their conscience; then the community of evil people contributed to the increase of evil and vice, and the apparent remoteness of judgment or deliverance could embolden the most daring unbelief and blasphemy. Everything depended on which of the two generations of primitive humanity would take the upper hand: Sifovo, as the bearer of the ideal principles of history, or Cainovo, who completely surrendered to crude materialism. On the side of the first was the continuity of great traditions and promises, which all the thoughts of people should have been directed towards the highest goal - the redemption of fallen humanity from slavery to sin and death; but on the side of the second were all the temptations of unfettered use of the tactile benefits of the present. Here, as it were, a person was once again given the opportunity to fully take advantage of the benefit of free self-determination given to him and show where his thoughts are more directed - towards God or the world. But if already in Eden man showed a clear preference for the world and violated the commandment of God, then now human nature, which had submitted to corruption, due to the very gravity of original sin, clearly gravitated towards the world with its delights, and only a few chosen ones had enough spiritual courage to resist this general gravity and protect themselves from the general infatuation with sin. That's exactly what happened. The delights of the world were too tempting for fallen humanity, and it completely opened the door of its heart to sin and all iniquity. And so, indeed, evil began to grow greatly in the world; but it reached its highest development as a result of the mixing of the descendants of Cain and Seth with each other, and precisely when, through the coarse attraction of sensuality, “the Sons of God (descendants of Seth) saw the daughters of men that they were beautiful, and took them as wives, whichever one chose.” At this time, the land was already significantly populated, but along with its settlement, the terrible evil of depravity and corruption spread. “And the Lord God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” This was evidently not the mere natural depravity of a corrupt nature, but the general reign of open and bold sin and rebellion against God. From the criminally voluptuous communication of the descendants of the Sifovs with the descendants of the Cainovs, a generation of “giants on earth” arose. Relying on their strength, they introduced into human society the horrors of violence, lawlessness, predation, voluptuousness and general disbelief in the promise of future deliverance. When the generation of Seth lived isolated, there was still hope for the preservation of the true religion and the promise associated with it, and now this hope also perished, and the only outcome remained for the eradication of vice and unbelief on earth - to destroy all existing humanity. And so, at the sight of such a state of people, “the Lord repented (speaking humanly) for having created man on earth, and was grieved in His heart. And the Lord said: I will destroy from the face of the earth man whom I have created, from man to cattle, to creeping things, and to the birds of the air. for I repented that I made them.” As created simultaneously with man and for man, animals must constantly share the fate of man. But the waves of vice have not yet flooded all of humanity. Among him was a man who “found grace in the sight of the Lord God.” This was Noah, son of Lamech, “a man righteous and blameless in his generation”; he “walked with God,” like his ancestor Enoch. And so, when the earth “was corrupt before the face of God and filled with evil,” when “all flesh perverted its way on earth,” the Lord deigned to grant Noah the great honor of being the ancestor of a new humanity in the place of the former corruption, which was doomed to the death it deserved. The righteous judge revealed his divine decision to Noah and said to him: “The end of all flesh has come before Me, and I will destroy them from the face of the earth. Make yourself an ark, I will bring a flood of water on the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the spirit of life under the heavens; everything on earth will lose life. But I will establish My covenant with you, and you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives will go into the ark with you.” The revelation was terrible, and in view of the fact that the most daring unbelief reigned all around, it served as a strong test of faith. God appointed one hundred and twenty years for the human race to repent, and during this time Noah had to begin his extraordinary construction, which could only cause ridicule and threats among the people around him. But his faith was unshakable. Noah was not only the heir of righteousness and faith, but also its preacher on earth, and, “having received a revelation of things not yet seen” (Heb. 11:7), he began to build an ark for the salvation of his house, exposing with his preaching the whole world with its unbelief and iniquity. The ark was built according to the exact instructions of God - from gopher wood, which is most suitable for cypress, and was tarred inside and out. The length of the ark is 300 cubits, the width is 50 cubits, and the height is 30 cubits. 62 At the top there was a long hole made throughout the ark, a cubit wide, for light and air, and at the side there was a door. It was supposed to consist of three tiers, with many compartments in them. The latter were intended for all animals, which God also commanded to take with us (seven pairs of clean ones and one unclean pair), as well as for life supplies. “And Noah did all that the Lord God commanded him.” No doubt, during this magnificent building, Noah continued to “preach righteousness,” especially when this was caused by the presence of curious and mocking people of lawlessness who came to see his building. But the most eloquent and loud sermon was this very building. God's long-suffering still awaited the awakening of repentance even during the construction of the ark, but everything was in vain. Mocking the sermon and the dire warning, people became even more carefree and lawless. They “ate and drank, married and gave in marriage until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and they thought not until the flood came and destroyed them all” (Matthew 24:38, 39). By the time the construction of the ark was completed, Noah was six hundred years old, and then, seeing no more hope for the repentance of sinful humanity, the Lord commanded Noah to enter the ark with his entire family and a certain number of animals. “For after seven days,” He said, “I will rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights; And I will destroy everything that exists that I have made from the face of the earth.” Noah obeyed and entered the ark with his three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth, with his wife and his sons' wives, capturing all the selected animals, and “the Lord shut the ark behind him.” And so, when these seven days had passed, the last period given for repentance had passed, “the waters of the flood came to the earth. In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth (in Greek, 27) day of the month (i.e., according to our reckoning, if the civil Jewish year is meant here - around the beginning or half of November), all the sources of the great abyss burst open, and the windows of heaven were opened; and the rain fell on the earth for forty days and forty nights.” This is how God’s great punishment was accomplished for corrupted and drowned humanity. The water quickly flooded everything and rose higher and higher, covering even the highest mountains by fifteen cubits. “And all flesh that moved on the earth lost life, and birds, and cattle, and wild beasts, and every creeping thing that crawled on the earth, and all people. Everything that had the breath of the spirit of life in its nostrils on dry land died. Every creature that was on the surface of the earth was destroyed; only Noah remained, and what was with him in the ark.” The water arrived within one hundred and fifty days or five months. The entire surface of the earth was covered with water, and only one Noah’s ark rushed across this vast sea, containing only the chosen seed for the development of new life on earth. “And God remembered Noah and all that were with him in the ark, and God caused the winds to pass over the earth, and the waters stood still.” The springs of the abyss closed, the rain stopped and the water began to subside. Exactly five months after the start of the flood, the ark stopped on the mountains of Ararat. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared, and after another forty days, Noah had already opened the window in the ark and released the first messenger, a raven, who, however, having flown out and apparently found abundant food for himself in the corpses on the top of the exposed mountains, did not give a clear message about the state of the earth, but vaguely “flew and flew until the earth was drained of water.” The dove then released, not finding a dry place, returned to the ark, but released again after seven days, it returned with a fresh olive leaf in its mouth, and Noah thus “knew that the water had departed from the earth.” Released another seven days later, the dove never returned. Then Noah opened the roof of the ark and saw that the surface of the earth had dried up, and by the twenty-seventh day of the second month of the six hundred and first year of Noah’s life, i.e. exactly a year after the flood, and completely dried up. Then the Lord commanded Noah to leave the ark and release the animals to reproduce on earth. Upon leaving the ark, Noah’s first thought was to give thanks to the Lord for such a miraculous salvation; He built an altar to the Lord, took clean animals and birds and offered them as burnt offerings. Such piety of Noah was pleasing to the Lord and “He said in His heart: I will no longer curse the earth for man’s sake, because the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth, and I will no longer smite every living thing, as I have done.” Henceforth, throughout all the days of the earth, sowing and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will not cease.” Since Noah and his family were the new ancestors of humanity on earth, God repeated to him the blessing that had once been given to the first people. “And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them: Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth (and subdue it).” All animals were brought into subjection to man, and in addition to plant foods, he was allowed to eat animal meat, but not their blood, because “their soul is in the blood of animals.” At the same time, a law was given against murder - on the basis that all people are brothers, and therefore every murder is fratricide, and that man was created in the image of God. The first murderer was expelled from human society, but his life was declared inviolable; Now it was decreed that “whoever sheds the blood of a man, his blood will be shed by the hand of a man.” This law, obviously, established the right of the civil authority to punish murderers with death. Thus, three new regulations were added to the establishment of the Sabbath and marriage - on abstinence from drinking blood, on the prohibition of murder, and on the right of civil authority. These are the so-called “Noahic Laws,” of which the Jews numbered seven, adding to them regulations against idolatry, blasphemy, debauchery and theft. Finally, at the conclusion of these separate decrees, God made a solemn covenant with Noah, i.e. one of those agreements by which He, out of love for people, assumed certain obligations on Himself, so that through them He could impose on man the obligations that would save him. By virtue of this covenant, He solemnly promised Noah that “all flesh shall no more be destroyed by the waters of a flood, neither shall there be any more flood to destroy the earth,” and the banner of this covenant was a rainbow appearing in the sky after the rain as a sign that this was not the rain of a flood, but a rain of blessing. There are some perplexities associated with the story of the flood, which sometimes force us to reinterpret its actual meaning. Thus, some consider it impossible to understand here in the proper sense a global flood that covered the entire earth, and understand its universality only in the sense of the general destruction of people in those countries in which they had hitherto managed to settle. But such a limitation is not justified in any way, although it is not irreconcilable with direct biblical expressions, and, on the contrary, is refuted by the geological traces of the flood in the most remote parts of the earth's surface. Moreover, science knows of such revolutions on earth when entire continents were covered with water, such as, for example. the continent of Atlantis, now closed by the Atlantic Ocean. If such phenomena are possible due to natural revolutions, then the more understandable the global flood becomes in the full sense, as God’s terrible punishment for the destruction of life on a sinful earth. If we assume the universality of the flood, then it would be unthinkable to collect all the breeds of animals in the room that Noah’s Ark represented. But it must be borne in mind that only such rocks could be taken into the ark that absolutely could not survive the flood and exist in water even in the form of embryos and seeds, so that later they could be reborn from them from the heat of the sun or other conditions favorable for the initiation of life; then, based on the current diversity of rocks, it is impossible to judge the antediluvian rocks, of which there were incomparably fewer; and finally, many breeds were undoubtedly directly doomed to extermination, such as. all those terrible antediluvian monsters (mammoths, mastodons, pliosaurs, pterodactyls, etc.) that are in the layers of the earth and now do not exist in reality. Thus, with the exception of all this, there will not be so much left that it will not fit in the ark, which in size and spaciousness cannot be equaled by even one of the current gigantic ships sailing the oceans. As for the general truth of the history of the flood, it finds striking confirmation in the universality of legends about it among various and most distant peoples. And indeed, the legend of the flood is the most widespread and rightfully deserves the name of the world tradition par excellence. Traces of it are found among all the most remote peoples. It is clear that this great event was deeply imprinted in the memory of the ancestors of post-Flood humanity, who passed on the story about it to their descendants as a great warning for subsequent generations, who retained the memory of it even after resettling from the original cradle. As is natural, the traditions of individual peoples over time inevitably had to acquire shades of local conditions and take on a legendary character, but the general meaning of the legend remained unchanged among all peoples, namely, that humanity, with its evil deeds, angered God, who destroyed it, with the exception of one pious family, which became the ancestor of the renewed human race. Moreover, it is especially remarkable that the conscience of mankind has retained the memory that the main culprits of the disaster that befell the earth were precisely the “giants” who, with their evil deeds of violence and lust, made the earth a place of all kinds of horrors and abominations. This legend is invariably repeated among all nations where the memory of the flood itself has been preserved. Like all other legends about the primitive life of mankind, the legend about the flood was not preserved with the same completeness and accuracy among all peoples; but the most interesting and biblical narrative was found among the ancient Babylonians, the so-called Chaldean narrative. It has long been known from its transmission in Greek by the Babylonian priest Berosus in the 3rd century BC, whose goal was to acquaint the Greeks with the traditions of their homeland; but since one could suspect that Berosus, who wrote in Greek and at such a late time, could introduce into his story features borrowed from the Bible, he was not given due importance until recently, when the Chaldean originals of this legend were discovered. It was while analyzing the library of the last king of Assyria, Sardanapalus, found in the ruins of Nineveh that the English scientist Assyriologist George Smith found and read a large poem in which the 11th canto contains a narrative about the flood. The poem was found in three copies with the designation that they were made from the oldest original (from the 17th century BC). Christ) and thus free from extraneous influences. The hero of the poem is a certain Izdubar, to whom his ancestor Xisuthr, the tenth of the primitive kings (Noah is the tenth of the patriarchs), tells how he escaped from the flood. Let us present the Chaldean story in both of its forms. Having first told about the nine antediluvian kings, the Chaldean priest then sets out the story of the flood as follows: “After the death of Obarthes, his son, Xisuthr 63 reigned for eighteen sara (64,800 years); under him a great flood occurred, the history of which is told in sacred writings as follows. Kronos (Ea) appeared to him in a dream and announced that on the fifteenth day of the month of Desia (the Assyrian month of Sivan, a little before the summer solstice) all people would die from a flood. He therefore commanded him to take the beginning, the middle and the end of everything that was indicated in writing, and flee to the city of the sun, to Sippara, then build a ship and enter it with all his family and his closest friends, store provisions for food and drink in the ship and bring in animals - feathered and four-legged; Finally, get everything ready for sailing. And when Xisuthr asked where to send his ship, he answered: “to the gods, to whom he had to pray for the good of people.” Xisuther obeyed and built a ship five stades long and two stades wide; he collected everything that was prescribed to him and brought his wife, his children and his close friends into the ship. The flood came soon. When the flood passed and began to subside, Xisuther released some birds. They, finding neither food nor a place to sit, returned to the ship. A few days after this, Xisuthr released them again; but they returned to the ship again with mud at their feet. Finally, the birds released for the third time did not return. Then Xisuthr realized that the earth was freed from water; he made a hole in the roof of the ship and saw that the ship had stopped on a mountain. He went down with his wife, his daughter and his sailor, bowed to the ground, erected an altar and made a sacrifice to the gods; and at that moment he disappeared with all those accompanying him. Meanwhile, those remaining in the ship, not seeing Xisuther return, in turn went down to earth and began to look for him, calling him by name. They saw Xisuther no more, but they heard a voice from heaven commanding them to be pious towards the gods and announcing that Xisuther, as a reward for his piety, had been taken to heaven to dwell among the gods, and that his wife, his daughter and the captain of the ship shared with him this honor. The voice also told those who remained to go to Babylon and, in accordance with the dictates of fate, dig up the letters buried in Sippar to transmit them to people. He also added that the country where they were located was Armenia. These latter, hearing the voice, made a sacrifice to the gods and returned on foot to Babylon. From the ship Xisutra, which finally stopped in Armenia, part still exists today in the Gordien Mountains in Armenia, and pilgrims bring asphalt from there, which they collect from the ruins and use it to protect themselves from evil. As for the companions of Xisuthrus, they lived in Babylon, dug up the writings buried in Sippar, founded numerous cities, built churches and restored Babylon.” In this presentation one can no longer help but see partly the personal adaptation of Berosus, who wanted to present the Chaldean tradition for the Greeks in the simplest and most coherent form possible. Therefore, the now discovered original of the legend has a more primitive character and bears the stamp of artlessness, which gives it special interest. Unfortunately, many places in the poem are completely unreadable due to damage to the slabs, and therefore the translation contains inevitable gaps that can only be filled in by guesswork. This is how this Chaldean original of the flood legend reads: 64 “I want to reveal to you, Izdubar, the story of my salvation and tell you about the decision of the gods. The city of Suripak 65, the city that you know, is located on the Euphrates; It was ancient, and gods were not worshiped in it. (I alone was) their servant, the great gods. (The gods held a council of suggestion) Apu. (The flood was proposed) by Bel (And approved by Nabu, Nergal and) Pinib. And God (Ea), the immutable Lord, He communicated their command in a dream. I heard the behavior of fate that he proclaimed "The man from Surripak, son of Ubaratutu, Make yourself a ship and equip it (quickly). (With a flood) I will destroy seed and life. Bring into the ship the seed of all living things. The ship that you will build It should be six hundred cubits wide and (60?) high. (Lower it) onto the ocean and cover it with a roof.” I understood and they said to the god Ea, my master: „(The ship) which you ordered me to build so, When I do it, young and old will laugh at me.” (Ea opened his mouth and) said, speaking to me, his servant: “(If they laugh at you), you will say to them: (will be punished) the one who harms me, (Because I have the protection of the gods) 66. ...I will pronounce my judgment on what is above and what is below... ...At the proper time, which I will indicate to you, Enter it and close the doors of the ship behind you. Inside is your bread, your utensils, your provisions, Your riches, your male and female servants and young people, The cattle of the field and the wild animals that you have gathered And those whom I will look at from you will be saved in the ship.” Gazizadra opened his mouth and said, speaking to the god Ea, his master: “Nobody has made (such a) ship. On the bottom line I will state... The ship that you ordered me to build (sic), which in... (There is a gap of several verses here). “On the fifth day, two of its sides rose. There were fourteen locks to close it, Fourteen in total, including the top. I made a roof for it and covered it. I swam in it on the sixth (day); I divided its tiers into the seventh; I divided the interior into the eighth. I sealed the holes where the water entered. I spent 3,600 measures of asphalt on its exterior three times, And three times 3,600 measures of asphalt inside. Three times, 3,600 porters carried baskets of provisions on their heads. I set aside 3,600 baskets to feed my family, And he separated 3,600 baskets twice for the sailors. For (feeding) I killed bulls; I assigned portions for every day. I collected as many barrels of wine as there was water in the river; And there is as much food as there is dust on the ground. I collected everything that I had; I took all the silver I had; I collected all the gold I had; I collected all the living seed that I had; I placed everything in the ship, all my servants and my maidservants, Cattle of the field, beasts of the field... The flood was prepared by Samas (the sun god), And he said, speaking in the evening: “I will send a great rain from heaven; Enter the ship and lock the door." The flood he spoke about appeared Saying in the evening: “I will send great rain from heaven.” On the day that I celebrated his feast day, On the day of waking, I was afraid. I entered the ship and locked the door behind me... In the morning a furious storm arose, Extending widely from the edge of the horizon. Raman (god of storms) thundered in the middle of the sky... Destroying spirits rushed across the mountains and valleys, devastating the earth, The Raman flood reached the sky. The magnificent land turned into a desert. The surface of the earth was washed away, all living things were destroyed from the face of the earth; The brother did not see his brother again... everything died. I saw the sea in great turmoil and the entire human race perishing... Corpses floated like reeds... The ship rose twelve cubits above the surface of the earth. The ship stopped on Mount Nizir. On the seventh day I released a dove: The dove flew, did not find a resting place and returned. I released the swallow: the swallow flew, did not find a resting place and returned. I released the raven: the raven flew And he saw the decrease in waters and... did not return back. I released the animals into all four winds. I made a thanksgiving libation. I built an altar on the top of the mountain... The gods gathered, smelling its fragrance. From a distance the great goddess (Ishgara) appeared, By holding up the great belt made for the glory of the gods (i.e. the rainbow). God Ea opened his mouth and said, Said the warlike Bel: “O you, messenger of the gods, warrior, Let the sinner bear the weight of his sins, The blasphemer is the weight of his blasphemy. Let the righteous below not be destroyed. Let the believer not be destroyed. Instead of causing a new flood, Let lions and hyenas appear and reduce the number of people; Let there be famine and let the land be devastated. Let Dibbara (god of epidemic) appear I have not discovered this decision of the great gods; Gazizadra interpreted the dream and understood what the gods had decided. God Bel entered the ship, took me by the hand and lifted me up. He ordered me to stand up with my wife. He made a covenant (or covenant) and gave this blessing, In the presence of Gazizadra and his people: “When Gazizadra and his wife and the people are raptured, To be equal to the gods, Then Gazizadra must be sent to distant countries at the mouth of the streams." They took me, sent me to distant countries at the mouth of the streams. This is the famous Chaldean account of the flood, presented here only with slight abbreviations. From this presentation, points of similarity and difference with the biblical narrative are naturally revealed. The Bible says nothing about burying the scriptures and there is not a trace of that crude polytheism that disfigures the Chaldean story in both its editions. The length of the ark, according to Berosus, is related to its width as 5:2; in the book of Genesis as 6:1, and on the Chaldean tablets as 10:1. In Berosus and on the tiles, instead of a simple patriarch, which is Noah, a king appears, and instead of saving only the family, friends, servants and young people with all the royal treasures are saved in the Chaldean ark. According to the Assyrian inscriptions, the flood lasted only six days and nights; - according to the book of Genesis, it lasted 40 days and nights, and only 150 days passed before the waters disappeared. The Bible says that Noah took seven pairs of clean animals and one pair of unclean animals into the ark; in the Chaldean story no distinction is made between the pure and the unclean. Samas (the Sun god) says: “enter the ship and close the door”; The Bible says, “and the Lord shut it up.” According to both stories, the ark was covered with earthen resin. According to the Chaldean story, a dove, a swallow and a raven were released from the ark, and according to the biblical story, a raven and a dove. In the Chaldean story and the book of Genesis alike, the rainbow appears as a sign of divine satisfaction with the sacrifice made after the flood, and in both the assurance is made that the earth will never again be punished by a similar form of destruction. However, a different fate befalls the saved. According to the Chaldean narrative, as well as according to the story of Berosus, some of them are taken by the gods; in the book of Genesis they are kept alive to repopulate the earth. The Chaldean narrative apparently mixed the story of Enoch with the story of Noah. But in any case, we have here an independent tradition of extraordinary antiquity, telling about that particular great flood that destroyed the entire human race, with the exception of a few, and was a punishment for their sins. The essential difference between the Chaldean story and the biblical story is that the Chaldean story is entirely imbued with crude polytheism and deals in detail with the story of the participation of various gods in this great event, while the biblical story strictly adheres to monotheism, as a result of which it is distinguished by a more elevated and serious character and itself reveals its supernatural origin. By the way, one more feature is striking, in which the Chaldean story sharply differs from the biblical one and shows the local Babylonian flavor. In the book of Genesis the name of the ark tebah means a box, not a ship, and nothing is said about its launching, nor is there any mention of the sea, nor the voyage, nor the sailor. On the contrary, everything in the Chaldean epic indicates that it was compiled by the seaside people; all features reveal the morals and customs of the coastal inhabitants of the Persian Gulf. Gazizadra enters a ship specially prepared for sailing; this ship is launched into the water and a sailing experience is made with it; all its cracks are caulked and fixed with resin, and its management is entrusted to the sailor. 67 The Aramaic tradition is very similar to the Chaldean tradition and is directly dependent on it, which in turn spread further to the west, even among the Greeks and Romans. This is how it is conveyed by the unknown author of the book “On the Syrian Goddess” (as suggested by Lucian): “When I asked how old this church (the church of the Syrian goddess in Hierapolis), says the author, and to which goddess, in their opinion, it was dedicated, I received many explanations secretly and openly; some of them are peculiar, but others agree with Greek opinion. Most said that it was founded by Deucalion from Scythia, during whose days a terrible flood occurred. I heard stories about Deucalion from the Greeks, who say that the real human race is not the first, since the first was completely exterminated, but descended from Deucalion. The original clan, they say, was distinguished by violence and was guilty of many crimes; They did not keep any oaths or hospitality and did not show pity for each other, for which he was severely punished. The earth opened up and poured out a lot of water; terrible rains fell; The streams overflowed their banks and the sea expanded its banks, so that the waters covered everything, and the human race perished. Only Deucalion remained alive, due to his wisdom and piety, to restore the human race. This is how he was saved. He built a large ship, into which he brought his wives and children, and into which he himself entered. At the same time, pigs, horses, lions, snakes and all other animals that the earth feeds entered there. He took them all into his ark. There they did not harm him, because there was great friendship between them, which Zeus put into their hearts, and so they lived in the ark while the flood continued. This is the story told by the Greeks about Deucalion. The Hierapolitans add something very surprising to it. They say that a large gap opened in their country, which swallowed up all the waters, and that after this Deucalion erected an altar and built a church to Juno over this gap. I saw her; it is very narrow and located under the church. Whether it was ever large and is now narrowed, I don’t know; but I saw her, she is absolutely small. Currently they bring water to the church twice a year; not only the priests, but also many people from all over Syria, Arabia and beyond the Euphrates go to the sea and bring it. Then they pour it first into the church, from which it flows into a chasm. They do this, as they say, in fulfillment of the command of Deucalion and in remembrance of the disaster suffered and the deliverance given to him.” India, in turn, also had a legend about the flood, the similarity of which with the biblical and Chaldean narratives is very significant. Its oldest and simplest form is found in the Satapata Brahmana, one of the sacred books of India. This part of the sacred books was first translated by Max Müller and it reads like this: “one morning Manu 68 was brought water for washing; and when he washed himself, the fish ended up in his hands. And she turned to him with these words: “protect me and I will save you.” - Why will you save me? - “The flood will destroy all creation, and from this I will save you.” - How can I protect you? The fish answered: “Since we are small, we are in great danger, because the fish eats the fish; save me first in some vessel. When I get too big, dig a pond to let me in. When I grow even bigger, take me to the ocean. Then I will be saved from destruction.” Soon the fish became a big fish. She tells Manu: “In the very year when I reach my full height, the flood will come. Then build a ship and bow to me. When the waters rise, enter this ship and I will save you.” Holding the fish as she asked him, Manu carried it into the ocean. That year, she said, Manu built a ship and worshiped the fish. And when the flood came, he entered the ship. Then the fish swam to him, and Manu tied the rope of the ship to the horn of the fish, and thus the fish led him to the northern mountain. The fish told him: “I saved you, tie the ship to a tree so that the water does not carry it away when you are on the mountain, and as soon as the waters subside, get off from there.” Manu descended as the waters lowered, and this is precisely what is called the descent of Manu on the northern mountain. The flood destroyed all creatures, and only Manu remained.” Four forms of the flood tale are known in Indian literature, but, as Burnouf thoroughly proves, it is not found in the ethical hymns, the most ancient Sanskrit scriptures, and hence the legend itself is an alien imported work of Semitic or rather Babylonian origin. A strong confirmation of this is that Vishnu's transformation into a fish is allowed here, while in India there is no trace of fish worship, and not the slightest hint of it is found in mythology. But the fish-shaped god was a prominent deity in Babylon. The image of the god Ea, who plays such a prominent role in the Chaldean flood stories, almost always combines the form of a man and a fish, like the god Dagon, who was transferred from Mesopotamia to the soil of Palestine. The similarity of the Indian tradition with the biblical narrative is however quite remarkable. Vishnu (according to one Indian legend) gives a warning: “in seven days all creatures will be destroyed,” and in St. The Scripture says: “Seven more days and I will make it rain on the earth.” “In seven days the sea overflowed its banks,” says the Purana; “After seven days, the waters of the flood were on the earth,” says the book of Genesis. Similarly, according to the Babylonian legend, the flood begins on the evening of the seventh day and begins to subside after seven days. The repeated use of the same number serves as a further basis for the assumption that the Indian tradition came from the same country as the legend of the Assyrian tablets, and thus is in close even geographical relationship with the biblical narrative. The Iranians also have a legend about the flood in their sacred books, which form the basis of the Zoroaster religion and go back to a very distant antiquity, but it takes on a completely unique character and in many significant features deviates from what has just been stated. They tell how Yima, who in his original conception is the father of mankind, was informed by Ormuzd, the good God, that the earth would be devastated by a destructive flood. God commanded him to build a shelter, namely a quadrangular garden surrounded by a fence, and there to introduce the seeds of people, animals and plants to preserve them from destruction. And indeed, when the flood came, only one garden of Yima remained unflooded with everything that was contained in it; and his salvation was announced to him by the bird karshipta, sent by Ormuzd. The Greeks had two main, significantly different legends about the flood that destroyed primitive humanity. The first is associated with the name of Ogyges, the most ancient king of Boeotia or Attica, a personality so mythical that he is completely lost in the darkness of centuries; his very name, apparently, comes from a word that originally meant “flood” in Aryan dialects, in Sanskrit oga. According to this legend, in his time the whole country was flooded with a flood, the waters of which rose to the sky and from which he escaped in a ship with several companions. The second legend is found in the Thessalian legend of Deucalion. When Zeus decided to exterminate the people of the Bronze Age, whose crimes aroused his anger, Deucalion, on the advice of Prometheus, his father, built an ark in which he escaped with his wife Pyrrha. The flood came; the ark floated at the will of the waves for nine days and nine nights and was finally carried by the waters to the top of Parnassus. Deucalion and Pyrrha came out of it, made a sacrifice and repopulated the earth when, at the command of Zeus, they threw “the bones of the earth” behind them, i.e. stones that turned into people. This flood of Deucalion in Greek legend bears the most signs of a global flood. Moreover, the writers say that it spread throughout the entire earth and that all of humanity perished. In Athens, to propitiate the souls who died during the flood, a special ceremony was performed in memory of this event, called hydrophoria, which had such a close resemblance to the ceremony performed in Hierapolis in Syria that it is difficult not to see a Syrophoenician borrowing here. Near the Church of Olympian Zeus, they even showed a hole in the ground, one cubit long, through which, as they say, the waters of the flood went into the ground. Every year, on the third day of the Anthesferii festival, the “day of sorrow”, dedicated to the dead, i.e. on the thirteenth day of the month Antistria, around the beginning of March, water mixed with flour and honey was poured into this crevice. Others, on the contrary, limited the Deucalion flood to Greece alone. They even said that this catastrophe destroyed only the majority of the country's population, but that many could have escaped from it on the high mountains. So the Delphic legend said that the inhabitants of this city, following the running wolves, escaped in one cave on the top of Parnassus, where they built the city of Lykorea. The idea that there were many survivors in different places at the same time was naturally suggested to subsequent mythographers by the desire to reconcile the local legends of various countries of Greece, which assumed that other heroes besides Deucalion were saved. In Phrygia the legend of the flood was as national as in Greece. From him the city of Apomea received its nickname Kivotos, i.e. the ark, since it was considered the place where the ark supposedly stopped. The city of Iconium, for its part, made the same claims. In the same way, the inhabitants of the Milian region, in Armenia, showed on the top of the mountain called Baris the remains of the ark, which, however, were also shown to pilgrims on Ararat in the first centuries of Christianity, just as, according to the story of Berosus, the remains of the ship of Gazizadra were shown on the Gordien mountains in his time. In the second and third centuries of the Christian era, as a result of the combination and confusion of Jewish and Christian traditions in minds still attached to paganism, the religious representatives of Apomeia of Phrygia ordered the minting of coins that depicted an open ark and in it the patriarch and his wife saved from the flood; they receive a dove, which brings them an olive branch and then next to the ark they are depicted already leaving the ark to take the land into their possession. The name of Noah is written on the ark in Greek letters. Thus, at this time, the pagan priesthood of the Phrygian city had already accepted the biblical story with its names, which supplanted the ancient local tradition. These legends also related that shortly before the flood there reigned a holy man named Annakh, who preached and occupied the throne for more than 300 years; but everything is clear that this was only a reproduction of the biblical Enoch with his 365 years of life, marked by walking with God. As for the branch of the Celtic peoples, in the poetic legends of the Cymri of Gaul we find a legend about the flood, which, despite its relatively late edition, compiled under the form of the so-called triads, nevertheless deserves some attention. As always, the legend has local characteristics, and the flood is related as three terrible catastrophes of the island of Dowry or Britain, the other two being devastation by fire and a devastating drought. “The first of these events,” it says there, “was the overflow of the “lake of streams” and the spread of flooding across the entire surface of the country, from which all the people died, with the exception of Dwifan and Dwifakha, who escaped in a ship without gear; and it was with them that the island of Priden was again populated.” Although the triads in their present form date back no earlier than the thirteenth or fourteenth century, observes one scholar,[69] some of them are undoubtedly based on very ancient traditions, and in this respect there is nothing to indicate a borrowing from the book of Genesis. It is perhaps impossible to say the same about the other triad, which speaks of the ship Nefid-naf-neifion, in which a pair of all living creatures floated during the flood of Lake Lynn Ilion, which is very similar to the ship of Noah. From this it becomes clear that the Cymrs had their own local legend about the flood. Among the European peoples, the Lithuanians were the last to adopt Christianity and at the same time were the people whose language remained closer to its Aryan root. They had a legend about the flood, the basis of which was undoubtedly ancient, although it took on the naive character of a folk tale, in which certain features could even be borrowed from the Bible from the time of the first preaching of Christian missionaries among them. According to this legend, the god Pramzima, seeing the complete dominance of unrest on earth, sent two giants, Wanda and Veya, water and wind, to devastate it. These giants, in their rage, overthrew everything, and only a few people were saved from death on the mountain. Then, overwhelmed by a feeling of regret, Pramzima, who was preparing to eat the heavenly nuts, dropped a shell near the mountain, in which the people took refuge and which the giants spared. Having escaped death, they later settled. One couple, very old, remained in this country and mourned the fact that they had no children. Pramzima, to console them, sends them his rainbow and instructs them to “leap over the bones of the earth,” which is strikingly reminiscent of the story of Deucalion. The elderly spouses make nine leaps and from this nine new couples are born, who become the ancestors of the nine Lithuanian tribes. But if the legend of the flood occupies such a large place in the legendary memories of all branches of the Aryan race, then the monuments and authentic texts of Egypt, despite all the richness of the cosmogonic speculations contained in them, do not, apparently, present the slightest hint of a memory of the flood. When the Greeks told the Egyptian priests about the flood of Deucalion, they answered them that the Nile Valley was saved both from the flood and from the conflagration caused by Phaeton. To this they even added that the Greeks showed too much childish gullibility, attributing so much importance to this event, since, in their opinion, there were many other local disasters similar to it. Nevertheless, the Egyptians themselves recognized the destruction of primitive people by the gods due to their indignation and wickedness. This event is recounted in one chapter of the sacred books of Taghut, the famous hermetic books of the Egyptian priesthood, inscribed on the walls of one of the most remote rooms of the underground funerary church of King Seti I in Thebes. This text was translated and published by Eduard Naville. The scene takes place at the end of the reign of the god Ra, the first earthly reign according to the interpretation of the Theban priests, the second according to the interpretation of the Memphian priests, who at the beginning of all things believed the reign of Phtha to be before the reign of Ra. Angered by the wickedness and crimes of the people he created, this god gathers other gods for council with him in such secrecy, “so that people do not know about it and their hearts are not afraid.” The council decided to destroy the human race. One goddess (probably Tefnuta or Seheta, although her name cannot be made out on the inscription) is then sent to carry out the sentence. "The goddess went and beat the people on the ground." But when the beating was completed, the anger of the god Ra passed and he began to regret the deed. The great propitiatory sacrifice finally consoled his divine anger, and a solemn agreement is concluded between several people who escaped death and the deity, and God swears never to destroy them. Although this story in many respects deviates from other stories and, mainly, from the biblical story about the flood, since the human race is destroyed not by a flood, but through a beating committed by the goddess Tefnuta or Seheta with the lion's head, nevertheless, here too some similarities can be seen. It also talks about the corruption of people, which aroused divine wrath; this corruption is punished by the destruction of humanity and only a few people are saved from the beating, who became the spreaders of the new human race. Finally, after the destruction of people, a propitiatory sacrifice is made, which appeases the wrath of the gods, and a solemn agreement is concluded between the deity and the renewed humanity, sealed by an oath not to destroy it anymore. The significant difference lies only in the method of destruction itself. “The Egyptians,” says Vigouroux, “retained the memory of the destruction of people, but since the flood was a source of wealth and life for them, they modified this primitive tradition in their own way; the human race, instead of perishing from the water, according to their legend, was exterminated in another way, and the flood, this greatest benefit of the Nile Valley, became in their eyes a sign of propitiation of the wrath of the god Ra.” 70 But the legend of the flood is not limited to the Old World and finds a clear response in the New World - in America. At the same time, one is involuntarily struck by the remarkable circumstance that the stories of the American natives are even closer to the biblical tradition than those of the peoples of the old world, thus providing striking evidence of the origin of the American population from the common ancestors of post-Flood humanity. The most remarkable of the American flood legends are found in Mexico because they have a more definite form, expressed in symbolic and mnemonic documents dating back much earlier than the contact of the natives with Europeans. According to these documents, the Noah of the Mexican flood was Cox-Cox, called Teocipactli or Tetzpi by some peoples. He escaped the flood with his wife, Xohiketzal, in a ship or, according to other legends, on a raft made of cypress trees. The image relating to the Cox-Cox flood is also found among the Aztecs, Miztecs, Zapotecs, Tlaxcaltecs and Mechoacaneses. The tradition of these latter in particular bears an even more striking similarity than that of other peoples with the biblical narrative and the Chaldean tales. It tells that Tezpi entered a vast ship with his wife, with his children, with several animals and seeds, the preservation of which was necessary for the existence of the human race. When the great god Tezcatlicopa commanded that the waters withdraw to their places, Tezpi released a kite from the ship. This bird, which feeds on dead bodies, did not return due to the huge number of corpses with which the land that had just been freed from water was strewn. Tezpi then sent out other birds, of which only one returned, a hummingbird, holding in its beak a branch with blossoming leaves. Then Tezpi, seeing that the soil began to be covered with new greenery, left his ship on Mount Colguacan. The most ancient document from which one can get acquainted with the cosmogonic system of the Mexicans is known as the Codex Vaticanus, after the Vatican Library, where it is preserved. It consists of four symbolic paintings depicting the four periods of the world that preceded the present century. The first is called Tlatonatiu, "sun of the earth." This is the age of the giants or quinameans, the first inhabitants of Anaguac, who were destroyed by famine. The second period, called Tletonatiu, “the sun of fire,” ends with the descent to earth of Xiutefqtli, the god of the fire element. All people were turned into birds and did not escape the conflagration. Only one human couple found refuge in the cave and populated the universe after this destruction. The third age of Egecatonatiu, the "sun of the wind", ends in disaster caused by a terrible hurricane raised by Quetzalcohuatl, the god of the air. With few exceptions, almost all people, due to this hurricane, were turned into monkeys. Finally comes the fourth century, the so-called Atonatiu, “sun of water.” It ends with a great flood, a true flood. All the people turn into fish, except one man and his wife, who escape in a boat made of cypress. The painting depicts Matlalqueya, the goddess of water, with her companion Tlaloc, the god of rain, both rushing to earth. Cox-Cox and Xohiquetzal, two human beings who escaped the disaster, are depicted sitting on a tree trunk, on which they float in the middle of the water. This flood is depicted as the last revolution that ever took place on the face of the earth. The cosmogonic legend just stated shows an obvious similarity with the four centuries or yugas of India and with the idea of ​​​​Manvantara, according to which there is an alternation between the destruction of the world and the renewal of humanity. Their similarity to each other is such that the question even involuntarily arises whether the Mexicans, on their own, could, in a completely independent way, form for themselves an idea that was so close to that of the Indians, or whether they received it from India in one way or another. The legend of the flood and the system of the four centuries with which this tradition is inseparable in Mexico, involuntarily pose before us the question that we always have to resort to when it comes to American civilizations, namely, the question of the complete originality of these civilizations and of the introductions that they may have received from Asia, thanks to Buddhist missionaries or others in any particular era. In the present state of knowledge it is impossible to decide this question either negatively or affirmatively, and all attempts that have been made to solve it have been too premature and therefore could not lead to any more lasting result. Be that as it may, the doctrine of successive centuries and the destruction of mankind in the first of these centuries by a flood is also found in the peculiar book of Popol-Vu, a collection of mythological legends of the natives of Guatemala, written in a special language by a secret adherent of the ancient religion and openly rewritten and translated into Italian at the beginning of the last century by the Dominican Francis Jiminez. It says that after creation, the gods, seeing that animals could neither speak nor worship them, wanted to create humans in their own image. They made them first from clay. But these people were fragile and could not turn their heads; they spoke, but did not understand anything. Then the gods destroyed this imperfect work of theirs with a flood. Starting the task a second time, they made a man from wood and a woman from tree resin. These creatures were much taller than the previous ones; they did not move and live like animals; they spoke, but in a completely incomprehensible way and did not think about the gods. Then Gurakon, the heart of the sky, the god of thunder, poured flaming resin onto the earth, and at the same time the earth was shaken by a terrible earthquake. All the people descended from the wood and resin couple died, with the exception of a few who turned into forest monkeys. Finally, the gods made four perfect people from white and yellow maize: Balam-Kitse - the “laughing jaguar”, Balam-Agap - the “jaguar of the night”, Mogenta - the “famous name”, and Iki-Balam - the “jaguar of the moon”. They were great and strong, they saw everything, knew everything and thanked the gods. But these latter were frightened by the decisive success of their business and began to fear their superiority, therefore, they threw a light blanket, like a fog, over the appearance of the four people, which became similar to the appearance of present-day people. While they were sleeping, the gods created for them four wives of extraordinary beauty, and from three of them the Kihei were born, and Iki-Balam and his wife Kokixaga had no children. This story, with its series of unsuccessful attempts on the part of the gods to create man, so that they were forced to destroy their imperfect work twice before they finally managed to achieve what they wanted, is obviously extremely far from the biblical story, far enough to eliminate any suspicion about the influence of the sermons of Christian missionaries here on this native Guatemalan legend. And yet here we find the belief that the first human race was destroyed at the beginning of time by a great flood. Many legends about the great flood in early times were also collected from American tribes that remained in a wild state. But by their very nature, these legends necessarily leave room for doubt. They were not written down by the natives themselves, since we know about them only through other people, who sometimes even unwittingly, when transmitting them, could make significant modifications and unconsciously bring them closer to the biblical narrative. Then they were collected in general at a rather late era, when the Indian tribes were already in long-term contact with Europeans, who could introduce elements that were completely new to them into their legend. These stories, therefore, could have only a weak significance, if we had not other more positive facts that we notice in Mexico, Guatemala and Nicaragua and which prove the existence of the tradition of the flood among the peoples of America before the arrival of European conquerors there. In view of these facts, the flood traditions of the savage tribes of the New World deserve mention, although with some limitation. The most remarkable tradition in this regard is that of the Iroquois, since it is the most free from any European influences. It looks like a children's retelling of the Indian story with the difference that here, instead of a fish, there is a dog who saves a man who escaped the flood. “For several days the dog did not stop running along the banks of the river with extraordinary persistence, looking intently into the water and howling, as if sensing some kind of disaster. Her master, angry at her behavior, ordered her in a rude tone to enter the house; then she began to speak and revealed the threatening disaster. She ended her prediction with the statement that her master and his family could only be saved from drowning if he immediately threw her into the water, because then she would become their savior. She will sail to look for a boat so that those whom she wanted to save can be saved in it, but he must not waste a single moment, since a terrible rain was soon to come, which would cause a general flood and destroy everything. The man obeyed what his dog said; and he was thus saved with his family, and it was they who repopulated the earth again.” The Tamanaks of the Carib tribe of the Orenoka coast also have a legend about the flood, according to which a man and a woman alone escaped death by climbing to the top of Mount Tapanaku. There they threw back from themselves, over their heads, the fruits of the coconut, from which a new generation of men and women emerged. If this transmission is correct, then here we see a curious similarity with the essential features of the famous Greek story of Deucalion and Pyrrhus. Russian researchers noticed the existence of a children's narrative about the flood among the inhabitants of the Aleutian Islands, which form a geographical chain between Asia and North America, and on the extreme North American coast among the Koloshes. The traveler Henry tells the following legend, which he recorded from the Indians of the Great Lakes. “The father of the Indian tribes once dwelt at the rising sun. Having been informed in a dream that a flood would come and devastate the earth, he built himself a raft, on which he escaped with his wife and all the animals. So he swam on the waters for several months. The animals who spoke then complained and murmured greatly against him. Finally, a new land appeared. He descended upon her with all the animals, who from that time on were deprived of the ability to speak as punishment for their murmuring against their savior.” The tribes of Canada and the Mississippi Valley, in their crude legends, said that all people were destroyed by a flood, and then the great Spirit, in order to repopulate the earth, transformed animals into people. The Chippeway tribe also has a story about a man who escaped a flood. To find out whether the land was dry, he sent a diving bird from his ship; then, upon returning to the land freed from water, he became the restorer of the human race and the founder of society. The songs of the inhabitants of New California also speak of a very distant era when the sea overflowed its banks and covered the earth. All people and all animals died as a result of this flood, sent by the supreme god Chinig-Chinig, with the exception of a few who escaped on a high mountain where the water did not reach. The commissioners of the United States, who were entrusted with the exploration of the territory of New Mexico when it entered the boundaries of the possessions of the American Republic, noted the existence of the same tradition among various native tribes of this vast country. Stories of the same kind have been noticed by other travelers in various parts of North America, and all of them have more or less similarities with the biblical narrative. But all these stories are generally conveyed too vaguely for one to be able to unconditionally trust the details with which they are accompanied. At first it was thought that the peoples inhabiting the islands of Oceania did not have a legend about the flood, but now it has been confirmed that the same tradition exists among the Polynesian race, although it is obviously colored by the features of local floods that constitute the usual scourge of these islands. The most famous story of this kind is found on the islands of Tahiti, and it bears more than any other signs of resemblance to the flood of primitive times. But this story, like all the stories of this part of the world, has a completely childish character, characteristic of the legends of the Polynesian peoples, and besides, the Taitian story can be easily explained by the memory of one of the sea spills that are so frequent in Polynesia. It does not even contain the most essential feature of all stories about the actual flood. The island of Toa Marama, on which, according to the Tahitian story, sinners who aroused the wrath of the god of waters by throwing their fishing rod into his hair were saved, of course, can hardly bear even a remote resemblance to the ark. It is true that according to one version of the Tahitian legend, two sinners were saved on Toa Marame not only with all their families, but also with a pig, a dog and a pair of chickens, which is partly similar to the introduction of animals into the ark. On the other hand, some of the features of the Fiji Islands story, especially that for many years after this event the inhabitants kept boats constantly ready in case of another flood, apparently refer more clearly to a local phenomenon, a sea flood, than to a universal flood in the proper sense. But nevertheless, in these stories one cannot help but see, albeit a distant and distorted echo of the universal legend of the flood, and this serves as new confirmation of the general prevalence of this tradition, which finds its true and full expression in the biblical narrative. The long series of legends just outlined gives every reason to assert that the story of the flood is a universal story, found in all branches of the human race. Such a memory, consistent in all its essential parts among the most diverse and distant peoples, for this very reason cannot be a myth invented by chance. No religious or cosmogonic myth bears such a universal character. From here the conclusion necessarily follows that it represents a memory of a real and terrible event, which so strongly struck the imagination of the first ancestors of the human race that the memory of it was never erased from their offspring. This catastrophe occurred in primitive times, before the heads of the families from which subsequent generations descended were divided and separated from each other; otherwise, it would be necessary, contrary to all belief and sound laws of criticism, to admit that in such different and distant countries and localities of the globe, local phenomena could occur that were completely similar to each other, and that the memory of them always took exactly the same form, associated with circumstances that could not necessarily be imagined by the human mind. Chapter 8. The cradle of post-Flood humanity and the genealogy of peoples The place where, according to the biblical narrative, the ark stopped after the flood is called the Ararat Mountains. Since a certain time, this memory has always been attached to the highest mountain of the Armenian mountain range, which, during the various migrations that took place in this country, actually received the name Ararat more than nine centuries before the Christian era, although this mountain range was known to the first native inhabitants under the name Masis. Most of the interpreters of St. The Scriptures accepted this view, although others, already in the first centuries of Christianity, preferred to follow the data of the Chaldean tradition told by Berosus, which placed the place of Xisuther's exit in the more southern part of the same chain, in the mountains of Gordien, precisely in the mountains of present-day Kurdistan, northeast of Assyria. Mount Nizir, where, according to legend read on the wedge-shaped slabs of Nineveh, the ark in which the patriarch was saved from the flood stopped, formed the southern part of this mountain range. Its position at 36° east latitude is in fact precisely determined by the indications that we find in the historical inscriptions of the Assyrian king Assurnazirbal, precisely in the story of one military expedition he undertook to this particular country. Setting out from the area neighboring Arbela, he crossed the Zab River, in its lower reaches, and walked all the time to the east. If you carefully examine the biblical text, it is also difficult to admit that in the thoughts of the sacred writer, the Ararat he mentioned as the stopping place of the ark was precisely the Ararat of Armenia. A few verses further (Gen. 11:2) it is directly stated that the descendants of Noah “moved (apparently from the place where the ark stopped) from the east” to the west and found a plain in the land of Shinar (i.e. Mesopotamia), where they settled. This evidence is more consistent with the data of the Chaldean-Babylonian legend about Mount Nizir as the starting point of renewed humanity after the flood. Consequently, it is in this direction that one must look for the biblical Ararat. And indeed, if we draw a line further towards the east, through the Gordien Mountains, and look for the highest peak on which the ark could rest, we will come to the chain of the Indus Kush mountains, or even to those mountains where the Indus originates. And it is remarkable that this is precisely the last point at which the legend regarding the cradle of post-Flood humanity converges among the two main peoples of the ancient world, who preserved the purest and most detailed memories of primitive times, most similar to the narrative of the Bible and the sacred books of Chaldea, namely the Indians and Iranians. In all Indian legends, the origin of people refers to Mount Meru, the home of the gods, the pillar connecting heaven and earth. This Mount Meru was later moved several times due to the gradual movement of the Aryans in India: the Brahmins of central India wanted to have a sacred mountain in their neighborhood and they transferred its name first to Mount Kailasa, then to Mount Magapanta (also called Sumeru), and even later, with the spread of Buddhist teachings among the Burmese, Chinese and Sinigalese, each of these peoples assigned the name Meru to some mountain in their own country. In view of the possibility of such a transfer of historical names from one area to another, it is not impossible to assume that in a similar way the name of Ararat gradually moved from one place to another, being first applied to the Gordien Mountains and then to Ararat of Armenia. But primitive Meru was located to the north of the first residence of the Aryan tribes on Indian soil, in the Punjab and on the banks of the upper Indus. And this was not just an imaginary mountain, alien to earthly geography; Baron Eckstein 71 fully proved its actual existence near the ancient Serik, i.e. southeastern part of Tibet. But the instructions of the Iranians are even more precise and even more consistent with those instructions that follow from the Bible, because they were less distant from the primitive cradle, which, as a result, did not take on such a vague character among them. Their exact recollections of the successive residences of their race, contained in one of the oldest chapters of the books attributed to Zoroaster, are considered to be the place of the original settlement of people and especially of the Iranians Erianu-Vedju, which is described as a northern, cold and mountainous country; It was from here that the Persian tribe descended south to Sogdiana. There rises the navel of waters, the sacred mountain Gara-Berezaiti according to Zendavesta, Alborj of the newest Persians, from the slope of which flows the no less sacred river Arvand, the river from which the first people drank water. The famous French explorer Burnouf proved in the most undoubted manner that Gara-Berezaiti is Bolor or Belurtag, and that Arvand is Yaxarta or, rather, Tarim. It is true that the names Berezaiti and Arvand later served to designate the more distant mountains and rivers of Bactriana: they were successively applied to the mountains and rivers of Persia, Media, Mesopotamia, Syria and Asia Minor, and, not without surprise, they can again be found in the classical names of Berykintus of Phrygia and Orontes of Syria. This last name is especially curious because we find it already in the Egyptian inscriptions of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, and it, of course, was brought to northern Syria not by the Aryan peoples, but by the Semites. The facts just mentioned thus constitute the result of the displacement to which all areas of the legendary geography of primitive times are subjected. Peoples, during their migrations, carry with them their ancient names, with which their dear memories are associated, and attach them to the new mountains and rivers that they find in the countries of their new settlement. 72 The same thing happened with the name of Ararat. The learned researcher Aubrey proved that the mountain, which the Aryan peoples considered the sacred cradle of humanity, originally bore in their memory the name Ariaratha, “the chariot of the worshiped,” “because around its top, in their opinion, revolved the chariot of the seven Brahminical Magarshis, the seven Persian Amesha-Cientas and the seven Chaldean Kakkabis, that is, the chariot of the seven stars of the Great Bear.” This name of Ariarat is the source of the name Ararat, and only later the first Aryan tribes that came to Armenia transferred this name to the mountain that was previously called Masis. Hence the biblical legend about the primeval Ararat, as lying to the east of Shinar or Assyria, exactly coincides with the traditions of the Aryan peoples. All folk legends thus, in amazing agreement with the sacred narrative, lead us to the vast mountainous region of Little Bukharia and western Tibet, as to the place from which the human race spread. There it is that the four greatest rivers of Asia, the Indus, the Tarim, the Oxus and the Jaxarte, have their source, and the highest points are the Belur-tagh and the vast flat upland of the Pamirs, so suitable for the subsistence of the primitive population, still in a pastoral state, and the very name of which in its original form was Upa-Meru, that is, “the country under Meru,” or, perhaps, Upa-Mira, “a country near a lake”, which was the reason for the name Meru. Even some memories of the Greeks point to this particular area, especially the sacred expression άνϑρωποι μέροπες, which, in its original meaning, undoubtedly meant “people who came from Meru.” The memories of other peoples about the primitive fatherland of their ancestors also converge in this direction, although they do not directly point to the central point, since these traditions are partly obscured by the very remoteness of this place. The Chinese considered themselves to have origins from Kuen Lun. The Mongolian tribes associate their most ancient legends with Tianshan and Altai, the Finnish tribes with the Urals, because these two chains, so to speak, blocked their view of the more distant mountains. But one has only to extend two lines from them in the direction indicated by their memories of the primitive cradle, and they will meet each other in Little Bukharia or, in general, in that chain of the highest mountains, which is recognized by the legends of various peoples as the cradle of post-Flood humanity. Thus, the biblical Ararat was that mountain node in Central Asia that dominates the entire Old World and the surrounding area, namely the flat Central Asian upland, is most convenient for primitive settlement. This is exactly the country to which the people themselves gravitated after being expelled from paradise. It was there, to the east of Eden, that the first people withdrew, and even further in the same direction the stern and gloomy Cain retired, seeking distance from human society. The Central Asian upland, being the birthplace of grain plants and the most important domestic animals, became the cradle of post-Flood humanity. Representing a kind of vast bowl, bordered on all sides by mountains, it fed Noah’s family until it multiplied to the point that it overflowed this bowl and, of necessity, had to settle in all directions. This settlement also found echoes in the biblical narrative, which at the same time represents the genealogy of peoples in their original origin from the three sons of Noah, as the ancestors of a renewed humanity. By the time of the Pentateuch, the course of the settlement of peoples had already been so determined and ended that Moses could compile a complete genealogy of all the main peoples of antiquity, showing their origin from Noah. This particular genealogical document, which undoubtedly represents the oldest and best ethnographic document that has ever reached us from antiquity, is contained in the famous tenth chapter of the book of Genesis. Providing ethnologists, philologists and archaeologists, historians, geographers and politicians, no less than interpreters of the Bible, with the most precious and at the same time reliable information that is now available to science regarding the primitive peoples of the earth, first in their formation, then in their place of residence, this chapter at the same time reveals that the biblical writer of everyday life had historical and geographical knowledge, equal to which none of them represented the most famous historians of antiquity. This genealogy provides the bridge through which every learned researcher has the opportunity to safely cross the abyss of centuries that lies between the ancient world, which was destroyed by the flood, and the new humanity, the most important and chosen representative of which was the seed of Abraham. Criticism naturally tried in every possible way to undermine the historical authenticity of this document and tried to equate it with similar genealogical tables found among other peoples. In particular, it was equated with the mythological ethnography of the Greeks, in which these peoples are transformed into personal heroes, acting as the ancestors of the Dorians, Aeolians, Ionians, Achaeans, for whom ancestors with identical names were sought, such as Dor, Aeolus, Ion and Achaeus. It was also equated with Hindu works in which entire peoples, barbarian tribes and even foreign races are presented as descending from the same root as the Hindus themselves, and tribal names are transformed into the names of patriarchal ancestors who allegedly deviated from the Brahminical religion. But this obvious confusion of races in both the Greek and Indian genealogies, the undeniable presence in both of undoubted mythical elements, and the extreme confusion of the legends themselves, make evident the enormous difference between these pagan genealogies and the biblical genealogy of the peoples. “The entire ancient world,” says Delitzsch, has nothing that in terms of universality could be equal to this biblical genealogy. The land-descriptive sections of the epic poems of the Hindus and some of the Puranas diverge so much from each other even in relation to India itself that there is nothing to say about other countries, since even their neighboring countries are lost in the fog of wild and monstrous stories about them. Their system of seven world islands (dvinas) lying around Meru is more concerned with the games of gods and spirits than with the land of man. Nowhere else can one find such a comprehensive overview of national connections.” 73 And this overview is so accurate, has remained so unchanged for thousands of years, that it evokes involuntary reverence on the part of subsequent historians and ethnographers. Others tried to shake the antiquity of this genealogy and attribute it to post-Mosaic times, in order to then deprive the data reported in it of historical reliability, as only conjectural. Bolen placed its origin no earlier than the time of the Babylonian captivity, based on the order and position in which the peoples stand in it, and especially pointing out that “Assyria, Nineveh and the country beyond the Euphrates (occupying a prominent position in the table) were at that time most familiar to the Jews.” 74 According to Knobel, the genealogy arose no earlier than 1000 BC. Chr., was the product of such geographical and ethnographic knowledge as the Israelites acquired at that time through intercourse with Phenicia, and was intended as a picture of the state of mankind and the distribution of peoples somewhere between the twelfth and tenth centuries BC, and the main argument in support of this position is that the genealogy embraces almost the entire territory covered by the Phoenician trade in the times of Solomon and Hiram. With greater thoroughness, however, such researchers as Delitzsch and Gavernik argue that the genealogy itself bears clear traces of its origin from patriarchal times, as well as its expansion through familiarization with the peoples of the earth acquired by the Israelites in Egypt - an opinion that is fully consistent with the universal tradition that the author of the book in which the genealogy makes up one chapter was Moses, who received higher education in Egypt. Some other philological difficulties were also pointed out, supposedly presented by the genealogy. Thus, the Phoenicians and Canaanites are descended from Ham, while according to their language and place of residence they should be descended from Shem and classified among the Semitic peoples. According to Bohlen, they were undoubted Semites, who, however, out of national pride, were attributed by the Israeli chronicler to the cursed family of Ham, “so that they could not enter into close communication with the Jews.” But such a categorical statement does not find justification in science, which has every opportunity to prove that these are Hamitic peoples, but they, having invaded the Semitic possessions and conquered the Semitic tribes, adopted the language of the latter, forgetting their own. History presents many examples of such transformations, and science, as we will see later, brilliantly confirms this position in this case. As for the plan itself, according to which the genealogy was drawn up, it reveals remarkable correctness and harmony. In it, the peoples of the earth are, firstly, divided into three groups, each of which is associated with one of the sons of Noah as its ancestor. Having special ancestors, each group also has a separate place of residence on the surface of the earth: the Japhethites, or the peoples descended from Japheth, occupy countries along the shores of the Caspian, Black and Mediterranean seas; the Hamites, or descendants of Ham, settled in the warmer countries of northern Africa and Arabia, and the Semites, or descendants of Noah's third son, Shem, settled generally in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and never moved far from the place of their original settlement. Then, secondly, each individual people in the various groups is assigned a special tribal ancestor, who in some cases is the grandson, and in others the great-grandson or great-great-grandson of Noah. In this case, the name of the ancestor usually turns into the name of an entire people. Thirdly, the author also points out the very considerations by which peoples are divided into groups. These considerations were: physical kinship - "according to their tribes", linguistic kinship - "according to their language", geographical proximity - "according to their families", national characteristics - "in their peoples" and historical development - "according to their families." Fourthly, the order in which the surveyed peoples are introduced is also determined by special considerations. The people of Japheth's tribe are described first, and this is because they moved away from the theocratic center more than others or even founded the cradle of humanity earlier than others. The Hamites are given second place, and this is not because these two sons of Noah have primary importance in the eyes of the writer of everyday life, but are brought out first in accordance with the general plan of the everyday writer, who always sets out the secondary lines earlier with the goal that, having moved on to the main line, he can then continue the thread of the main narrative without interruption. The genealogy ends with the Semites, because it is through them that the line goes that leads to the founder of the chosen people, Abraham. The same order is noticeable in the geographical distribution of peoples, and the writer of everyday life begins with the most distant ones and gradually moves on to the nearest ones. All this must be kept in mind when studying this famous document. The biblical genealogy of nations, as stated above, begins with the tribe of Japheth. The first of his sons to be mentioned is Homer. This was the ancestor of the Cimmerians of antiquity, the Cimbri of Roman times and the Cimri or Celts of the still existing tribe. Their original residence was the most distant north known to the Greeks or Romans, which, by the way, is also indicated in the Odyssey. It is, in the words of this poem, In the deep-flowing waters of the ocean - There's a Cimmerian sad region covered forever Damp fog and haze of clouds; never shows To the eye of people the face of the radiant Helios, the earth He leaves, rising into the star-filled sky, From the sky, abundant with stars, it descends, turning to the earth; A bleak night has always surrounded those who live there. 75 This gloomy description applies to the northern shore of the Black Sea, to the Crimea, and to the shores of the Azov Sea. The Black Sea in ancient times was called the Cimmerian Sea, and other areas in these countries equally indicate the predominance of the Cimmerian tribe. The very name Crimea is in reality just a spoiled word “Kimry”. They were a warlike and ferocious people, and ancient history often tells of their invasions of more civilized countries. Thus, the prophet Ezekiel (38:2–6) predicts their military invasion from the north in alliance with other nations, an invasion that will bring horror and destruction. Their invasions of Asia Minor, especially when they themselves were pressed by the Scythians, were a common source of fear for seven centuries BC. But the majority of them stayed in distant countries, where they lived in forests all the way to the forests of Germany. Subsequently, the Jutland Peninsula became their main residence and was known by their name; but they spread to France, Spain and Britain, and still continue to exist among the Celtic tribes of western Europe, including Great Britain. Thus, the Welsh still call themselves Cymry, and Cumberland by its very name indicates their existence in this district. Homer had three sons: Ashkenaz, Riphat and Togarmah. These were also the ancestors of the peoples named after them, which, however, is not easy to identify. Ashkenaz, by its very meaning in the sense of “horse milkers,” indicates nomads, like the later Tatars or ancient Scythians, who lived in the elevated steppes of western Asia in the vicinity of the Cimmerians, with whom they were related by blood. Traces of them may have been preserved in the name of the Ascania River in Asia Minor and in the names Scandia and Scandinavia, but in general such an assumption is rather doubtful. Rifat has some similarities with the name of the fabulous Riphean Mountains, in the caves of which, according to the legends of the Greeks, the north wind was born and which the Greeks attributed to the north of the world known to them. But there is much more probability in the assumption that puts it in connection with the Rifat mountain range, a snowy ridge in Armenia beyond the Tigris. Togarmah is mentioned by the prophet Ezekiel (27:13, 38:6) as a people trading horses and mules in the bazaars of Tire and as related to Homer or Kimri in the upcoming invasion of Palestine. In this regard, it is remarkable that the Armenians, Georgians and the Caucasian tribes in general even now trace their origins through some Torgona to Homer and call themselves the “house of Torgona” or, as it appears in the Bible, Togarma. All these tribes are Indo-Germanic or Aryan. Magog, the second of the sons of Japheth, appears elsewhere in the Bible as the name of a country, together with Gog, the prince of the tribes known as Rosh, Meshech and Tubal (Ezek. 38:2; 39:1). The last two are called in the book of Genesis the fifth and sixth sons of Japheth. From here, apparently, we can conclude that "Magog" was a vague term among the Jews to designate the barbarian tribes of northern Asia, like "Scythians" among the Greeks. Bl. Jerome cites the opinion of the Jews of his time that this name denoted the “terrible countless Scythian peoples.” Of the newest interpreters, Knobel identifies him with the Slavs of the present time, and Ezekiel and others understand Rosh as the newest Russians. Ezekiel describes them as a wild and fearsome tribe of horsemen (28:15; 39:3), armed with bows, and this description fits the Scythians who invaded Palestine in 625 BC. But this name was also applied to other nations, because Tubal and Meshech are not only barbarian horsemen riding on steppe horses, but in some at least their parts they were also trading people who brought iron and copper to Tire on ships for sale (Ezek. 27:13). It is remarkable that Tubal is a clear consonance with the Persian word for copper or bronze, and Meshech, according to some, is a neighboring people - the Khalibs, who were famous in ancient times for copper mining. This is confirmed by the fact that Herodotus mentions the Tibarians and Moschians together as peoples living southeast of the Black Sea, and says that they mined copper ores and were part of the nineteenth satrapy of the kingdom of Darius. 76 Assyrian inscriptions, moreover, speak of the people and land of the Musks in northern Assyria, and by them, in all likelihood, one must understand Meshech of the Bible. The next name on the list, Madai, is apparently identical with the same name by which the Medes are known on the Assyrian monuments and the great inscription of Darius. Iavan indicates the country of the Greeks or Ionians in the broad sense of the word, which is confirmed by the Assyrian plates, where this name appears almost without any change, precisely in the form of Iavan. It is remarkable that this name was also used by Darius the Mede. 77 Tiras, the seventh son of Japheth, cannot be identified with the same ease. According to some writers, both ancient and modern, this name refers to the inhabitants of Thrace, who in ancient times occupied the entire country lying north of the Sea of ​​​​Marmara and the Aegean archipelago. But more correct is the later assumption, according to which this name is attached to the Tursenoi, to the Tursci or Tusci, a branch of the Etruscan tribe in its most ancient northern settlements, long before it penetrated into Italy. They were known in the most remote antiquity as sailors and sea robbers, not only in Italian waters, but also under the name of the Tursenoi Pelasgians in the Greek archipelago. It is interesting that this people invaded Egypt in alliance with the Achaeans, Lydians, Sicilians, Sardinians and other tribes already in the 14th century BC. 78 This completes the genealogy of the seven sons or immediate descendants of Japheth. But then follows a list of peoples or tribes descended from Javan or the Greeks. The first of these was Elis; Ezekiel says about him (27:7) that he lived along the northern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, from where the famous purple dye was brought to Tire. The fact that the sea snail that produced this dye was found not only on the shores of Lacaonia, but also on the Gulf of Corinth and near various islands of the Greek archipelago, together with the name of this region Elis in the Peloponnese, apparently indicates that this is the country that is of course here. Elisa, however, is translated in the Syriac Bible as "a region in Italy," and the mention of it in connection with Tarsis and Kittim, by which the whole Greek territory is sometimes meant, has led some to believe that Sicily is meant by this name. Tarsis undoubtedly points to the famous Phoenician port in Spain beyond the Strait of Gibraltar, between the two mouths of the Guadalquivir, i.e. "Big River" 79 The name Tarsis strikingly confirms the position of the biblical chronicle of peoples, indicating that this settlement was first made by the Aryan or Japheth tribe, since this very word turns out to be only a form of the Sanskrit or Aryan word tarisha - “sea” or “sea shore”, which meaning, according to the ancient tradition of the rabbis, was always attached to it. Thus, before the Phoenicians settled in this region, another tribe had already given it a name, which they adopted and subsequently applied to the whole region. According to Knobel, the original settlers of this area were a branch of the Etruscans who settled here before they finally made Italy their main seat. 80 It is not without interest to follow these ancient movements of people that took place thousands of years ago, and to observe what exactly attracted them to certain countries. Thus, Tarsis was famous since ancient times for the abundance of silver and other metals mined in the local mines, as well as grain bread. Already in the time of Solomon, a thousand years before Christ, the large ships that sailed there were known as the ships of Tarsis, and this name was generally applied to large merchant ships wherever they sailed. 81 From the busy harbors of Tharsis, large cargoes of iron, tin, silver, lead and other metals, as well as grain bread, were transported everywhere, for which Tharsis was famous in ancient times throughout the East. The peoples were just as industrial then as they are now: fishermen were busy working with their nets, miners were digging in the depths of the mountains, sailors were working on ships, blacksmiths and carpenters were rattling their hammers, jewelers were making precious things - everything is exactly as we see it now. Human life is so monotonous! The third son of Javan bore the name Kittim or Hittim, and by this is meant one of the branches of the Greek tribe, a people whose residence is described as an island or coastal country. The Kittim Islands are often mentioned in St. Scripture (Jer. 2:10). Near them, it was the homebound Tyrian fleet that heard about the fall of their great city, and it was there that the Tyrians sought refuge (Isa. 23:1–12). I. Flavius, already in the time of Christ, identified this name with the name Cyprus and, as proof of this, pointed to the name of one Cypriot city - Kittion or Kitium, adding that the same name was applied in a broader sense to other islands and to most of the coastal countries of the Mediterranean Sea. 82 “It was especially used,” adds another ancient writer, who himself lived on the island of Cyprus, “about the Cypriots and Rhodians, as well as about the Macedonians, because they were of Cypriot or Rhodian origin.” 83 The fourth son of Javan is called Dodanim in the Hebrew original of the Bible, 84 but, according to the general assumption of researchers, this word should be read Rodanim, since it was very easy to replace one letter with another; especially since in Greek and other ancient translations this name appears precisely in the form Rodanim. It, without a doubt, points to the Greek population of the island of Rhodes, which was considered one of the islands of Kittim and in connection with which the Rhodians were constantly present. This ends the genealogy of the descendants of Japheth, who were thus distributed in their ancient history over the countries known to the Jews in the extreme north, from central Asia and Armenia to the wild forest countries north of the Black and Aegean seas, and also in Greece; Moreover, their descendants subsequently spread little by little to Sicily, Spain and to the large islands of the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea. The exact correspondence of this distribution with the later results of ethnological science is striking. The genealogy of Japheth is followed by the genealogy of Ham. The very word Ham, in Hebrew, means “warm” or “hot”, and therefore points to the south. The same word was used among the Egyptians, and was a common name among the Nile population for their country, owing to the "black" or dark color of their soil. 85 Ham is depicted as the father of the southern or black tribes, in contrast to Japheth, from whom the northern peoples descended, and all those who lived between them belonged to Shem. To this group of humanity belong four great nations descended from the sons of Ham, namely: Cush, Mizraim, Puth and Canaan. Kush or Kush was the ancient Egyptian name for the country between the falls of the Nile and Abyssinia and for the peoples living south of Egypt, except the blacks. She is thus almost identified with the present Nubia and with the more ancient use of the name Ethiopia among the Greeks. The black tribes were, however, known as Ethiopians on both sides of the Arabian Gulf, and Herodotus even speaks of an Asiatic branch of this race. In Homer this name is applied to all the tribes and countries of the then known southern parts of the world, and in like manner Cush was a general term among the ancient Hebrews for the same countries and tribes (Gen. 2:13), because the peoples who in the genealogical table are considered to have descended from Cush include the inhabitants of both southern Asia and Africa (Gen. 10:7). But we must not forget that these continents in ancient times were not precisely delimited from each other; so that even Herodotus attributed Egypt to Asia, although he was aware of the difficulty of such a division. Even as late as the time of Christ, geographers speak of the “Kussites” of the Susian region beyond the Tigris and Euphrates. Nimrod, then the first son of Cush, was considered the first king of Babylon and the region around it. Hence, perhaps, the Mesopotamian king Husarsafem, of the time of the judges, by his very name indicates the existence of the Kushite kingdom in this area until a relatively late time (Judges 3:8). In addition, in Persia there is still a province at the mouth of the Euphrates, bearing the significant name Khuzistan in this regard. In a more specific sense, Cush is used in the Bible, as it was also used by the ancient Egyptians, to designate the country south of the Falls of the Nile (Ezek. 39:10), including Kordofan along with Abyssinia and present-day Nubia. This large strip of land in ancient times was much less mixed in its ethnography than even at the present time, because countless historical upheavals contributed to the origin of various mixed tribes, descended from the mixture of Cushites, Semites and Negroes. In ancient times there was no such mixing, since the Old Testament does not mention Semitic tribes in these countries, although Herodotus in the 5th century BC. mentions Arabs along with African Ethiopians in the army of Xerxes. 86 Nor is there any indication of the presence of Negro tribes, because even the Egyptian monuments make a clear distinction between the Ethiopians and the Negroes to the west of their country. Like all the peoples already mentioned in the genealogical table, the Cushites belonged to the Caucasian race. It is true that the Ethiopian language, which they used during later centuries, is essentially Semitic in character, but this can be explained by the fact that the Ethiopian races mixed with the Semitic in Arabia 87 and adopted their language, just as the Normans adopted the French language, or as the Latin language became the language of many peoples, as for example. Gauls, Iberians and others who entered the Roman Empire. And now there are still tribes that undoubtedly represent the remnants of the ancient Cushites, and their language is equally different from both the Semitic language of the Abyssinians on the one hand, and from the Negro languages ​​on the other, and in physical features they clearly differ from both. The typical African in general differs very sharply from the Negro, whose characteristics first appear under the influence of local conditions and social degeneration. Simple color does not serve as an indicator of race, since, for example. Modern Jews come in all colors, depending on the area they inhabit, from the dark-faced Jew of India to the fair-haired Jew of Denmark. From Cush came five ancestors of different nations, namely: Seva, Havilah, Sawta, Raama and Sawteha. Of these, Seva, “men,” according to I. Flavius, constituted the ancient kingdom of Meroe, surrounded as an island by the branches of the Nile, and this indication is generally recognized as correct. This tribe thus occupied a part of the present Nubia, north of Kordofan and Abyssinia, a region which in ancient times lay on the direct caravan route between Arabia and India on the one hand and Africa on the other, and served as a source of wealth and prosperity for the country in general and for the cities in particular. Seva is mentioned only twice in St. Scriptures; one says that this people were famous for their growth (Isa. 45:14), and the other speaks of them as “a strong and vigorous people, terrible from the beginning to this day, who tramples everything and whose country is cut by rivers” (Is. 18:2, 7). Herodotus describes them in a similar way, as the tallest and most beautiful people who chose their king for his height and strength and often lived up to 120 years. 88 Havilah is a name that was already mentioned in the description of Eden; but it, apparently, was applied in ancient times to other distant countries. Niebuhr found a place near the shore of the Persian Gulf called Huwayla, but this does not fit with the mention of Havilah in connection with the Ethiopian tribes living in Africa. This appears to have been the country now known as Yemen in southwestern Arabia, where there was a place still known in Roman times as Waila. But it could also be an African country at the mouth of the Red Sea, where the ancients called one gulf Avalitsky. In either case, she would be in close proximity to Seva. The name of Sawta can be identified with the name of the ancient Arabian trading city of Sawwafa or Sabbota, which lay east of Yemen or Havilah. If so, then we know that this rich city in later times had 60 churches and jealously guarded its monopoly in the incense trade. Raama seems to indicate a country still further east than Sawta, reaching as far as the Persian Gulf, where in former times there was a place known as Regma, the form in which the Greek Bible renders the name. A region was known under the name Savtekha, which lay even further to the east and constituted the new Persian province of Karamania, lying opposite Regma on the other side of the Persian Gulf. From Raama came two nations: Sheba and Dedan; in the first of them you can see the Sabaeans of happy Arabia, a people famous in ancient times for their extensive trade in the precious products of their country, incense, balm, mur, etc. ( Job 6:9 ; Ezek. 27:23, 28:13 ). Such trade was the reason that they were considered the richest people of antiquity, and this is what gave particular interest to the visit of Solomon by the Queen of Sheba, described in detail in St. Scripture (1 Kings 10:1, 2 Chronicles 9:1). Her arrival in the eyes of the Israelites was one of the greatest honors that could be given to the house of David. Hence it was quite natural that Isaiah, depicting the glory of Messianic times, said that the kings of Sheba would bring him gold and incense, and the psalmist predicted that they would bring him gold (Isa. 60:6; Ps. 71:15). Dedan, always mentioned together with Sheba, gave his name to a vast country in Arabia, north of Sheba, and his descendants gradually spread to the southern borders of Edom (Jer. 49:8). It is remarkable that Dedan and Sheba are also found among the descendants of Abraham (Gen. 25:3). The reason for this was probably that the descendants of Dedan and Sheba gradually spread northward, first in caravan travel, and then in permanent settlements, among the tribes descended from Abraham who lived in these parts, until finally all these tribes became one mixed race. Nimrod, another descendant of Cush, will be spoken of later as being of special historical interest. The name of the second son of Ham, Mizraim, from the most ancient times, among the Semitic peoples, was given to the “two Egypts,” although in the strict sense it was given only to what is now known as lower Egypt, divided into two districts, since Upper Egypt was not known to the ancient world until the Persian invasion. This name means “fortified” or “locked,” which apparently indicates a strong military wall, which, for almost 250 miles, protected the Nile valley from attacks by Asian tribes. 89 The physical characteristics of the Egyptians, their language and even their concepts show that they were a branch of the Caucasian tribe, 90 and their migration from the south and the presence of native tribes, which led to a gradual mixing of blood, serve to explain the fact that mummies and images of earlier times approach closer to the Caucasian type and stand further from the African type than mummies and images of later times. One has only to look closely at ancient sculptural and pictorial images to see that they depict people of the same race as us. In the Dover Museum, for example. there is the figure of a scribe, extremely ancient, and his features are completely European, with only a slight reddish tint to his skin. Kings, priests and warriors, as the most protective of the purity of their blood, clearly show that this people emerged from the same cradle where the Semitic tribe first lived. From Mizraim came Ludim, Anamim, Legavim, Naftuhim, Patrusim, Kasluhim and Kaftorim. Ludim probably refers to either the Egyptians themselves or the Barbary people of northern Africa. The first opinion is supported with great wit by Ebers, and since this word means, like Seva, “men,” it is not surprising that this particular people called themselves so in contrast to all other peoples, which they, like the Egyptians, despised as inferior races. “They considered themselves,” says Herodotus, “the best of all people.” 91 The Anamim, according to Ebers and Brugsch, were the same as the Amu, a Semitic tribe of shepherds who settled in the flat and marshy grasslands of the lower Delta and in one district in the eastern half of middle Egypt. 92 But this opinion goes no further than conjecture. The legavim were of the same tribe as the Lubim 93 or Libyans, the Lubu of the Egyptian monuments. On these latter they are described as a people living in the west of Egypt and spreading from there, under the general name of Temgu, to the boundless ocean and the setting sun. In ancient times, the Libyans actually called the tribes that lived in the country west of the Nile, from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea to the rather distant south along the vast northern coast of Africa. On monuments they are depicted as light-skinned, painted, wearing multi-colored cloaks, with pointed beards and clearly Caucasian features; in Thebes and the Delta they were spoken of as “white men of the West.” Ebers cites striking data to prove that they first came from the islands of the Mediterranean Sea, attracted perhaps by the fertility of the African coast, which, as can be seen from the many ruins, was undoubtedly greater in ancient times than it is now. However, the Hebrew name Legavim, like that given to them by the Egyptians, means inhabitants of a dry and waterless country, so that, with the exception of a narrow coastal strip, their country, apparently, has always been relatively deserted. Naftuhim and Patrusim - gave their names to the ancient regions of Memphis and Thebes in their sacred names, as opposed to simple popular names (each Egyptian city had two names: sacred and popular). Memphis and its region are mentioned first, perhaps due to their greater antiquity; because Thebes, with its highly influential religion and temples, became famous at a later time than the city of the kings who built the pyramids. Patrusim was, perhaps, the city and region of the god Pa-Gator; Naphtuhim may be the city and region of the god Ptah, but in neither case should we see here any special tribe different from the surrounding Egyptians. Kasluhim is identified with sufficient thoroughness with the population located in the area extending from the eastern limits of the Nile flood, along the sea coast, to the southern limits of Palestine. Here lay, to the west of the Egyptian River (now Wadi el-Arish), the Sirbon Lakes and Mount Kasia, a dry area known for its salt marshes, which poisoned the soil and left only minor areas suitable for cultivation. This salt, however, was an important article of trade, since the Phoenicians in the north and in the Delta were famous salters in ancient times; and although the Egyptians generally had an aversion to sea fish, as unclean, and to salt itself, Africa nevertheless generally consumed it in large quantities, and it could easily be sent from here in all directions, since the high road between Asia and Africa went through this salt region. The name Kasluhim was given to this population from Mount Kasia in their territory; hence Kas-loh, or “burnt hill” of the ancient Egyptians. This population, according to Ebers, was of Phoenician origin, but in its morals and customs of life it became completely Egyptian. By Kaphtorim Ebers means the settlement of the Phoenicians in the most distant times on the banks of the Delta, before the Egyptians spread to these northern limits. Kaft was the Egyptian name for this people and these colonies. According to his assumption, they first occupied the islands of the Greek archipelago, including Crete, and from there moved to the Nile Delta; he supports this view with great learning. He considers the Philistines to be the remnant of a powerful branch of the Kaphtarim, who, having first reached Egypt, of necessity moved to Palestine - the place of their final settlement through the lands of the Kasluhim. It is extremely gratifying to see the accuracy of the Bible even in so insignificant a subject as the movement of this tribe in the earliest times, an accuracy demonstrated by the latest scientific research. To this we can add that in ancient and Jewish manuscripts instead of kaftarim it is read: inhabitants of Damietta, i.e. shores of the Delta. This reference to the migration of tribes at the dawn of history, brief as it may be in itself, throws a deeply interesting light on the greatest step in the mental development of mankind, namely, the introduction of the alphabet. During their long settlement in Egypt, the Phoenicians learned to represent sounds by means of signs borrowed from the sacred script of the Egyptians, and these signs were first transferred to Palestine and from there spread to all the peoples of the east and west. Coming first from one island in the Persian Gulf, this people early became accustomed to the Mediterranean Sea, which washed the shores of their country at the foot of Lebanon, and spread on the one hand to the islands of the Levant and Aegean and on the other to the still uninhabited but rich shores of the Egyptian Delta. There, fishing immediately opened up a new branch of industry for this people, who had a special instinct and ability for trade. The salt of the country of the Kasluhim and Libya gave them the opportunity to begin salting fisheries, as was already the case in the north in Sidon, since the very name Sidon, according to some, simply means a fishing place, although according to others it indicates the fact that one of the main Phoenician gods had the shape of a fish. Coastal settlements soon spread south, as the Phoenicians were almost more famous for their colonization than for their trade. The mouths of the Nile at that time were completely covered with papyrus and other aquatic plants, which are now found only in Nubia. In its waters there were many huge crocodiles, hippopotamuses and other large animals, and the reeds gave shelter to countless flocks of birds of all kinds. But the Egyptians from the south, and the Phoenicians from the north, clearing the way for themselves, like the newest pioneers of the American prairies, in the course of time met each other, and then began that close communication between them, which was so beneficial for civilization, as for example. in the spread of the alphabet. By the name of Fut or Put, the third son of Ham, one can understand the country known in hieroglyphs as Punt, the newest Turkish province of Hedge, stretching inland from the shore of the Red Sea along the northern half of its eastern shore. Residents of Punt sold themselves en masse to serve as mercenary troops in Tire and other states, and for example. fought under the banners of Egypt in the famous Battle of Carchemish, although at times they fought against Egypt itself (Jer. 46:9; Ezek. 27:10; 30:5; Libya is called Fut in Hebrew). They were also famous as traders in the markets of Tire, where they brought the products of their mercury mines, famous throughout the world, as well as many incense, for which their country was also famous. In inscriptions and images on monuments they are depicted as a wandering tribe of dark brown color and strictly distinguished from the sedentary Cushites with whom they lived in the neighborhood. The very word Punt, meaning flight, precisely indicates their nomadic way of life. From Canaan, the fourth son of Ham, came no less than eleven nations. His firstborn was Sidon, the founder of the first Phoenician settlement on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, a settlement that later turned into a famous city and became the head of other neighboring cities of Phenicia. The very name Canaan was originally applied only apparently to the Phoenicians and to the coastal plain at the foot of Lebanon, on which Sidon was built, as the earliest settlement; and this may have included the fertile plain of Esdrilon, as well as the coastal strip extending south to Egypt. In the time of Moses and Joshua, however, the name Canaan meant the whole country west of the Jordan, but it never crossed that river. This name means “low-lying land,” although, due to the living commercial sense that distinguished the Phoenicians, the word Canaanite subsequently became equivalent to the word “merchant.” The very word “Phoenician”, in its original meaning, means “brown” or “dark red”, and arose as a result of the color of this tribe, but they called themselves Canaanites, a name their Carthaginian brothers were proud of back in the days of bl. Augustine. In classifying the Phoenicians in the genealogy of the book of Genesis as a Hamitic section of humanity, some, as mentioned above, saw a serious difficulty, since their language is almost completely identical with the language of the Jews, and thus they should be ranked among the Semitic peoples. This objection is completely resolved by the assumption made above that the Hamites adopted the language of the Semitic tribes they conquered, who settled in Palestine before them. But apart from this assumption, the consanguinity of the ancestors of these races could naturally influence, especially in ancient times, the similarity in the language of at least some of their descendants, as it turned out to be in Palestine. Language at first could not serve as a definite sign of origin, since in distant times, when humanity first began to spread from a common cradle in Asia, the families of languages ​​were less clearly demarcated than was subsequently the case. The Hamitic tribes could still speak the Semitic language and carried it with them in their wanderings. In addition, the original location of the Phoenicians further confirms the biblical story of their origin from Ham. We first meet them as they made their way from southern Arabia to what are now called the Barein Islands in the Persian Gulf. The churches still standing on these islands during the reign of the Romans were obviously Phoenician, and the inhabitants considered themselves descendants of this famous people of Palestine. Their next place of residence, even further to the north, was the flat shores of the Persian Gulf at the mouth of the Euphrates, which they first called Canaan or, in their pronunciation, Henna, “lowland”; which name was subsequently transferred by them to the country of their stay at the foot of Lebanon. The Gimiarites, a related Arabian tribe who spoke a language similar to theirs and the Hebrew, remained in southern Arabia; but the Canaanites chose to move to the shores of Palestine, from where, by the way, they settled, as we have seen, to Egypt, remaining for centuries at the mouth of the Nile, so that Egyptian art, inventions, way of thinking and religious views became the common property of these tribes and influenced Sidon and Tire. Egyptian morality, gross pagan idolatry, and even the very character of writing were thus introduced by them into Palestine, serving for the Jews as a sad confirmation of the common origin of the Canaanites with Mizraim. Finally, proof of the Hamitic origin of the Phoenicians and other Canaanites is their very character, which clearly shows an inclination towards materialism and worldly culture - a common feature that distinguished the Hamitic tribes in ancient times. The second son of Canaan was Heth, who follows Sidon and enjoyed great fame in the ancient history of Palestine. This name is attached in Assyrian inscriptions to all the “western peoples of Syria” 94, right down to the seashore, so that among the Egyptians Syria itself was known under the name Kheti or Hatti. There these people were so strong that one of their kings had a significant army and withstood a long struggle with the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses II; the latter's victory over the united forces of the Hets was considered such a great feat that it was glorified in pompous verse on six different monuments and churches. The center of their power apparently was at one time Asia Minor, where monuments belonging to them, hitherto erroneously attributed to Ramses II, have recently been found and read. There they at one time formed a powerful monarchy that had great influence on all surrounding countries. Actually, the Palestinian Hittites (if they are the same tribe), however, were, apparently, a relatively insignificant tribe. During the time of Abraham they lived in Hebron, and during the time of Moses, together with the Amorites and Jebusites, they occupied the hilly terrain of the inheritances of Ephraim and Judah (Gen. 23; Num. 13:29; Josh. 11:3), and during the reign of Solomon they were forced to perform forced government work (1 Kings 9:20). Even as late as the time of Ezra, the Jews were condemned for their association with them (Ezra 9:1), The next son of Canaan, Jebusite, was the ancestor of the Jebusites, who had Jebus as their capital, later Jerusalem: the word Jebus means, apparently, in the Canaanite language a “waterless” hill, and the city itself was named from the hill on which it was located. The Jebusites belonged to one of the small Canaanite tribes and apparently occupied only Jerusalem and the surrounding area; but their courage and warlike spirit enabled them, despite the limited population, to maintain their independence for several centuries against the Israelites, so that only David could take their main city, which was the stronghold of their kingdom. From the Amorites came the Amorites, also a Canaanite tribe that lived within western Palestine. Their very name shows that they were “highlanders”; They built their cities on the tops of mountains, which made the Israeli spies tell in horror that the walls of these cities seemed to rise to the sky. According to the description of the prophet Amos, they were an extremely tall people, tall as cedars and strong as oaks (Amos 2:9), and apparently were in some relationship with the gigantic tribes of Rephaim and the sons of Anak (Num. 13:3). During Abraham's time they lived in southern Palestine, in Hatzazonthemar (palm groves) and Hebron (Gen. 14:7, 13), but they also lived in central Palestine (Gen. 48:22). In the time of Moses they appear in the hills of Judah's inheritance, as far as Selah or Petra in the south, and in the inheritances east of the Jordan formerly occupied by the Rephaim and other tribes (Gen. 14:5; Num. 13:30; Jud. 1:36), where they founded two strong states, ruled by Sihon and Og and extending from the Arnon River to the northern part of Bashan. It was these tribes that offered particularly strong resistance to the Israelis when they entered Palestine from the south, and a fierce struggle was subsequently waged against them on the eastern bank of the Jordan. Sihon and Og, their kings in this region, were then defeated, and their possessions became the property of the Israelites; but the southern Amorites were conquered only in later times by the tribe of Judah. The Amorites of central Palestine retained their possessions for even longer, but finally they too were forced to submit to the power of the Israelites, and their pitiful remnant, along with other Canaanite tribes, had to carry out state work during the reign of Solomon (1 Kings 9:20, 21). Some of them remained, however, until the return of the Jews from captivity, since Ezra expressly forbade marriages between them and the Israelites. From Gergesei came the Gergesei, who lived somewhere in central Palestine, although even I. Flavius ​​could no longer find any traces of them in his time. 95 There is, however, an Armenian legend testifying that during the time of Joshua they moved to Armenia and became the ancestors of the Circassians living between the Black Sea and the Kuban River, which, however, already leads us to assume that they were not of Semitic, but of Aryan origin. From the son of Canaan, Hive, descended the Hivites who lived in Shechem during the time of the patriarchs and remained there after the conquest of the country by the Israelites. The inhabitants of Gibeon, who saved their lives by their cunning, although they were converted into slaves to serve at the tabernacle, belonged to this tribe. It is remarkable that this incident indicates the existence of a republican form of government in Gibeon through the elders, while the Hivites of Shechem formed a free community under the rule of the prince. They were not limited to Palestine, as they are also found on the southern slopes of Lebanon and even in Imath, on the Orontes. But by the time of Solomon they had already become an insignificant people and were, along with other similar tribes, forced to perform government work. After the reign of Solomon, they are no longer mentioned at all. From Arkaei came the Arkaei, a small Canaanite tribe that lived in the north along the coast of Palestine, about a hundred miles from present-day Beirut. This name is still borne by the ruins of the city, in the middle of which rises a hill one hundred feet high, which was a fortress during the Crusades. From Sinei descended the Sinei, an even more insignificant tribe that owned the city of Sinai and a small adjacent district on the western slope of the Lebanon Mountains, north of the Arkaei; this name was still preserved during the time of bl. Jerome, although the city no longer existed. The reason why these two minor tribes are mentioned in the genealogy appears to be the fact that, according to Josephus, the Arkeans were included within the tribe of Asher and entered the kingdom of Solomon. 96 From Arvadei came the Arvadeans, inhabitants of the city of Arad and the island of the same name on which he stood. This area is no more than a mile in circumference, not far from the Phoenician coast, north of Tripolis, and received its name, like Tyre, from the islands of the Persian Gulf, from which the population of these countries originally came. The inhabitants of Arad were not only brave sailors and brave warriors, but also industrial traders, and their city was so densely populated that houses were built on several floors. 97 This island is now called Ruweida, and in ancient times, apparently, was surrounded by a wall of large hewn stones, and even had double walls on the northern and western sides. From Cemarei descended the Cemarei, another Phoenician tribe who apparently lived in the Phoenician fortified city of Smyrna, near the Eleuthera River, at the western foot of the Lebanon chain. The name itself exactly corresponds to the area, because it comes from the Arabic Samar - “to flow down” or “to rush down”, and was quite applicable to the population living on steep mountain slopes, among murmuring mountain streams. The last son of Canaan was Himathaeus; under this name a strong city (Himath or Imath) was known on the banks of the Orontes, in the Valley of Lebanon, and was considered at one time a very important city. Like Arad, it was first a Phoenician colony and ruled by its own king in the time of David. Due to its position on the high road of Phoenician trade with the Euphrates, Himath early became rich, but was taken by Jeroboam II and annexed to the kingdom of Israel. In this long list of Canaanite peoples, the names, with the exception of Sidon, run from south to north and coincide with the boundaries of the kingdom of Judah, at least in the original delimitation. Hence, it becomes self-evident why the sacred writer dwells in particular detail on the population of this particular country, as if it were his own. The peoples of Africa, Arabia and Palestine are listed among the descendants of Ham in the biblical genealogy table, just as the peoples of northern Asia and Europe were listed among the descendants of Japheth. It remains to trace more descendants of Shem. Of these, the first is Elam. Under this name the country of Elam (“high land”) is known, stretching along the eastern bank of the lower Tigris and bordering on the west with the province of Babylon, on the north on Assyria and Media, and on the south on the Persian Gulf. She thus embraced parts of present-day Laristan, Khuzistan and Arabistan. It was a picturesque mountainous country and its capital in later times was the famous city of Shushan (or Susa), so often mentioned by the prophet Daniel as the residence of the kings of Babylon, and in the book of Esther as the favorite city of residence of the Persian kings. Lying far to the south-east of the various Semitic tribes and bordering on the Medes, who belong to Japheth or the Indo-Germanic tribe, Elam, from the most remote ages, was in constant historical intercourse with its Semitic neighbors. It is not known whether the Elamites spoke any unique Semitic dialect, i.e. related to the language of Syriac, Hebrew, Arabic and Ethiopian. Some have thought that the Elamites spoke an Aryan rather than a Semitic language, but there is no basis for this. It is much more likely that the people, clearly called Semitic in the biblical genealogy and from the most distant times, were in historical relations with other peoples of the same tribe, spoke a language related to Assyrian and Babylonian, i.e. one of the so-called Semitic languages. This is not refuted by the possibility that some Aryan tribe, like the Persian, could have penetrated into this country, and as a result of this, a mixed language could have gradually formed, which came into use among the Elamites. The random remark of the Bible is thus confirmed by a very strong historical probability. An interesting proof of the antiquity, as well as the correctness of the genealogy of the book of Genesis, is, among other things, the fact that, while mentioning Elam, it says nothing about Persia. The explanation for this circumstance is that before the rise of Cyrus in the 6th century BC. Persia was a completely insignificant country and unknown to other peoples. This fact serves as an eloquent refutation of those critics who try to attribute the composition of the book of Genesis to the time of the Babylonian captivity, when such an omission would have been unthinkable. Shem's second son was Assur. He was the founder of the famous Assyrian monarchy and the builder of Nineveh and other cities. It is said about him that he “came out of this (Babylonian) land and built Nineveh.” At the same time, it is remarkable that Babylon is mentioned before Nineveh, and this circumstance is fully confirmed by the latest research. The Assyrian monuments discovered at Nineveh, as well as the very type of face of the population, prove that the Bible correctly classifies the inhabitants of Assyria as belonging to the Semitic branch of the Caucasian race. Their language was the same as that of the Babylonian population, and the writing itself was similar to Babylonian, and even in religion the later state borrowed from the most ancient. It is extremely remarkable that the writer of everyday life, thousands of years ago, attributed the Assyrians to the Semitic peoples, while the discoveries of modern times show that it would be completely easy to attribute to them another origin. Recent studies of wedge-shaped inscriptions have shown that the earliest population first established on the banks of the Euphrates was the Akkadian, apparently of Turanian or Tatar origin, and they first introduced culture and citizenship there. From them the Babylonians and Assyrians borrowed their writing, their ancient religion and much more, so that it would be more natural to say that it was they, and not the Semitic people, who founded Assyria, as was in reality. The Akkadians were ancient Babylonians, but Assyria was first of Semitic origin, and the very word Assur is the name of the main god of the Assyrians, who apparently idolized their founder in his person. The boundaries of ancient Assyria were at first very small; it embraced almost the same terrain that made up the Roman province of Adiavena or the southern part of the new Turkish province of Kurdistan, at the sources of the Tigris and south of ancient Armenia, i.e. on a line with the newest Aleppo and the southern coast of Asia Minor. For the Jews of Palestine, Assyria was thus at all times a northern power in the proper sense of the word; in this sense, the prophets constantly talk about it. The question has often been discussed how tribes of such different origins, such as the Cushitic Babylonians and the Semitic Assyrians, could speak the same language; but this difficulty apparently arises from the inaccurate use of the expression “Semitic.” Many, if not most, of the peoples descended from Ham in the biblical lineage, especially the Cushites, spoke languages ​​of this class. The Hebrew language was in fact at first only the dialect of the Canaanites, a predominantly Hamitic population. Even Isaiah calls it the language of Canaan (Isaiah 19:18). Living for entire generations among the Canaanite tribes, Abraham and his descendants adopted it instead of the language they spoke before, namely, a dialect that, in all likelihood, stands much closer to Arabic, judging by the initial relations of Eber, the ancestor of the Jews, with Joktan, the ancestor of the Arabs. The separation of the tribes that became the ancestors of the Cushites from others of the same root, called the ancestors of the Semitic race (the former abandoning the nomadic way of life, and the latter retaining it), was thus the separation of the descendants of Ham from the descendants of Shem. The former went south and west, the latter north and east, although all were members of the same original family, spoke the same language, in its various dialects, and professed the same religion, under different symbols. Therefore, it was quite possible to speak of them ethnographically as a common family - Syro-Arab or Syro-Ethiopian, as opposed to the Indo-Persian or Indo-Germanic race, the other large division of the white race. Thus, the Bible quite rightly classified the races that spoke the so-called Semitic languages ​​as the descendants of Ham, although only now modern science has discovered this circumstance, indicated by St. a writer of everyday life with amazing accuracy thousands of years ago. Climbing still higher up the great river, we then meet with Arphaxad or Arpachshad, the region north of Assyria proper and north-east of the upper Tigris. This is, apparently, that flat hill that is located between lakes Urumia and Van and, thus, only 150 versts south of Kars in Asia Minor. Arphaxad, according to the biblical legend, was the ancestor of Abraham in the seventh generation; but it cannot be said with certainty whether this statement means that the country called Arphaxad was the cradle of the Jewish branch of the Semitic race, or whether this name belonged to an individual, since a tribe, living in a certain region, always gave its name to the region it inhabited. The fourth son of Shem was Lud, and from him, according to general opinion, starting from the time of I. Flavius, descended the people who inhabited Lydia in Asia Minor. This opinion is confirmed by the very order of the names in the genealogy, since, starting with Elam in the southeast, the countries are listed correctly to the northwest, but starting with Lydia, they turn west and end in the south with Aram or Syria, which lay not far from it. The language of the Lydians is not yet known enough to allow us to judge with certainty whether it was Semitic; but some scholars, by no means predisposed in favor of the Bible, 98 recognize a Semitic element in it and conclude that it belonged to this root. Herodotus also has a legend that the first king of Lydia was the son of Ninus, the grandson of Bel, which, apparently, also indicates the Semitic origin of this people. With regard to their language, then, we must not forget that if the evidence of its Semitic origin were insufficient, then this very fact cannot yet serve as a decisive refutation of this position. Lydia, one might add, in ancient times was not limited to the boundaries of its later state, but was a much more extensive country. The fifth son of Shem, Aram, was the founder of the so-called Aramaic or Syrian branch of the Semitic race. In Assyrian inscriptions the name is applied to the northern and eastern Arameans, including the inhabitants of Imath in upper Lebanon and Harran on the upper Euphrates, or, in other words, the country from northern Mesopotamia to upper Syria. But this name soon began to be applied to all the peoples who spoke Aramaic and were considered Semitic, with the exception of those who belonged to Elam, Assur, Lud and Arphaxad. All such tribes living in Armenia in the north, in the regions of Taurus and Lebanon in the west, in northern Palestine, in the Arabian desert in the south and in the east, on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris, were thus Aramaic or Syrian, although not all of these sharply divided countries were considered Aram or Syria (which is obviously only a shortening of Assyria, which has come into use at least since the time of Herodotus). The vastness of its limits can be seen from the fact that in Arabic it is simply called the “northern land”, as opposed to Yemen or the southern land, i.e. as opposed to Arabia in the proper sense of the word. “Aram” apparently means “high land” and thus the very name indicates that this name originally designated the mountainous and elevated districts of the upper Tigris and the Taurus mountain range, stretching from there to the west into Asia Minor. Aram had four sons: Ud, Hul, Gepher and Mash. The name of the first of them, Ud, is identical with the name of the place of residence of the patriarch Job. Consequently, it has been subjected to the most careful and numerous studies, but a later and more careful study of the whole subject seems to lead to its identification with Bashan, east of the Jordan, including the district of Bethanea, the Trachonite region, Abran and Iturea, but excluding Gilead. In this area, according to legend, was the “land of Job,” and people still call it that, indicating the very place of residence of the patriarch in the most fertile part of the Avran plains. There still exists a hut known as “Job’s Place,” and there are springs in which, according to the Koran, Job washed himself after his recovery. Already in the 4th century AD. Eusebius of Caesarea considered this country the birthplace of the patriarch, and Chrysostom testifies that people flocked there from all parts of the world in order to see the piles of ashes on which Job sat, and to kiss the land that had become sacred as a result of the memories of him. This assumption is not contradicted by the fact that Job’s place of residence sometimes refers, apparently, to Arabia, since this last name was applied equally to Avran, and his southern city of Bosora was referred to Arabia even by Josephus, who considers Avran itself to be the country of Uts, who was recognized as the founder of Damascus and Trachonita. Khule was, apparently, the ancestor of the tribe that settled around Lake Merom, also hitherto known as El-Khule. This area is partly swampy, covered with thick reeds, and was later a favorite hunting ground of Herod the Great, who hunted wild boars and other large animals here. But this area rises to the west by more than 1000 feet and even higher towards the east, although the entire district is no more than 8-9 miles wide and about 30 from north to south. The name of the region of Iturea, lying between Utz or Avran in the east and Hul in the west, is associated with the name of Gepher, the third son of Aram. This may be the district from which, like the kingdom of Geshur, David took his wife Maacah, the mother of Absalom. Mash, called in translation 70 Mesekh, probably inhabited the vicinity of Mount Masiya, in northern Mesopotamia, south of Armenia; but it is even more likely that traces of this tribe can be found near El-Khule in the area known as Mais-el-Jebel. 99 After the data presented, the list of names becomes more genealogical in the proper sense of the word, and it lists the descendants of Arphaxad, in whom we recognize already known historical names. Arphaxad, according to translation 70, had Cainan as his first son, and according to the Hebrew text, Salah. But the biblical and historical significance is not actually associated with these names, but with the first son of Salah, Eber, whose very name means “Misile.” This name, however, was also applied to the country itself, which undoubtedly meant part of Mesopotamia (Num. 24:24). Associated with the history of Eber is the memory of the initial migration of the ancestors of the Jews from their mountainous homeland in the distant northeast to the fertile plains of Mesopotamia in the southwest, which migration may have been caused by the pressure of the Central Asian tribes, which from time immemorial had been constantly moving towards the southwest. After Eber, the smaller part of the Chaldean Semitic race, of which he was the head, divided and, under the leadership of his two sons: Peleg and Joktan, began to live separately as independent peoples. Joktan's tribe moved south towards Arabia, where they apparently merged with various Cushite tribes. Thus forming a mixed people, proud of their connections with Cush, which connected them more closely with the great patriarch Noah than if they had been under the headship of Eber and their nearest ancestor. The same thing was repeated in later times, with a similar mixture of tribes descended from Abraham with the same Cushite tribe; and thus the mention of the same names among the descendants of Cush and Abraham is easily explained. The place of settlement of the tribe of Peleg for a time seems to have been the area where the river Habar flows into the Euphrates from the east, halfway along its course. The name of the city that previously existed here, Faliga, apparently indicates the ancient residence of the Phalek tribe. Thirteen tribes descended from Ioktan generally lived in Arabia, although nothing can be said definitely in this regard, since the interior of this country is still almost completely unknown to researchers. Thus ends this famous genealogy, which Rawlinson rightly calls “the most authoritative record we have of the genealogy of nations.” Its historical accuracy finds amazing confirmation in the latest philological and ethnographic research, and this one circumstance is enough to see in it a document that is not only completely historical, but also bears undoubted signs of a higher origin. 100 Chapter 9. Pandemonium of Babylon and the dispersion of the nations The descendants of Ham settled almost exclusively in Africa, with the exception of Canaan, which occupied Palestine and was subsequently partly expelled from it by the Israelites. But there was another descendant of the Hams who also settled in Asia. This is precisely Nimrod, the son of Cush, the founder of the Babylonian kingdom and the conqueror of Assyria. He was a “strong trapper,” but in his character he resembles the first city builder - Cain and his immediate descendants. Finding in Mesopotamia the people of the Turanian tribe, the so-called Akkadians, he conquered them and founded his own kingdom, headed by the city of Babylon, which quickly grew into a large, proud capital, which became at the head of a large population with a number of other neighboring cities. This is the first example of aggressive activity known to us from history, and it is confirmed in the most ancient monuments that have survived to our time. On these monuments the two constituent parts of the population of Chaldea and Babylon, united by this conquest, clearly appear under the names of Sumirs or "dwellers on the river", and Akkadians or "highlanders", the first name being especially applied to the inhabitants of the land of Sumir or Shinar, and the latter to the inhabitants of the land of the Akkadians. The fusion of these two tribes, conquered with the conqueror, served as the origin of the time of the Chaldean people, known by this name in history. This mixed people did not find any more or less durable building materials here and at first probably lived in miserable huts, somehow molded from clay and covered with matting. But over time, as they became materially successful, they began to use for construction more durable materials from palm trees and baked or sun-dried bricks, as can be seen from the remains of the most ancient buildings built there from precisely such materials. Thus, on the site of ancient Babylon, among various churches, one ruin was found 100 feet high and almost 600 feet long, which turns out to be the remains of an ancient church to the god Merodach. This vast building, apparently, was a square pyramid more than 600 feet high and the same on each side at its base. The extreme antiquity of this majestic building is proven by its mysterious name Siggatu - “high temple” in the ancient Akkadian language. An inscription made on it by Nebuchadnezzar, one of the greatest builders among the Babylonian kings, shows that he restored it 600 years before Christ; but it was already restored as a venerable remnant of antiquity by Tiglath-Pilassar a century earlier. But the most interesting remnant from the ancient centuries of Babylon is located in Borzippa, 18 versts from the ruins of Babylon, in that huge ruin, which from time immemorial has been called Birs-Nimrud, i.e. "Towers of Nimrod" This huge ruin, which is a bare hill of yellow sand and bricks, near the left bank of the Euphrates, reaches a height of 198 feet, and from the very base - 235 feet. You can enter it from the south-east side, and at first glance it looks like a simple earthen mound, but just dig into it to see that it is the remains of a building built of brick. From the top of the hill a vast landscape opens up before your eyes; but the enormous frame of Nebuchadnezzar's tower, built of pale red brick, rises massively nearly 40 feet above the hill. Almost its entire surface is covered with a layer of moss, which in itself serves as sufficient evidence of the extreme antiquity of this ruin. Numerous birds find shelter in its crevices and ledges, and the entire area is covered with fragments of bricks that have fallen off the building. Some of them are yellow, others are blue or dark green; many of the larger slabs show clear signs of having been exposed to intense heat. 101 And indeed, the fire used to burn these bricks was so strong that the bricklayers, who are still visible in the images, had to involuntarily deviate from their straight position. And in general, Birs-Nimrud represents such a great remnant of antiquity, with which other ruins of the ancient world can hardly be compared. As for the original form of this huge building, known to the Greeks as the Church of Bel, it consisted of seven square towers, rising one above the other, like gigantic steps. Each of them was smaller than the previous one, and they were all dedicated to the seven planetary gods, for whom they served as separate churches. At the very bottom was the church of Nin, followed by the church of Astarte, and then one after the other were the churches of Merodach, Heaven, Nergal, the Moon and the Sun. The church of each god was distinguished by a special color, so that the majestic tower was a series of colors: black, white, purple, blue, red, silver and gold. A similar construction plan was not unknown in ancient times, and in Khorsabad, for example. there is a similar tower, from which traces of four ledges remain. According to Herodotus’ description, the tower of Birs-Nimrud stood within a fence of 1200 square meters. feet and itself had a base of 606 sq. feet, and according to Strabo, it was one stade in height. To climb to the top of the tower, a winding road was made around its sides, with places to rest in the middle of the way, and in the topmost tower there was a spacious church with a magnificently furnished room in which there was a bed and next to it a golden table prepared for Heaven - the god to whom the entire building was dedicated. The priestess always slept on the bed in this room at night. In the church, on the lowest ledge, there was a golden image of Bel on a golden throne in front of a golden table that stood on a golden floor; and another golden statue of the god, 24 feet high, stood in the church fence until both of them were taken away by Xerxes. If the measurements given to us by ancient writers are correct, then this building was indeed huge, since the greatest of the pyramids has only 750 square meters. feet at its base and rises only 480 feet, while this tower, which at its base has more than 600 feet, rose 120 feet above it. Its enormity can be judged, for example. from the fact that Alexander the Great used 10,000 people for two months to remove the debris that attacked it in his time. Some researchers suspect the accuracy of Herodotus' testimony, since, as if, in his time, this church was already in complete destruction by Xerxes; but one must not lose sight of the fact that Xerxes hardly subjected this tower to destruction in the proper sense of the word, and one might think that he limited himself to only seizing its treasures. Doubts are chiefly aroused by the fact that such a description is in apparent contradiction with the more modest dimensions of that great tower, renewed by Nebuchadnezzar, which, apparently, was the same church of Bel. Two inscriptions tell us that this king repaired and completed the “church of the seven luminaries or planets of the earth,” a name that exactly matches the description of the Tower of Borsippus, as it is actually called. Until then, it had remained unfinished since time immemorial, which circumstance serves as a striking confirmation of the well-known biblical story about the unfinished construction of the Tower of Babel. Nebuchadnezzar, however, says the following in the inscription he made on the tower: “One ancient king built the church of the seven luminaries of the earth, the tower of Borzippa, 84 feet high, but he did not finish it, and many days have passed since that time. At that time, there was no proper monitoring of diversion channels during water spills. Rain and storm washed away the baked bricks, and the sun-dried bricks on her roof burst. The burnt bricks of the church itself were also washed away into piles of ruins. The great god Merodach inspired me to correct it; but I didn't touch the location and left the main walls untouched. In a lucky month and on a happy day, I repaired the burnt bricks of the building's frame and dried the roof bricks in the sun, binding them tightly with stone work. I also renewed all the wooden work and put my name on the top of its renewed walls. I raised my hand to finish it and build its top. I restored it as it was of old, and raised its top as it was in those days.” 102 According to Schrader, who owns this translation of the inscription, Nebuchadnezzar added 84 feet to the already existing tower, thus making it 168 feet high; but this is hardly confirmed in the inscription itself. Ebers, on the other hand, thinks that the present Birs-Nimrud, if at all it can be considered a Tower of Babel, is only the ruins of the first floor. The many similar buildings in Babylon and the remoteness of this particular tower from Babylon itself make this learned researcher consider their identification doubtful. 103 It is not surprising that this gigantic building has long been identified with that famous Tower of Babel, which mad builders wanted to raise to the heavens. The Tower of Babel owes its origin to Nimrod. It was when he conquered the natives of Mesopotamia and founded a great monarchy that such success filled him with extraordinary pride. He began to dream of founding a world monarchy in order to unite all the peoples of the earth under his rule and dominate them contrary to the will of God, which determined the descendants of Ham to be slaves. And so, for this purpose, having founded a powerful city in the land of Shinar, as Mesopotamia was called in ancient times, the descendants of Ham formed a council, at which they proudly decided - as a sign of their political power, to build “a tower with a height reaching to heaven.” The enterprise, obviously, was crazy and unfulfillable, but at the same time it was criminal and dangerous: criminal because it stemmed from pride, bordering on arrogance and rejection of God, and dangerous because it came from the midst of the cursed and unblessed descendants of Ham. His success in this matter could have a detrimental effect on other nations and thus infect them with criminal arrogance and wickedness. And so, when work began to boil, bricks were fired and earthen resin was prepared, the Lord decided to punish them for their crazy undertaking. “And the Lord said: Behold, there is one people, and they all have one language, and they will not deviate from what they have planned to do. Let us go down and confuse their language there so that one does not understand the speech of the other. And the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth; and they stopped building the city and the tower. Therefore the name was given to it: Babylon; for there the Lord confused the language of all the earth, and from there the Lord scattered them throughout all the earth” (Gen. 11:6–9). Such an amazing event could not help but be immortalized in the memory of peoples, and we actually meet it in the traditions of various peoples. The clearest traditions are naturally found in the Chaldean legends and are read on tiles found in the ruins of Nineveh and read by the Assyriologist George Smith. Unfortunately, these slabs were found in a very ruined state, but, as far as they can be read, they apparently tell about this event as follows: "The thoughts of men's hearts were evil, So the father of the gods turned away from them. Babylon criminally turned to evil And he began to build a great tower. Small and great began to work. But at night the god Anu completely stopped their work. In his anger he also poured out before the gods Your secret advice to scatter them everywhere And turn your face against them; He gave the command to make their language foreign And prevent them from working. Numantir (god of confusion) came down, They resisted him with force, But he cast them down to the ground, When they didn't want to stop their work. They rebelled against the gods, Babylon was mourned bitterly When their work was stopped And they were scattered everywhere." 104 Echoes of the same legend are found among other peoples. Thus, Eusebius quotes from Avidenus, a Greek historian who lived around the 2nd century BC, the following legend: “The Assyrians say that the first people who came from the earth, proud of their strength and gigantic stature, considered themselves above the gods and, despising them, decided to build a high tower on the place where Babylon now stands. She had almost reached the sky when the winds, helping the gods, overthrew this huge structure on the heads of the builders; and from these ruins Babylon was built. And although people until that time all spoke the same language, from now on, according to the dispensation of the gods, they began to speak in different languages.” 105 Western peoples also preserve traces of this legend. An echo of it can be seen even in Homer’s Odyssey, which tells how two giants - The daring began to threaten the immortal gods that Olympus was theirs They will be shocked by a noisy war and excited by a destructive battle; Pile the ossa on ancient Olympus, Pelion is multi-forested They attempted to climb Ossa in order to boldly reach the sky; And they would have made the threat when they reached Male strength; but the son of the Thunderer, born of Latona, Before the down of youth shaded their cheeks and the first A hair appeared on their chins, striking them both. 106 It is also said about these same giants (Loadas, the sons of Aloe and Ifimedea) that they, having forgotten themselves in their pride, began to build a great tower, the top of which, according to their assumption, should reach the sky. But in the middle of this crazy undertaking, they were struck by the gods and cast down into Tartarus. Even in the New World, among the ancient Indian tribes, the memory of this great event was vivid. The Mexican Manuscript (in the Vatican Library) tells; “Before the great flood, which occurred 4800 years after the creation of the world, the country of Anaguac was inhabited by giants. Everyone who did not die in the flood was turned into fish, except for seven who fled to the caves. When the waters subsided, one of the giants, called the builder, went to Halula, where, in memory of Mount Ilaloe, which served as a refuge for him and his six brothers, he erected an artificial hill in the form of a pyramid. He ordered bricks to be made at the foot of the hills and appointed a number of people to pass them from hand to hand. But the gods looked with anger at this construction, the top of which was supposed to reach the clouds, and, angry at such an enterprise, they threw fire at this pyramid. Many builders died, the work was interrupted and the completed part of the building was dedicated to the god of air.” The ruins of this pyramid during the Spanish conquest were also known as “mountains of unbaked brick.” The Jews themselves have preserved many extremely curious tales about the Tower of Babel, and some of them deserve to be given here. “After the flood,” the rabbis said, “people were afraid of another similar visit and, leaving Palestine, that beautiful country where Noah lived and sacrificed to God, they all settled together in another place, namely on the plains of Shinar. But there they no longer submitted to the meek leadership of the pious Shem, the son of Noah, but, having rejected the kingdom of God, began to show respect to Nimrod, the son of Cush, the son of Ham. But Nimrod was a man strong in strength and power. Born in his father's old age, he was extremely loved by him and received from him as a gift the clothing with which God first clothed Adam when he was expelled from paradise. This clothing passed from Adam to Enoch, and from him to Methuselah and Noah, who took it with him into the ark. There she was stolen by Ham and secretly given by him to his son Cush. Nimrod, when dressed in these clothes, was irresistible and invincible. Birds and forest animals fell before him, and he easily conquered all his enemies. So he became the king of Babylon and increasingly expanded his dominion, so that with his cunning he forced people to recognize himself as the master of the whole earth and convinced them no longer to look to God, but to rely entirely on their own strength. This is where the saying came from: from the beginning of the world there was no one like Nimrod, terrible and powerful in destruction and sinful before the face of God. The longer Nimrod sat on his throne, the more arrogant he became. He wanted to kill the baby Abraham, in whom he saw a dangerous rival, and, not knowing how to recognize him, he beat 70,000 children, in the hope that a dangerous child would die among them. He was full of a presentiment that his monarchy would fall and that a man would rise who would restore the kingdom of Him to whom alone belonged all the glory and all the greatness of the earth. To prevent this and completely turn people away from God, Nimrod gathered all his people and told them: “Let us build a great city and strengthen ourselves in it, so that we do not scatter throughout the whole earth and perish in the flood, as happened to our ancestors.” At this time, rumors had already spread that God wanted to scatter people in order to better subjugate them to his power. “Let us build a tower in the middle of the city, so high that no flood could rise higher than it, and so strong that no fire, if it happened, could destroy it. But this is not enough: let us build it up to the heavens and strengthen it on them on all four sides, so that it is stable and so that the waters of heaven cannot fall on us. Let us therefore raise its top to the sky, cut through the sky with axes, so that the waters of heaven flow out and never again expose us to danger, and in this way we will avenge the destruction of our ancestors. Thus we will defeat the Ruler of heaven, whose strength lies only in these waters; then we will smite Him with arrows and spears and set up an idol on the top of the tower with a sword in its hand to fight the heavenly King for us. Then we will acquire a great name for ourselves and rule the whole world.” Although not everyone was so crazy as to dream of conquering heaven and expelling God from His throne, they nevertheless agreed with Nimrod’s desire. Many saw this tower as truly a bulwark against the dispersion of the human race and its destruction by a flood. Others thought that this plan would promote the idolatry to which they were inclined. Therefore, 600,000 people and among them 1,000 princes set about building the tower and erected it so that the top rose a hundred miles. When there were not enough stones, they began to burn bricks and carry them upstairs; to make the work easier, they built steps on the eastern side of the tower for climbing to the top, and on the western side for descending. But the height and width of the tower were so great that when the builders lacked something, it took a whole year before they could get the necessary material. If a worker fell from the top, then no one paid attention to it; but if a brick fell off or fell, it caused loud screams and screams. The arrows they shot into the sky came back covered in blood, and they, in their madness, shouted: “Behold, we have killed everything that is in the sky.” Abraham was already 48 years old when he saw this tower, and he immediately felt the wickedness and madness of the work so deeply that, approaching it, he begged the builders to leave their enterprise. But they laughed at him and treated him with the same contempt as they would treat any stone on the earth. Then he raised his voice and cried out to God: “Lord! mix and separate their languages, because I see only violence and hatred in this city.” And the Lord called seventy angels around His throne and commanded them to confuse the language of the builders so that they would not understand each other. As a result, they had to abandon construction and were divided into seventy nations speaking as many different languages. The upper part of the tower was destroyed by fire, and the lower part was overthrown by an earthquake, leaving only the middle part." Finally, an echo of the legend about this biblical event is found even in Egyptian hieroglyphs. “The Egyptian traditions,” says the famous Egyptologist Shaba, “bear a remarkable resemblance to the narrative of the book of Genesis. They attribute the dispersion of the nations to the rebellion of the wicked. In the inscriptions of the church of Edfu, published by Naville, we read that the good principle, under the solar form of Harmachis, triumphed over its opponents in the country south of the nome (district) of Apollinopolis. Of those who escaped the slaughter, some moved to the south and became the Kushites, others to the north and became the Amu, others moved to the west and became the Tamagu people, and others to the east and became the Shasu tribe. In this calculation, the Cushites include the Negroes. The Tamagu were a white race from northern Africa, the Mediterranean islands and Europe. Among the Amu are meant all the great peoples of Central and Eastern Asia - Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor, Chaldea and Arabia, including the Bedouins of the deserts and "mountains of Asia". Such was the Egyptian division of the human race. It can be noted that the red, yellow, black and white races were all more or less under the control and protection of the gods of Egypt. The Egyptians considered all foreigners to be branches of that great root of which they themselves were the main branch. They also thought that when the human race scattered, they already knew the art of metalworking and the art of writing, could erect large buildings and already had a social and religious structure.” 107 How many floors were erected in the Tower of Babel when its construction was suddenly stopped by divine wrath, the book of Genesis does not say, but, apparently, it was not completed to the seven floors to which Nebuchadnezzar later built it. Seven was a sacred number among both the Babylonians and the Jews, and one can be sure that at the beginning there was an intention to erect it precisely at seven floors, since otherwise it would hardly have been considered necessary to bring it to this particular height when rebuilding. By comparison with the shape of other towers, the ruins of which still exist, we can form some idea of ​​the state in which it remained when the work was interrupted. The great tower-shaped church of Ur now has only three floors, and a bas-relief at Kuyundzhik shows a tower of another city with five floors. For other towers located in the large cities of Babylon and Assyria, the Tower of Babel, as the most ancient and famous, probably served as a model, and we can confidently conclude from this that if it had not remained unfinished, then the sacred number seven would probably have been observed in other towers. It is remarkable that the ancient Assyrian name for these towers Ziggurat or Zikurat is consonant with the Hebrew. the verb zakar means “remember”, “keep in mind”, so the tower itself could mean a monument, something that was supposed to preserve the name or memory of the builders. If this assumption is correct, then it is in striking agreement with the evidence of the book of Genesis that the builders intended to perpetuate their name with this tower (“and let us make a name for ourselves,” Gen. 11:4). The history of the Tower of Babel is usually associated with the question of the cessation of a single primitive language and the origin of various languages. Assyriology, from the point of view of general philology, does not give us any explanation on this issue; but nevertheless, the latest Assyro-Chaldean discoveries shed some light on this very difficult question of science. The solution to the question of the original unity of language belongs to philology itself. But it is still a completely young science, and, despite the wonderful speed of its development and the tireless zeal of its learned workers, it is still unable to dispel the ambiguities associated with this issue and cannot draw one continuous chain of development of languages ​​from the original root through all its endless ramifications, in which it appears at the present time. Nevertheless, her efforts have already been crowned with one remarkable result, which is of great importance in this regard: namely, she has sufficient data to scientifically establish the possibility of the original unity of languages ​​and to present a strong basis in favor of their common origin. Thus, Max Müller, speaking about the study of philology, concludes with these words: “in the amazing fecundity of the original origin of sounds and in the instinctive kinship of those roots that subsequently appeared among different tribes, we have the opportunity to find the most complete explanation of the diversity of languages, as descended from the same root. We can understand not only how language was formed, but also how it must necessarily have been divided into many dialects, and we come to the conviction that, whatever may be the diversity in the existing forms and roots of human languages, from this diversity no argument can be drawn against the possibility of a common origin of these languages. The science of language leads us to that sublimity from which we can contemplate even the dawn of human life on earth and where the words of the book of Genesis, so familiar to us from childhood: “in all the earth there was one language and one speech” (Gen. 11:1) present to us a more natural, more understandable and more scientific meaning than that which we would have achieved without this.” 108 Comparative philology, for its part, has proven the kinship connecting the various languages ​​of the Indo-European and Semitic families, as well as some branches of the Turanian family, but it is not able to go further. How can we establish that these very different families have the same ancestor, and are different branches emerging from the same trunk? To establish this fact, it is necessary to rebuild the entire family tree of languages, or little by little. Unfortunately, we do not have the necessary data for this. How many ancient dialects have already disappeared forever! How many tribes and how many peoples have passed across the earth’s surface, leaving almost no traces of their existence! The articulate sounds that they used to communicate their feelings and their thoughts left no trace behind them, just as a ship sailing on the ocean leaves no trace behind itself. Let us not despair, however; Perhaps one day it will be possible to satisfactorily restore the destruction wrought over centuries in the edifice of human language. The bilingual tiles discovered in the Assurbanipal libraries have already largely filled one of the sadder gaps. They represent, next to the Assyrian language, another language, the existence of which was completely unknown to science just a few years ago, namely the Akkadian language. Nowadays, learned researchers cannot agree on the name of the people who spoke to them, and on the name that they gave themselves: some, for example. English Assyriologists and Lenormand, to whom he inspired so many wonderful works, call it Akkadian, while others, such as. Oppert and Friedrich Delitzsch, who accepted his opinion, call it Sumirian. But the fact remains beyond any dispute that it belongs to the Turanian family, i.e. to that family of languages, which until now has not been amenable to any similarities that have been made between it and the large Indo-European family. There was absolutely no data for comparison from ancient times: the sacred dialect, which was spoken on the banks of the Euphrates before the Semites mastered it, fortunately fills this void in a completely unexpected way. Oppert thinks that the language of the Sumirs can become the connecting thread that will renew the threads of kinship between these two great families and prove their common origin. He had already discovered in the Sumirian language several roots that are found in Sanskrit and the similarity of which cannot be explained by chance, such as. bat, "to die", in Sanskrit badh. If this scientist, with his extensive philological knowledge, manages to expound and develop this position in more detail, then this newest discovery will serve as new confirmation from Chaldean antiquity in favor of the biblical narrative. As for the relationship between the Indo-European family and the Semitic family, philology has not yet given anything decisive in this regard. Nobody, of course, now thinks of deriving Sanskrit from Hebrew or Hebrew from Sanskrit. The only question that can be asked is in what era exactly the Sanskrit and Hebrew languages ​​did not yet exist separately, but constituted one language. While scientists, many of whom are famous in science, deny any similarity between these two languages, and, consequently, their common origin, others have succeeded in finding so many elements common to the Aryan and Semitic languages ​​that it is truly difficult to attribute these numerous coincidences to chance. It is now obvious that the separation of these two families of languages ​​took place long before the era when they became inflectional languages. 109 Consequently, one cannot look for their relationships either in their systems of declensions or conjugations, or in prefixes or suffixes, which, after a period of agglutination, have lost their phonetic integrity and even their own meaning; between Hebrew and Sanskrit there is no such relationship as exists, for example. between Sanskrit and Greek, and if everyone admits that this latter comes from Sanskrit (or rather from the same language as Sanskrit), in the period of inflection, then the same cannot be said about Hebrew. We are therefore led to the question whether the Semitic and Aryan languages ​​were identical during the period of agglutination. According to Max Müller, the answer cannot be doubted: the separation of the two languages ​​must have preceded the secondary period of language; because not only the words, now without meaning and transformed into the educational syllables of derivative words, differ in these two families of languages; but what is especially remarkable is that the very way in which these syllables are connected to the roots is also completely different. In Aryan languages, syllables are placed at the end of words to form derivatives; in Semitic languages ​​they are placed either at the beginning or at the end. It remains, therefore, to look for the identity of the Semitic and Aryan languages ​​in the primary era of language development, namely, in the monosyllabic era. But then we encounter another difficulty: all Aryan roots are monosyllabic, and in the present state of Semitic languages ​​all the roots of these latter are triliteral. Hence it must be assumed that the identity of these two languages ​​preceded the era in which the Semitic languages ​​adopted three-letter roots. Referring to such a distant era the identity of the Semitic and Aryan languages, we must abandon all hope of finding much evidence of this original unity. What remains in our inflectional languages ​​of what constituted them in the era of pure monosyllabism? Each of the Aryan languages ​​contains tens of thousands of words, but in reality the entire wealth of our dictionaries is based on a small number of roots. The latter do not exceed 500, and this limited number of roots can be reduced to an even smaller number. Assuming also 500 roots in the Semitic languages ​​of the present tense, what result can be expected from comparing the Hebrew language with Sanskrit? It obviously can give only a small number of matches, which in any case cannot go up to 500. Many common roots in the Aryan and Semitic languages ​​must have perished and been forgotten over time; and other roots may have formed since the time of their division into groups. Let us note at the same time that the meaning of root words is always, of necessity, uncertain, and this uncertainty of the meaning of Semitic roots is one of the main difficulties encountered by students of the Hebrew language. Depending on how the same root is used in one or another combination, it receives a completely different meaning. The variety of dialects then further modified this meaning, and the spelling of the roots often rendered the original identity unrecognizable. Aryan languages ​​show us how glottal, dental and labial consonants are easily mixed with each other. Aspirated letters are often placed one in place of another. Even if in the field of adverbs the difference is often quite significant, it naturally becomes clear that there is an even greater difference between the words of one family of languages ​​and the words of another. Moreover, when it is asserted that monosyllabic languages ​​do not demonstrate any change in the phonetic integrity and in the sense of their roots, they are expressing a hypothesis that is not justified by the facts. Atkins, who has devoted himself to a thorough study of Chinese dialects, declares that two of the provinces of the north differ significantly from each other. They repeatedly changed the initial consonants of their words and lost many final letters. When, even among the still existing monosyllabic languages, words consisting of one consonant and one vowel show so many changes, then all the more significant changes must be expected in the roots of two languages ​​that went through the era of agglutination to become inflectional languages. So is it really true that in the present state of language there is no relationship between Sanskrit and Hebrew, and we must say that these languages ​​are two forms of human language, completely independent? To express such a position would be reckless in view of the attempts made by such scientists as Ewald, Riemer and Askali, who made many connections between the Aryan and Semitic languages. These last two came to results in their research that could not have been expected at first. 110 Other famous linguists have likewise made new discoveries that support the conclusion of the first. Thus, Raumer showed that the argument that was drawn to refute the relationship of Indo-European languages ​​with Semitic, from the fact that these latter have three-letter roots, has no significance, since in reality there are many two-letter words between them. It has even been proven that most or even all of the Semitic roots originally consisted of only two letters. Finally, Friedrich Delitzsch, in his scientific experiments on Indo-Germanic and Semitic roots, indicated such a large number of roots common to these two families of languages ​​that it is completely impossible to explain them by random coincidences and circumstances. In order to scientifically confirm the truth of the biblical narrative, we only need to know that the original identity of the Aryan and Semitic languages ​​was by no means impossible during the monosyllabic period of the formation of these two languages. Even if this identity cannot be strictly established with the help of philology, there are still no sufficient grounds to reject it. The historical evidence of the Bible retains its fullest authority. The desire, with the help of grammatical laws alone, to reach from the current state of human language to the primitive state, without a doubt, would be a desire and an unreasonable undertaking. The confusion of languages ​​is described in the book of Genesis as a miraculous event. From this it naturally follows that it cannot be explained in a purely natural way. In the miraculous action of God it is always necessary to leave a significant place for the mysterious, incomprehensible, as in all the great questions of existence. So it is now, so it will always be. Since the wicked offspring of Ham, who had forgotten God and relied entirely on themselves, would not have been slow to instill the godlessness that distinguished them in all other tribes and peoples that they wanted to unite under the dominion of Babylon, then with the dispersion of the peoples the danger of the rapid spread of this evil was averted. But the makings of evil itself still remained, “because the thought of the human heart is evil from his youth.” Dividing further and further from the original cradle of humanity and those ancestors who kept true faith in God and the truths associated with it, and encountering many unprecedented objects and dangers, peoples little by little began to concentrate entirely on these immediate objects; their memory of the common traditions of their ancestors was obscured, and at the same time the very concept of God was obscured. Among the many difficulties and dangers, they needed a God who would be close to them and to whom they could resort for help in any present disaster. Meanwhile, the God of their fathers was invisible to them and was only vaguely presented to their imagination. In view of this, they could easily move on to the idolization of something visible that could especially strike their imagination with its greatness, beauty, usefulness or fear. This is how idolatry or paganism arose, which is nothing more than the rejection of the invisible and superstitious attachment to the visible. Instead of the invisible Creator and Provider, man began to idolize the visible - first of all, perhaps, the sun, moon and stars, as beneficent luminaries that gave life and guided one’s journey, then objects of the surrounding inanimate and animate world (useful or terrible animals), and finally people outstanding in some way, who, as heroes, became demigods and upon death passed into the host of gods. The idolization of the visible sky (Sabeism), visible and especially animate nature (zootheism) and man (anthropotheism) constitute the three main stages of paganism and, as its external expression, idolatry. These three types of idolatry subsequently found their most dramatic expression in three separate countries - Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece. True, man was not satisfied with such crude idolatry, and in addition to all the visible gods, he constantly recognized the dominance of a higher, inexorable fate over everyone and even over the gods (in which one cannot help but see the dark remnant of the memory of the one omnipotent God - the Provider), but idolatry, by its very essence, chained the mind to crudely sensual objects and distracted from everything supersensible. Sensual deities forced them to idolize sensual powers and properties, and with the spread of wickedness, things came to the point that people began to idolize and sanctify even gross vices in their sensual deities, imitation of which was made a religious duty. And thus, instead of true knowledge of God and reverence for God, gross idolatry and wickedness spread on earth. Waves of sin and superstition again flooded the earth and again threatened to completely destroy and eradicate true religion with its main root, which consisted in the great promise of the future Savior of the world from slavery to sin and moral death. True, on earth, among the general idolatry and wickedness, there were still some individuals who retained the true faith. But the environment could soon carry them away with a common stream of wickedness. Therefore, in order to preserve the seeds of true faith for the future, it was necessary to single out some bearer of them from the midst of lawlessness and make him the chosen father and ancestor of a new generation of believers. This is how it was arranged by the good Providence of God. 111 If we count a cubit of 21 inches (i.e. 12 inches), it will be 525 feet long, 871/2 wide and 52 and a half high. According to the calculation of bl. Augustine, the dimensions of the ark in its three dimensions were the same as the proportional dimensions of the normal human body, “the length of which from the sole to the crown is six times the width of the chest and ten times the thickness or depth of the lying figure of a man, measured in a straight line from the ground.” In 1609, one Dutchman, Peter Jansen in Goorn, built a ship exactly in the shape of Noah’s Ark (albeit smaller in size, exactly 120 feet long, 20 wide and 12 high) and it turned out that with this shape the ship has much greater capacity (by one third) than with the usual form of building ships. Gazizadra - but the Chaldean original. Lenormant, Histoire ancienne de I'Orient, t. I, pp. 60 et seq. Surripaca, from which the scribes of Berosus, through a series of successive errors, made Laranja, was a city of lower Chaldea, located near the sea, as they say about the “ships of Surripaca.” The religious Akkadian name of this city was Ma-uru - “city of the ship”, which, no doubt, alludes to the legend about its construction by Gazizadra. In Muslim legends, the place where Noah boarded his ship was Kufa, on the western branch of the Euphrates, or according to others, Babylon, or Ainvard, in Mesopotamia. Mohammed says in the Koran, apparently according to the popular tradition of the Jews of his time: “he built a ship, and every time the leaders of his people passed by him, they laughed at him. “Don’t laugh at me,” said Noah, because I, in turn, will laugh at you,” as you laugh at me, and you will know who will receive the punishment that will overtake the obstinate. This punishment will always remain over your head.” It is worth noting that the Chaldean story about the flood, just like the story about creation, deals a decisive blow to rationalistic criticism, which tries to see in the biblical story about the flood a summary of heterogeneous and different stories, suggesting that some of these legends belong to the elogist, others to the Jehovahist. So, as if places in Gen. 6:8,13,9,12,20,17,22,18 and 7:11,13,14,15,16,18,21, and 22 belong to the elogist, and Gen. 6:5 and 7, 7: 1–9, 17 and 23 - to the Jehovah's Witness. The Chaldean story, meanwhile, contains everything in one integral narrative and thus completely overthrows this artificial theory, proving, in any case, that the story of the flood in all its contents could have been known to Moses even from tradition from ancient times. Manu Vaivasvata is the model and ancestor of humanity in Indian legends. Pictet, Les origines indoeuroppeennes, t. II, p. 619. Vigouroux, La Bible, t. I, p. 258 and 259. Eckstein, De quelques legends bramaniques, qui se rapportent au berceau de l'espece humaine, Paris 1856. This interesting fact of the relocation of geographical names from one country to another along with settlers is repeated in modern times. It is known that America is full of names of cities, rivers, lakes and mountains, literally transferred from the old world, even often without adding the epithet “new” (York - New York, Orleans - New Orleans, London, etc.). Delitsch, Genesis, p. 213. Bohlen, Introduction to Genesis, vol. II, p. 207. Schrader, Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament, p. 13. Chabas, Etudes de l'antiquite historique. Paris 1873. The name "Guadalquivir" was given to this river by the Arabs during their stay in Spain. Having no word in their language to designate “river” in our sense, they called this river “Gdol-keber” - “big water” or water stream. Thus, the ships that sailed the Red Sea and traded in Ophir (in southern Arabia or even in India) were also called Tarsis ships. Is. 23:1,14; 1 Kings 9:28; 10:22; 20:49 ; 2 Par. 9:21; 20:36, 37. Epiphanius, † in 403 AD. Haer. xxx, 25. Also in Russian translation. Gen 10:4. This name is still preserved in the words alchemy and chemistry. They literally mean: “black art” - from Kemia - Khem - black. They came to us through the Arabs from Egypt. Knobel, Volkertafel, p. 257. Ebers, Aegypten und die Bucher Mose’s, p. 79. According to Ebers, there were even two walls, which may be indicated by the dual form of the word Mizraim. 2 Par. 12:3; 16:8; Nahum. 3:9. Schrader, Keilinschriften, pp. 27, 31. They extended from the Euphrates to Asia Minor. Αntiqq. 1, 6, 2; V, 1. 22: Wed. I. Nav. 13:5; 19:28. How, for example Lagarde, in his Gesammelten Abhandlungen, Leipzig, 1866. Thomson, Land and Book, p. 25. See Geikie, Hours, vol. I, ch. XV and XVII. It is remarkable that during this construction earthen resin was used instead of lime, as they say in Gen. 11:3. Schrader, Keilinschriften, p. 38. It is not without interest to see how different scientists define its height differently. So Layard gives it 198 feet with an addition of 38 for the top. According to Rawlinson, it was only 153 1/2 feet in height, etc. From this it can be seen how all Layard's measurements differ greatly from the testimony of Herodotus and Strabo, and it is self-evident that they are in clear contradiction with the evidence of the works of Alexander the Great, or with the statement of Ebers that in these ruins we have only the ruins of the first floor. Smith, Chaldean Genesis, pp. 160–162. Euseb., Praeparatio Evangelica, IX, p. 14. Chabas, Etudes sur l'antiquite historique, pp. 97–100. Max Muller, La Science du langage, fr. transl., p. 426. Philology distinguishes three periods in the development of each language: 1) monosyllabic, when the language consists of monosyllabic sounds or words; 2) agglutinative, when complex words and concepts are mechanically composed from individual sounds, and 3) inflectional, when the language gains flexibility through the use of grammatical inflections. Each language goes through these stages of development, and from the existing languages ​​one can point out examples of languages ​​that are in one or another period of their development (Chinese - monosyllabic, Turkic Finnish - agglutinative, European - inflectional). Meignan, Le monde et l'homme primitif selon la Bible, p. 282–286. This was 352 years after the flood according to the Hebrew reckoning and 1207 according to the Greek reckoning. The latter reckoning seems more likely, since it provides more historical space for the commission of the important events outlined. The disagreement in determining this time depends on the fact that the only data for its determination are the years of the post-diluvium patriarchs, whose testimony again differs significantly in the main texts of the biblical chronicle. The genealogy of the post-flood patriarchs begins with Shem, who gave birth to Arphaxad 2 years after the flood. All three texts agree in this indication, and then the difference in the indication of the years of the next patriarchs before the birth of the name of the first son can be seen from the following table: From this table it is clear that in the indications of the years of the post-diluvian patriarchs, the Greek and Samaritan texts agree with each other, but the Hebrew evades them, consistently lowering the figure by one hundred years and in the indication of the years of Nahor by 50 years. Such a departure clearly indicates a deliberate shortening of years, and even entire generations, since Cainan does not appear in the Hebrew text at all. In view of the almost complete agreement of the Greek and Samaritan texts, their testimony receives more reliability compared to the Hebrew.