Quote:Well, I provide references, can you tell me which sects? There is only one temple in all of India for Brahma, so if such a sect existed I hardly think it was big.
I saw it referenced in wikipedia under the Brahma entry a while ago. But it appears it has changed.
Quote:Actually, I have given you references from 2 sources one from the Torah itself, "Abraham made souls in Haran"...the verb involved
is E(sh)h, which does mean to create with effort and hard work. It is not taking liberality with Hebrew.
You're trying to think historically so it's important to take things in context. The word soul never appears in the Torah. Soul is a meaning that comes later. Nefesh would better be translated as life or life-spark or person depending on how it's used. There's no immortal soul in the Torah. Ayin shin heh as I said is a very flexible root and the Torah sometimes used very simple language. This could easily have meant that he made them for himself. Unless I am mistaken (and I could be) that is why the vav is there. That is to say, it was through his effort that he aquired them.
You haven't given me 2 sources. You don't know how to read a kabbalistic text. They sometimes use symbols to conceal their true meaning. Kaballah is extremely esoteric, even for an esoteric practice. I also don't have it in context. But what I found is that Abraham is related to Chesed, so this could be speaking about the creation of man. Up until Gen 2:4 the only name used for God is Elohim, which is associated with justice. But in 2:4 the name YHWH Elohim is used, which is justice tempered by mercy. So this is really talking about God creating man through the sefirot of chesed, lovingkindness, which is in the middle of the male side of the tree, the male side being associated with mercy. If you can supply passages before and after that one I might be able to confirm this. But you can't read such an esoteric text as if it's exoteric. That's not what the author intended.
Haran is probably also a symbol for something, and words "looked, saw, probed, engraved, and carved" I'm sure have a very specific meaning, perhaps a reference to Adam Kadmon.
Quote:This would only be true if El was portrayed as human as well, but Abraham is shown worshipping El, not Yahweh. And modern archeology shows that El was a separate God, and Yahweh was a war God known as Yahweh Saboath...whose name is taken in one of the psalms, I believe. So which one is the ONE GOD according to you?
Archaeology has also shown that El became a common name for any god, just like Allah has among Jews in the Arab world, which itself was once the name of a specific god. It's not a good idea to rely too strongly on any particular archealogical finding because there are always others that disprove it. YHWH Sabaot is not where YHWH comes from. It's used all through the Torah such as the example I gave above, and is the name revealed to Moses. It's relate to the verb to be and could refer to God Is-Was-Willbe or it could refer to bringing into being, or that God will always be there. There's some debate, which is good for an ineffable name.
There are other theories that YHWH was a god of high places originally. Yours doesn't seem very well founded if you say that name first appears in Psalms. Who is the one God to me? There's only one and I affirm in the Shema: Shema Yisrael Hashem Eloheinu Hashem Ehad. But by any other name, it's still God.
Quote:
again, I am not disagreeing with a TRANSLATION, I am disagreeing with an interpretation. The translation is accepted by many Hebrew scholars as being correct, "Abraham made souls in haran", E(sh)H, the verb in question, literally means to make by hard labor.
No it doesn't it means to do or make. Anything else is inferred from the context. That's in Pa'al. Otherwise it would mean something else.
Quote: Abraham is called Elohim gen.23:5,6,
That's because he is a representative of Elohim.
Quote: had a baby when he would need Viagra,
God granted that to him. It was not of his own doing.
Quote: talked to Gods in a council
Gods? God? How does it make him a god that he does such a thing? Greek myths speak of gods fraternizing with humans. And if we look at the structure of Torah, it goes from man(Adam = man) walking with God to some of man being very close to God to some of man being less close to God to our present condition.
Quote:...er...taking a complete look at the story of Abraham, the conclusion that Abraham was a divine being is perhaps the correct interpretation.
I find it unlikely but you're welcome to find whatever you like in the text.
Quote:Now the concubine thing...I don't disagree with it, in fact, if you thought you were middle eastern, and you read the Bible you would think they were descended from concubines...since they moved east...but that is because this interpretation is absent a complete perspective. We must remember that the Jews for the most part did not have a country and were wandering tribes, so this interpretation can be questioned as to "WHOSE EAST"?
Exactly. It was the Zohar's attempt at explaining away the practices of the East to show that all spiritual wisdom comes from Torah and its members.
Quote: There is some genetic evidence to suggest that the Levi tribe (tribe of Moses) in particular has a central asian gene that other Jewish tribes don't.
You don't seem to have your facts straight. I direct you to this very comprehensive Jewish genetics website right about now when I stop typing here:
http://www.khazaria.com/genetics/abstracts.html
There are Indian Jews. I'm not sure there are many left in India. One group did very well in the caste system and one group, not as well. My grandfather was in that area during WWII and was invited to a Jewish wedding there. Ah... Galut.
Quote:if this were the case, then why wouldn't they add the story of David to the 5 books?
Because the first five had already been canonized by that time. They were very early writings. You can find a lot about this. Deut resembles a Hittite vassal treaty. Many of the myths are borrowed. Elements of Zoroastrian texts in some places. And There is a portion of the early prophets called the Deuteronimic History that only makes reference to Deut and not to any other text, is even shaped in its telling by the Deuteronomic world view. Deut seems to be the lost book that was "found" by Josiah's scribes. It contains Josianic reforms.
Quote: He's the story of the next messiah?
No, the messiah is the story of the next David. A better question would be why Joshua is not included, and I'd say probably because it's not a part of the Mosaic history. It's a new saga.
Quote: I think Mohammad offers a glimpse as to the "revelation" since the entire Quran was "revealed" to him in one lifetime...
He was illiterate. And it seems a number of the things he said were from Midrash.
Quote:it was probably revealed to some Levi who called himself "Moses" over the lifetime of this man, I don't think people added to the original 5 books, otherwise you wouldn't have the Tenach.
They did add to the five books. Neviim and Ketuvim were additions. Look at the text of Torah itself and you can see additions being made, like the two creation stories. Moses is an extremely enigmatic figure. I don't doubt there was a Moses but I have no idea who this was.
Quote:You know, the God i.e. Elohim who said, "LET THERE BE LIGHT"...of Genesis.
Elohim is just a general name for God and there has been (Dum dum dum) archealogical evidence to support it was used in the singular. But it has also been suggested this is a reference to a consort that was edited out as the religion evolved.
Quote:Elohim of course is gods or divine beings (Abraham, Moses, Judges, Angels) with a little g, however, ...Yah is the God with the big G... :wink:
Or God singular. or god singular. God has many names. Yah and YHWH are two different names. Elohim is another name, Adonai another, Shadai, Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh. Traditionally they're all considered titles except for YHWH.
Quote:no, I am attempting to make sense of some complex theological, genetic history, who came from where, and how all these Gods might come about due to a mixing up of tribes, who carry many of these Gods along...
That's a worthy project. I guess it just seems to me like whomever it was, they were trying to unify the people. So they united everyone under one God and used myths the people might have been carrying about gods to apply to people, as if to say, "The old gods are nothing now. God is One." Of course that's not all they were doing with the myths but it seems to be present.
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