Leolaia
JoinedTopics Started by Leolaia
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Tartarus in 2 Peter 2:4
by Leolaia inin my recent thread on the nephilim and the rephaim (http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/68224/1.ashx), i indicated that the legend of the titans was broadly related to the canaanite and hebrew myths of the nephilim and rephaim, but here in 2 peter we see more recent hellenistic influence on jewish legend.
according to hesiod and other greek writers, the titans were the wicked offspring of ouranius and gaia ("heaven" and "earth") who initially had sovereignty over the cosmos but whom zeus and the olympian gods defeated and consigned to eternal bondage in the prison called tartarus in the netherworld.
iliad 8:13-16 describes tartarus as a bottomless pit located below hades, a distinction reminiscent of hades and the abyss of revelation.
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777 vs. 666
by Leolaia ini've heard 777 or 7777 used as a godly number in christian televangelist hotline numbers, 777music.com is a christian music online store, and the number is supposed to represent an ideally perfect number representing god and his creation.
but it strikes me as a pallid ripoff of 666, and nothing in the bible seems to produce a higher order number above 70 (7 x 10) with 7.
144,000 is of course based on 12 and 10. and contrary to it being such a godly number, it seems to have been the subject to a book on gematria and the kabbalah by satan incarnate himself, aleister crowley.
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Do you really know what you believe?
by Leolaia inthere is a thought-provoking article on religion in the latest issue of skeptical inquirer.
i thought i'd share this quote which bears on jw issues in an interesting way:.
"do people know what their religious concepts are?
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The enigmatic mystery of the Nephilim, the Rephaim, and the Titans
by Leolaia init has been said that historical memory in oral tradition goes back only a few hundred years before it alters considerably in later retellings, and when even greater time depth is involved the mythic past fills in what has been collectively forgotten.
but myths purporting to relate events hundreds or even thousands of years in the past often contain kernals of historical memory amid the layers of tradition and archetypal folk motifs.
an excellent example from my own reading is that of the inuit eskimo in greenland who have a rich oral tradition about the norsemen who died out over 500 years ago and who originally colonized the land a millenium ago.
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The skinny on the Leviathan and Rahab monsters
by Leolaia inthe primeval conflict myth is a staple of greek, hittite, canaanite, babylonian, and even hindu myth, and the canaanite version appears throughout the ot and even turns up in the christian apocalypse of revelation.
this post will survey the literary evidence of the myth in the bible and in ancient literature.
in revelation, jesus is the messiah-figure whose birth is depicted in ch.
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Canaanite legend quoted in 2 Samuel 1:21?
by Leolaia inthe legend of aqhat, one of the great epic myths preserved in the ugaritic archive at ras shamra, was popular in some form in israel and judah and shows its traces in the ot and later jewish literature.
ezekiel 14:12-20, 28:1-3 makes several passing references to the legend and its hero, an ancient semi-divine king named danel renowned for his wisdom and healing powers.
danel was one of the rephaim, a primeval race of demigod kings who linger on as spirits in sheol and who were revered by the canaanites in ancestor worship (cf.
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Holy mountains in Canaanite myth and the Bible
by Leolaia inbaal's mountain: mount casius
baal's mountain was biblical zaphon, known in ugaritic as sapan, in hittite and hurrian as mount hazzi, in akkadian as ba'lisapuna, in greek and latin as casius (< kasios), and in modern arabic as jebel 'el-aqra', which stands at a height of 5,660 ft. about 25 miles north of ras shamra and 2.5 miles from the coast.
i will climb to the top of thunderclouds, i will rival elyon ('l'wn).
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Enoch's Sumerian ancestors
by Leolaia inwithin the antediluvian geneology lists of genesis, one figure stands out.
in the formulaic "priestly" geneology, we read: "when enoch was sixty-five years old he became father to methuselah.
after the birth of methuselah he lived for three hundred years and he became the father of sons and daughters.
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Who is the Faithful and Wise Servant? It's JOSEPH, of course!
by Leolaia inwho is the faithful and wise servant?
it's a question that the wt has misused to establish its own authority.
as it is, the parable today as a cautionary tale applies to whoever it fits, but it is clear who the original servant was that inspired the parable.. .