The Second Coming of Saturn Part 3: Ritual Pits and Rephaim

[00:00:05]Welcome to our third session as we continue with our introduction to the book The Second Coming of Saturn. I'm Derek Gilbert. Uh today we'll talk about um chapters 7 through 10 and the Hurrians in the Holy Land.

[00:00:18]The Hurrians are mentioned in the Bible, but not by that name. They're called the Horites, and we find them in the earlier chapters of the Old Testament.

[00:00:29]The Hurrians as a people pretty much faded from history after the collapse of the the um the kingdom of Mitanni that I mentioned in the last section. They were invaded and more or less destroyed by the Hittites not long after the time of the Exodus. So, during the time of the judges there was a a lot of turmoil taking place in the ancient world. It uh included the um uh the transition from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age, what scholars call the Bronze Age Collapse, and Mitanni, the kingdom of the Hurrians in northern Mesopotamia, was one of the casualties of the Bronze Age Collapse.

[00:01:04]But, the Horites are mentioned in the Bible. We see them in um in kind of a roundabout way in the story of Abraham.

[00:01:13]And I argue in the book, and I've argued in previous books, and I'm not the one to come up with this. This has actually been uh an argument that was made by uh renowned scholars like Cyrus H. Gordon uh going back 60 years now, that Abraham did not come from Ur of the Chaldeans, which uh has been interpreted by Bible scholars for the last 100 years or so as uh southeast Iraq.

[00:01:37]Um Ur of the Chaldees, or Ur Kasdim in Hebrew, actually refers to a site in northern Mesopotamia. We see that in a number of um clues in scripture. Uh I won't go deep into that right now, but the bottom line is this.

[00:01:52]Abraham was called from northern Mesopotamia, the area around the ancient city of Haran, which is in southeastern Turkey, and this was Hurrian territory.

[00:02:03]This was the center of Hurrian culture in the time of Abraham.

[00:02:09]And God called him from there.

[00:02:12]Now, as we discussed last week, a central part of the Hurrian religion was this idea that you needed to summon gods from the netherworld to ask them for their favor. That was the purpose of the necromantic ritual pit called the obi, a b i. You notice that when Abraham sends his servant back to his homeland to look for a wife for Isaac, he tells him twice, "You must not take my son back there." Is it possible that he didn't want Isaac going back there so that he would not fall back into the pagan religion of the people around the people around Abraham when he was growing up?

[00:02:49]It's possible. The Bible doesn't tell us that, but again, that's the culture from which Abraham emerged.

[00:02:55]And we we see the Horites all over the land of the Bible. I go into that in in some detail here in the book, but one of the more significant and interesting connections is in the the war of nine kings. This is Genesis chapter 14, where Kedorlaomer and his allies from Mesopotamia travel across the Syrian desert and do battle with the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. But on their way to that battle, they have to fight the Rephaim tribes in the Transjordan, the area that we would call the land of Bashan, the land of Ammon, Moab, and Edom. And it was in the land of Edom that Kedorlaomer and the and his allies did battle with the Horites. And I'm quoting now from Genesis 14:6, "In their hill country of Seir, which is Edom, as far as El Paran on the border of the wilderness." End quote. Paran is another name for the vicinity of for the region around Sinai, which is one of the reasons we think Sinai is farther north than most other scholars do, but that will be for a future book project. Anyway, the point is that the Horites, the Hurrians, had extended their influence by the time of Abraham. Again, their king their city of Urkesh in northern Syria established around 3500 BC.

[00:04:18]Um Abraham was probably about um let's say 1800 years after that, sometime around 1800 BC.

[00:04:27]And they were as far south as Edom, which is south and east of the Dead Sea.

[00:04:34]When they traveled, of course, they brought with them their religion. And this included the idea of the ritual pit, the necromantic ritual pit that you would use to summon gods from the underworld. The Hurrian word, again, abi, a b i, is actually the origin of other words in ancient languages for similar structures.

[00:04:56]In Sumerian and this is uh argued by a a scholar of ancient Hurrian 50 years ago, before the city of Urkesh and its abi was even discovered. He argued that based on the the rules of ancient language that the Hurrian word abi is the source of the Sumerian word abzu, from which we get the word abyss.

[00:05:21]Interestingly though, it's also the origin of the Hebrew word ov.

[00:05:26]It's o b, but it's it's pronounced ov.

[00:05:30]Usually translated in the Old Testament into the word the English word medium.

[00:05:35]So, for example, the the the medium of Endor, often well, in the King James the witch of Endor, but the medium of Endor is actually the ov of Endor in Hebrew.

[00:05:47]But according to now a more well recent scholarship, thanks again to Giorgio and Marilyn Kelly Buccellati, the archaeologists from UCLA, ov more accurately means necromantic ritual pit. So to call someone an ov is to call them the owner of a ritual pit.

[00:06:09]So in 1 Samuel 28, we see that account where King Saul is about to go to battle with the Philistines and he's upset because Samuel is dead, God is not responding to him, he doesn't know what to do. And so he goes to the the ov of Endor to get a message from the netherworld.

[00:06:32]And the New English Translation, I like the New English Translation, usually we'll read the English Standard Version, the ESV, but we look at other translations to try to triangulate on the the exact meaning of the ancient word. Some of this Hebrew is archaic, difficult to understand. This is a word ov that has been hard for English translators to get a handle on because it's only been the last 40 years or so that archaeologists have even acknowledged that there was a cult that venerated the dead around ancient Israel, only since about 1980. So this is again relatively recent research.

[00:07:10]The New English translators, looking at the uh the the Hurrian aspect of this word, translate this text in 1 Samuel 28 with the understanding that ov means owner of a ritual pit. So 1 Samuel 28:8 in the NET, Saul disguised himself and put on other clothing and left, accompanied by two of his men. They came to the woman at night and said, "Use your ritual pit to conjure up for me the one I tell you." End quote. And of course, if you're familiar with the story, you know that when the spirit of Samuel appears, which she was not expecting, which is why you see in the account in 1 Samuel 28, she cries out with a loud voice. She was expecting her familiar spirit.

[00:07:55]But instead, the Elohim of Samuel, the spirit of Samuel, emerges from the ground. Why? Because she was using a ritual pit to summon gods from the nether world.

[00:08:07]This is a practice derived directly from the ancient Hurrian culture and the worship of their father god, Kumarbi.

[00:08:19]This is the influence of the Hurrians on the pagans in and around ancient Israel.

[00:08:29]Now, how does this connect to the gods of the Canaanites, who were the main culture that was the main culture with which Israel interacted in the biblical period from Old Testament times, from the entry into Canaan, even down to the time of Jesus?

[00:08:44]The Canaanites were still affecting the the Israelites.

[00:08:49]In our book Venerations, Sharon devoted an entire chapter to explaining why threshing floors, which were usually located on the tops of hills to take advantage of winds, were considered portals to the spirit realm.

[00:09:05]Threshing floors were portals. At least that's what pagans believed.

[00:09:11]We saw this in fact with the David when he was being punished for ordering a census of the Israelites and God sent a destroying angel to smite the people of Israel.

[00:09:22]And when they saw the destroyer above Jerusalem, David went to the threshing floor of Araunah and purchased the threshing floor and offered sacrifice there to God and that was the site that later became the site of uh Solomon's Temple. It is the site of the Dome of the Rock today.

[00:09:41]Interestingly, and I go into this in the book, Araunah or Ornan, depending on where you're reading his name in the Old Testament, Araunah is actually a Hurrian title that means lord.

[00:09:53]You see, the Hurrians were at Jerusalem.

[00:09:56]The Jebusites were probably Hurrians, and Araunah had been the king.

[00:10:03]David apparently let him live after they took the city, and he purchased his threshing floor, and then built the temple there. But, interestingly, the circular shape of the threshing floor, because you would have an ox that was attached to a pole and it was basically uh threshing out the grain, treading out the grain, um this the circular shape of the threshing floor is similar to the shape of the magic circle that, according to the ancient Hurrian texts, they would describe on the floor of their ritual pit.

[00:10:36]That similarity is not coincidental.

[00:10:39]This um this connects to the creator god of the Canaanites, who is called El. We know that El became a generic word in Hebrew for God, uh but uh El, the creator god of the Canaanites, is distinct from Yahweh, the god of the Bible.

[00:11:02]And um the connection between El, Saturn, Shemyaza, Kumarbi, another name, another identity worn by this entity, is in the threshing floor.

[00:11:14]Scholars, about 40 years ago, translated and began to get a handle on um several texts discovered in Syria at a site called Ras Shamra. This is the ancient Amorite kingdom of Ugarit. It was destroyed around the time of the judges, around 1200 BC, part of that Bronze Age collapse, and these texts called by scholars Rephaim texts. There are three of them that um describe a necromancy ritual to summon the Rephaim, the spirits of the Nephilim destroyed in the flood, although that's not how the Canaanites saw them, but uh they were called Rephaim in these texts.

[00:11:51]Yeah, yes, the neighbors of the ancient Israelites knew who the Rephaim were.

[00:11:55]They just had a more favorable impression of them than the Israelites did. The Israelites understood that the Rephaim were in the netherworld. They were the spirits of the mighty men who were of old. The Canaanites, the Amorites believed that the Rephaim were their divinized dead kings.

[00:12:12]The kings of the Canaanites, the Amorites aspired to join the assembly of the Rephaim in the netherworld.

[00:12:20]And we did a a lot of that study in in the book Veneration. I won't go into much detail here except to hit the high point, which is this, that the Rephaim texts were a necromancy ritual that summoned the Rephaim to a ritual meal in their honor at the threshing floor of El.

[00:12:43]And uh Belgian scholar Edward Lipinski wrote a very important article about 1977 on El's abode, and he identifies the threshing floor of El as the summit of Mount Hermon.

[00:12:56]Now, that's significant because that connects El, creator god of the Canaanites, the father of the Canaanite pantheon, all of the gods in the pantheon fathered by El, um connects him to the rebellion of the watchers.

[00:13:11]Because they descended to the summit of Mount Hermon, swore their mutual oaths and imprecations that they would not leave Shemihazah, their leader, hanging out to dry and being punished by himself for the sin they were about to commit.

[00:13:24]This is where the Canaanites believed their father god El held court with his consort Asherah and their 70 sons. And 70, by the way, is just a symbol in the ancient Near East, not just in the Bible, not just in Hebrew culture, but all across the ancient Near East, the number 70 just represented the complete set or all of them.

[00:13:46]In other words, the Canaanites believed that the 70 sons of El were the gods of all the nations.

[00:13:53]Well, the main epithet of El, according to the Canaanites, was Bull El. Bull, b u l l, Bull El, which is thought to refer to his power and his dignity, but also his generative powers, shall we say, which are referred to in the Canaanite myths of El quite a lot.

[00:14:16]Yes, he was indeed the father of all their gods. But interestingly, according to scholar Dr. Nicholas Wyatt, Bull El, the father god of the Canaanites, like Kumarbi, who was the father god of the Hurrians, he's mentioned in the Bible.

[00:14:33]This is an interesting thing. In Hosea chapter 8, the prophet Hosea is condemning the sin of Jeroboam. He was the one who led the rebellion against Solomon's son Rehoboam and set up as an alternate sites of worship, golden calves at Dan and at Bethel.

[00:14:53]And Hosea wrote this in Hosea chapter 8, beginning at verse 5, "I have spurned your calf, O Samaria." That's the northern kingdom. "My anger burns against them. How long will they be incapable of innocence? For it is from Israel, a craftsman made it. It is not god. The calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces."

[00:15:14]Now, Dr. Wyatt points out that the phrase "for it is from Israel" in English is not an accurate translation of the Hebrew. The Hebrew actually reads for from Israel, which makes no sense.

[00:15:27]For from Israel.

[00:15:30]English translators, not understanding what was being referred to here by Hosea, tried to make sense out of a nonsensical to them um grouping of consonants. Remember, ancient Hebrew has no vowels.

[00:15:45]So, uh they came up with for it is from Israel.

[00:15:50]But, as Dr. Wyatt points out, if you regroup the consonants, in other words, if you put the spaces between the words in different places, you get this instead in verse six. For who is Bull El?

[00:16:04]A craftsman made it. It is not God.

[00:16:07]The calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces.

[00:16:10]In other words, Hosea was condemning the worship of this entity, El, Kumarbi, Shemihaza, that was represented by the calf, the bull, that Jeroboam set up at Dan and at Bethel.

[00:16:29]It makes sense.

[00:16:32]Now, in the the Canaanite myths, El's abode, his domain, the place where he held court, was located at the source of the rivers, at the midst of the springs of the two deeps, the two deeps, or the double deep, depending on who's doing the translation.

[00:16:51]This also is referred to in the Bible in Psalm 42, verses six and seven.

[00:16:59]We read this. My soul is cast down within me, therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon.

[00:17:08]From Mount Mizar, which scholars think was just a name of one of the smaller peaks in the the Anti-Lebanon mountain range. Hermon is the tallest of those peaks.

[00:17:17]From Mount Mizar, deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls, all your breakers and your waves have gone over me.

[00:17:26]Now, we read this we've heard, you know, deep calls to deep and it it's very poetic and it's very moving.

[00:17:32]But without the cultural understanding that this is referring to the two deeps of El's abode, we kind of miss what the psalmist is expressing here. And again, the new English translators uh new English translation, their translators have come up I think with a better rendering of the psalm to explain what exactly is going on here. Rather than my soul is cast down within me, therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon.

[00:18:01]The new English translation reads this, Psalm 42:6, "I am depressed, so I will pray to you while I am trapped here in the region of the upper Jordan."

[00:18:11]In other words, the psalmist is depressed, soul is cast down within him because he's in enemy territory.

[00:18:22]The region of the upper Jordan, which emerges from the base of Mount Hermon, was the land of Bashan.

[00:18:31]To the Canaanites, this was the literal entrance to the netherworld.

[00:18:35]This was the abode of El, the creator god of the Canaanites. And in fact, there is some who believe there are some who believe that the two deeps may even refer to the Sea of Galilee or the area under the Sea of Galilee, which makes Jesus walking on the water even more significant. I go into that in the book, but no time here. There are other references to Hermon and Bashan in the Old Testament in the Bible. Whenever you see those references, they are significant because they are pointing to the abode of El, this entity known in other cultures and at other times as Kumarbi and some of the other names that we'll get to through the course of the book, Cronus to the Greeks, Saturn to the Romans.

[00:19:14]And another one that will emerge from the abyss in Revelation chapter 9. But in Psalm 82, this is one I want to get to. Psalm 68 by the way, fascinating reading, which talks about the many-peaked mountain of Bashan. That's a reference to Mount Hermon and why it's jealous of the mountain that God chose for his abode, Mount Zion. Psalm 82, God stands in the divine council, in the midst of the gods he renders judgment. That's the ESV translation. But the New English translation, again, looking at this and at the Hebrew phrase translated divine council, in Hebrew that's Adat El, which means the assembly of El.

[00:19:52]So, if we take it that way, God stands in the assembly of El.

[00:19:58]In the midst of the gods he renders judgment. In other words, Yahweh, the God of the Bible, invades the infernal council.

[00:20:07]El and his minions who have rebelled against him and passes judgment and says, "Though you are gods, all of you sons of the Most High, like men you shall die and fall like any prince."

[00:20:23]You're seeing wars of the gods here in the Bible.

[00:20:27]El, Kumarbi, Shemihaza, and Yahweh saying, "Okay, you and your colleagues, because you have transgressed, like men you shall die." And one final note here, when Jesus was transfigured into a being of light, he did it at Caesarea Philippi after Peter said, "You are the Christ, the son of the living God."

[00:20:51]Caesarea Philippi is at the base of Mount Hermon, right in front of the cave called the Grotto of Pan, which was believed to be the literal entrance to the netherworld.

[00:21:00]And following this, Jesus led his disciples, Peter, James, and John, up a very high mountain, Mount Hermon, the abode of El, El's threshing floor, and was transformed into a being of light. This was Jesus saying to the spirit realm, "Here I am.

[00:21:17]What are you going to do about it?"

[00:21:21]Speaking of great mountains, in our next session, we talk about the god called the great mountain, Enlil, chief god of Mesopotamia.

[00:21:30]That's next time.