It is 2000 B.
C.
For hundreds of years, Babylon and old Babylonia continue to grow.
Political and spiritual powers rise together, inseparable, as Babylonian politics and religion will ever be, seemingly unnoticed and unhindered by a holy God who has already destroyed a world for seemingly much less offense.
The major Biblical event of these early Babylonian (Chaldean) days is the call and promise of God to a man living in the midst of all this idolatry: Abram, later Abraham.
(Genesis 12) Through God's own way of communicating, He convinces Abraham's family to travel west, to present day Israel.
Here is the first indication that God's people must be called out of Babylon.
Then, much is made of a son to be born (Isaac), then another (Jacob, who is sent back to "Babylon", then called out again,Genesis 28-32), then a family (Israel).
We meet Joseph (Genesis 37-50), who is forced into the Egyptian version of Babylon's mysteries, but who ultimately is aware that he must come out with the Israelites (Genesis 50:25).
And even during his involvement with paganism, notice the provision he makes for God's people to be separate within Egypt (Genesis 47:6).
Then there is Moses, whose exodus is the classic example of God's people being separated from this present evil world (Exodus 1-20).
Slow, prodding work this, for such an all-powerful God, while the world marches on to destruction under the guidance of Satan and the prostitute.
Is this all you will do, God? Can you not stop this madness more quickly? Don't you see what's happening? God's reply, of course, is that He knows perfectly well what He is doing, how long it will take, who will be used, and that His ways are simply not ours.
The System Develops The father, the son, the mother-wife are the beginning of Satan's duplications of God's plans.
As indicated above,early on he introduces also the idea that, since the "father" is so awesome and unapproachable, the mother and her baby ought to be the prominent features of worship.
From this concept flow more of the system of mysteries: -the deification of the child -various magic tricks -total control by a group of men called "priests" who alone will be initiated into the fullness of the mysteries -a time of confessing of faults, where the ordinary people will tell their wrongs to the priests.
Thus will be created total manipulation by one group over another -the blood of a divinity needed for atonement -eventually, an overshadowing of the son by the mother -sensual perversions in worship -long processions of worshipers bowing down to statues -clothing and crowning of statues -the worship of "relics": pieces of hair, bones, or personal belongings of the "gods" -a string of beads used to recite prayers -special feast days tied in with the gods for example, the "birth of the sun" each year is around the end of December.
Both the sun and the son (Tammuz) are honored the same day! and of course, a special "lady day" to honor Semiaramis and, to announce the birth of the coming son, an annunciation festival on March 25 (which just happens to be nine months before December 25!) -mother-and-child statue worship -crying statues -weird "happenings" of various "holy ones" -the presence of obelisks, temples, towers We will cover some of these items in detail later.
They can be further researched in Hislop (see above) and in Woodrow's Babylon, Mystery Religion.
Now, Bible students will recognize portions of this list as some of the very essentials of the Christian faith! But in the same list is introduced a series of beliefs and practices that have their origins in none other than the mind of the beautiful (but fallen) angel.
Are you listening? Thousands of years before the institution in Rome that would be made in Babylon's image, and far from the Divine record given us in Holy Scriptures, thus far from the mind of Almighty God, there existed many of the items on this Babylonian agenda, the grand mixture (confusion) of the ages! Perhaps even now the Spirit of God is striving in your heart, telling you to consider well your attachment to what you have valued in the area of "religion.
" And I must hasten to add a word of caution to those who have already escaped.
Ours is not to judge or condemn.
Ours is to come out, and pray.
And be careful.
Jesus warned about pulling weeds out of the garden prematurely.
But we must continue.
As to the gods' names (borrowed from Hays' In the Beginnings and others): In early Babylonian culture,Anu is the god of the sky, Enlil god of the earth, and Enki god of the waters (also known as Ea.
) These three, of equal rank, are joined by a second triad: The sun (Utu or Shamash), the moon (Nanna or Sin), and the planet Venus (Inanna or Ishtar, whence our holiday "Easter.
") Now this Ishtar, who becomes the goddess of love and fertility, descends to the underworld and returns each year, coinciding with the yearly renewal of agricultural life.
Dumuzi, later called Tammuz, her husband/son, stays in the underworld, a substitute for her.
Slowly one named Marduk, who as we pointed out, is probably the Biblical Nimrod, deified, replaces the earth god Enlil; his worship is centered at Eridu, believed then to be the starting place of humanity.
By 2000 B.
C.
Abraham's contemporary Hammurabi, great ruler of ancient Babylonia, makes Marduk his chief god, based on the handed-down tradition that he (Marduk) has overcome the forces of evil.
Somehow our mystery of godliness is anticipated by this mystery of iniquity.
Oh how wise we need to be, how discerning! Next time the mystery moves from Babylonia to Assyria.
Its portability from culture to culture is one of its outstanding features!
C.
For hundreds of years, Babylon and old Babylonia continue to grow.
Political and spiritual powers rise together, inseparable, as Babylonian politics and religion will ever be, seemingly unnoticed and unhindered by a holy God who has already destroyed a world for seemingly much less offense.
The major Biblical event of these early Babylonian (Chaldean) days is the call and promise of God to a man living in the midst of all this idolatry: Abram, later Abraham.
(Genesis 12) Through God's own way of communicating, He convinces Abraham's family to travel west, to present day Israel.
Here is the first indication that God's people must be called out of Babylon.
Then, much is made of a son to be born (Isaac), then another (Jacob, who is sent back to "Babylon", then called out again,Genesis 28-32), then a family (Israel).
We meet Joseph (Genesis 37-50), who is forced into the Egyptian version of Babylon's mysteries, but who ultimately is aware that he must come out with the Israelites (Genesis 50:25).
And even during his involvement with paganism, notice the provision he makes for God's people to be separate within Egypt (Genesis 47:6).
Then there is Moses, whose exodus is the classic example of God's people being separated from this present evil world (Exodus 1-20).
Slow, prodding work this, for such an all-powerful God, while the world marches on to destruction under the guidance of Satan and the prostitute.
Is this all you will do, God? Can you not stop this madness more quickly? Don't you see what's happening? God's reply, of course, is that He knows perfectly well what He is doing, how long it will take, who will be used, and that His ways are simply not ours.
The System Develops The father, the son, the mother-wife are the beginning of Satan's duplications of God's plans.
As indicated above,early on he introduces also the idea that, since the "father" is so awesome and unapproachable, the mother and her baby ought to be the prominent features of worship.
From this concept flow more of the system of mysteries: -the deification of the child -various magic tricks -total control by a group of men called "priests" who alone will be initiated into the fullness of the mysteries -a time of confessing of faults, where the ordinary people will tell their wrongs to the priests.
Thus will be created total manipulation by one group over another -the blood of a divinity needed for atonement -eventually, an overshadowing of the son by the mother -sensual perversions in worship -long processions of worshipers bowing down to statues -clothing and crowning of statues -the worship of "relics": pieces of hair, bones, or personal belongings of the "gods" -a string of beads used to recite prayers -special feast days tied in with the gods for example, the "birth of the sun" each year is around the end of December.
Both the sun and the son (Tammuz) are honored the same day! and of course, a special "lady day" to honor Semiaramis and, to announce the birth of the coming son, an annunciation festival on March 25 (which just happens to be nine months before December 25!) -mother-and-child statue worship -crying statues -weird "happenings" of various "holy ones" -the presence of obelisks, temples, towers We will cover some of these items in detail later.
They can be further researched in Hislop (see above) and in Woodrow's Babylon, Mystery Religion.
Now, Bible students will recognize portions of this list as some of the very essentials of the Christian faith! But in the same list is introduced a series of beliefs and practices that have their origins in none other than the mind of the beautiful (but fallen) angel.
Are you listening? Thousands of years before the institution in Rome that would be made in Babylon's image, and far from the Divine record given us in Holy Scriptures, thus far from the mind of Almighty God, there existed many of the items on this Babylonian agenda, the grand mixture (confusion) of the ages! Perhaps even now the Spirit of God is striving in your heart, telling you to consider well your attachment to what you have valued in the area of "religion.
" And I must hasten to add a word of caution to those who have already escaped.
Ours is not to judge or condemn.
Ours is to come out, and pray.
And be careful.
Jesus warned about pulling weeds out of the garden prematurely.
But we must continue.
As to the gods' names (borrowed from Hays' In the Beginnings and others): In early Babylonian culture,Anu is the god of the sky, Enlil god of the earth, and Enki god of the waters (also known as Ea.
) These three, of equal rank, are joined by a second triad: The sun (Utu or Shamash), the moon (Nanna or Sin), and the planet Venus (Inanna or Ishtar, whence our holiday "Easter.
") Now this Ishtar, who becomes the goddess of love and fertility, descends to the underworld and returns each year, coinciding with the yearly renewal of agricultural life.
Dumuzi, later called Tammuz, her husband/son, stays in the underworld, a substitute for her.
Slowly one named Marduk, who as we pointed out, is probably the Biblical Nimrod, deified, replaces the earth god Enlil; his worship is centered at Eridu, believed then to be the starting place of humanity.
By 2000 B.
C.
Abraham's contemporary Hammurabi, great ruler of ancient Babylonia, makes Marduk his chief god, based on the handed-down tradition that he (Marduk) has overcome the forces of evil.
Somehow our mystery of godliness is anticipated by this mystery of iniquity.
Oh how wise we need to be, how discerning! Next time the mystery moves from Babylonia to Assyria.
Its portability from culture to culture is one of its outstanding features!
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