ONE Modern Interpretation of History

CHAPTER ONE

The Modern Interpretation of History

By what authority have historians left God and the Bible out of history?
This question may come as a surprise. Many are unaware that a radically new interpretation of history is being taught in schools and colleges today. It is a history of the world in which God and the supernatural are rejected.
It is impossible to believe BOTH this history AND the Bible. Both cannot be right.
The modern interpretation of world history stands in open conflict with Scripture. How did this conflict arise? When did history forget God and become confused? Why are historians so sharply divided into opposing schools over the chronological events of the ancient world?

A Radical New View

What many do not realize is that the modern world-view of history without God is a radically new interpretation of human experience. Almost no one today, it seems, has ever questioned whether this new interpretation is right. It is merely assumed to be right.
Students in particular -- and the public in general -- have been led to believe that archaeologists, historians, scientists and theologians live with full assurance and in absolute conviction that this new interpretation of HISTORY WITHOUT GOD is correct. Nothing could be farther from the truth!
One would be shocked to hear the candid admissions and private confessions of learned scholars. These men appear to write and speak with confidence. They are assumed to know the answers to history's greatest questions: how did man originate? why is man here? where is man going?
But they do not know. They have no scientific way of discovering the answers. They are only guessing! One famous historian -- Hendrik Van Loon -- dared to confess this in his book "Story of Mankind". Here are his candid words: "We live under the shadow of a gigantic question mark. What are we? Where did we come from? Whither are we bound?"
And his answer: "We still know very little but we have reached the point where (with a fair degree of accuracy) we can guess at many things."
Astounding -- but true! Yet these guesses are masquerading today as authoritative interpretations of history!

How History Is Written

Casual readers would be shocked to learn how history books are prepared. It is usually assumed that history is solely a matter of collecting factual material, judiciously evaluating it, and recording it for posterity. "Nothing could be farther from the truth," warns C. W. Ceram in "Secret of the Hittites," p. 119.
A historian is not a scribe, but a JUDGE of the evidence that is brought before him. He is his own final authority. He is not judged by, but sits in judgment of, history. Whatever evidence does not conform to the commonly accepted beliefs of the age or community in which he lives he summarily rejects!
History, in other words, is based only on that part of evidence which agrees with the prevailing opinions of the society in which a historian lives. These may be shocking evaluations, but they are true. World-history texts prove it. Historians admit it!
"The SELECTION of sources still rests upon the discretion of the individual historian. What he chooses as relevant depends upon his conception of the period he is studying. In this the historian is limited by his own temperament and guided by the spirit of his age." So writes C. W. Ceram in the previously mentioned volume, on page 119.
Is there any wonder that different nations and peoples have divergent histories of the same events?

Not Without Bias

Take as an example the history of the Second World War. Communist historians write only those facts about the war that can be shaped to suit the aims of the Communist Party. Japanese historians view the episode at Pearl Harbor quite differently from Americans. Even in America there are two or more versions about the responsibility for the Pearl Harbor incident -- depending upon the political party with which one is affiliated!
Today many German historians are united in a conspiracy to hide the truth about the Hitler regime from the younger generation. The Nazi period is glossed over almost as if it did not exist!
And how did historians handle the events of the First World War? In the same manner. The French historians' account of the Versailles Treaty at the end of the war was diametrically opposed to the German version. Each nation chose to accept only those facts which would lend historical support to its selfish motives.
The reconstruction and interpretation of history to suit political, social, economic, religious or race prejudices is a practice of scientific historians of all nations. Much of this prejudice the writers themselves are unaware of. It is so natural to human nature that they are often convinced that their prejudices do not exist! This suppression of part of the truth is the primary reason the world has never learned the lessons of history. The secondary reason, of course, is that most individuals do not want to believe the truth of history even when it is told them.

A Case History

A remarkable episode occurred in America in 1954 when the highest court of the land was confronted with a major social issue. A noted historian had become involved in the legal aspects of the case. Here is what happened, in his own words, told to fellow historians:
"The problem we faced was not the historian's discovery of the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth; the problem instead was the formulation of an adequate gloss ....
"It was not that we were engaged in formulating lies; there was nothing as crude and naive as that. But we were using facts, emphasizing facts, bearing down on facts, sliding off facts, quietly ignoring facts and, above all, interpreting facts in a way to ... 'get by ...."'
This candid admission strikes at the heart of the problem! Many times educators and ministers and writers of textbooks are confronted with the conflict between truth and the beliefs and ideas of the society around them. If they are to be accepted by the people, they must conform -- by altering or rejecting part of the truth!
Of course they use facts -- but how they use those facts, which facts they use, which facts they ignore or reject and the interpretation they place on the facts -- that is the crux of the problem!
Trapped in the vicious whirl of intellectual pressures like so many others, the historian admitted he was forced unwittingly to face the question of whether he would compromise his conscience. He reported to fellow historians in Washington, D. C., on December 28, 1961, that he was asked to produce "a plausible historical argument that will justify ..." a certain particular decision affecting public schools. "I was facing," he continued, "the deadly opposition between my professional integrity as a historian and" -- notice it -- "a contemporary question of values, of ideals, of policy, or partisanship and of political objectives. I suppose if a man is without scruple," he noted as a concluding thought, "this matter will not bother him, but I am frank to say that it bothered me terribly ...."
What an intellectual tragedy! Forced to make a decision between historical truth and the whims, the false ideas, the political partisanship of society!

"Anything but Historical Truth"

After days and nights of hard labor, a lengthy document was presented to the highest court of the land. "I am convinced now that this interpretation, which we hammered out with anything but historical truth as our objective, nonetheless contains an essential measure of historical truth," he concluded.
He was now convinced by his own arguments. This is exactly how every human mind works.
It is this same attitude of mind that has precipitated the conflict between the Bible and the new interpretation of history.
Altering history is not new to the twentieth century. It has been occurring ever since men began to write history.
In the United States, for example, there are two unharmonious versions of causes of the American Civil War. Yet these different versions are officially approved as texts in schools -- depending, of course, on the geographical area! The British account of the American Revolution of 1776 differs materially from the American version. A traitor in British eyes becomes a patriot in American histories.
One cannot peruse any major historical subject such as the Middle Ages, the Inquisition, or Church History without discovering Catholic, Protestant or agnostic bias. No Biblical subject can be read in any encyclopedia without noting the author's liberal, conservative or orthodox views. Or consider the life of Jesus. Could we think for a moment that Jew, Catholic, Protestant, Hindu or Muslim would view alike the place of Jesus in history? Or the apostle Peter? Would the Anglican version agree with the Greek Orthodox or the Roman Catholic version? Yet every historian has access to the same evidence.

History Involves Interpretation

History is not mere recording of facts. Contrary to the common idea, it is essentially interpretative. "The reconstruction of ancient history is an abstracting from the facts by means of hypothesis ...", wrote G. Ernest Wright in "The Biblical Archaeologist Reader," page 19. What occurs when the hypothesis is in error? The reconstruction of history will be in error!
This is one of the chief sources of confusion among historians. Each historian interprets the facts in accordance with his own hypothesis. He ignores those facts that do not fit the hypothesis. "This is inevitable for any hypothesis," admits George E. Mendenhall; for a hypothesis "is not intended as a presentation of eternal truth" (page 38 of "Biblical History in Transition," "The Bible and the Ancient Near East"). Yet many of these hypotheses ARE passing for truth in history textbooks.
One of the clearest summaries of this modern method of historical study was presented by Dr. Alfred H, Kelly at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association on December 28, 1961. He declared: "History is art as well as fact: everyone in this room knows that the facts do not automatically arrange themselves without the historian's creative leap, which occurs in our craft as well as in the exact sciences ...."
It is time historians took a GENUINELY creative leap and called into question the whole basic assumption of modern historical interpretation.

The Truth about the "Historical Method"

The foundation of modern historical research is the "historical method" of study. Few laymen are aware of what it is. Even many historians are not aware of its limitations and its fallacies. The "historical method" of study is essentially a new approach to history. It is called SCIENTIFIC because it limits itself to the tools of scientific research and reasoning. It is not based on demonstrable fact. It rests on only one fundamental -- and unprovable -- hypothesis: THAT GOD HAS NEVER AND DOES NOT NOW INTERVENE IN, OR DETERMINE, THE COURSE OF HISTORY.
Let a modern exponent of this new world-view explain it: "In any case, modern science does not believe that the course of nature can be interrupted or, so to speak, perforated by supernatural powers.
"The same is true of the modern study of history, which does not take into account any intervention of God or of the devil or of demons in the course of history .... Modern men take it for granted that the course of nature and of history, like their own inner life and their practical life, is nowhere interrupted by intervention of supernatural powers." ("Jesus Christ and Mythology", by Rudolf Bultmann, pgs. 16-17.)
This assumption has not been and can never be proved. There are no physical tools of science by which it may be demonstrated. It remains only a hypothesis. Yet scientists and historians take it for granted as if it were true.
The modern scientific historian blindly follows the "historical method." If he did not do so, he would be cast out by his fellows. He is taught to reject everything supernatural from history texts -- EVEN WHEN EVIDENCE OF THE INTERVENTION OF GOD IS RECORDED BY EYE-WITNESSES IN ANCIENT SECULAR RECORDS. He simply refuses to believe lt. This is not true history or science. It is half truth and intellectual folly.
This unscientific approach is the universally required method of modern historical study in institutions of higher learning. One will find it explained, for example, in the well-known text "The Critical Method in Historical Research and Writing". The author, Homer Carey Hockett, warns his students against God and the supernatural in history. He writes: "Moreover there are some kinds of statements which are rejected even without being subjected to the usual tests. The historian must reject them when the tests he usually makes are not applicable. Such treatment is due statements reporting happenings which do not conform to the laws of nature as established by scientific methods."
Since God cannot be scientifically tested He is rejected as myth. "It requires no justification where myths ... are involved. Their summary rejection is implied in the rule that no statement can be accepted unless it can be shown to rest upon trustworthy observation." Any who recognize God does intervene in nature is automatically assumed to be untrustworthy. "If any one asserts them he must be regarded as ignorant, superstitious, the victim of hallucination, or some other form of mental aberration" (p. 62).
What does all this mean? Just this: no one wants to be accused of "ignorance," "superstition" or "mental aberration." To avoid this stigma, the student or the historian finds himself compelled to reject God and any supernatural event recorded in history. He is forced to accept ,whatever passes under the vogue of science and reject whatever is presently called "myth." No observation is accepted as trustworthy if it disagrees with the present view of the natural world in which God and the supernatural are deliberately excluded. ALL RECORDS AND EVENTS ARE REINTERPRETED to fit the fallacious and unprovable assumption that God is not in history.
The "historical method" is nothing more than a new myth -- a new superstition. Its basic assumption is not only unverified, but absolutely and irrevocably refuted by the evidence of past records and of human experience WHICH HISTORIANS KNOW THEY HAVE REJECTED OR IGNORED.

Evidence of God Rejected as "Myth"

To justify the use of the "historical method" historians have had to discard or gloss over literally thousands of ancient records which corroborate the history of the Bible. These secular records include not only carefully preserved annals and references to the patriarchs, but also accounts of every major Biblical event, including the deluge, the building of the Tower of Babel and the Exodus! They are all summarily discarded -- as is the Bible -- under the name of "myth." Many of these records and annals will be re-examined in this compendium and properly placed in their historical milieu.
But how does a historian or a theologian prove whether the Bible or a secular record is a "myth" or a "fact." The answer is, he does not prove anything. He ASSUMES.
"The beginning of Thy word is truth," declares Psalm 119:160 (trans. of Jewish Publication Society). But modern scholarship would have us assume the beginning of Scripture -- Genesis -- is untrue or "myth."
Let Rudolf Bultmann explain it. "The whole conception of the world which is presupposed in the preaching of Jesus ... is mythological i.e., ... the conception of the intervention of supernatural powers in the course of events .... This conception of the world we call mythological because it is different from the conception of the world which has been formed and developed by science since its inception in ancient Greece ..." (p. 15).
It is called "myth" ONLY because it differs from pagan Greek science and its modern derivative! What modern science refuses to believe is arbitrarily and without proof designated "myth."
It is the very same hypothesis that atheistic, communistic materialists accept. Yet it is called "Christian scholarship." There is no essential difference between this Western God-rejecting skeptical scholarship and Communistic scholarship. Both reject the God who has intervened in the course of history. The former rejects Him in the name of humanistics and science; the latter in the name of atheistic materialism!
This similarity should surprise no one. For Karl Marx, the founder of atheistic Communism, was trained in the same German universities of Bonn, Berlin and Jena and by the same men who influenced Western scholars to accept the God-rejecting "historical method."

History Cut from Its Moorings

Scholarship today is in confusion -- usually dignified by the expression "learned controversy." The disagreement over the meaning of practically everything is so wide ranging, so acute, that archaeologist George E. Mendenhall wrote that it "may with perhaps less courtesy but more accuracy be called chaos"! (From "Biblical History in Transition," "The Bible and the Ancient Near East", edited by G. Ernest Wright. pp. 38, 33.)
The cause of this chaos is that historical conclusions are based not so much on authorities as on theories. There has been no true respect for the history of the Bible and for accurate secular annals. The Bible has been discounted simply because it has not been understood. Scripture has often been compared to a heap of winnowed chaff.
There is a reason the learned intellects have not understood the Bible. It is this: "And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind" -- or, as the margin reads: "a mind void of judgment" (Romans 1:28). And again, as Dr. Lamsa renders the Aramaic of I Corinthians 2:14: "For the material man rejects spiritual things, for they are foolishness to him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."
The modern interpretation of history is devoid of judgment. It is based on ignoring or disregarding the very documents and the evidence that disprove it.
Scholars and theologians therefore have read their own interpretations of secular records into the Bible. If necessary, they altered the text to accomodate a hypothesis. Even so conservative a scholar as A. T. Olmstead admitted when explaining the relationship of the Bible to history:
"This is only to say in other words that the Bible cannot be understood by itself .... It has become obvious that before we may claim to KNOW the Bible, we must first investigate all these varied sources and arrange their data in a general narrative. Then and only then we are ready at long last to fit the Biblical stories into ancient history." ("History, Ancient World, and the Bible -- Problems of Attitude and Method", "Journal of Near Eastern Studies", Vol. II, No. 1, January 1943.)
THERE is the root of the conflict that permeates theology, history, archaeology and related sciences. Men have rejected -- without examining the proof -- God as the source of truth. "Thy Word," declared Jesus, "is truth" (John 17:17). They have read their own interpretations into history and into the Bible. Each one follows his own human reasoning, apart from, and in opposition to, the revealed truth of God. Chaos is the result.
"But when you have the truth, everything fits"! (E. R. Punshon, "Information Received", Penguin Books, 1955.)
Next
Table of Contents

TWO 6000 Years of History

CHAPTER TWO

6000 Years of History

How long has Man been upon earth? Where, and through whom, did civilization originate? What about "prehistoric man"? Can the history of the Bible be reconciled with ancient history? with Egyptian and Babylonian chronology?
Historians and archaeologists are sharply divided over these questions today. Many sense something is drastically wrong with the present explanation of the ancient world. How did all this scholarly doubt arise?

It is Never Safe to Assume

Remove from a library shelf any volume on world history or ancient man and examine its opening chapters. In it will be such expressions as: "it is thought," "there appears to be some basis for believing," "it has been suggested," "it may be presumed," "one may safely assume," and "others are of the opinion" -- just to mention a few.
What do all these carefully chosen expressions really signify? Just this: that no demonstrable evidence really exists for accepting as a fact what has been written in the textbook. It is mere speculation!
The modern reconstruction of ancient history without God is almost 100% erroneous. And no wonder! It is derived from only a part of the historical sources that are available. It casts aside as "myth" factual and datable evidence of the past merely because God appeared in that evidence. without it, the modern historian is able only to theorize about the time or the place man appeared upon the earth. He cannot know. When these written records are rejected, not even archaeologists or geologists can come to the historians' aid and provide adequate dating.
Some modern writers, relying only on geological inferences, would place the appearance of man about 25,000 to 35,000 years ago. Others suggest the period is no less than 100,000 years ago. No small number of scholars assume it may be 500,000 years ago. And there are a few who place it several hundred thousand years earlier.
But how could intelligent, able men arrive at such absurdly varying figures for the origin of man and the beginnings of ancient history? They all have access, remember, to the same geological and archaeological sources of information.
The answer is, they are all interpreting geologic and archaeological evidence in accordance with their private theories. They are only guessing. They have no way of knowing.
One well-known writer phrased it this way: "We know that there is no absolute knowledge, that there are only theories, but we forget this. The better educated we are the harder we believe in axioms" (from Lincoln Steffens "Autobiography", page 816).
But we can know. The God who has intervened in history, records of whose acts we may read of in ancient sources from many nations -- that God has made known both the time and the place of origin of man. But historians, theologians and scientists alike refuse to believe it, for it leaves them no room to guess!
Before we examine these ancient secular and Biblical records, let us notice one classic illustration of the total inability of either archaeology or geology to determine DURATION OF TIME. Take the case of the Neolithic (New Stone) colonists of Wessex, England -- near the site of famous Stonehenge. "Estimates of the length of their sojourn have been very varied, the most extreme being that of W. A. Sturge, President of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia in 1909, who confidently stated and considered that he had proved 'on irrefragable evidence' that the Neolithic period had lasted well over 200,000 years -- a grossly inaccurate estimate .... Five to ten generations of men, or 100-200 years, would perhaps be nearer the mark as an estimate of time ...," declared archaeologist J. F. S. Stone recently ("Wessex Before the Celts", page 51).
Why such incomprehensible variations? Because no scientific means can determine the speed with which geological deposits were laid in the past -- or how long ago the deposition occurred, or the cause. Nor can any archaeology determine accurately the rate of accumulation of human remains unless there is some contemporary written evidence!

No "Prehistory" of Man

The modern idea that man has been upon earth for more than 6000 years is predicated on the assumption that "prehistoric time" once existed. Almost everyone takes it for granted. Few have ever thought to question it.
As used by critical historians, "prehistoric time" is said to refer to earliest antiquity that is nowhere documented in written records. Is this kind of "prehistoric time" really a fact?
Turn to Genesis 1:1 for the answer. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Time is coeval with the creation, for time is measured by the movements of the created heavenly bodies. But here also is a record of what occurred at the beginning. Here is a documented account reaching back even to the beginning of time. "Prehistoric time" in this sense is therefore irreconcilable with Scripture, for there is no period of time that is not documented in the Bible.
But how did the theory of "prehistoric time" originate? Why was the idea invented? Stuart Piggott, noted British archaeologist, summarized the development of the theory in his book "Approach to Archaeology." Note carefully his wording: "The first step was the realization that non-documented antiquity could in fact exist at all: that the whole creation and the sum of human history was not in fact contained within the Biblical narrative. This was the repudiation of the theological model of the past ..." (page 53).
"Prehistory" was developed to explain the presence of man without the Bible. It is merely another facet of the "historical method" which denies the possibility of God in history.
The fallacy of "prehistory" is clearly explained in the "Encyclopedia Americana". Here is its surprising statement: "... it is no longer accurate or logical to use the term 'prehistoric,' unless it is employed to designate that vague and hypothetical period in the beginnings of human development of which there exists no positive and tangible record ...." (from "History, its rise and development".)
Could words be plainer?
"Prehistoric" -- scholars now admit -- denotes nothing more than a "vague and hypothetical period ... of which there exists no positive and tangible record"!
But what of the famous periods or "ages" designated the Palaeolithic (Old Stone), the Mesolithic (Intermediate Stone), the Neolithic (New Stone), the Chalcolithic (Stone and Copper), the Bronze and the Iron?

Cultures, Not "Ages"

These terms do not represent "ages." They are CULTURAL appellations. It is a historical deception to speak of the "Stone Age." There are only STONE CULTURES. "These names," writes William L. Langer in "An Encyclopaedia of World History", "are excellent to identify cultures, but their use to designate periods of time has led to much inaccuracy and confusion, as the dates of the cultures to which they refer differ widely in different parts of the world" (page 2).
That is, societies using iron were contemporary with other societies using bronze or only stone. Most ancient societies used stone and bronze and iron. Today one may see backward tribes with a stone culture in New Guinea, Australia, areas of India, Africa and South America side by side with highly industrialized civilizations. These tribes are not "prehistoric." They are contemporary. Throughout history they have paralleled contemporary higher cultures, not ancestral to higher cultures as anthropologists assume. Even the Bible makes special mention of some of these degenerate tribes who anciently lived in Palestine and Sinai. The reference is found in Job 30:1-8, Jewish translation:

"But now they that are younger than I have me in derision,
Whose fathers I disdained to set with the dogs of my flock ....
"Men in whom ripe age is perished. They are gaunt with want and famine;
They gnaw the dry ground, in the gloom of wasteness and desolation.
"They pluck salt-wart with wormwood;
"And the roots of the broom are their food.
"THEY ARE DRIVEN FORTH FROM THE MIDST OF MEN ....
"In the clefts of the valleys must they dwell,
"In holes of the earth and of the rocks.
"Among the bushes they bray;
"Under the nettles they are gathered together.
"They are children of churls, yea, CHILDREN OF IGNOBLE MEN;
"They were scourged out of the land."

No evolution here. Only degeneration. civilized man did not descend from degraded, "primitive" tribes. But degraded tribes did descend from civilized men of low birth and degenerate habits. They were anciently driven out from the Middle East with its rising civilization, only to be rediscovered in tropical forests in recent centuries!
These facts make it clear why evolutionists are forced to admit: "Evolution is in the last analysis not a matter of evidence, but a matter of inference" (from "New Views of Evolution" by George Perrigo Conger, pp. 91).

Origin of the Study of History

Now we come to the origin of the scientific study of history. The facts are surprising. Few historians are aware of the real origin of their discipline. They generally take for granted as true the principles already laid down for them by preceding historians. Yet one of the basic rules of any scientific study is never to take anything for granted. Let us pull back the curtain on the study of history and view a plot that has eluded even the historians' keen eyes.
History as a scientific discipline may be said to have taken its rise with Lorenzo della Valla. He demonstrated that the "Donation of Constantine", on which the secular claims of the Roman Catholic Church were originally based, was a medieval forgery.
Forgery. That word became a touchstone. Soon non-catholic scholars everywhere became critical, negative, looking for spurious documents. The Middle Ages provided many rich finds.
During the same period a great revival in Classical Learning had been occurring, The popes had encouraged Catholic scholars of the Renaissance to revive the study of ancient Roman and Greek literature. In non-Catholic educational circles Classical Learning became associated with Catholicism. The inevitable occurred. Scholars who resented everything the word AUTHORITY stood for saw in the Greek and Roman Classics the symbolism of authority and tradition. Tradition would not be purged out, they reasoned, unless the Classics were also attacked and labeled as spurious.
The frontal assault began. At the close of the eighteenth century Friedrich August Wolf challenged the scholarly world with his "Prolegomena ad Homerum" (1795). The ancient Greek poet Homer -- famous for having composed the two great epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey -- did not compose either epic in its present form, charged Wolf. Homer, he reasoned, did not know how to write. The epics, he concluded, were pieced together about the seventh century from oral traditions, long after Homer lived. They were therefore unauthentic, Wolf concluded.
The floodgates of criticism were now opened wide. Thousands of youths, flocking to the German universities for their doctorates, were assigned the task of criticising classical literature. At the height of the epidemic, scarcely a single ancient work remained unimpugned as biased, untrue to fact, or unauthentic. Into the swirl of condemned poems, dramas, myths were heaved the sober histories of Herodotus, and Thucydides, the annals of the Greek city states, the Greek records of ancient Egypt, Assyria and Media. All ancient Greek and Roman history was condemned as spurious, unauthentic, fabulous, unhistorical -- because writing, said the critics, had not been known. How could the Greeks have preserved authentic histories reaching back 2000 years before the time of Christ, asked the critics, if the Greeks did not even know how to write till the seventh century before our era?

Historians Follow the Higher Critics

The historians of that day were greatly influenced by the subjective reasoning of the German Higher Critics. They accepted their verdict. Greek records prior to the seventh century disappeared from history books, or were labeled in footnotes as fabulous, or, at best, garbled.
Nearly a half century elapsed. During that period a new science arose -- archaeology. The past was being dug up. What did the excavators discover? Writing materials and documents dating more than 2000 years before the time of Christ! And in the Greek world, too!
The Greeks did know how to write after all. The critics, including Wolf, had been wrong. The imagined illiteracy of the early Greeks was a myth. The argument that they could not have preserved their history correctly was false.
But did the new evidence make any difference to the critics or to the historians? Were they willing to reconsider their conclusions? How were the historians going to explain that the basis for rejecting Greek history had been exploded?
No answers came forth. The new evidence was greeted with silence. All who brought up the problem were ridiculed as unscientific. Decades have passed, but not once has the evidence been reconsidered. The plot to suppress the truth had succeeded till now.
There is absolutely no reason why the records preserved by the Greeks should not be reinstated in their proper place in history. Refusal to reconsider the evidence is a standing indictment against the modern naturalistic interpretation of history.
But the story does not end here.
Every year saw fresh hordes of students arrive at the German universities demanding doctoral dissertations. Johann Gottlieb Fichte had made the German educational system famous the world over. Many students from abroad were coming to study in Germany under the great literary critics. The German professors insisted that their students thresh again the old classics. But this was not research. It was mere confirmation of what had already been universally accepted. With the quantity of classical raw material strictly limited in the early nineteenth century, a new field of study had to be thought up.
A "new discovery" must be found, the critics agreed, if Germany was to maintain absolute educational domination of the world. Such a discovery necessarily meant something to attack, for assailing a commonly accepted idea always creates interest. What literature, the critics asked themselves, did people believe to be true, but which had not yet been subjected to higher criticism?
The Bible!
Protestant Germany had, since the days of Dr. Martin Luther, assumed the absolute authenticity of Scripture. What a challenge! The opening wedge of the attack had, in actuality, been made by Dr. Luther himself, for had he not denounced the epistle of James as a book of straw?
All the methodology and reasoning, once feverishly applied to classical literature, was now directed in a frontal assault on the authenticity and historicity of Scripture. The Bible, proudly announced the critics, was pieced together from tradition in much the same fashion as the ancient Greek and Roman classics had been. The extremists declared it a pious fraud.
The literature of the Old Testament was rejected as contrary to human experience. It was obviously unhistorical, they concluded, for no events of a supernatural nature were befalling any nation today -- and certainly not any German professors and students! There was no God punishing them for their attacks upon Him, as He had once punished Israel, or Egypt, or Babylon.
Historians who had heretofore acknowledged the authority of the historical record in the Old Testament were impressed with the theories of the literary scholars. Then, too, the theory of organic evolution was mushrooming. Rationalism was king. Within a few decades the entire study of history was reshaped to meet the new theories.
But how were historians to reconstruct ancient history without the Old Testament? without God? without the supernatural? with all the early classical events removed? What kind of framework would they use to date events? History had to have some kind of chronological backbone.

Framework of History Founded on Egypt

A new reconstruction and interpretation of history without God or the supernatural, and now without Genesis, was foisted upon the world in the latter half of the nineteenth century. It first created the phantom of "prehistory", as we have already noted. To bolster their concept of "ancient man," the discoveries by travellers of savage, cannibalistic tribes in far away places were heavily called upon. It became a fad to picture "early man" in the garb of a savage.
The next step was to tie "prehistory" to modern history. What chronological means was to be used? The answer is two-fold: astronomy and the history of Egypt.
Rationalism had disposed of all supernaturalism in history. God was excluded from nature. Uniformitarianism became a basic concept. The astronomer was now called on by the historian to date the past for thousands of years on the basis of the present movement of heavenly bodies. All ancient historical records referring to supernatural movements of the heavens were rejected as mythological. Away went "Joshua's long day," and the backward decline of the sun for ten degrees in the kingship of Hezekiah. (See II Kings 20:8-11.)
From the Biblical record it would be impossible to determine the position of any solar body prior to the time of Hezekiah. But historians postulated that since God, according to their reasoning, could not intervene in the course of nature, it would be possible to date the past by calculating backward the present movements of the sun, moon and other planets, and the stars. All that was necessary, said the historians, was to discover, through archaeological means, early calendars and ancient documents that referred to positions of the sun, or moon, or the rise of the stars on certain stated calendar days. A few documents were discovered -- but, alas, they did not agree with the present movements of the heavenly body. The historians -- unwilling to admit uniformitarianism an error -- decided the mistaken numbers lay in the scribes who copied the astronomical documents. It was an easy task to change the figures on the cuneiform tablets and Egyptian papyri.
Still a problem remained. Astronomical movements repeat themselves in varying cycles. The 19-year cycle of the Hebrew calendar is an illustration. No ancient date could be determined by astronomical means unless the approximate date had already been determined by historical methods. Here is where Egypt comes on the scene.
Egypt seemed to provide the best solution. Her earliest documents were more likely to be preserved because of the warm, dry climate. Most of the monuments were above ground, unlike those in Mesopotamia. This made it a much easier task for the archaeologist. Egypt, decided the scholars, should become the historical standard of the world. Its civilization was certainly one of the oldest and earliest. Why not tie "prehistory" and modern history together through Egypt.
Now came the difficulty. Archaeology could not always determine which Egyptian monuments and which kings reigns came first. There were no buried cities, one above another, as in Mesopotamia. No stratigraphy to determine the exact order of events. The only solution was to adopt the traditional dynastic history of Egypt. It is based on the Greek versions of Manetho, an Egyptian priest and historian, who drew up the history of ancient Egypt under thirty dynasties.
The influence of Manetho on the order of events of ancient history is tremendous. This is confirmed by Sir Alan Gardiner, one of the most famous Egyptologists of the twentieth century. "That I have devoted so much discussion to what survives of Manetho ... will need no excuse for those familiar with the evolution of our science; no Egyptologist has yet been able to free himself from the shackles imposed by the native annalist's thirty Dynasties, and these are likely always to remain the essential framework of our modern expositions" ("Egypt of the Pharaohs", p. viii).

Is Egyptian History Correct?

The dynastic history of Egypt is universally assumed to be correct. NO historian thinks of questioning it. It is simply one of the assumptions he has taken for granted.
The time has come to explode this assumption! The story of how it became universally accepted over 2000 years ago is one of the most intriguing in all the annals of history. Let us roll back the centuries and discover the plot that changed history.
The historians of the last century inherited their views of history from the classical professors, for ancient history was for a long time an aspect of classical studies. The classical professors were interested in attacking LITERATURE. But they needed history for background if they were to demonstrate that early writings were merely garbled oral traditions and mythical accounts of heroes.
It suited their purpose to retain the commonly accepted view of history -- especially Homer's story of the fall of Troy. The earlier that ancient events could be placed the longer the time for oral traditions and myths to develop. The greater the likelihood for events to become garbled and untrue to fact.
Thus the framework of history remained essentially the same as it has been all through the Middle Ages.
Medieval and Modern Europe inherited its account of the past mainly through Catholic scholars and historians. Sextus Julius Africanus (early third century), Eusebius (early fourth century), and George the Monk, known as Syncellus (eighth to ninth century) contributed greatly to the transmission of ancient history. These men, together with the Jewish historian Josephus, obtained their information from earlier Greek documents long since lost. But from where did the Greek world obtain its history of Egypt? From the Egyptians.
The framework of all history, in simple terms, is derived ultimately from Egypt -- particularly through the writings of Manetho.
"In the arrangement of ... Egyptian materials within a framework of consecutive dynasties, all modern historians are dependent upon an ancient predecessor. This was an Egyptian priest and writer Manetho who lived under Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285-246 B.C.). Manetho was born at Sebennytus (now Samannud) in the Delta. Eventually he rose to be high priest in the temple at Heliopolis. Berossos of Babylon," continues Finegan, "was practically a contemporary, and the two priests became rivals in the proclamation of the antiquity and greatness of their respective lands." (From "Light from the Ancient Past", by Jack Finegan, pp. 65-66.)
In Manetho's time this spirit of competition reached a climax. Egypt and Babylonia were vying with each other for influence over the Greek-speaking world. Each sought to be known as the founder of civilization, of cultural and religious institutions, of political unity. Vanity was coupled in both by a deep sense of inferiority, for both were peoples subject to the Greeks. To rise above that feeling, each claimed to be the first people of earth, not alone in the sense of civilization, but in the sense of time.

Distorting History

To justify their claims to antiquity, Manetho and Berossos utilized their early records, the king lists of the various cities, and cleverly marshalled them together in consecutive order. Manetho summarized the history of Egypt under the rule of thirty dynasties, or ruling houses, from the royal cities of Abydos, Memphis, Elephantine, Heracleopolis, Xois, Thebes, Tanis, Bubastis, Sais and other cities. The history of the royal families of each city was drawn up to make it appear that only one city at a time dominated Egypt, and that Egypt was, from its beginning, under the government of only one ruler at a time. The result was that Egypt appeared to be extremely ancient and the first land to establish unity -- thousands of years before the Greek city-states were united. It was a fraud!
The internal details of the reigns of the kings of the various dynasties were scrupulously correct -- they had to be to make the history look valid -- but the order in which the dynasties appeared was a historic lie. Manetho cleverly told the history of the ruling families of each city, then attached them end to end to make Egypt appear the oldest and earliest unified nation on earth.
Egypt was a confederation. Its several kings exercised authority under the most powerful who was called Pharaoh. The word "Pharaoh" means the Great House -- as there were also lesser houses ruling.
Even the Bible preserves an account of more than one king in Egypt at the same time: "Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us," said the Arameans, "the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians" (II Kings 7:6).
Like Egypt, the land of Assyria also had more than one king at the same time: "At that time did king Ahaz send unto the kings of Assyria to help him" (II Chronicles 28:16). Historians falsely charge these verses are untrue to fact.
As an example of the strength of a great confederation, one may name Germany. Few are really aware that the German Empire, like the ancient Egyptian Empire, was a confederation governed by several kings even at the time of World War I. The supreme ruler was of the Prussian House of Hohenzollern, William II (1888-1918). Ruling with him in the German Confederation were Frederick Augustus III (1904-1918), king of Saxony: William II (1891-1918), king of Wuerttemberg Louis III (1913-1918), king of Bavaria and Ernest Augustus (1913-1918), duke of Brunswick. All lost their thrones in November of 1918.
To return to the theme of the story. Succeeding chapters of this compendium will now demonstrate how the true history of Egypt may be restored. Never before has the history of the ancient world been made clear as it will now be.
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CHAPTER THREE History Begins at Babel

http://www.cgca.net/coglinks/wcglit/hoehcompendium/hhc1ch3.htm

CHAPTER THREE

History Begins at Babel

The restoration of history begins with this chapter. It has taken years of research to recover all the vital pieces of evidence needed to tell the full story. The assumptions of historians and archaeologists had first to be cleared away. The most difficult part, however, was the recovery of rejected evidence -- much of it published over 100 years ag.
At last the restoration of the framework of history was complete for Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, Greece, Media. All the records went back to one momentous event.
The event? The building of the City and Tower of Babel! The beginning of the civilization of this world! It commenced as an act of rebellion against the Government of God. It began with the establishment of the Government of Man. And just as one might expect, all the ancient nations began to reckon their kings from this event.

History Corroborates the Bible

The Biblical account of the City and the Tower of Babel may be found in Genesis 11:1-9. In the Jewish Publication Society translation we read:
And the whole earth was of one language and of one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar: and they dwelt there. And they said one to another: 'Come, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly.' And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said: 'Come, let us build us a city, and a tower, with its top in heaven, and let us make us a name: lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.' And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the Lord said: 'Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language: and this is what they begin to do: and now nothing will be withholden from them, which they purpose to do. Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.' So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth and they left off to build the city. Therefore was the name of it called Babel: because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.
The most complete secular record is that found in the Akkadian Creation Epic. It is reproduced in "Ancient Near Eastern Texts", by James B. Pritchard, pages 68-69. This account, like most from ancient pagan sources, is encrusted with myth. But that does not nullify the basic historical evidence contained in the epic. Following are extracts, freely translated, from the Epic of Creation concerning the building of the City and the Tower of Babel. A vague recollection of the Supreme God is discernable.

"'Now, O lord, thou who hast caused our deliverance,
What shall be our homage to thee?
Let us build a shrine ....'
Brightly glowed his features, like the day:
'Like that of lofty Babylon, whose building you have requested,
Let its brickwork be fashioned. You shall name it "The Sanctuary"'
For one whole year they molded the bricks.
When the second year arrived,
They raised high the shrine equaling a great height.
Having built a stage-tower a great height,
They set up in it an abode for Marduk, Enlil, and Ea.
"This is Babylon, the place that is your home' ...'"

The account in Genesis describes exactly what is given here -- the building of a Tower, or religious edifice, and of a City.
The epic then continues with the establishment of human government. At this point the document is fragmentary, but a father and a son are clearly spoken of:

"He set up a throne ....
Another in ....
'Verily, most exalted is the son ....
His sovereignty is surpassing ....
May he shepherd the human race."

The Biblical account reveals who these two individuals were. Cush, the father, and Nimrod, the son. "And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth .... And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel ..." (Genesis 10:8, 10).
With the reign of Cush and of Nimrod the history of civilization begins. At this point commences also the chronology of Egypt, of Assyria, of Babylonia and of the whole Near East.
The exact date of this event was preserved down to Roman times. For Velleius Paterculus cites from Aemilius Sura, in his "Roman History", book I, section VI, the following: "Between this time (when Rome conquered Philip, king of Macedonia) and the beginning of the reign of Ninus (Nimrod) king of the Assyrians, who was the first to hold world power, lies an interval of 1995 years." Philip was conquered in 197. (All dates in this compendium which are not otherwise designated are understood to be before the present era, commonly, though mistakenly, written "B.C.") Nimrod, therefore, began his sole reign in 2192. It followed a joint reign with his father Cush for 62 years, according to Julius Africanus. That places the overthrow of Babel 2254 years before the present era. The two previous years, according to the Epic of Creation, had been spent in erecting Babel. The building of the Tower may therefore be dated 2256-2254. The Bible does not specifically date this event. But it does confirm the general period: "And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided ..." (Genesis 10:25).
Certainly the most spectacular confirmation of this date may be found in the history of China. For the Chinese begin their authentic history also 2254 years before the present era. This is no coincidence. China's first king was "black." His eyes shown with "double brightness." That is, theologically, "demon possessed." They called him Shun, and his father's name is spelled variously Chusou or Kusou -- that is, Cush. In his days lived a very famous woman whose name may be translated as either "the mother of the king of the west," or the "queen mother of the west " (See the "Annals of the Bamboo Books," "The Chinese Classics", by James Legge, vol. III, part I, pages 114-115.)
Before presenting the chronological history of China -- which has been preserved without alteration since the Tower of Babel, let us trace in the West the story of these heroes who founded Babel. No story of history is so unusual, so filled with the unexpected.

On to Egypt

The tombs of all the famous heroes who founded Babel are located in Egypt. Egypt early became the second center of civilization. One can now easily understand why both Babylonians and Egyptians claimed to be the first people in the world -- claimed their civilization and their religious customs were the earliest. In Egypt we now trace the history of what occurred immediately after Babel.
Egyptian history opens with Dynasty I. Its capital was Thinis in Upper Egypt. The names of the first four rulers of Dynasty I are Menes, Athothis, Kenkenes and Uenephes. The spelling of the names is from the Greek of Manetho. The early Egyptian forms vary slightly. Who were these famous individuals?
Let the Egyptians themselves provide the answer. Athothis, Egypt's second king, was Osiris. The tomb of Athothis at Abydos was "the sepulchre of the god Osiris, and, as such, became the shrine to which millions of pilgrims made their way," declared Arthur Weigall in "A History of the Pharaohs", vol. I, page 111. The Egyptian god Osiris was the Baal of the Phoenicians, the Marduk of the Babylonians, the Tammuz of the Semites, the Nimrod of the Bible.
The Cairo fragment of the Annals of Dynasties I-V preserves a name of the mother of Athothis. She is Hept, meaning "the veiled one." This is a designation of Isis, the mother and wife of Osiris. The Assyrians called Isis or Hept Ishtar or Semiramis. In Scripture she is called Ashtoreth. This woman was originally the queen of Meni. Egypt's first king. She became Athothis' queen and wife after the planned death of Meni. Here is confirmation of the age-old tradition that Nimrod married his own mother. Later. Athothis himself was slain in the 28th year of his reign, according to Plutarch.
The father of Athothis, and Egypt's first king, was Meni or Mena -- Menes in Greek. His name means "The Establisher" ("History of Ancient Egypt", vol. II, p. 26, by George Rawlinson), or "The Everlasting" (Waddell's "Manetho", p. 215) Menes was the first to ESTABLISH himself as king in place of the Everlasting God. Since Menes was the father of Athothis (Nimrod), he is the Cush of the Bible. "And Cush begot Nimrod, he began to be a mighty one in the earth" (Gen. 10:8).
The third name in the first dynasty is Kenkenes, a Greek form of Kenken, meaning "The Terrible." He was born, according to Egyptian tradition, after the death of Osiris. His mother placed him on the throne. She claimed he was the reincarnation of Osiris, or Athothis; hence he is at times called Athothis, or Itit in early fragments. (These various names may be found in Sir Alan Gardiner's "Egypt of the Pharaohs" and in Weigall's "A History of the Pharaohs") He was also named Horus, the son of Isis.
Everyone of these famous men of old had many names. Of Nimrod, we read in the Epic of Creation:

"As for us, by however many names we call him, he is our god'
Let us then proclaim his fifty names ...."

Listed fourth in Dynasty I is Uenephes. This king was a woman! She called herself Henneit, meaning "Neit is victorious." Neit is the Egyptian form of the Greek Athena. She also called herself Hept, which means "the veiled one," as already noted. This evidence clearly means that the wife of Meni, or Cush, was the mother and later the wife of Nimrod, and later still the mother of Kenkenes or Horus.
Years later, she even propositioned her own son Horus, called Gilgamesh in Babylonian tradition, as we read in the following extracts from the Epic of Gilgamesh:

"When Gilgamesh had put on his tiara,
Glorious Ishtar raised an eye at the beauty of Gilgamesh:
'Come, Gilgamesh, be thou my lover!
Do but grant me of thy fruit.
Thou shalt be my husband and I will be thy wife'.
Gilgamesh opened his mouth to speak,
Thou art but a brazier which goes out in the cold;
A back door which does not keep out blast and .windstorm;
Pitch which soils its bearers; A waterskin which soaks through its bearer;
A shoe which pinches the foot of its owner!
Which lover didst thou love forever?
Come and I will name for thee thy lovers:
Of .... (the story of Cush is broken from the cuneiform tablet)
for Tammuz, the lover of thy youth,
Thou hast ordained wailing year after year.
them."

(Consult Pritchard's "Ancient Near Eastern Texts", pages 83-84. Compare the account of Tammuz with Ezekiel 8:14.)

The Chronology of Dynasty I

Now we are ready to build the chronology of Egypt and of all ancient history from its beginning. Without a knowledge of who these rulers of Dynasty I are, it would be impossible to make sense of the following lengths of reign. The various pieces of information came originally from a full-length account by Manetho. The abstractors each told only part of the full story. No one list is complete in itself, but taken together -- in the same way the Bible ought to be studied -- every chronological fact makes sense.
 

	Africanus	Eusebius	Eusebius (Armenian Version)
	Years	Years	Years
1 Menes (Cush)	62	60	30
2 Athothis (Nimrod)	57	27	25
3 Kenkenes (Horus or Gilgamesh)	31	39	39
4 Uenephes (Ishtar or Isis)	23	42	42

Eratosthenes gives 62 for Menes and 59 for Athothis.
The immediate comment that all modern historians give, is that the list is corrupt. But they have no proof. They have never assembled these figures to tell the full story. Remember, the full account of what really occurred is lost in Manetho's original work. (A few facts have been reclaimed by archaeology.) Each of the abstractors of Manetho told only part of the story. Like the writers of the four gospels, each viewed what he saw in history from a different perspective. What was important to one, did not appear as important to another. It is time scholarship had a little more respect for the documents they purport to handle so judiciously.
The numbers in this list, as in almost all ancient history and also the Bible, are calendar years. That explains why they are whole figures. The immediate years after the building of Babel are assigned to Cush, although his son Nimrod reigned jointly with him.
The account begins with the reign of Cush or Menes. He began to reign in Shinar, not in Egypt. He came to Egypt where he spent his last 30 years. Cush or Menes ruled altogether 62 years, after which Nimrod began his sole rule of 25 years. Nimrod settled in Egypt 60 years after the building of Babel, and reigned two years jointly with his father. His total reign in Egypt was therefore 27 years. Plutarch records that Osiris (Nimrod) had to flee Egypt at the end of 27 years. He was executed in the summer in his 28th year by Shem, in the month of Tammuz, the 17th day according to ancient tradition.

These events may thus be clearly dated as follows:
 

Menes (Cush)	60	2254-2194 (reign prior to coming of Nimrod)
Athothis (Nisrod)	27	2194-2167 (total reign in Egypt)

-or-

 

Menes (Cush)	62	2254-2192 (total reign of Cush)
Athothis (Nimrod)	25	2192-2167 (sole reign in Egypt)

Cush came to Egypt about 2222 and united Upper and Lower Egypt under his supreme authority for 30 years -- 2222-2192. This marks the beginning of Cushite, or Ethiopian, settlement in Africa. Cush, at the time of death, may have been nearly 170 years of age.
Josephus confirms this restoration of history in "Antiquities" book VIII, chapter vi, sect. 2: "All the kings from Menes, who built Memphis, ... until Solomon ... was more than one thousand three hundred years."
In 2167 Nimrod (Athothis) fled to Italy and was slain there. At the flight of Nimrod, his mother-wife Uenephes also had to flee -- tradition states to the Delta. At this point some continued to reckon after the era of Nimrod or Athothis, since he had no male heir. Others reckoned time after his mother-wife who went into hiding. Thirty years passed. Now see how Manetho's figures fit!
It was about 57 years after Nimrod had come to Egypt. Suddenly his widow Uenephes or Isis reappears with a son -- Kenkenes or Horus. Four years later -- 59 years after the death of Menes or Cush, she associates the son with her on the throne of Egypt. Isis or Uenephes thus temporarily triumphs over those who were responsible for the execution of Nimrod.
Eight years later -- 42 years after the death of Nimrod -- the son Horus becomes supreme ruler as his mother turns over to him the reins of government. Horus or Kenkenes reigned altogether 39 years, alone for 31 years. Uenephes therefore reigned, after her return from exile, for 12 years (four years alone and eight years with her son). Afterward she returned to the throne again for 11 years following the departure of Horus for Babylonia, making a total of 23 years. (In Babylon Horus received the name Gilgamesh.) Thus every figure of Manetho, preserved from antiquity, fits.

This information may therefore be summarized as follows:
 

Athothis (Nimrod)	57	2194-2137 (years from Nimrod's coming into Egypt to return of Isis)
Uenephes (Ishtar)	12	2137-2125
Kenkenes (Horus)	31	2125-2094 (sole reign of Horus)
Uenephes	-- 11 years more,	2094-2083, making a total of 23.

-or-

 

Athothis (Nimrod)	27	2194-2167 (total reign in Egypt)
Uenephes (Ishtar)	42	2167-2125 (years from flight of Nimrod to sole reign of Horus)
Kenkenes (Horus)	31	2125-2094

-or-

Athothis (Nimrod)	59	2192-2133 (years from the death of Cush to reign of Horus)
Kenkenes (Horus)	39	2133-2094 (total reign of Horus)

It is immediately noticeable that Horus or Gilgamesh left Egypt exactly 100 years after Nimrod left Babylonia to come to Egypt -- 2194-2094. This figure has important significance when we come to comparing Egyptian history with that of the land of Shinar or Sumer, in Mesopotamia.

Shem in Egypt

The first book of Manetho lists four more kings in Dynasty I. Among them is Shem. All classical records agree as to the length of reign. The reconstructed Cairo fragment of the Palermo stone gives different figures, but the same total -- indicating there were contemporary reigns, during which more than one ruler shared the throne. A Biblical parallel to this may be observed in the case of Jehoshaphat and Jehoram in Judah (II Kings 8:16).

The figures appear as follows:
 

	Manetho		Palermo Stone Restored
5 Usaphais	20	2083-2063	34	2083-2049
6 Miebis	26	2063-2037	19	2049-2030
7 Semempses	18	2037-2019	9	2030-2021
8 Bieneches	26	2019-1993	28	2021-1993

The total length of Dynasty I is 261 years -- 2254-1993.
The seventh king is especially significant. His original name in the Egyptian records is Semsem -- meaning the Great Sem or Shem. In the New Testament Greek, Shem is spelled Sem (Luke 3:36). The hieroglyphics representing Shem depict him in Asiatic, not Egyptian, dress. He appears as an old man with a long beard in priestly garb. Old indeed he was. About 430 years old!
Shem left Egypt in 2019 or one year before the death of Noah in 2018 which was 350 years after the Flood Shem probably heard that Noah was approaching death in 2019.
Now consider Miebis, the sixth king, and predecessor of Semsem. His tomb was defaced by Semsem. A later section, in volume II, will reveal Miebis to be Osiris II. He was slain by Semsem. The Egyptians called him Typhon. He was the "father" or ancestor of "Judah and Jerusalem," records Plutarch.
Dynasty II of Thinis
The kings of the second dynasty were comparatively insignificant. Other and more powerful rulers were dominating Egypt at this time -- ever since the days of Shem, but who they were will be disclosed only after the chronology of the first eight dynasties is firmly established. The change from Dynasty I to II at this point in history will also become apparent, once we begin to examine parallel dynasties who fought over the possession of Abydos and Thinis.

The first four rulers of Dynasty II:
 

Names in Manetho	Names in King lists	Years of Reign	Dates
1 Boethos	Bedjau	38	1993-1955
2 Kaiechos	Kakau	39	1955-1916
3 Binothris	Banutjeren	47	1916-1869
4 Tlas	Wadjnas	17	1869-1852

The fragment of the Palermo Stone agrees with this total.
In the reign of Binothris "it was decided that women might hold the kingly office," wrote Manetho. This legal decision accounts for the bifurcation of the dynasty within two generations. Manetho's abstractors list both branches of the dynasty in successive order, giving the false impression that one followed the other. This is the very same technique Manetho employed in listing contemporary dynasties. The Turin Papyrus and the Palermo Stone provide the information missing from Manetho. Once again all the evidence must be considered, including Manetho.
The fifth king listed by Manetho and the monuments was Sethenes (Sendi in the King-lists). He reigned altogether for 41 years -- 1852-1811. The Palermo stone provides the added fact that he associated others with him after his 37th year. His sole reign was 37 years -- 1852-1815.

At this point he associated Chaires and Sesochris with him on the throne. Sesochris -- the eighth in Manetho's list -- was succeeded by Cheneres -- the ninth in Manetho. Their reigns:
 

Names in Manetho	Names in King lists	Years of Reign in Manetho	Dates
5 Sethenes	Sendi	37 (or 41)	1852-1815 (or 1852-1811)
8 Sesochris	Neferkaseker	48	1815-1767
9 Cheneres	--	30	1767-1737

Parallel with Sesochris was Chaires, who reigned for 17 years. His successor was Nephercheres (Neferkare in the King-lists). Manetho gives him a total reign of 25 years, but the Palermo Stone and the Turin Papyrus indicate he was removed from the kingship by Sesochris after a reign of only 15 years. The Turin Papyrus preserves the record that Sesochris replaced him for 8 years. Following the usurpation by Sesochris, Nephercheres returned to the throne for 10 more years completing 25 years of reign. He was succeeded by Necherophes, the first king listed by Manetho for Dynasty III of Memphis. In chart form this information appears thus:
 

Names in Manetho	Years of Reign	Dates
6 Chaires	17	1815-1798
7 Nephercheres	15	1798-1783
8 Sesochris (Neferkaseker)	8	1783-1775
7 Nephercheres	10	1775-1765
Necherophes (reigns in Memphis)	28	1765-1737

The Turin Papyrus indicates that the return to power of Nephercheres was facilitated by another prince of royal blood who shared the throne. Though Manetho does not list him, he and his successor appear in the King-lists and in the Turin Papyrus as follows:
 

Names in King-lists and Turin Panyrus	Years of Reign	Dates
Hudjefa	11	1775-1764
Beby (Bebty)	27	1764-1737

Thus every date from each document is accounted for. The total length of Dynasty II is 256 years -- 1993-1737, Altogether 517 years had elapsed since human government was established after the deluge.

Joseph and the Seven-Years' Famine

It has been necessary to name kings not associated with Biblical events in order to establish the proper date for Dynasty III. This dynasty is one of the most important in all Egyptian history. In it are the records of Joseph's rulership and of the seven years' famine. This dynasty is usually mistakenly placed over a thousand years too early! But before proceeding, we must examine the Turin Papyrus for a most significant summary date.
The Turin Papyrus contains the following entry after Dynasty VIII: "Kings since Menes, their kingdoms and years: 949 years: kingless years: 6. Total, 955." (See Gardiner's Royal Canon of Turin.) It also lists 181 years for Dynasty VI. The known length of Dynasty III is 74 years, of Dynasty IV, 123; of Dynasty V, 140; of Dynasty VIII, 140. And remember, Dynasty I and Dynasty II totaled 517 years. Yet the total for the entire period is only 955 years. There is no other possible explanation than that certain of these dynasties reigned parallel with each other. Joseph will be found listed in two of them!

To return to Dynasty III -- the first dynasty of the city of Memphis. The Turin Papyrus, together with the restored Palermo Stone, provides the complete regnal years of the five successive kings who dominated the dynasty. The name Zoser, the first ruler of the dynasty is also spelled Djoser.
 

Names of Kings in King-lists	Name in Manetho	Reigns in Turin Canon	Dates
Zoser-za (Netjrikhe)	Tosorthros	19	1737-1718
Nebka (of the royal line of Beby)		19	1718-1699
Zoser-teti	Tosertasis	6	1699-1693
Nebkare		6	1693-1687
Huny		24	1687-1663

The end of a seven-year's famine occurred at the close of year 18 of Zoser I (end of winter 1719). No other seven-years' famine is reported during the entire history of the Pharaohs. This is the Biblical seven-years' famine under Joseph. It is at the right time.
An account of the calamity is to be found on the rocks of the island of Sehel, at the First Cataract. A modern translation of it may be found in "Biblical Archaeology" by G. Ernest Wright, page 56. The account reads:

"Year 18 .... I was in distress on the
Great Throne, and those who are in the palace
were in Heart's affliction from a very great
evil, since the Nile had not come in my time
for a space of seven years. Grain was scant,
fruits were dried up, and everything which
they eat was short .... The infant was wailing;
the youth was waiting; the heart of the old
man was in sorrow .... The courtiers were
in need. The temples were shut up ....
Everything was found empty." (Translation
by J. A. Wilson in "Ancient Near Eastern Texts",
edited by J. B. Pritchard, page 31.)

But where does Joseph appear in this period? The answer is found in Dynasty III and Dynasty IV of Manetho. He appears under the name Suphis (or Souphis or Saophis) -- different Greek spellings from Manetho's abstractors. Joseph in Hebrew, it should be noted, is not pronounced with an English "J" sound, but with a "Y" sound. In Manetho's Egyptian transcription of the name only the consonents "s" and "ph" appear -- hence the Greek Souphis or its variant forms. Eratosthenes wrote that the Egyptians had designated Suphis as a "money-getter" or "trafficker" (Fragment 17, "Manetho", by W. G. Waddell, page 219).

Dynasty III in Manetho is made up of many rulers which do not appear in the Turin Papyrus. Only the two Djosers appear in each list, and in each case the full length of reign is preserved in Manetho. These otherwise unknown rulers are accounted fiction by modern historians. Had they only looked in the Bible they would have found one of them in the person of Joseph.
 

Names in Manetho	Name in King-lists	Length of Reign	Dates
1 Necherophes (previously mentioned at end of Dynasty II)		28	1765-1737
2 Tosorthros	Djoser-za	29	1737-1708
3 Tureis		7	1708-1701
4 Mesochris		17	1701-1684
5 Souphis (Joseph)		16	1684-1668

In Dynasty IV Suphis or Joseph is given 66 years by Manetho. This makes it clear that Dynasty IV -- a foreign dynasty -- parallels Dynasty III. The two records together tell the full story. Only the latter portion of Joseph's reign is preserved in the list of rulers in Dynasty III. The entire period of Joseph's public service is contained in the parallel account. The 66 years of Joseph's public service cover the years 1734-1668. Compare this date with Zoser's seven years of famine. The famine ended in 1719 after the rise in Upper Egypt of the new Nile during the summer of 1720 in Zoser's 18th year. The famine thus extends in Egypt from the spring of 1726 to the spring of 1719 (Jacob came to Egypt in the summer of 1725, after the harvest had failed two years in Palestine ) The seven harvests of great abundance were during the years 1733-1727. Joseph, according to the Bible, came to power in 1734, the year before the beginning of the seven years of prosperity. And 1734 is the very date for the commencement of Joseph's public office, as listed in the fourth dynasty! Joseph was 30 years of age upon entering his service (Gen. 41:46). He thus served till 96 years of age, and died at 110 (50:26).

But Manetho's account does not end here. There are yet four kings that complete the dynasty. These kings parallel, in part, those already mentioned, and whose reign is preserved in the Turin Papyrus.
 

Names in Manetho Dynasty III	Names in Turin Canon and King-list	Length of Reign in	Dates
6 Tosertasis	Djoser-teti or Teti	19	1699-1680
7 Aches		42	1680-1638
8 Sephuris	Sahure	30	1638-1608
9 Kerpheres		26	1608-1582

In summary, the third dynasty is divided at times into two or three branches -- just as was the second dynasty. The government under this dynasty was centered at Memphis. Not every ruler was of the same rank, of course, but all exercised royal power (Genesis 41:39-44).
Although Dynasty IV, in which Joseph's and Job's long reigns are recorded, is parallel with these events, it is better to restore it after the fifth and sixth dynasties are presented.

The Exodus

In Manetho, Dynasty V is designated as from Elephantine -- far away to the south, in Upper Egypt on the borders of Nubia. Although Manetho lists nine kings in the dynasty, he plainly states that there were only "eight kings from Elephantine." This mystery has never been solved by historians. Their explanation is that the records are incorrect. Not so. There were only eight kings from Elephantine, because Sephres, the second in the list, was of the Memphis line and had already appeared as Sephuris in the third dynasty. He is the key to the proper dating of Dynasty V. Though from Elephantine, the government was usually centered near Memphis. The Turin Papyrus and the restored Palermo Stone give us the following summary:
 

Names in Manetho	Names in King-lists & Canon of Turin	Years of Reign in Turin Canon and in Palermo Stone	Dates
1 Usercheres	Userkaf	7	1627-1620
2 Sephres (mentioned in Dynasty III as Sephuris)	Sahure	12	1620-1608
3 Nephercheres	Neferirkare	21	1608-1587
4 Sisires	Shepseskare	7	1587-1580
5 Cheres	Khaneferre	17	1580-1563
6 Rathures	Niuserre	11	1563-1552
7 Mencheres	Menkauhor	8	1552-1544
8 Tancheres	Djedkare	28	1544-1516
9 Onnos	Unis (Unas)	30	1516-1486

With Unis the dynasty comes to a catastrophic end. (He was a contemporary of the Pharaoh who perished at the Red Sea.) The king died the night of the Passover. Unis was a firstborn' He was also a cannibal! After Moses left Egypt, he commenced the frightful practice of eating the firstborn of his enemies. That is one of the reasons God slew the firstborn of Egypt. From the pyramid-tomb of Unis one may read this horrible account of his life, his blasphemous claims, and his deeds.
"Behold, Unas hath arrived at the height of heaven .... Ra is on one side and Horus is on the other, and Unas is between them .... Unas hath weighed his word with the hidden god who hath no name, on the day of hacking in pieces the firstborn .... Unas devoureth men .... He ... cutteth off hairy scalps ... the cordmaster hath bound them for slaughter. Khonsu the slayer of ... hath cut their throats and drawn out their inward parts, for it was he whom Unas sent to drive them in: and Shesem hath cut them in pieces and boiled their members in his blazing cauldrons. Unas hath eaten their words of power, and he hath swallowed their spirits; the great ones among them serve for his meal at daybreak, the lesser serve for his meal at eventide, and the least among them serve for his meal at night. The old gods and the old goddesses become fuel for his furnace. The mighty ones in heaven shoot out fire under the cauldrons which are heaped up with the haunches of the firstborn; and he that maketh those who live in heaven to revolve around Unas hath shot into the cauldrons the haunches of their women of the gods in visible form. UNAS IS THE FIRSTBORN OF THE FIRSTBORN existence is ... and the offerings made unto him are more than those made unto the gods ..." (from E. A. Wallis Budge's "A History of Egypt", vol. II, pages 83-88.) Compare King Unis and his blasphemous claims with II Thessalonians 2:3-4. A remarkable analogy.

Name in Manetho Length of Reign Dates

Manetho adds details to this dynasty missing from the Turin Canon. His figures for length of reign clearly illustrate that several kings of Dynasty V reigned jointly as with almost every previous royal line. From Manetho's abstractors the following table may be drawn up:
 

Name in Manetho	Length of Reign	Dates
1 Usercheres	28	1648-1620

(The reign of Usercheres in the Turin Papyrus does not begin until 1627, after the end of its Dynasty IV, though he had previously been reigning.)
 

2 Sephres	13	1620-1607
3 Nephercheres	20	1607-1587
4 Sisires	7	1587-1580
5 Cheres	20	1580-1560

At this point the line of Elephantine divides into two branches. After year 17 of Cheres, Rathures came to power for 44 years and was succeeded by Unis.
 

6 Rathures	44	1563-1519
9 Onnos	33	1519-1486

After the 20-year reign of Cheres, Tancheres came to power also for 44 years, with Unis as his successor as follows:
 

8 Tancheres	44	1560-1516
9 Onnos (Unis)	30 in Turin Canon	1516-1486

For a total period of 9 years Mencheres shared in the government, giving rise to three parallel reigns. Subdivisions of government as here illustrated were quite typical of the ancient world. An example that might be cited is the government of the later Roman Empire when subdivided into two parts, each under two emperors.

Pharaoh of the Exodus

Now for the sixth dynasty. To determine its chronological place in history, we must first establish the end of Dynasty VIII. Dynasty VIII, located at Memphis, was a very weak period -- under foreign dominion, as will later be established. It lasted a total of 140 years. Many of the names of its kings have been found, but no regnal dates for any individual kings can be determined. (Consult Gardiner's "Egypt of the Pharaohs", page 437.) This dynasty concludes the 955 years from the beginning of the government of Menes or Cush at Babel, according to the Turin Canon. Its dates are therefore 1439-1299.
It was preceded by 6 kingless years, extending from 1445-1439. This period corresponds with Joshua's conquest of Goshen to the Nile (Joshua 10:41 and 11:16). Sometimes these six kingless years are attached to Dynasty VI; on other occasions the period is attached to Dynasty VIII. During this period of six kingless years occurs the ephemeral seventh dynasty. Africanus records that it comprised a kind of council with 70 kings exercising authority for 70 days. Eusebius declares there were 5 kings who ruled for 75 days. Little else is known of the period.

Dynasty VI of Memphis immediately preceded this period. It lasted 181 years -- 1626-1445. The following chart is determined from archaeological evidence and the Turin Canon.
 

Names in Manetho	Names in Turin Canon and King-lists	Length of Reign	Dates
1 Othoes	Teti	13	1623-1613
	Userkare (a usurper)	6	1613-1607
2 Phios	Piopi	20	1607-1587
3 Menthusuphis	Merenre	6	1587-1581
4 Phiops	Neferkare	94	1581-1487
5 Menthesuphis	Merenre-Antyemzaef	1	1487-1486
6 Nitocris	Nitokerty	12	1486-1474
(Manetho ends his list here)	Neferka, the younger	20	1474-1454
	Nufe	2	1454-1452
	Kakare (Ibi)	4	1452-1448
	(name missing)	2	1448-1446
	(name missing)	1	1446-1445

Manetho assigns to Othoes 30 years, at the end of which time he was assassinated by his bodyguard, His total reign extended from 1643-1613. Manetho's second king Phios is assigned 53 years: 1613-1560. He reigned jointly during the early years of his young son Pepi the Great (Phiops Neferkare) Menthusuphis is assigned by Manetho 7 years, and archaeological finds indicate he reigned a year jointly with his young brother before he died (1581-1580).
Compare these dates with those of Dynasty V for the Exodus. Dynasty V ended at 1486 with the death of the magician-king (Unis is called Jannes in II Timothy 3:8.) In Dynasty VI king Merenre II also dies in 1486, after only one year's reign. He was succeeded by his wife Nitocris, then by his son Neferka "the younger." Neferka's older brother, the firstborn, died at the Passover. No trace of him has been found. Compare this with Exodus 2:23, "And it came to pass in the course of those many days that the king of Egypt died." This king is Neferkare -- more commonly called Pepi II -- who reigned the longest in all Egyptian history. He came to the throne at 6 years of age and died at 100. Then God calls Moses. To Moses he declared: "Go, return into Egypt: for all the men are dead that sought thy life" (Exodus 4:19). Merenre II was now reigning -- the Pharaoh whom Moses and Aaron met and who perished in the Red Sea. At this juncture in history Egypt collapsed. Foreign invaders enter the land -- but who they were and where they came from must wait until all the previous dynasties before the Exodus are determined.

Dynasty IV -- the Pyramid Builders

To return to the story of Joseph. Parallel with Dynasty III of Memphis, was Dynasty IV, "eight kings of Memphis belonging to a different line." This dynasty includes such famous names as Cheops, Chephren and Mycerinus -- to use the names made familiar by Herodotus. The list of kings of the fourth dynasty in the Turin Canon and on the Palermo Stone differs from Manetho after Cheops. The result, no doubt, of the tragic plague that came upon Cheops (Job). The Palermo Stone and the Turin Canon begin Dynasty IV 123 years before Dynasty V. That means it commenced the 24-year reign of Snefru in 1750. The following dates are from Turin Canon and restored Palermo Stone.
 

Name in King-lists and on Turin Papyrus	Length of Reign	Dates
Snefru	24	1750-1726
Khufwey (Cheops)	23	1726-1703

(According to Herodotus, the Great Pyramid took 20 years to build, much of it during the time of the seven-years' famine when labor was available. The loss of authority after 23 years appears to correspond with the plague on Job. At this point the death of several of the sons of Cheops is recorded at the tombs near Gizeh) Continuing:
 

Radjedef	8	1703-1695
Khafre	27	1695-1668
Hardjedef	7	1668-1661
Baufre	28	1661-1633
Shepseskaf	4	1633-1629
( name missing)	2	1629-1627

At this point this branch of the dynasty was succeeded by the kings of Dynasty V, from Elephantine.

The following is the information preserved by Manetho who begins the dynasty five years earlier than does the Turin Canon. (Note that Cheops is designated as Job. See May 1958 "Good News", p. 3.)
 

Names in Manetho	Names in King-lists	Length of Reign	Dates
1 Soris	Snofru or Snefru	29	1755-1726
2 Suphis (Cheops or Job)	Khufwey	63	1726-1663
3 Suphis (Joseph)	---	66	1734-1668
4 Mencheres	Menkaure	63	1668-1605

Parallel with Mycerinus were the following:
 

5 Ratoises	---	25	1668-1643
6 Bicheris	---	22	1643-1621
7 Sebecheres	---	7	1621-1614
8 Thampthis	---	9	1614-1605

Herodotus tells us that according to Egyptian tradition there were 150 years between the beginning of the dynasty and the end of the life of Mycerinug, 1755-1605. Manetho's account appears senseless to historians because they have assumed there were no other kings than those whose records they have found through archaeology. It is often the men who were least important in their own age whose tombs or monuments have been recovered, while the individuals who loomed large at the time have vanished completely.
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