1. The Rivers of Eden:The first mention of rivers in the Bible is found in the account of the Garden of Eden. Genesis 2:10-14 describes a river flowing out of Eden to water the garden, which then divides into four headstreams: Pishon, Gihon, Tigris, and Euphrates. · Pishon: This ...
The northern kingdom falls to Assyria in 722 BC, and the southern kingdom is exiled to Babylon in 586 BC. The prophets, such as Isaiah and Jeremiah, call the Israelites to repentance and foretell a future restoration. The return from exile is chronicled in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah,...
Though I later found myself spellbound by The Green Pastures, I had a hard time understanding what it was talking about when first viewing it. It is a dense movie for people who are not familiar with the Bible stories; its grammar and dialect make it even more difficult to understand- pe...
Ezekiel 42 This is a very difficult section to interpret because the description of these structures is obscure in the Hebrew text. Ezekiel 42:1-2 1 Then he brought me forth into the outter court, the way toward the north: and he brought me into the chamber that was over against the se...
A ziggurat excavated at Babylon illustrates the form of the biblical Tower of Babel. The prototype of the biblical story of the Deluge has turned up in the Gilgamesh epic. A fragment (dating from about 1400 bc) of that Babylonian epic has been found at Megiddo in Israel, showing that the...
Whore of Babylon, in Christianity, a portentous figure described in the apocalyptic Revelation to John. She is seen as analogous to the pagan nations and governments considered in direct opposition to the Christian faith, particularly the imperial city o
Marduk, in Mesopotamian religion, the chief god of the city of Babylon and the national god of Babylonia; as such, he was eventually called simply Bel, or Lord. Originally, he seems to have been a god of thunderstorms. A poem, known as Enuma elish and da
Evidence of Old Akkadian is found in the Sumerian literary tradition. By the early 2nd millennium bce, Akkadian dialects in Babylonia and Assyria had acquired the cuneiform writing system used by the Sumerians, causing Akkadian to become the chief language of Mesopotamia. The discovery of the ...
In the ancient civilizations ofAssyria,Babylonia,Persia, andEgypt, the selection, preparation, service, and enjoyment of food were practiced on anelaboratescale. In theBook of DanieltheBiblerelates the story of howBelshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, “made a great feast to a thousand of hi...
“Babylon,” John recounts a series of visions that foretell acrescendoof persecutions and martyrdoms followed by universal judgment,retributionfor the forces of evil, and rewards for the faithful. Details are often impenetrable because of esoteric allusive language (e.g., “a woman clothed with...