Similarities with the Five Books of Moses and Other Ancient Beliefs

By Dr. Robert H. Schram

The Five Books of Moses (Torah) contain 613 commandments. Since there are only three Commandments (Mitzvot) in the Book of Genesis only the practice of circumcision is compared with other ancient civilizations. The other four Books of Moses have been divided numerically into 34 categories in Moses Maimonides' (Rambam) Mishnah Torah with each one followed by their total number of Torah Mitzvot. Rambam's categories have been listed in ascending order from those with the least number of Commandments to those with the greatest number of commandments. The Commandments are listed in each book by line and verse followed by similar practices in other ancient Middle Eastern civilizations: Egyptian, Greek, Sumerian, Akkadian, Hittite, Amorites, Ammonites, Moabites, Mesopotamia and the city-state of Babylon. Babylonia founded 4,000 years ago as a small port town on the Euphrates River was a state in ancient Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia is a region of southwest Asia in the Tigris and Euphrates river system that hosted the beginnings of human civilization. It is part of the Fertile Crescent, an area also known as "Cradle of Civilization" for the number of innovations that arose from the early societies in the area. It was in what is today large portions of Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and Kuwait from the Mediterranean Sea in the north and the Persian Gulf in the south.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781984584922

Dr. Robert H. Schram

The author Dr. ROBERT H. SCHRAM is a fellow in the American Association for Intellectual Disabilities and Autism for his meritorious service supporting children and adults with Intellectual Disabilities and Autism over forty-two years in Bucks County Pennsylvania. He has degrees in Political Science and Personnel/Counseling with a Doctorate in Public Administration and is Executive Director Emeritus of BARC Developmental Services (1977-2020). His prior published books include the following: Maximize Life by Living for Peace, Harmony, and Joy Oh My God it is all the Same! Zohar - The Book of Radiance Revealed Life is but a Dream! Musings of an Inveterate Traveler Musings of an Inveterate Traveler II Musings of an Inveterate Traveler III Illusafact the Inevitable Advance of our Technologies & Us Musings of an Inveterate Traveler IV Company Management…Policies, Procedures, Practices Mixed Marriage . . .Interreligious, Interracial, Interethnic Worldwide Human Corruption

Book preview

Copyright © 2020 by Dr. Robert H. Schram.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 07/15/2020

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

798133

CONTENTS

I. Introduction

II. The Book of Genesis

III. The Book of Exodus

IV. The Book of Leviticus

V. The Book of Numbers

VI. The Book of Deuteronomy

VII. Summary

VIII. References

Chapter One

Introduction

Through my weekly Torah study over many years with my Jewish brethren and others utilizing The Torah A Modern Commentary (Edited by W. Gunther Plaut Union of American Hebrew Congregations New York 1981) I was inspired to write this book based on Plaut’s commentaries and gleanings throughout the Five Books of Moses. Plaut’s General Introduction to the Torah xxii thru xxiv concluded the following:

The Torah is written in different literary styles with discrepancies in certain accounts and figures. The Documentary Hypothesis says there are four major sources of the book (J, E, P, and D). The combination of these four sources resulted in the creation of a single book, the Torah and was considered a sacred text canonized about 400 BCE. J is the author who used the divine name YHWH and probably lived in the Southern Kingdom sometime after the death of King Solomon (931 BCE); he was responsible for most of Genesis. E uses the divine name Elohim and authored the binding of Isaac (Gen 22) and other Genesis passages as well as much of Exodus and Numbers; he most likely was a northern contemporary of J. D is the author of Deuteronomy claimed to be the book discovered by King Josiah in 621 BCE. P is the author of the first chapter of Genesis, the book of Leviticus and other sections interested in genealogies and priesthood. P is considered the latest part of the Torah composed during or after the Babylonian exile (597-516 BCE). Some theorized that P was the framework into which J/E and D were fitted in the fifth century BCE while others theorize it was the earliest not the latest book to be incorporated. There appeared translations over the centuries in Aramaic (Targum), Greek (Septuagint), Latin (Vulgate), Syriac (Peshitta), and today in just about every written language.

In addition to Plaut’s commentaries he also provides gleanings from world literature having a bearing on the text. In the Five Books of Moses (Torah) the gleanings are generally divided into legal (halachic) and non-legal (Haggadic) excerpts. Since there are only three Commandments (Mitzvot) in the Book of Genesis (out of a total of 613) only the practice of circumcision is compared with other ancient civilizations. The other four Books of Moses have been divided numerically into 34 categories in Moses Maimonides’ (Rambam) Mishnah Torah with each one followed by their total number of Torah Mitzvot. Rambam’s categories have been listed in ascending order from those with the least number of Commandments to those with the greatest number of commandments. The Commandments are listed in each book by line and verse followed by similar practices in other ancient Middle Eastern civilizations: Egyptian, Greek, Sumerian, Akkadian, Hittite, Amorites, Ammonites, Moabites, Mesopotamia and the city-state of Babylon. Babylonia founded 4,000 years ago as a small port town on the Euphrates River was a state in ancient Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia is a region of southwest Asia in the Tigris and Euphrates river system that hosted the beginnings of human civilization. It is part of the Fertile Crescent, an area also known as Cradle of Civilization for the number of innovations that arose from the early societies in the area. It was in what is today large portions of Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and Kuwait from the Mediterranean Sea in the north and the Persian Gulf in the south.

Mesopotamian religion was polytheistic, with followers worshipping several main gods and thousands of minor gods. The three main gods were Ea (Sumerian: Enki), the god of wisdom and magic, Anu (Sumerian: An), the sky god, and Enlil (Ellil), the god of earth, storms and agriculture and the controller of fates. Ea is the creator and protector of humanity in both the Epic of Gilgamesh and the story of the Great Flood. The foundational Mesopotamian religious stories were about the Garden of Eden, the Great Flood, and the Creation of the Tower of Babel. Humans first settled in Mesopotamia in the Paleolithic era. By 14,000 BCE, people in the region lived in small settlements with circular houses.

By 3000 BCE, Mesopotamia was firmly under the control of the Sumerian people. Sumer contained several decentralized city-states—Eridu, Nippur, Lagash, Uruk, Kish, and Ur. Gilgamesh, son of Lugalbanda is believed to been born in Uruk c 2700 BCE and is the legendary subject of the Epic of Gilgamesh.

The Epic of Gilgamesh (c 2700 BCE) is the earliest great work of literature and the inspiration for some of the stories in the Bible. In the epic poem, Gilgamesh adventures to the Cedar Forest, the land of the gods in Mesopotamian mythology. When his friend is slain, Gilgamesh goes on a quest to discover the secret of eternal life, finding: Life, which you look for, you will never find. For when the gods created man, they let death be his share, and life withheld in their own hands.

The Akkadian Empire existed from 2234-2154 BCE under the leadership of the now-titled Sargon the Great. It was considered the world’s first multicultural empire with a central government. Legends give Sargon a similar origin to the Torah story of Moses. His mother conceived him in secret and set him in a basket of rushes sealed with tar and cast him into the river which carried him to Akki, the drawer of water who took him as his son and reared him. Akki was a gardener for Ur-Zababa, the king of the Sumerian city of Kish.

In 2100 BCE the city of Ur attempted to establish a dynasty for a new empire. The ruler Ur-Nammu, the king of the city of Ur, brought Sumerians back into control. Under King Ur-Nammu, the first code of law in recorded history, The Code of Ur-Nammu, appeared, and he was attacked by both the Elamites and the Amorites and defeated in 2004 BCE. The Amorites made Babylon their capital and took control and established Babylonia. Kings were considered deities and the most famous of these was Hammurabi, who ruled from 1792–1750 BCE. King Hammurabi worked to expand the empire, and the Babylonians were almost continually at war. The Code of Hammurabi was written c 1772 BCE.

Hammurabi’s innovation was not just writing down the laws for everyone to see and know but making sure that everyone throughout the empire followed the same legal codes, and that governors in different areas did not enact their own. In 1750 BCE the Elamites conquered the city of Ur. Together with the control of the Amorites, the conquest marked the end of Sumerian culture.

The Hittites were centered around Anatolia and Syria and conquered the Babylonians c 1595 BCE. The Hittites pulled out shortly after sacking Babylon, and the Kassites took control of the city. Hailing from the mountains east of Mesopotamia, their period of rule saw immigrants from India and Europe arriving, and travel sped up thanks to the use of horses with chariots and carts. The Kassites abandoned their own culture after a couple of generations of dominance, allowing themselves to be absorbed into Babylonian civilization.

The Assyrian Empire under the leadership of Ashur-uballit I rose c 1365 BCE in the areas between the lands controlled by the Hittites and the Kassites. In c 1220 BCE King Tukulti-Ninurta I aspired to rule all of Mesopotamia and seized Babylon. The Assyrian Empire continued to expand over the next two centuries, moving into modern-day Palestine and Syria. A new dynasty began in c 722 BCE when Sargon II seized power. Modeling himself on Sargon the Great, he divided the empire into provinces and kept the peace.¹

The Hebrew Promised Land (also known biblically as The Land of Milk and Honey is the land which, according to the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) was promised and subsequently given by God to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and their descendants (Genesis 15:18-21; 26:3; 28:13). The Promised Land’s territory was described as from the River of Egypt to the Euphrates River (Exodus 23:31). A smaller area of former Canaanite land and land east of the Jordan River was conquered and occupied by the Israelites, after Moses led the Exodus out of Egypt (Numbers 34:1-12); the occupation was interpreted as God’s fulfilment of the promise (Deuteronomy 1:8).

The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.

The LORD appeared to Abram and said, ‘To your offspring [or seed] I will give this land.’ (Genesis 12:1 and 7)

The boundary of the Promised Land is clarified in Genesis 15:18-21 as the territory of various ancient peoples:

To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates - the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaite, Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.

The promise is fulfilled at the end of the Exodus from Egypt:

See, I have given you this land. Go in and take possession of the land that the LORD swore he would give to your fathers—to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—and to their descendants after them. (Deuteronomy 1:8)²

There were many occupiers of the Promised Land from 1300 to 1 BCE. Canaan was the name of a large, prosperous ancient country (at times independent, at other times a tributary to Egypt) located in the region of present-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Israel. It was also known as Phoenicia. The origin of the name `Canaan’ was named after a man called Canaan, the grandson of Noah according to Genesis 10. Between c 1400-1300 BCE Moses led the Hebrews out of Egypt and went up on Mount Sinai. The name Canaan also appears in various ancient texts from Egypt to Mesopotamia.

The books of Joshua and Numbers attribute the destruction of Canaan to the Hebrew general Joshua who populated the area and the kingdoms of Israel and Judah were eventually established; they lasted until the region was conquered in succession by the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks (Alexander the Great), the Seleucids, and the Roman Empire in 63 BCE. For a brief period, the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucids in 140 BCE established the Hebrew Hasmonean Dynasty that lasted until the Roman occupation.

The Canaanites’ chief god was El among many other gods including the goddess Ashera (associated with Astarte) and her consort Baal; they also worshipped the Sumerian god Utu-Shamash. A minor god Yahweh may have been the Canaanite god of metallurgy. Religious rites included human sacrifice (especially children) since they believed that since the gods gave the best to people, the people should reciprocate by offering their best to the gods. The Hebrews only sacrificed their best animals without blemish and produce. Women could serve as Priestesses, own land, enter contracts and initiate divorce as mirrored in the cultural values of Mesopotamia. Fertility cults were numerous, and bread and grain offerings were made to Ashera and her various regional avatars for increased fertility and healthy children. The Hebrew Priests were all male descended from Aaron and women did not own land or enter contracts. Only Hebrew men could initiate divorce and there were no fertility cults in Israel. Tyre was a great Canaanite industrial center producing highly sought-after garments colored by the purple dye of Murex shells. The Hebrews used the blue dye of tekhelet for their prayer shawls (tallit) The tallit would have two kinds of threads attached to the corners, white wool and blue wool. This blue wool, known as tekhelet was commanded in Numbers 15:38

Speak to the children of Israel and you shall say to them that they shall make for themselves fringes (tzitzit) on the corners of their garments, throughout their generations, and that they shall affix a thread of tekhelet on the fringe of each corner.

The blue dye was made from a byproduct of a sea creature known as the chilazon, in the Mediterranean Sea. In the 21st century CE the marine snail Murex trunculus has been identified as possibly being the elusive chilazon, and many use its dye.

The Canaanite-Phoenicians developed the first alphabetic writing system, further developed mathematical principles from Mesopotamia, were renowned in the ancient world for their skill in shipbuilding and navigating the seas, and have also been cited as the early source or inspiration for the mythology of the Greek gods. Having preserved the use of the script in the Dark Age after 1200 BCE, the Phoenicians inspired all the alphabetic writing systems of their neighbors. In the Near East, the Hebrew and Aramaic scripts derived from the Phoenician. The Phoenician alphabet was adopted by the Greeks.

The various aspects of the great upheaval in the region are consistent with a military invasion. In the Book of Genesis Abraham brings his tribe to the Promised Land from the region of Ur in Mesopotamia and, through his son Isaac and grandson Jacob (also known as Israel), established his people and a culture distinct from the Canaanites. Jacob’s youngest son Joseph, after being given to a nomadic tribe by his brothers was imprisoned in Egypt. By rightly interpreting the pharaoh’s dreams he came to hold a position of power. He saved Egypt and the regions from famine through the storage of grain during the years when there was plenty. Jacob and his tribe came to Egypt for food and stayed in Egypt for the next 400 years.³, ⁴

The area of the modern Middle East is approximately the area of the ancient Near East and includes a number of civilizations: Mesopotamia; ancient Egypt; ancient Iran; Anatolia/Asia Minor; Armenian Highlands; the Levant. The ancient Near East begins with the rise of Sumer in the 4th millennium BCE; the term covers the Bronze Age and the Iron Age in the region, until it was either conquered by the Achaemenid Empire in the 6th century BCE, or by the Macedonian Empire in the 4th century BCE. The ancient Near East is considered one of the cradles of civilization with many parallels in the Hebrew bible: year-round agriculture was first practiced; the rise of the first dense urban settlements; many familiar institutions of civilization (social stratification, centralized government and empires, organized religion and organized warfare); the creation of the first writing system; the first alphabet; the first currency; law codes; the foundations of astronomy, mathematics, and the invention of the wheel.

As states grew the region became controlled by militaristic empires that had conquered several different cultures. The Uruk period was named after the Sumerian city of Uruk (c 4000 to 3100 BCE) and followed the Ubaid Period in the early history of Mesopotamia. This period saw the emergence of urban life in Mesopotamia and was followed by the Sumerian civilization.

Sumeria was located in southern Mesopotamia and lasted through the Ubaid, Uruk, and the Dynastic periods (3rd millennium BCE) until the rise of Assyria and Babylon in the late 3rd millennium BCE and early 2nd millennium BCE respectively. The Akkadian Empire, founded by Sargon the Great, lasted from the 24th to the 21st century BCE. The Akkadians eventually fragmented into Assyria and Babylonia. The Amorites were a nomadic Semitic people who occupied the country west of the Euphrates from the second half of the 3rd millennium BCE. They ultimately settled in Mesopotamia, ruling Isin, Larsa, and later Babylon. Assyria from 1365 BCE to the death of Tiglath-Pileser I in 1076 BCE rivaled Egypt and dominated much of the near east. Babylonia was founded as a state by Amorite tribes and was under the rule of Kassites for 435 years. The nation stagnated during the Kassite period, and often found itself under Assyrian or Elamite domination.

The Hittite Empire was founded at a time after 2000 BCE and existed as a major power, dominating Asia Minor and the Levant until 1200 BCE, when it was first overrun by the Phrygians, and then appropriated by Assyria. The Hurrians lived in northern Mesopotamia and areas to the immediate east and west, beginning c 2500 BCE and played a substantial part in the history of the Hittites. The Hittite king Hattusili I (c 1600 BCE) is reported to have marched his army across the Euphrates River and destroyed the cities there. This corresponds well with burnt destruction layers discovered by archaeologists at town sites in Ishuwa of roughly the same date.⁵

Chapter Two

The Book of Genesis

Circumcision (Milah) was practiced by the ancient Egyptians. Many scholars believe the practice goes back before the Egyptians with the people of southern Arabia and parts of Africa. Over the millennia, circumcision has been most often used as a religious rite, a rite of passage into manhood, but also as a form of punishment in wartime. The complete removal of the foreskin or prepuce is what is practiced in Judaism. In ancient Egypt and other cultures in Africa, only part of the foreskin was removed. In ancient Israel, circumcision was taken as a sign of membership in the covenant community established between God and Abraham. It was usually performed on infants, eight days after birth, like among modern Jews. In Egypt, it was typically done on adolescent men who were about to be initiated into the priesthood or as adult males of the noble class. Other African cultures also practiced circumcision usually as a rite of passage into manhood.⁶,⁷,⁸,⁹

The existence of angels was part of Egyptian culture. The goddess Isis (the daughter of Geb and Nut-Sister and Wife of Osiris and Mother of Horus) was one of the most widely worshipped goddesses within and external to Egypt symbolizing motherhood, nurturance, sovereignty, and stability. Some traditions consider her a Seraph and when she manifests as an angel form it is with feathered wings that are spread to enfold her worshippers. The distinction between gods and angels was a thin one in Egypt and other polytheistic religions.¹⁰

In Genesis 39:1–20, Joseph was bought as a slave by Potiphar, an officer of the Pharaoh. His wife Zuleika tried to seduce Joseph. As Joseph repelled her attempt to lure him into her bed, she grabbed him by his coat and Joseph fled leaving his garment with Zuleika who used it to falsely accuse Joseph of assaulting her and he was sent to prison. A parallel story is the Egyptian Tale of Two Brothers Aunbis the elder and Bata the younger from the reign of Seti II (ruled from 1200 to 1194 BCE). Anubis was married and Bata was associated with him in the manner of a son making his clothes while he plowed and reaped the fields. Bata was considered a perfect man since there was none like him in the entire land; he brought the produce of the field to Aunbis and his wife every evening sharing a meal with them before sleeping in the stable with his cattle. One day Bata was sent to fetch more seed and met up with Aunbis’ wife plaiting her hair and she told him to fetch the seed for yourself and don’t make me leave my hairdressing unfinished. When the wife saw him carrying five bags of seed from the stable, she told him of his great virility and invited him to be