Erik Langkjer

The motif of pilgrimage in the Bible. The journey through the world in the course of the sun. The goal of the journey, the mountain, the firm ground. Solar motifs and travel-motifs in the Acts of Thomas. Sunrise and Paradise in the early church.

Added: Jesus as the foundation-stone. The foundation mountain in the Letter of Barnabas and The Shepherd of Hermas. Foundation in The Odes of Solomon. The world pillar with the snake and the bowl of immortality. The Paradise-mountain. The firm rock in Ginza and the Qumran Hodayot. “The standing one”, al-qâ´im

Primordial twins as two central stone pillars at Göbekli Tepe and the bull-hunt at Catal Hüyük Interpretation and the traces they have left in Near Eastern history of religion. Genesis 4 and the history of religion. Baal, Melqart, El Kronos and St. Thomas as sun heroes.

Prehistoric Susa and Elam? The idea of a cosmic omphalos, a Paradise-mountain, seems to be very old. It is behind the Ziggurats of Mesopotamia. But already very early seals show a mountain with a tree at its top and rams or goats feeding on the tree. The archaic notion of the bull god converges with the archaic notion of the Garden of Eden with the “Tree of Life” and the “Well of Life”. These are two different ways of visualizing the Life-giving force.

The expression “Kingdom of God” has its origin in the temple-theology and its liturgical language and this is still felt at the time of Jesus. The Kingdom of Heaven was mirrored earthly in the rites of Tabernacles. This temple- and omphalos ideology has some relevance also for the use of the phrase Kingdom of God in the gospels. What takes place in medio mundi (the temple, Jerusalem) has consequences for the whole cosmos.

The article then describes a Near Eastern pattern of great antiquity: A primordial god ruling as king over the world-centre (Greek: omphalos, Hebrew: ´even shetiyyah, Syrian: Mt. Zaphon or Mt. Lel) representing mystic union of opposites and life-giving water is killed by a demonic god, but is reborn in his son, the sun hero.

It is reasonable to assume that Simon was the great founder of the Gnostic movement. He was a charismatic magician, a tantric mystic, a Christian syncretist, a believer in reincarnation, but first and foremost a believer in himself as a yogi being able to resist death and decay.

Brass - plaques dedicated to Jupiter Dolichenus with two genii. Bull, calves and two pillars on the eastern walls at Catal Hüyük. The two stêlai of Sê`ír. The great cutting instrument (golden saw or sichel-sword). Tierkapelle/marzeah – presence of demons from the underworld (lion & lion god). 
God, the Highest, killed by Baal and men changed into animals.
The vision of Yhwh's "glory" in the sunrise, the epiphany of divine justice in the rising sun.

On the second evening of the Feast of Tabernacles the leading men of Israel would gather in the Forecourt of the Women to a dance with torches. It would last the whole night and at dawn the rising of the sun would be greeted with blasts of trumpets from two white clad priests (i.e., clad as angels) standing on the 15 steps to the next Forecourt, and the whole crowd would follow the two priest out through the eastern gate to greet the rising sun. Acc. To Philo of Alexandria, De cont. vit., a similar ritual was performed by the Therapeutai at Pentecost. This is the old solar theophany hinted at in the Psalms of David.

Ginza, Lidz. pp. 19f.: A triple baptism in running water from the heavenly Jordan-river, cf. Early Christian baptismal ritual: A triple baptism, mostly, but not always in running water, Didakê, ch. 7 For remission of sins - For remission of sins. Signatio with water w. the "sign of Life" The name of the "King of Life" mentioned over the baptismal candidate, cf. In the name of the Father, Son & Holy Spirit. The candidate erected to firm standing -Erected to standing.  The candidate is dressed in a white garment (symbol of the heavenly garment). In baptism and in the masiqta-ceremony for the deceased man is united to the heavenly Adam as his heavenly body/garment, cf. Alba baptismalis, symbol of the heavenly garment. In baptism man is united to Christ as the heavenly Adam, God's icon. Impositio manus - Impositio manus. Coronatio (crown, wreath-klila), cf. Odes of Solomon 1,1: "The Lord is on my head like a crown (klîlâ). Kushta (ritual handclaps) - Holy kiss.

In discussing the origin of Gnosticism one has to take note of the fact that Gnosticism with a libertine practice (Simon Magus, Cainites, Carpocratians, Nicolaitans) is older than Gnosticism with an ascetical practice. The belief in a divine but fallen female principle (Simon, Valentinus) is older that the belief in a fallen primordial man. Now Gnosticism obviously has some similarity with the kind of mysticism cultivated in Hindu religion. We all know that the classical goal of Hinduism is to attain mystic vision by cutting off the flow of information and impressions from the senses. But there is also another method less known by Western students of religion: the Tantric, " left hand " path, where one hopes to attain ecstasy by breaking social taboos, drinking wine, eating flesh and (most important!) engaging in taboo-breaking sexual activities

In the Ugarit texts the old West Semitic High-god is called " ´El, the Bull ". He is " God " par excellence, for " gods " in plural aréelim. He is living inside the mountain of the " night " , Lel, the nightly vault seen as a black mountain dotted with firestones situated by the double offspring of water-streams. He can be compared with the Akkadian god, Ea (Sumerian Enki), who has his temple called " House of abzu " in Eridu surrounded by Euphratian marshlands near the ancient coastline. Abzu is the underground freshwater-basin, and Ea is often pictured with two streams of water running from his shoulders; and his symbol is the goat and the fish, and his priests are dressed in skin of carp. Enki is the great provider of life-giving water as seen in the great poem, Enki and Ninhursag. He lives on the paradise island of Dilmun, called a garden where there is not sickness nor old age or death. This island must be identified with modern Bahrein, a name that in Arabic means " two seas " , i.e. the place where the fresh waters coming from the underground meet with the salt water from the Persian Golf. Ea can be compared with the Luwian god Ia. We have a pair of very old Anatolian gods, Tarku and Ja witnessed by the names given to old ritual singing, triambe and jambe and the names given the priest serving at a temple1 close to the Corycian cave in Cilicia. Jao is also the name given to the Cilician monster, Typhon, overcome by Zeus. Typhon is the personification of the Paradise mountain, Tsaphon, and he is half snake, half man, and tries to get more strength by eating a certain fruit, but it has the opposite effect (cf. Gen 3). Ea in Eridu is not only the provider of life-giving water, but also has a holy kishkanu-tree standing in his temple. God of the Bible,´El/Jah, is simply the old prehistoric high god of the Middle East, the Lord of Paradise with the fourfold river bringing the life-giving water to the world, cf. rivers of fire surrounding the Ancient of Days, Dan 7, and God enthroned by the sea of crystal, and the river of life coming out from beneath his throne in Rev 22,1f. This belief in a life-giving god, in prehistoric time (Catal Höyük) seen riding the bull, or as a bull suffering, killed and surrounded by water, but in the Bible called the good shepherd and the lamb slaughtered, is reaching us through endless ages of human struggle for life. In Greece he was called upon with the call eleleu ju ju (Semitic halleluja), in Rome Jo-Saturnalia. But most often he was forgotten and only survived in the faint memory of a Garden of the Hesperides where the apples of eternal life were guarded by an always vigilant snake or the fair Adonis who was killed on the holy Cedar mountains of Lebanon, in his death giving his blood to the Adonis-river coming out of the mountain side, and every year, at the beginning of the hot season, turning red. At the painted walls in Catal Höyük the bull killed by the hunters seems to be reborn as the young calf. This rebirth is not typical for Adonis. And his Egyptian parallel, Osiris, becomes lord of the Underworld, but is actually reborn in his son Horus. He is not only the giver of the Water of Life, his power can be identified with the vine or the almond trees being the first to blossom in early spring (the Menorah). On the carved slabs from Nineveh we see the Tree of Life nursed by cherub-winged griffons (Gen 3,24), but they can also be seen nursing the king, the king can be identified with the Tree of Life, cf. Jesus calling himself the " True vine ". The blood of Adonis was foaming and giving color to the roses, just as the sperm of Uranos was foaming on the sea and out of it came Aphrodite. Out of the blood of Hyakinthos (with the Hya-/Ia-and suffixes –k-and –nthos) sprouted the hyacinth, and out of the blood of Attis the 1 Strabo XIV 5,10: The priestly potentates of nearby Olba bore the name of either Teucer or Ajax.