Freethought & Rationalism Archive

shivalinga · 08-29-2003, 04:01 PM

http://www.ece.lsu.edu/kak/akhena.pdf

Peter Kirby · 08-29-2003, 04:32 PM

What do you think about the linked article? It is customary to include a paragraph or more of your own to kick off discussion.

best,
Peter Kirby

shivalinga · 08-30-2003, 10:31 AM

okely doekely,

what i find interesting about the piece is that
the constant day in day out T.V. documentaries
on ancient egypt never mention stuff like this,
the amount of stuff shown on T.V. about egypt
overwhelms all other types of discussions into
the ancient world, for instance have you ever in your
life seen a documentary on ancient india ?

there is a bias in the biz, clearly they have an agenda,
they ignore anything about india and constantly
repeat over and over second rate historically incomplete
data about ancient egypt, they never mention the
aryan(indo-european) influence that was predominant
at the time ,for instance the land of Canaan, the home
of the ancient phoenicans was an aryan culture, even in the
bible the names are given of the various kings that the followers of Abraham killed, they were all Sanskrit names,
but you never hear any of this in the documentaries
shown every day about egypt or the ancient world
in that area.

why ?

these shows are being funded by people with an agenda
that wants to promote a certain worldview of the ancient
world that excludes the aryan(Indian) influence,
why is that ?

Toto · 08-30-2003, 11:36 AM

This article appears to be the work of one professor of electrical engineering. New ideas such as this take some time to gain attention, and survive challenges from other scholars in the field. His work is based on some speculation:

Quote:

The Sun King Akhenaten of Egypt (ruled 1352-1336 BC according to the mainstream view) was a son-in-law of Tushratta, the Mitanni king of North Syria, through queen Kiya. 2 (The name Tushratta is spelled Tui�srata in the Hittite cuneiform script, which does not distinguish between \d" and \t" very well. Some have suggested that the Sanskrit original is Dasaratha, a few others that it is Tvesaratha (having splendid chariots), a name which is attested in the Rgveda. Letters exchanged between Akhenaten and Tushratta have been found in Amarna in Egypt 3 and other evidence comes from the tombs of the period, which have been discovered in excellent condition.

Quote:

But how could an Indic kingdom be so far from India, near Egypt? A plausible scenario is that after catastrophic earthquakes dried up the Sarasvati river around 1900 BC, many groups of Indic people started moving West. 5 This idea of westward movement of Indic people is preserved in the Vedic and Puranic texts. 6

It is hard for a non-specialist to evaluate this, but I don't see any sinister motive for TV producers to ignore it.

Toto · 08-30-2003, 11:50 AM

Or perhaps this should be read in conjunction with this other thread that you posted in the Non-Abrahamic forum:

Vedic origins of pre-Islamic Arabia

It appears that Hindu nationalists are trying to claim "Vedic" origins for everything. Do you have another link where Vedic sailors discovered America?

Edited to add: I was being sarcastic, but I see you have another thread claiming that Celts are really Vedic.

shivalinga · 08-30-2003, 12:02 PM

funny how actual scholarship is derided as "indian nationalism",
and incomplete scholarship- the rest of the stuff seen in the
mass media- is lauded and accepted as accurate and un biased.

this shows the truth of the bias i speak of, whenever the facts are laid out, those wwith an agenda will try and silence it,claiming bias and non scholarship, and belittling things they admit to not
being expert at.

the only loser is truth, do the people who put forth a euro centric
or biblical
view of history have their motivation called into question ?

even though it can be proven that they are in fact biased, as you are, and openly so ?

Dilandau · 08-30-2003, 03:28 PM

According to LexiLine and Andis Kaulins the King Akhenaten WAS the biblical King Saul.

http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi760.htm

However to my Friend ANdreas' discoverings, the Torah is a star myth of 16 years and so, equipped with real names and places. Maybe the rest of the bible is also that. So "Saul" has existed that much as if i would create a new language, e.g. "Hebrew 2" and write a astronomy stuffed myth about my self in it. Then teach it to people as the truth about me.

GakuseiDon · 08-30-2003, 04:14 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Toto
Or perhaps this should be read in conjunction with this other thread that you posted in the Non-Abrahamic forum:

Vedic origins of pre-Islamic Arabia

It appears that Hindu nationalists are trying to claim "Vedic" origins for everything. Do you have another link where Vedic sailors discovered America?

Edited to add: I was being sarcastic, but I see you have another thread claiming that Celts are really Vedic.

Oh ye of little faith! Of course the Hindus discovered America! http://www.viewzone.com/atlantis2.html

Quote:

In his book, Hindu America, India-Indian author Chaman Lal states: "At present we are studying the native tongues and find that at least as far as Nahuatl, Zapoteca, and Maya languages are concerned, they are of Indo-European (Sanskrit) origin."

(This is from a link that shivalinga provides in another thread).

As an Australian, I'm a bit put out that ancient Hindus never made it to Australia (even though the Romans did apparently)... can you help, shivalinga?

DrJim · 08-31-2003, 08:06 AM

shivalinga wrote:
"funny how actual scholarship is derided as "indian nationalism",
and incomplete scholarship- the rest of the stuff seen in the
mass media- is lauded and accepted as accurate and un biased."

This is bizzare assertion to make regarding Kak's article. I will not comment on the Indian material, since I do not know it well enough, but on the few references to the biblical material, my claim is fully justified.

Kak associates the rise of the Hebrew monotheism and Moses's mission to the sun-worship of Akenaton, and employs at least some of Freud's ideas on the subject. What kind of "actual scholarship" uses the 60-70 year old opinions of a psychiatrist in matters of ancient history when there is so many modern works on this period written by experts in the field? At least this part of his paper is not at the academic level expected from first-year university students. It is NOT scholarship but rather the uncritical acceptance of ideas from Freud who is way out of his area of expertise (if he was not just creating a grand metaphor for something else). I suspect Kak appealed to him in this case since his name is so well known in the mass media and it saved him from doing any real work.

To my mind, a lot of the parallels between Ps. 104 and the hymn to the Aten are rather over-blown. Moreover, there is no largely evidence of Moses, the Exodus or Conquest, let along an Israelite monotheism dedicated to YHWH in the second millenium bce (although that hasn't stopped the mass-production of arguments for them). As I understand it, Akhenaton's religion was wiped out by the reassertion of the old order after his death. What happened in Israel was in all probably a totally unrelated phenomenon.

Kak also seems to link many Psalms to Ugarit (N. Syrian coast, destroyed ca. 1200 bce) and Phoenician sources. This too is probably overstated. Comparative evidence suggests that very many literary motifs and forms have a tremendously long shelf life accross different cultures, and Yahweh does share a nubmer of attributes of El and Baal. But one is not justified to claim that the Israelites merely "adopted" foreign religious literature for their own.
There is something of an attempt to disposses the Israelites of their own culture in Kak's paper, and one might accuse him of dispossessing the Egyptians, too! Of course, he is trying to find the original "source" and there is also a sense in his writing that the "original" has more value. I thnk the label "Indian nationalism" may sum up his agenda rather well.

JR Linville

shivalinga · 08-31-2003, 01:57 PM

i don't know about down under
but how about polynesia ?
http://www.rongorongo.org/theories/indus/bill092.html

as far as the stuff about moses and so on,

Is Kak's research incorrect in any specific
way that you can show,
there are a lot of scholars with this subject,
see my other links on noah and abraham
and the phoenicans,
or google it.

08-29-2003, 04:01 PM	#1
shivalinga Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: california Posts: 517	Akhenaten plagarized in bible ? http://www.ece.lsu.edu/kak/akhena.pdf

08-31-2003, 01:57 PM	#10
shivalinga Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: california Posts: 517	here mate i don't know about down under but how about polynesia ? http://www.rongorongo.org/theories/indus/bill092.html as far as the stuff about moses and so on, Is Kak's research incorrect in any specific way that you can show, there are a lot of scholars with this subject, see my other links on noah and abraham and the phoenicans, or google it.

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08-29-2003, 04:32 PM	#2
Peter Kirby Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: the reliquary of Ockham's razor Posts: 4,035	What do you think about the linked article? It is customary to include a paragraph or more of your own to kick off discussion. best, Peter Kirby

08-30-2003, 10:31 AM	#3
shivalinga Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: california Posts: 517	okely doekely, what i find interesting about the piece is that the constant day in day out T.V. documentaries on ancient egypt never mention stuff like this, the amount of stuff shown on T.V. about egypt overwhelms all other types of discussions into the ancient world, for instance have you ever in your life seen a documentary on ancient india ? there is a bias in the biz, clearly they have an agenda, they ignore anything about india and constantly repeat over and over second rate historically incomplete data about ancient egypt, they never mention the aryan(indo-european) influence that was predominant at the time ,for instance the land of Canaan, the home of the ancient phoenicans was an aryan culture, even in the bible the names are given of the various kings that the followers of Abraham killed, they were all Sanskrit names, but you never hear any of this in the documentaries shown every day about egypt or the ancient world in that area. why ? these shows are being funded by people with an agenda that wants to promote a certain worldview of the ancient world that excludes the aryan(Indian) influence, why is that ?

08-30-2003, 11:50 AM	#5
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	Or perhaps this should be read in conjunction with this other thread that you posted in the Non-Abrahamic forum: Vedic origins of pre-Islamic Arabia It appears that Hindu nationalists are trying to claim "Vedic" origins for everything. Do you have another link where Vedic sailors discovered America? Edited to add: I was being sarcastic, but I see you have another thread claiming that Celts are really Vedic.

08-30-2003, 12:02 PM	#6
shivalinga Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: california Posts: 517	funny how actual scholarship is derided as "indian nationalism", and incomplete scholarship- the rest of the stuff seen in the mass media- is lauded and accepted as accurate and un biased. this shows the truth of the bias i speak of, whenever the facts are laid out, those wwith an agenda will try and silence it,claiming bias and non scholarship, and belittling things they admit to not being expert at. the only loser is truth, do the people who put forth a euro centric or biblical view of history have their motivation called into question ? even though it can be proven that they are in fact biased, as you are, and openly so ?

08-30-2003, 03:28 PM	#7
Dilandau Regular Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Munich Posts: 151	According to LexiLine and Andis Kaulins the King Akhenaten WAS the biblical King Saul. http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi760.htm However to my Friend ANdreas' discoverings, the Torah is a star myth of 16 years and so, equipped with real names and places. Maybe the rest of the bible is also that. So "Saul" has existed that much as if i would create a new language, e.g. "Hebrew 2" and write a astronomy stuffed myth about my self in it. Then teach it to people as the truth about me.

08-31-2003, 08:06 AM	#9
DrJim Regular Member Join Date: May 2003 Location: Lethbridge AB Canada Posts: 445	shivalinga wrote: "funny how actual scholarship is derided as "indian nationalism", and incomplete scholarship- the rest of the stuff seen in the mass media- is lauded and accepted as accurate and un biased." This is bizzare assertion to make regarding Kak's article. I will not comment on the Indian material, since I do not know it well enough, but on the few references to the biblical material, my claim is fully justified. Kak associates the rise of the Hebrew monotheism and Moses's mission to the sun-worship of Akenaton, and employs at least some of Freud's ideas on the subject. What kind of "actual scholarship" uses the 60-70 year old opinions of a psychiatrist in matters of ancient history when there is so many modern works on this period written by experts in the field? At least this part of his paper is not at the academic level expected from first-year university students. It is NOT scholarship but rather the uncritical acceptance of ideas from Freud who is way out of his area of expertise (if he was not just creating a grand metaphor for something else). I suspect Kak appealed to him in this case since his name is so well known in the mass media and it saved him from doing any real work. To my mind, a lot of the parallels between Ps. 104 and the hymn to the Aten are rather over-blown. Moreover, there is no largely evidence of Moses, the Exodus or Conquest, let along an Israelite monotheism dedicated to YHWH in the second millenium bce (although that hasn't stopped the mass-production of arguments for them). As I understand it, Akhenaton's religion was wiped out by the reassertion of the old order after his death. What happened in Israel was in all probably a totally unrelated phenomenon. Kak also seems to link many Psalms to Ugarit (N. Syrian coast, destroyed ca. 1200 bce) and Phoenician sources. This too is probably overstated. Comparative evidence suggests that very many literary motifs and forms have a tremendously long shelf life accross different cultures, and Yahweh does share a nubmer of attributes of El and Baal. But one is not justified to claim that the Israelites merely "adopted" foreign religious literature for their own. There is something of an attempt to disposses the Israelites of their own culture in Kak's paper, and one might accuse him of dispossessing the Egyptians, too! Of course, he is trying to find the original "source" and there is also a sense in his writing that the "original" has more value. I thnk the label "Indian nationalism" may sum up his agenda rather well. JR Linville

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