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Mark 15:34 records some of the last words of Jesus as he was on the cross.  They have been used to support the claim that Jesus spoke Aramaic and not Hebrew.  “And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?’ which is translated, ‘My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?’” These words closely parallel the words in Psalm 22:1 in both the original Hebrew and in the Aramaic Targumim, though His words, as recorded in Mark 15:34 match neither exactly.  Many scholars have glossed over this utterance as Aramaic without even really taking the time to see if it indeed is.

The table below lists Jesus’ phrase according to Mark and Matthew and then gives the text from Psalm 22:1 in the Hebrew original, the Targum (Aramaic) and then the Christian Syriac version (Syriac and Aramaic are basically the same).  Notice that none of the aforementioned texts is exactly the same.  Matthew’s version is exactly the same for the first three words: Eli Eli, lama but then differs with sabachthani.  The Targum of Ps 22:1 has shabachtani like in Mark and Matthew but then differs on the following: Eli Elahi instead of Eli Eli, and metul ma instead of lama.  While these are similar in meaning, it must be conceded that they are significantly different to merit investigation.  The Syriac version is the closest but again, it is not an exact match since lama is written lamna.  It must not be overlooked, however, that the Syriac version was written as a translation to the New Testament and thus cannot be used conclusively to prove one way or the other the exact words of Jesus.  The rest of the table lists the different ways of saying God in Hebrew and Aramaic (Syriac).

Table 3 Eloi, Eloi Lama Sabaktani

Eloi

We have some interesting evidence in the New Testament given that the original words of Jesus have been recorded by two of his disciples – Matthew and Mark (according to early church tradition, Mark received his Gospel from the testimony of Peter).  It is interesting to note that Matthew’s version is slightly different from Mark’s.  Matthew records, in 27:46 that Jesus said Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? (resembling Psalm 22:1 in Hebrew eli, eli lama azavtani) while Mark’s account says Eloi Eloi.  I believe that we can safely assume that Jesus did not say it one way for Matthew and another for the writer of Mark while on the cross.  Matthew’s version – Eli Eli is what we would expect in Hebrew or even in Aramaic.  Eloi, however, is a mystery. Which way he said it has to do with the issue of transliteration and will be answered in the course of our search.

We know what Eloi means, due to the convenient translation in the text, that is my God.  The question of course, is whether it is Hebrew or Aramaic.  The truth is, as such, it is neither Hebrew nor Aramaic.  While it is close to the Hebrew form of אלהים elohim, it falls short.  Its form is not found even once in the Hebrew Bible and since elohim is such a common word, not finding it there forces us to conclude that it is not Hebrew. However, it is not Aramaic either.  If Eloi were Aramaic, as is assumed, then why don’t we see at least one example of its use in the OT since in both Daniel 4:5, and 6:22, which were plainly written in Aramaic, the words “my God” are not Eloi but אלהי elahi.  The form spoken by Jesus as recorded in Mark is conspicuously absent!  Furthermore, the Targumim translate my God as elahi just as the Aramaic does from the time of Daniel.  Targum Psalm 22:1, has אלי אלהי eli elahi (Targum Psalms). Moreover, the Syriac (Aramaic) version of the New Testament (written about 200 AD) actually translates the Greek text of Mark 15:34 (my God) ὁ Θεός μου  (ho Theos mou) as elahi and not Eloi!  Apparently the Aramaic speakers didn’t consider it to be Aramaic either since they wrote Elahi.  Considering that this text was written after the time of Jesus just further serves to demonstrate that Eloi is not Aramaic.

If Eloi is neither Hebrew nor Aramaic, then what is it?  There are three ways to say God in Hebrew:אלהים  Elohim (2605 times) only in Hebrew, used most often to refer to the God of Israel,  אל El (242 times), both Hebrew and Aramaic, more often used of foreign gods, though nevertheless, used in reference to the true God of Israel, and אלוה Eloah (56 times) used only in Hebrew texts (primarily in Job).  All of them have a general meaning of mighty one – really just a title, which can theoretically, be applied to any one who “is mighty”. [1] Elohim, unlike el and Eloah, is the plural form meaning gods.  Whenever used of the one true God of Israel, however, the verb related to it is always singular. [2] To say my God with el simply requires that one add the letter yud to the end of the word.  Thus, El becomes Eli.  To add my to plural masculine nouns like Elohim, however, basically requires adding the vowel a and dropping the mem (mem makes a masculine noun plural).  Elohim therefore, becomes Elohai.  To make the first person possessive of Eloah is similar, though, unfortunately, the first person singular my is not found in the pages of the Bible.  There is, however, one passage in Habbakuk 1:11 which does have the possessive pronoun suffix his אלהו – Eloho.  Thus, according to the conventions of Hebrew grammar, the way to say my God would be Elohi.  (Gallagher, personal correspondence)   Aramaic has two ways to say God, El, which is exactly the same as the Hebrew counterpart and the other way is אלה Elah. To say my God is Eli and Elahi similar to the Hebrew forms.

Thus in either Hebrew or Aramaic, we should see one of four forms: Elohai or Elohi (only Hebrew), Eli (both Hebrew and Aramaic) or Elahi (only Aramaic).  There are no other possibilities and Eloi is simply not one of the options.  In order to discover which language Jesus spoke, we will limit our discussion to Mark’s Eloi since Eli could be either Hebrew or Aramaic.  We will essentially address two questions:

1. What happened to the letter he in the middle of the word (equivalent to the letter H)?
2. Are there any occurrences of Eloi in the Septuagint?

Without Eli we have limited our focus to three candidates for the mysterious Eloi, the two Hebrew words Elohai, Elohi and the Aramaic Elahi.  We don’t have the actual Hebrew or Aramaic word written in the Hebrew/Aramaic [3] script but the Greek transliteration, which can sometimes be tricky.  Some languages don’t have the rough breathing sound that the letter H makes.  English, for example, can make the sound at the beginning and middle of words but not at the end (this seems normal to us; however, Hebrew can do all three!).  Greek is able to produce the H sound at the beginning of words, but not in the middle or end. [4] So, how would one transliterate any of the three from either Hebrew or Aramaic to Greek?  There is, in fact, no way to transliterate the words other than by transliterating them without the rough breathing sound, which would yield three different options: Eloai, Eloi and Elai.

To prove the theory, we will select words which we know have the letter ה (letter H) in the middle and then compare them to the Greek transliterations (in the Septuagint) where, if the theory is correct, there should be the absence of a rough breathing mark (like the letter H).  For example, Abraham in the Septuagint is Αβραάμ (Abraam).

Table 4 Loss of the ה(H) Sound in Greek

Notice from the table that the Hebrew words lose the H in the Greek (and English transliteration).  As expected, the Greek version cannot reproduce the H and so it was left out in the transliteration.  Therefore, the word Eloi is not necessarily Aramaic simply based on the lack of the letter H. However it is too early to conclude that it is Hebrew.  Clearly, the Hebrew letter he or H was lost due to transliteration, but was the original Hebrew or Aramaic?  The loss of the letter he in the Greek transliteration leaves us with the following three possibilities: Eloai, Eloi, and Elai.

Clearly Eloi fits perfectly what Mark recorded and fortunately we have an example of this in the Septuagint.  Judges 5:5 “The mountains gushed before the LORD, this Sinai before the LORD God of Israel” κυρίου Ελωι, τοῦτο Σινα ἀπὸ προσώπου κυρίου θεοῦ Ισραηλ (kuriou Eloi touto Sina apo prosopou kuriou theou Israel).  Notice that they translated the word LORD (YHWH in Hebrew) into Greek as kuriou (Lord) and then added the word Eloi (my God), which is not in the Hebrew text.  There are two things that must not be missed here.  First of all, the mysterious word in Mark is attested in the Septuagint with exactly the same spelling.  Secondly, the Septuagint was translated into Greek from Hebrew and not Aramaic.  Thus when looking at Mark 15:34 we have solid evidence of how Elohi was transliterated from Hebrew (not Aramaic!) in to Greek.  If Mark had been transliterating from Aramaic, he would probably not have written Eloi ᾿Ελωΐ [5] with the letter omega (ω) since the Aramaic is distinctly elahi and would have better transliterated it as ᾿Ελaΐ with the letter alpha.

In summary, we see that there is no way to actually write the Hebrew Elohai, Elohi, or the Aramaic Elahi except by dropping the letter he.  Of the three, Elohi fits perfectly and is attested once in the Septuagint – ᾿Ελωΐ Eloi – the exact same spelling and meaning as what is in Mark 15:34.  Furthermore, if Mark had been transliterating Aramaic, it most likely would have appeared as Elai and not Eloi. Our findings may explain the difference between Matthew and Mark since Matthew records Eli, Eli – which has the same meaning but does not present any problems of transliteration. Perhaps knowing this, we might conclude that Matthew simply wrote Eli Eli and not Eloi knowing that Greek letters could not reproduce the word Elohi and since Eli, Eli is how the Hebrew text of Psalm 22:1 reads. And it would seem that Mark opted to write the specific literal words, even though they could not be written exactly in Greek.

Lama

Lama למה, meaning why, is an extremely common word and is used least 145 times in the Hebrew OT in almost every book. It is seen in every phase in Hebrew – from proto Hebrew to Standard Biblical Hebrew to Late Biblical Hebrew and numerous times in the Mishnah.  So, we should not be surprised to see it here in Jesus’ day as well.  The root letters lamed, mem and he are also found in Aramaic, though it should be noted that the vocalization (the vowels) are slightly different than what is recorded in Mark 15:34.  The Aramaic word is lema. [6] It is possible that Mark was transliterating the Aramaic lema as λαμα (lama) – although we cannot be dogmatic about the issue, he could have more accurately written it with the Greek letter epsilon (λεμα) if that were the case. [7] However, as the historical sources indicate, it would seem that Mark was simply writing in Hebrew. Moreover, the word lama does not appear in the (Aramaic) Targum of Psalm 22:1.  Even though lema exists in Aramaic, the translators of this Targum used two words metul ma, also meaning why.  Thus, not only does the Hebrew lama fit better than the Aramaic lema but even the Targum doesn’t use the word.  Only the Hebrew text has the word that Jesus used while enduring our sins on the cross.

Shabachtani

Shabachtani[8] שׁבקתני appears to be a word of Aramaic origin.  It means to leave, leave alone, entrust, bequeath, divorce, permit, forgive, abandon and forsake.  It is used a total of five times in the Old Testament, all of which are found in the Aramaic portions of Daniel and Ezra.  However, given that there was a limited amount of Aramaic influence exerted on the Hebrew language after the return from the Babylonian captivity, we later see the root shabak [9] שׁבק attested in Jewish writings such as the Jerusalem Talmud, which is where the Mishna is found.

Of the seven occurrences of shabak in the Mishnah, four are clearly couched in Hebrew prose.  A passage from the Jerusalem Talmud (31:5:1), is an especially good example of the words surrounding shabak. The text contains certain grammatical structures and vocabulary which occur only in Hebrew and not Aramaic.  A few examples are the use of the letter ה he found at the beginning of words which means the (Aramaic has א – aleph at the end of words).  Also the word שׁ Shay, that, (used only Hebrew) versus די di [10] (used only in Aramaic).  Thus the word shabak, which Jesus spoke on the cross, we find situated in the midst of Mishnaic Hebrew words and grammar, and therefore, we can safely conclude that while this was originally a loan word from Aramaic, by Jesus’ day, it had become common place in the Hebrew language.  We should actually expect there to be some loan words in the language.

Consider for example, if you live in France and you hear someone say that he intends to do “le jogging” you should not conclude that he is actually speaking English!  Likewise, consider the dramatic influence French had on English – we use without any thought words such as pork and beef not knowing that these words are not originally English.  This does not lead us to the conclusion that Americans are speaking French, though it does imply that there was some French influence upon the English language.  In fact, pork and beef have become so common that we are often surprised to learn that they are French.  Nevertheless, though pork and beef are clearly French, the way they are spelled (vs. porc and boeuf) shows that they have been completely assimilated into the English language. [11] And so it is with Shabaktani – the word seems to have come originally from Aramaic but was completely assimilated into (Mishnaic) Hebrew as attested by its usage in the writings of the Mishnah, which as pointed out already, was the final stage of ancient Hebrew before its demise around 200 AD [12].  Also, the ending of the word “ta+ni” is exactly what we would expect in Biblical Hebrew [13] viz. shabakta=you forsook +ni=me.

[1] Jesus makes reference to this word in John 10:34 of the leaders and judges of Israel.

[2] A beautiful example of the Trinity in the Old Testament (first occurring in Genesis 1:26).

[3] Both Hebrew and Aramaic were written in what was known as Aramaic script just like how English is written using Latin letters.

[4] My lovely wife, Anna, pointed this out to me!

[5] Mark includes the breathing marks and accents making it even clearer that it is to be pronounced Elo-i demonstrating that the Hebrew letter he has been dropped.

[6] The e is written with a shewa which is a very short sound.

[7] Some manuscripts do contain the variants λεμα lema, λιμα lima, –  see The Robinson/Pierpont Byzantine Greek New Testament.  However, the Textus Receptus and the Vulgate have λαμμα lamma or λαμα lama respectively.

[8] The Aramaic word is actually Shabachtani – Greek does not have the “sh” sound which is why the NT text has transliterated it as Sabachtani.

[9] The last root letter is like the letter K as in kite.  Again this is a matter of transliteration.

[10] The other uses are: זאת zot, בן ben, אני ani, את et – these words are specifically Hebrew.  The Aramaic counterpart is different enough so that we can conclude that these words are Hebrew and not Aramaic.  Ben and bar (in a later chapter), however, are often interchangeable.

[11] Perhaps even more surprising is discovering that the word sack is in fact a Hebrew word – it is found 17 times in the Old Testament.  It has been so completely assimilated that few people ever give it a second thought.  It is indeed English, but was originally (and still is!) Hebrew.

[12] Hebrew essentially died as a spoken language but was still in use in Jewish life up until the establishment of Modern Hebrew.

[13] The form, though, is the same in Aramaic.

If you are already a Christian, then be encouraged that God loves you, and He rejoices in your resolve to believe His Word to the fullest.  He has many wonderful promises in store for you that are written in the pages of the Bible.

Your Creator Loves You

If you have come to the conclusion that God’s Word is faithful and accurate in all that it says but are not a Christian, then I would like to invite you to enter into a relationship with the God who created everything.  God is awesome and mighty – just imagine how He made everything in only six days!  Nevertheless, even more amazing is that He paid for our sins in less than one day!  Jesus paid the price that our original parents, Adam and Eve, brought upon the world through their disobedience.  But He also paid for your and my personal sin.  Put your trust in Him now and receive a new life.  You can trust the word that He speaks to you:

For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died; and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again […] Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.  Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God.  For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5:14-21, emphasis mine)

Jesus Himself also invites you to believe in Him: “Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life.  He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live.  And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.  Do you believe this?’” (John 11:25-26).

If you believe that Jesus died for your sins, as the Scriptures clearly say, then you can have eternal life.  I invite you to receive His gift of life to you and then to rest in the promise that you are a new creation and will live forever with Christ.  If you would like pray or to speak with me one on one, please don’t hesitate to write!

Still soft and stretchy

Dinosaur soft tissue find—a stunning rebuttal of “millions of years”

by Dr Carl Wieland, AiG–Australia

25 March 2005

We previously announced the discovery of what seemed to be microscopic red blood cells (and immunological evidence of hemoglobin) in dinosaur bone (see Sensational dinosaur blood report! and response to critic).¹ Now a further announcement, involving the same scientist (Montana State University’s Dr Mary Schweitzer²) stretches (pun intentional) the long-age paradigm beyond belief.

Not only have more blood cells been found, but also soft, fibrous tissue, and complete blood vessels. The fact that this really is unfossilized soft tissue from a dinosaur is in this instance so obvious to the naked eye that any scepticism directed at the previous discovery is completely “history”.

T Rex Soft Tissue Science via AP (From www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7285683/) A: The arrow points to a tissue fragment that is still elastic.  It beggars belief that elastic tissue like this could have lasted for 65 million years. B: Another instance of “fresh appearance” which similarly makes it hard to believe in the “millions of years”. C: Regions of bone showing where the fibrous structure is still present, compared to most fossil bones which lack this structure.  But these bones are claimed to be 65 million years old, yet they manage to retain this structure.

One description of a portion of the tissue was that it is “flexible and resilient and when stretched returns to its original shape”.³

The exciting discovery was apparently made when researchers were forced to break open the leg bone of a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil to lift it by helicopter. The bone was still largely hollow and not filled up with minerals as is usual. Dr Schweitzer used chemicals to dissolve the bony matrix, revealing the soft tissue still present.⁴

She has been cited as saying that the blood vessels were flexible, and that in some instances, one could squeeze out their contents. Furthermore, she said, “The microstructures that look like cells are preserved in every way.” She also is reported as commenting that “preservation of this extent, where you still have this flexibility and transparency, has never been seen in a dinosaur before.”

It appears that this sort of thing has not been found before mainly because it was never looked for. Schweitzer was probably alert to the possibility because of her previous serendipitous discovery of T. rex blood cells. (It appears that the fossils were sent to her to look for soft tissues, prior to preservative being applied, because of her known interest.) In fact, Schweitzer has since found similar soft tissue in several other dinosaur specimens!

NC State scientist finds soft tissue in T. rex bones

Contact: Tracey Peake
tracey_peake@ncsu.edu
9190515-3470
North Carolina State University

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-03/ncsu-nss032405.php retrieved October 6, 2006

Conventional wisdom among paleontologists states that when dinosaurs died and became fossilized, soft tissues didn’t preserve – the bones were essentially transformed into “rocks” through a gradual replacement of all organic material by minerals. New research by a North Carolina State University paleontologist, however, could literally turn that theory inside out.

Dr. Mary Schweitzer, assistant professor of paleontology with a joint appointment at the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences, has succeeded in isolating soft tissue from the femur of a 68-million-year-old dinosaur. Not only is the tissue largely intact, it’s still transparent and pliable, and microscopic interior structures resembling blood vessels and even cells are still present.

In a paper published in the March 25 edition of the journal Science, Schweitzer describes the process by which she and her technician, Jennifer Wittmeyer, isolated soft organic tissue from the leg bone of a 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex.

Schweitzer was interested in studying the microstructure and organic components of a dinosaur’s bone. All bone is made up of a combination of protein (and other organic molecules) and minerals. In modern bone, removing the minerals leaves supple, soft organic materials that are much easier to work with in a lab. In contrast, fossilized bone is believed to be completely mineralized, meaning no organics are present. Attempting to dissolve the minerals from a piece of fossilized bone, so the theory goes, would merely dissolve the entire fossil.

But the team was surprised by what actually happened when they removed the minerals from the T. rex femur fragment. The removal process left behind stretchy bone matrix material that, when examined microscopically, seemed to show blood vessels, osteocytes, or bone building cells, and other recognizable organic features.

Since current data indicates that living birds are more closely related to dinosaurs than any other group, Schweitzer compared the findings from the T. rex with structures found in modern-day ostriches. In both samples, transparent branching blood vessels were present, and many of the small microstructures present in the T. rex sample displayed the same appearance as the blood and bone cells from the ostrich sample.

Schweitzer then duplicated her findings with at least three other well-preserved dinosaur specimens, one 80-million-year-old hadrosaur and two 65-million-year-old tyrannosaurs. All of these specimens preserved vessels, cell-like structures, or flexible matrix that resembled bone collagen from modern specimens.

Current theories about fossil preservation hold that organic molecules should not preserve beyond 100,000 years. Schweitzer hopes that further research will reveal exactly what the soft structures isolated from these bones are made of. Do they consist of the original cells, and if so, do the cells still contain genetic information? Her early studies of the material suggest that at least some fragments of the dinosaurs’ original molecular material may still be present.

“We may not really know as much about how fossils are preserved as we think,” says Schweitzer. “Our preliminary research shows that antibodies that recognize collagen react to chemical extracts of this fossil bone. If further studies confirm this, we may have the potential to learn more not only about the dinosaurs themselves, but also about how and why they were preserved in the first place.”

The research was funded by NC State, the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences and the National Science Foundation.

Note to editors: An abstract of the paper follows.

“Soft-Tissue Vessels and Cellular Preservation in Tyrannosaurus rex”
Authors: Mary H. Schweitzer and Jennifer L. Wittmeyer, North Carolina State University; John R. Horner, Montana State University; Jan B. Toporski, Carnegie Institution of Washington Geophysical Laboratory Published: March 25, 2005, in Science

Abstract: Soft tissues are preserved within hindlimb elements of Tyrannosaurus rex (Museum of the Rockies specimen 1125). Removal of the mineral phase reveals transparent, flexible, hollow blood vessels containing small round microstructures that can be expressed from the vessels into solution. Some regions of the demineralized bone matrix are highly fibrous, and the matrix possesses elasticity and resilience. Three populations of microstructures have cell-like morphology. Thus, some dinosaurian soft tissues may retain some of their original flexibility, elasticity and resilience.

Evidence of Men and Dinosaurs Living Together

The following page is taken in whole from s8int.org Please visit their site for more amazing out of place artifacts that challenge the evolutionary/old earth paradigm.
Palestrina Mosaic.

CLICK HERE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION NILE MOSAIC IMAGE

In this article s8int.com will once again, (as we’ve tried to do on more than 50 pages of this section), provide visual evidence that dinosaurs and humans did in fact coexist; this time in the art of the 1st century. In this article we will seek to show that not just dinosaurs but that other fauna said by science to have become extinct millions of years ago were still living up to at least the time of the 1st century A.D.

I was in the library this week poring over literally thousands of pages of early Roman art, including the art of 1st century Pompeii. I spent this time in the library after spending weeks trying to find more copies and higher resolution photos of the pieces being presented here online.

If and when I did find them, in the great majority of cases the representations of the art had been cropped so that the “offending details” had been eliminated. Other companion works were often shown in their entirety and often in higher resolution, but these were not.

Although these art masterpieces should be easy to find—they are not. As you look at the evidence s8int.com presents here, remember that the keepers of the evolutionary paradigm did everything overtly or subtlety possible to keep us from seeing them. That might tend to lend them additional credibility as evidence supporting interaction since there would be no need to surpress or deny information which does not threaten the paradigm.

The Nile Mosaic of Palestrina and the hunting mosaic from the “House of the Physician” are incredible works that should be well known to the public in their entirety, but if in fact they were well known, they would be very controversial with respect to the evolutionary timeline.

What we really wonder about is; with respect to the powers that be who conspire to keep this information out of the public eye, do they themselves manage to maintain the belief that dinosaurs and man never coexisted—or is it just the great unwashed true believers out there who have the pure religion? Is the power of denial really that strong?

What we do know is that whatever we do stumble upon here at s8int.com or whatever anyone else discovers is just the tip of the iceberg.

The Nile is not just a river in Egypt.

The Nile is the longest river in the world, stretching northwards for approximately 4,000 miles from East Africa to the Mediterranean. In addition to Egypt, it flows through the African countries of Sudan, Burundi, Rwanda, DR Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia,. Nilotic art like the first century Nile Mosaic of Palestrina detailed life along the Nile.

“The vast Nilotic mosaic (21.3 x 17.3 feet) set into the floor of the apsidal hall adjacent to the sanctuary of Fortuna Primigenia at Praeneste (Palestrina) provides important evidence for what Roman triumphal paintings using topographical conventions may have looked like.

On the mosaic, the Nile winds past vignettes representing exotic landscapes and settlements; the more recondite details are carefully labeled in Greek, underscoring the Alexandrian source of the genre. The precise nature of the relationship between the mosaic and cartographic practices is controversial.

Recently the Palestrina mosaic has been interpreted as an actual topographic map of the Nile: the upper part of the mosaic represents Ethiopia, the upper zone of the lower section represents Egypt, and the foreground represents the Delta, top to bottom understood as south to north, the standard convention for ancient maps.

More likely, however, the mosaic provides a large, coherent landscape composition of the Nile during the flood season, nevertheless dependent on topographical conventions”.( Meyboom )

Dinosaur Art From the House of the Physician-Mid First Century A.D.

“Pompeii is a ruined Roman city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the commune of Pompei. It was destroyed during a catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius on 24 August 79 AD.

The volcano buried the city under many metres of ash and it was lost for 1,600 years before its accidental rediscovery in 1748. Since then, its excavation has provided an extraordinarily detailed insight into the life of a city at the height of the Roman Empire”……Wikipedia

IMAGES: Both of the images on the left are from the “Hunt” mosaic discovered in the House of the physician in Pompeii, Rome.

When the images are discussed, it is within academia, not with the general public. The apology given for the oversized reptiles is that they are simply nile crocodiles. This is not the case. As we will show, the crocodiles on these Nile works were rendered realistically and accurately as shown in this rendering from the Nile Mosaic on the right.

Note that in the image on the left, and in the complete mural below a man is battling a reptile taller than himself with a shield and a spear. Compare the man, the dinosaur and the building at the center of the image.

The creature on the right has a dermal ridge, unlike a crocodile but exactly like certain dinosaur types which might be safer to sit astride as we will explore below.

CLICK HERE FOR HIGH RESOLUTION MOSAIC IMAGE

There are many armored dinosaur types that fit this reptile portrayal at least as well as the crocodile. Most of them had “low slung” bodies with heights of six feet high or less. One can make up his/her own mind but the hunter astride the reptile is between “plates” on its bck. In addition to the examples shown here, other candidates can be seen by following this link.

Another denial tactic is to label the dark skinned peoples in these mosaics as pygmies (to account for reptile towering over native). However, authorities on Roman art note that its not just blacks who are made diminutive in Roman art but that it was a way of making the Romans seem superior.

African-Roman Hero, Hercules. Fresco, Imperial Roman Pompeii. Hercules stands beside the enthroned Lydian Queen Omphale

Not only blacks were diminutive in the pieces, white or light skinned persons were dwarfed as well. As a matter of fact, Snowden, in his book “Before Color Prejudice” makes note of the egalitarian nature of the Roman civilization, and apparent lack of color discrimination, using examples from ancient Roman Art; many works showing scenes involving both dark skinned and light skinned citizens.

With respect to the three pieces found at the House of the Physician, all portray light skinned and dark skinned dwarves.

This includes “Judgment of Solomon”, (NOT SHOWN) which depicts the Jews as dwarfed and as both dark skinned and light skinned peoples.

The work below is also first century, from the House of the Physician at Pompeii.

Dinosaurs In Literature, History and Art: Part 2

Suppressed Evidence of Human, Dinosaur and Other “Extinct” Fauna Interaction in First Century Roman, Nilotic Art

Extinct Fauna on First Century Roman “Palestrina” Mosaic & Other Works?

As we noted in Part 1 of this article, it has turned out to be extremely difficult to obtain detailed, complete or higher resolution images of both the Palestrina Mosaic as well as the works from the House of the Physician at Pompeii.

In this part of the article using the resources we have, we will attempt to show that there were a number of fauna represented in first or second century ancient Roman art, including several creatures that we now call dinosaurs. These tentative identifications will be made more difficult by the lower resolutions that we have available to us here at s8int.com. we have only been able to study a sample of the fauna represented o the work. If you have access to exclusive academic sources like JSTOR or MUSE, let us know.

The Nile mosaic of Palestrina is an ancient mosaic depicting the Nile from Ethiopia to the Mediterranean. It is dated to around 100 BCE, and is thought to have been the work of Demetrius the Topographer, a Greek artist from Ptolemaic Egypt who visited Rome. The mosaic is located in the city of Palestrina. It contains detailed depictions of Ptolemaic greeks, black Ethiopians in hunting scenes, and various animals of the Nile river. Wikipedia References:Finley, The Light of the Past, 1965, p93. In this detail, we’ve circled some of the fauna we’re going to highlight in this part of our article….s8int.com

Readers will of course be free to decide for themselves whether or not we’ve been able to make correct observations. Of course we could be wrong about all of them. “Science” would claim that all the dry land creatures are actually crocodiles just as dead sea monster identifications are basking sharks. Those evolutionary believers down at the bottom of the “food chain” will likely agree.

Perhaps they are correct.

However, remember that science also told us that there were primitive “cavemen” called Neanderthal man and the slightly less primitive caveman, Cro-Magnon. These fables and images have permeated our culture for over 100 years.

In order to preserve and promote evolutionary theories of man, as recently as this year science has insisted that Neanderthal; could not speak but could only grunt not having a language, never mated with “modern” man, (but may have mated with apes) did not bury their dead etc, etc.

In November of this year, scientists were able to sequence the DNA of a man they called a “Neanderthal”. His DNA turned out to match “modern humans” to 99.99%. Everyone living today has DNA that matches other humans to 99.99%. This means that your DNA is as close to Neanderthals as it is to Richard Dawkins’, the famous evolutionist at Harvard. Exit caveman.

Oh, and what about the “Gap theorists”. This is a group of Christians so distressed about what science said about primitive man that they invented pre-adamic races to account for “cave men”, doubting the Bible from the first chapter of Genesis, it’s first book? No doubt they will cling to the Gap theory just as evolutionists will cling to evolution and to cave men.

We know that no matter how much evidence is provided, “rationalists” and evolutionists will refuse to accept the evidence of their own eyes. Romans 1 says that what may be known about God is from evidence that can be “seen”. Denial is not just a river…

Science was wrong about Neanderthal. Maybe science is wrong about dinosaurs and when they lived as well.

Palestrina Mosaic Dinosaurs?

Iguanodon? See top photo for location on mosaic under the tiger representation.

Several years ago, we came across an image of the Palestrina Mosaic in used book store in a book entitled “The Light of the Past”, by Finley. In that one book we found several things that shouldn’t be there if the evolution paradigm were true. We found evidence that ancient man had lived with dinosaurs.

As it turns out, the high resolution portion of the mosaic featured in that book represented only a small portion of the complete mosaic. Just off to the left of the “dinosaur” being hunted that we featured on the first page of this section was another dinosaur representation we had not seen.

Iguanodon.

We believe it represents a dinosaur similar to iguanodon. We regret that we don’t have a higher resolution photo of this section of the mosaic. It appears here after having tried several filters to make it appear as clearly as possible.

Iguanodon according to science

“(meaning “Iguana tooth”) is the name given to a genus of ornithopod dinosaurs, which lived roughly halfway between the early hypsilophodontids and their ultimate culmination in the duck-billed dinosaurs.

They lived between 120 to 140 million years ago, in the Barremian to Valanginian ages of the Early Cretaceous Period, although one dubious species is from the Late Jurassic. Iguanodon’s most distinctive feature was a large razor-sharp ‘thumb spike’, probably used for defense against predators.

Iguanodon was the first dinosaur recognized and the second dinosaur formally named, described in 1822 by English geologist Gideon Mantell. Together with Megalosaurus and Hylaeosaurus, it was one of the three originally used to define the new classification, Dinosauria.

Paleobiology

The various Iguanodon species are bulky herbivores, ranging from 6 to 11 metres (20 to 36 feet) in length, and averaging about 5 tonnes (5.5 tons) in weight. Iguanodon’s thumb spikes were perpendicular to the three main digits.

In early restorations, the spike was placed on the animal’s nose. Later fossils revealed the true nature of the thumb spikes, although their exact purpose is still debated. It could have been used for defense, or for foraging for food…..Wikipedia.

Dinosaur Depiction on Roman Mosaic at Sepphoris?

Detail from floor mosaic discovered at Sepphoris. This is a nilotic scene incorporated into the Dionysos Mosaic.

The mosaic is dated between the first and third centuries. A great earthquake destroyed Sepphoris in 363 A.D.

Note that here warriors/hunters battle the “large reptile” using shields and large rocks.

Palestrina Mosaic Entelodont:? Dinohyus?

Dinohyus

Photo:Dinohyus is just our speculation but it appears to be a enteledont rather than a hippo.

Dinohyus (meaning “terrible pig”) was a large, warthog-like hoofed mammal that lived during the early Miocene, roughly 24 million years ago. This herbivore (it ate plants, including roots) had a long skull (over 1 m = 3 feet long), a small braincase, a pair of knob-like protrusions on the back of the lower jaw (in the cheek area), blunt incisors, and wide, strong canine teeth.

Its long legs probably made it a fast runner. The neck was short and stout and there was a hump on the shoulders formed by spines along the backbone. It was about 6 feet (2 m) tall at the shoulders and was the biggest and among the last of the Entelodonts.

Fossils have been found in western North America (including Battle Creek, South Dakota, USA).

Classification: Class Mammalia (mammals), Order Artiodactyla (even-toed ungulates), Family Entelodontidae (large, pig-like mammals from the Oligocene to early Miocene, including Archaeotherium, Megachoerus, Dinohyus, Entelodon and Eoentelodon), Genus Dinohyus

Source: Metareligion

Palestrina Mosaic Camelops-Extinct Camel?

Camelops

Camelops is an extinct genus of camels that once roamed western North America, where it appeared about 45 million years ago. It migrated to Eurasia and Africa around 2 to 3 million years ago, contrary to various other animals that migrated to North America. Its name is derived from the Greek κάμελος (camel) + ὀψ (face), thus “camel-face.”

Camelops first appeared during the Late Pliocene period and became extinct at the end of the Pleistocene. The reason for its extinction is poorly understood but was part of a larger North American die-off in which native horses, camelids and mastodons also died out.

Because soft tissues are generally not preserved in the fossil record, it is not certain if camelops possessed a hump, like modern camels, or lacked one, like its modern llama relatives….Wikipedia

Palestrina Mosaic -Extinct Horse?

Pliohippus

Photo: The tiny horse in the mosaic could represent any of the small tiny horses science believes were ancestors to modern horses. In reality, they were simply part of the genetic variation God built into all creatures, just as there are large and small dogs.

“Grandfather” to the modern horse, Pliohippus appears to be the source of the latest radiation in the horse family. It is believed to have given rise to Hippidion and Onohippidion, genera that thrived for a time in South American, and to Dinohippus which in turn led to Equus.

Where & When? Fossils of Pliohippus are found at many late Miocene localities in Colorado, the Great Plains of the US (Nebraska and the Dakotas) and Canada. Species in this genus lived from 12-6 million years ago.

Did Pliohippus live during the Pliocene? Or, how do you manage to miss an entire epoch? As incredible as it may sound, recent research shows that Pliohippus and the Pliocene have shrunk in duration so that they completely missed each other!

The problem is twofold. First of all, the epochs like the Pliocene and Miocene are all compared to marine sediments in Europe. It is difficult, although not impossible, to compare the ages of horses with British invertebrate fossils.

Over the years, refinements in our understanding of the Pliocene have resulted in the shrinking of that epoch. It is now believed to have covered a period ranging from about 5.3 to 1.75 million years ago. It formerly included North American land mammals ages that are now regarded as being late Miocene.

Our concept of the genus Pliohippus has also shrunk. In essence, Pliohippus has been split into two genera. Pliohippus now includes horses with large facial depressions in front of their eyes. These lived during the Miocene. The second genus, Dinohippus, includes horses with smaller facial depressions which lived into the Pliocene. (Equus lacks these depressions.)

The shrinking of the Pliocene and Pliohippus has resulted in the unhappy complication that the namesake of the Pliocene did not live during this time period”…..Florida Museum of Natural History

Palestrina Mosaic -Smilodon?

Smilodon (IPA: /smailəʊdɑn/, a bahuvrihi from Greek: σμιλη “knife” and (Ionic) οδων “tooth”) is an extinct genus of large machairodontine saber-toothed cats that are understood to have lived between approximately 3 million to 10,000 years ago in North and South America. .

They are the only known successors to Machairodus. Smilodon means knife tooth, an entirely appropriate name given its enormous fangs. The smilodon species are also known as Saber-Toothed Cats or Saber-Toothed Tigers.

As many as six species of Smilodon are known to have existed:

• Smilodon fatalis, 1.6 million-10,000 years ago
• Smilodon gracilis, 2.5 million-500,000 years ago
• Smilodon populator, 1 million-10,000 years ago
• Smilodon neogaeus, 3 million-500,000 years ago
• Smilodon floridus, may be a subspecies of Smilodon fatalis
• Smilodon californicus, may be a subspecies of Smilodon fatalis.

A fully-grown Smilodon weighed approximately 200 kilograms (450 pounds) and had a short tail, powerful legs and a large head. About the size of a lion, smilodon was extremely powerful. Its jaws could open 120 degrees. Its fangs were about 17 cm (7 inches) long.

Many Smilodon fossils have been unearthed at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles. The Smilodon is the prehistoric cat that researchers know the most about….Wiipedia

Books

• Bones of Contention, Marvin L. Lubenow
• Buried Alive, Jack Cuozzo
• Darwin on Trial, Phillip E. Johnson
• Darwin’s Black Box, Michael J. Behe
• Footprints in the Ash, John Morris & Steven A. Austin
• In the Beginning, Walt Brown
• Starlight and Time, D. Russell Humphreys
• Thousands Not Billions, Dr. Don DeYoung
• What Darwin Didn’t Know, Geoffery Simmons

DVDs

• A Question of Origins, Eternal Productions
• Dinosaurs and Creation, Mace Baker
• Scientific Evidence for Noah’s Flood, Mace Baker
• Incredible Creatures that Defy Evolution (Three part series), Exploration Films
• Mount St. Helens, ICR
• Thousands Not Billions, ICR
• The Privileged Planet, Illustra Media
• Unlocking the Mystery of Life, Illustra Media
• Where Does the Evidence Lead? Illustra Media

Websites

• www.answersingenesis.com
• www.bible.ca
• www.christiananswers.net
• www.creationscience.com
• www.icr.org
• www.darwinisdead.com
• www.s8int.com (interesting site regarding “out of place artifacts”)

Other useful links

• bornagainmormon.com
• www.jerusalemperspective.com Information on the life and teaching of Jesus from a Hebrew perspective.
• biblicalulpan.com Learn Biblical Hebrew in Israel as a spoken language!
• www.theword.net Great and free multilingual Bible software that can search the Greek text.
• Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa School of Ministry (Pastoral Training).  Our school, our version of seminary, is designed for men who feel a call into some type of ministry and desire to become better equipped in the teaching of God’s Word.
• www.bornagainmormon.com
• www.bibleplaces.com – great pictures of the Holy Land
• www.evalife.com If you are looking for some good vitamins, then I would recommend that you check out Evalife Vitamins.