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WERE ADAM & EVE OUR FIRST PARENTS?
BY 0. BliADLAUGH.
This question. Were Adam and Eve our first parents? is indeed one of most
grave importance. If the answer be a negative one, it is, in fact, a denial
of the whole scheme of Christianity. The Christian theory is that Adam,
the common father of the whole human race, sinned, and that by his sin he
dragged down all his posterity to a state from which redemption was needed,
and that Jesus is, and was, the Redeemer, by whom all mankind are and
were saved from the consequences of the fall of Adam. If Adam therefore
be proved not to be the first man, if it be shown that it is not to Adam the
various races of mankind are indebted for their origin, then the whole hypo
thesis of fall and redemption is dissipated.
In a pamphlet like the present, it is impossible (even if I possessed the
ability, which I do not) to attempt to give any statement and analysis
of the various hypotheses as to the origin of the human race. I frankly
admit, that my only wish and intent is, to compel people to examine the Bible
record for themselves, instead of making it their fetish, bowing down before
it without thought. I am inclined to the opinion that the doctrine of a
plurality of sources for the various types of the human race is a correct one.
That wherever the conditions for life have been found, there also has been
the degree of life resultant on those conditions. My purpose in this essay
is not to demonstrate the correctness of my own thinking, but rather to illus
trate the incorrectness of the Genesiacal teaching. Were Adam and
Eve our first parents? On the one hand an answer in the affirma
tive to this question can be obtained from the Bible, which asserts Adam
and Eve to be the first man and woman made by God, and fixes ths
date of their making about 6,000 years, little more or less, from the present
time. On the other hand, it seems to me that science emphatically declares
man to have existed on the earth for a far more extended period, affirms
that as far as we can trace man, we find him in isolated groups, diverse in
type, till we lose him in the ante-historic period; and with nearly equal dis
tinctness, denies that the various existing races find their common parentage
in one pair. It is only on the first point that I attack the Bible chronology
of man’s existence. I am aware that compilations based upon the authorised
version of the Old Testament Scriptures are open to objection, and that
while from the Hebrew, 1656 years represent the period from Adam to the
Deluge generally acknowledged, the Samaritan Pentateuch only yields for
the same period 130T years, while the Septuagint vsrsicn furnishes 2243
�ft
WEBB ADAM AND EVE OCR FIRST PARENTS?
years; there is, I am also informed, on the authority of a most erudite
Egyptologist, a fatal objection to the Septuagint chronology—i.e., that it
makes Methusaleh outlive the Flood.
*
The deluge occurred, according to the Septuagint, in the year of the world
4242, and by adding up the generations previous to his (Methusaleh’s.)
Adam
Seth
Enos
Cainan
Mahaleel
Jared
Enoch
...
...
...
...
..
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
...
230
205
190
170
165
162
165
1287
We shall find that he was born in the year of the world 1287. He lived
969 years, and therefore died in 2256. But this is 14 years after the
deluge.
The Rev. Dr. Lightfoot, who wrote about 1644, fixes the month of the
creation at September, 5572 years preceding the date of his book, and
says that Adam was expelled from Eden on the day on which he was
created.^ In the London ‘ Ethnological Journal,’ for which I am indebted to
the kindness of its Editor, an able ethnologist and careful thinker, the reader
will find a chronology of Genesis ably and elaborately examined. At pre
sent, for our immediate purpose, we will take the ordinary English Bible,
which gives the following result:—
From Adam to Abraham (Genesis v. and xi.)
...
.M
From Abraham to Isaac (Gen. xxi. 5)
.............................
From Isaac to Jacob (Gen. xxv. 26)
...
................
From Jacob going into Egypt (Gen. xlvii. 9)
...
...
Sojourn in Egypt (Exodus xii. 41)......................................
Duration of Moses’s leadership (Exodus vii. 7, xxxi. 2) ...
Thence to David, about
......................................................
From David to Captivity, 14 generations (27), about 22
reigns
...
...
......................................................
Captivity to Jesus, 14 generations, about............................
Less disputed 230 years of sojourn in Egypt
...
...
2008
100
60
130
430
40
400
473
593
4234
230
4004
From Adam to Abraham the dates are certain, if we take the Bible state
ment, and there is certainly no portion of the orthodox text, except the
period of the Judges, which will admit any considerable extension of the
ordinary Oxford chronology.
• Sharpe’s History of Egypt, page 196.
t Harmony of the Four Evangelists, and Harmony of the Old Testament.
�VERB ADAM AND EVB OUR MnsI PARENTS?
3
The Book of Judges is not a book of history. Everything in it is recounted without chronological order. It will suffice to say, that the cyphers
which we find in the book of Judges, and in the first book of Samuel
*
yield us, from the death of Joshua to the commencement of the reign
of Saul, the sum total of 500 years, which would make, since the exodo
from Egypt, 565 years; whereas the first book of Kings counts but 480
years, from the going out of Egypt down to the foundation of the temple
under Solomon. According to this we must suppose that several of the
judges governed simultaneously.
*
In reading Alfred Maury’s profound essay on the classification of tongues,
I was much struck with the fact that he, in his philological researches, traces
back some of the ancient Greek mythologies, to a Sanscrit source. He has
the following remark, worthy of earnest attention:—“The God of Heaven
*
or the sky, is called by the Greeks Zeus Pater; and let us have notice
that the pronunciation of Z resembles very much that of D, inasmuch as
the word Zeus becomes in the genitive Dios. The Latins termed the
same God, Dies-piter, or Jupiter. Now in the Veda, the God of Heaven
is called Dyashpitai.” What is this, but the original of our own Christian
God, the father, the H'ln'1 (Jeue) pater of the Old Testament? I introduce
this remark for the purpose of shaking a very commonly entertained
opinion, that the Hebrew Records, whether or not God inspired, are at
any rate the most antique, and are written in a primitive tongue. Neither
is it true that the Hebrew mythology is the most ancient, nor the Hebrew
language the most primitive; on the contrary, the mythology is clearly
derived, and the language in a secondary or tertiary state.
What is the value of this Book of Genesis, which is the sole authority
for the hypothesis that Adam and Eve, about 5,865 years ago, were the sole
founders of the peoples now living on the face of the earth? Written we
know not by whom, we know not when, and we know not in what
language. If we respect the book, it must be from its internal merits; its
author is to us unknown. Eusebius, Chrysostom, and Clemens Alexan>
drinus alike agree that the name of Moses should not stand at the head oit
Genesis as the author of the book. As to its internal merit, Origen did not
hesitate to declare the contents of the first and second chapters of Genesis
to be purely figurative. Our translation of it has been severely criticised
by the learned and pious Bellamy, and by the more learned and less pious
Sir Wiliiam Drummond. Errors almost innumerable have been pointed
out, the correctness of the Hebrew text itself questioned, and yet this book
is an unerring guide to the students of ethnology. They may do anything,
everything, except stray out of the beaten track. We have, therefore, on
.he one hand, an anonymous book, which indeed does not take you back so
much as 6,000 years, for at least 1,600 years must be deducted for the
Noachian deluge, when the world’s inhabitants were again reduced to one
family, one race, one type. On the other hand, we have now existing
Esquimaux men, of the Arctic realm—Chinamen, of the Asiatic realm—
Englishmen, of the European realm—Sahara negroes, of the Af rican realm
—Euegians, of the American realm—New Zealanders, of the Polynesian
realm—the Malay, representative of the realm which bears his name—the
• Munks’ Palestine, page 231.
1
�4
WEBB ADAM AND EVE OUR EIR8T PARENTST
Tasmanian, of the Australian realm, with other families of each realm, too
numerous for mention here; dark and fair, black-skinned and white
skinned, woolly-haired and straight-haired; low forehead, high forehead;
Hottentot limb, Negro limb, Caucasian limb. Do all these different and
differing structures and colours trace their origin to one pair? To Adam
and Eve, or rather to Noah and his family? Or are they (the various
races) indigenous to their nature, soils, and climates? And are these
various types naturally resultant, with all their differences, from the
differing conditions for life persistent to and consistent with them ?
The question, then, really is this—Have the different races of man all
found their common parent in Noah, about 4,300 years ago? Assuming
the unity of the races or species of men now existing, there are but three
suppositions on which the diversity now seen can be accounted for:—>
“ 1st. A miracle or direct act of the Almighty, in changing one type into
another.
“2nd. The gradual action of physical causes, such as climate, food,
mode of life, &c.
“ 3rd. Congenital or accidental varieties.”*
We may fairly dismiss entirely from our minds the question of miracle.
Such a miracle is nowhere recorded in the Bible, and it lies'upon any one
hardy enough to assert that the present diversity has a miraculous origin,
to show some kind of reasons for his faith, some kind of evidence for our
conviction, and until this is done we have no reason to dwell on the first
hypothesis.
Of the permanence of type under its own climatic conditions—that is, in
the country to which it is indigenous—we have overwhelming proof in the
statue of an ancient Egyptian scribe, taken from a tomb of the fifth
dynasty, 5,000 years old, and precisely corresponding to the Fellah of the
present day. J The sand had preserved the colour of the statuette, which,
from its portrait-like beauty, marks a long era of art-progress preceding
its production. It ante-dates the orthodox era of the flood, carries us back
to a time when, if the Bible were true, Adam was yet alive, and still we
find before it kings reigning and ruling in mighty Egypt. Can the reader
wonder that these facts are held to impeach the orthodox faith?
On the second point Dr. Nott writes, “ It is a commonly received error
that the influence of a hot climate is gradually exerted on successive
generations, until one species of mankind is completely changed into
another. . . . This idea is proven to be false. ... A sunburnt
cheek is never handed down to succeeding generations. The exposed parts
of the body are alone tanned by the sun, and the children of the white
skinned Europeans in New Orleans, Mobile, and the West Indies are bom
as fair as their ancestors, and would remain so if carried back to a colder
climate.^
Pure negroes and negresses, transported from Central Africa to England,
and marrying among themselves, would Dever acquire the characteristics
of the Caucasian races; nor would pure Englishmen and Englishwomen,
• “ Types of Mankind,” Dr. Nott, p- 57.
t M. Pulzsky on Iconography—“ Indigenous Races,” p. Ill,
I “ Types of Mankind,” p. 58.
�WERE ADAM AND EVE OUR FIRST PARENTS?
5
emigrating to Central Africa, and in like manner inter-marrying, ever
become negroes or negresses. The fact is, that while you don’t bleach the
colour out of the dark- skinned African by placing him in London, you
bleach the life out of him; and vice versa with the Englishman.
*
For a
long time there has been ascribed to man the faculty of adapting himself to
every climate. The following facts will show the ascription a most
erroneous one:—“In Egypt the austral negroes are, and the Caucasian
Memlooks were, unable to raise up even a third generation; in Corsica
French families vanish beneath Italian summers. Where are the descen
dants of the Bomans, the.Vandals, or the Greeks in Africa? In Modern
Arabia, 1830 years after Mahomed Ali had got clear of the Morea war,
18,000 Arnaots (Albanians) were soon reduced to some 400 men. At
Gibraltar, in 1617, a negro regiment was almost annihilated by consump
tion. In 1841, during the three weeks on the Niger, 130 Europeans out of
145 caught African fever, and 40 died; out of 158 negro sailors only eleven
were affected, and not one died. In 1809 the British expedition to Walchereen failed in the Netherlands through marsh fever. About the same
time, in St. Domingo, about 15,000 French soldiers died from malaria. Of
30,000 Frenchmen, only 8,000 survived exposure to that Antillian island;
while the Dominicanized African negro, Toussaint l’Overture, retransported
to Europe, was perishing from the chili of his prison in France.”
On the third point we again quote Dr. Nott:—
*• The only argument left, then, is that of congenital varieties or pecu•iarities, which are said to spring up and be transmitted from parent to child,
40 as to form new races. Let us pause for a moment to illustrate this
fanciful idea. The negroes of Africa, for example, are admitted not to be
offsets from some other race which have been gradually blackened and
changed in a moral and physical type by the action of climate; but it is
asserted that ‘once, in the flight of ages’ some genuine little negro, or
rather many such, were born of Caucasian, Mongol, or other light-skinned
parents, and then have turned about and changed the type of the inhabi
tants of a whole continent. So in America, the countless aborigines found
on this continent, which we have reason to believe were building mounds
before the time of Abraham, are the offspring of a race changed by acci
dental or congenital varieties. Thus, too, old China, India, Australia
*
Oceana, &c., all owe their types, physical and mental, to congenital and
accidental varieties, and are descended from Adam and Eve! Can human
credulity go farther, or hi man ingenuity invent any argument more
absurd ?”
But even supposing these cbjections to the second and third suppositions
set aside, there are two other propositions which, if affirmed, as I believe
they may be, entirely overthrow the orthodox assertion:—“That Adam
and Eve, six thousand years ago, were the first pair; and that all diver
sities now existing must find their common source in Noah—less than four
thousand three hundred years from the present time.” These two are as
follows:—
• ‘ Indigenous Races of the Earth,’ p. 458. The alleged discovery of white-skinned
Megroes in Western Africa does not affect this question, it is not only to the colour
if the skin but also the general negro characteristics that the above remarks apply.
�4
WERE ADAK AMD ETE OUR. FIRST PARENTS?
1. That man may be traced back on the earth long prior to the alleged
Adamic era.
2. That there are diversities traceable as existing amongst the human
race four thousand five hundred years ago, as marked as in the present day.
To illustrate the position that man may be traced back to a period long
prior to the Adamic era, we refer our readers to the chronology of the late
Baron Bunsen, who, while allowing about 2,2000 years for man’s existence on
earth, fixes the following dates, after a patient examination of the Nilotic
antiquities:—
Egyptians under a republican form......................................... 10,000 n.0.
Ascension of Bytis, the Theban, 1st Priest King................ 9085
Elective Kings in Egypt
................
7230
Hereditary Kings in Upper and Lower Egypt, a double
empire, form
.............................
5143*
The assertion of such an antiquity for Egypt is no modern hypothesis.
Plato puts language into the mouth of an Egyptian, first claiming in that
day an antecedent, 10,000 years for painting and sculpture in Egypt. This
has long been regarded as fabulous because it was contrary to the Hebrew
Chronology.
If this be the result of the researches into Egyptian archaeology, the
reader will scarcely be surprised to find me endeavouring from other sources
to get corroborative evidence of a still more astonising character.
There are few who now pretend that the whole creation (?) took place
6000 years ago, although if it be true that God made all in six days, and
man on the sixth, then the universe would only be more ancient than
Adam by some five days. To state the age of the earth at 6000 years is
simply preposterous, when we ascertain that it would require about
4,000,000 of years for the formation of the fosiliferous rocks alone, and
that 15,000,000 of years have been stated as a moderate estimate for the
antiquity of our globe. The deltas of the great rivers afford corroboration
to our position as to man’s duration. The delta of the Nile, formed by
immense quantities of sedimentary matter, which in like manner is still
carried down and deposited, has not perceptibly increased during the last
3000 years. “ In the days of the earliest Pharoahs, the delta, as it now
exists, was covered with ancient cities and filled with a dense population,
whose civilization must have required a period going back far beyond any
date that has yet been assigned to the deluge of Noah, or even to the
creation of the world.”f
From borings which have been made at New Orleans to the depth of
600 feet, from excavations for public works, and from examinations in
parts of Louisiana, where the range between high and low water is much
greater than it is at New Orleans, no less than 10 distinct cypress forests
divided from each other by eras of aquatic plants, &c., have been traced,
arranged vertically above each other, and from these and other data it is
estimated by Dr. Benet Dowler, that the age of the delta is at least 158,000
* Nott and Gliddon, “ Indigenous Races,” page 587.
f Gliddon’s “ Types of Mankind,” page 335.
�WERE ADAM AND EVE OUR FIRST PARENTS?
r
years, and in the excavations above referred to, human remains have beeB
found below the further forest level, making it appear that the human race
existed m the delta of the Mississippi more than 57,000 years ago.
*
It is further urged, by the same competent writer, that human bones
discovered oh the coast of Brazil near Santas, and on the borders of a
lake called Lagoa Santa, by Captain Elliott and Dr. Lund, thoroughly
incorporated with a very hard breccia, every one in a fossil state, demon
strate that aboriginal man in America antedates the Mississippi alluvia, and
that he can even boast a geological antiquity, because numerous species of
animals have become extinct since American humanity’s first appearance.f
With reference to the second point as to the possibility of tracing back the
diversities of the Human Race to an antediluvian date, it is amply sufficient
to point on the one side to the remains of the American Indian disentombed
from the Mississippi forests, and on the other to the Egyptian monuments,
tombs, pyramids, and stuccoes, revealing to us Caucasian men, and Negro
men, their diversities as marked as in the present day. Sir William J ones,
in his day, claimed for Sanscrit literature a vast antiquity, and asserted the
existence of the religions of Egypt, Greece, India, and Italy, prior to the
Mosaic era. So far as Egypt is concerned, the researches of Lepsius,
Bunsen, Champoilion, Lenormant, Gliddon, and others, have fully verified
the position of the learned president of the Asiatic Society.
We have Egyptian statutes of the third dynasty, going back far beyond
the 4,300 years, which would give the orthodox era of the deluge, and tak
ing us over the 4,500 years fixed by our second proposition. The fourth
dynasty is rich in pyramids, tombs, and statues; and according to Lepsius,
this dynasty commenced 3,426 B.C., or about 5,287 years from the present
date.
In reading a modern work on the orthodox side,} I have been much
pained by the constant assumption that the long chronologists must be in
error, because their views do not coincide with orthodox teachings. Ortho
dox authors treat their heterodox brethren as unworthy of credit, because
of their heterodoxy. The writer asserts§ that the earliest reference to the
Negro tribes is in the era of the 12th dynasty. Supposing for a moment
this to be correct, I ask what even then will be the state of the argument?
The 12th dynasty, according to Lepsius, ends about 4,000 years ago. The
orthodox chronology fixes the deluge about 300 years earlier. Will any
sane man argue that there was sufficient lapse of time in three centuries
for the development of Caucasian and Negro man from one family?
The fact is, that we trace back the various types of man now known,
not to one centre, not to one country, not to one family, not to one pair,
but we trace them to different centres, to distinct countries, to separate
families, probably to many pairs. Wherever the conditions for life are
found, there are living beings also. The conditions of climate, soil, &c^
of Central Africa, differ from those of Europe. The indigenous races of
Central Africa, differ from those of Europe.
• “ Types,” pages 336 to 369.
} "Archaia,” by Dr. Dawson.
f “ Types,” pages 350 and 357.
§ “ Archaia,” page 306.
�9
WEBB ADAM AND EVE OUB FIRST PABENTS?
Without pretending, in the present limited essay, to do more than index
some of the most prominent features of the case, I yet hope that enough is
here stated to interest my readers in the prosecution of future inquiry, upon
the important question which serves as the title to these pages. I put
forward no knowledge from myself, but am ready to listen to the teachings
of wiser men; and while I shrink from the ordinary orthodox assertion of
Adamic unity of origin, accompanied as it is by threats of pains and penal
ties if rejected, I am yet ready to receive it, if it can be presented to me
associated with facts, and divested of those future hell-fire torments and
present societarian persecutions which now form its chief, it not sole,
supports.
The rejection of the Bible account of the peopling of the world involves
also the rejection, as has been already remarked, of the entire scheme of
Christianity. According to the orthodox rendering of both New and Old
Testament teaching, all men are involved in the curse which followed
Adam’s sin. But if the account of the Fall be mythical; not historical; if
Adam and Eve—supposing them to have ever existed—were preceded on
the earth by many nations and empires, what becomes of the doctrine that
Jesus came to redeem mankind from a sin committed by one who was not
the common father of all humanity?
Reject Adam, and you cannot accept Jesus. Refuse to believe Genesis,
and you cannot give credence to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Paul.
The Old and New Testaments are so connected together, that to dissolve
the union is to destroy the system. The account of the Creation and Fall
of Man is the foundation-stone of the Christian Church—if this stone ba
rotten, the superstructure cannot be stable. It is therefore most important,
that those who profess a faith in Christianity should consider facts which so
vitally and materially affect the creed they hold.
�
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Were Adam & Eve our first parents?
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Bradlaugh, C
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Bible-O.T.-Genesis
Creation-Biblical Teaching
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https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/90b39eaa895834a829d9a4808e1749b9.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=KQTRL5L3bYVknmBKTJh9bClqgQI9Y6p2fQVuoywRi5KspmbSDq%7Ez14UA3LqWwodhC0lWX4SauBSy8qiVqJAq9b0JosDPvmKhDn3U2mPyaCMSg8yePsVoxEXXDw-NcgxxxgRlqAMCyqo64tIoJnXBSrBvGlqgRMc4pSqkFnoV-w03dNudapq950Ut-jW%7E55-nsWI9-6aRm59vUSFpegKQ2TsRrb7SYU2RJ2qMigfwg5ZQCPthF-Ni%7E7pIGHF7%7EmiwxaKqT86aXbdx1BrBNdfX0hkCUMsSYMoWJsZJ0liFfd6vzjj1O6tBdRX1mtP9pExVMG5OTlnITEfBAMlawG7lhw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
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CT
THE
CHALDEAN ACCOUNT OF GENESIS.
BY
Sir GEORGE WILLIAM DENYS, Bart.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
NO.
11,
THE TERRACE,
FARQUHAR ROAD,
UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E.
Price Fourpence.
��THE CHALDEAN ACCOUNT OF GENESIS *
N the thirteenth page of this most remarkable and
interesting work, Mr Smith says, “ The first series
I may call the ‘ story of the Creation and Fall/ and the
history is much fuller and longer than the correspond
ing account in the book of Genesis. With respect to
these Genesis narratives a furious strife has existed for
many years, every word has been scanned by eager
scholars, and every possible meaning which the various
passages could bear has been suggested; while the age
and authenticity of the narratives have been discussed
on all sides. In particular it may be said that the
account of the fall of man, the heritage of all Christian
countries, has been the centre of the controversy, for it
is one of the pivots on which the Christian religion
turns. The world-wide importance of these subjects will
therefore give the newly discovered inscriptions, and
especially the one relating to ‘the Fall’ an unparal
leled value.”
But is this “Fall of Man ” the heritage of Christian
countries only, as Mr Smith remarks ? Is not the old
story of temptation also the heritage of all heathen
times and countries ? Is there a cosmogony or theogony,
however ancient, in which, under one form or another,
the Adamic legend is not traceable ?
“ The symbol of the serpent associates itself with the
rise of all societies, is at the root of all mythologies, its
trace is lost in the far off depths of time, but amongst
animal symbol worship this is the most singular and
I
* By George Smith.
Sampson and Low, 1876.
�4
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
the widest spread.” Whether the serpent, prime agent
in “the fall,” be regarded as wisdom personified, as by
the Gnostic sect of Ophites, who honoured it as the
father of all science and knowledge, the key that un
locked for man the secret that should make him “ as
the gods knowing all things,” or as temptation under
the guise of a beautiful woman, (Bochart explains
how Eve in the Chaldee means serpent), the story
of Eden in the Mosaic narrative appears to be only
another phase of this ancient myth, though it is in
Genesis alone that the serpent is at once the prime
agent and symbol of evil.
Certainly the greatest interest must attach to the
unearthing of what we conceive to be the sources of
the Bible history, inasmuch as they tend to prove that
there is no more rational ground for accepting this
particular explanation of the origin of evil, than there
is for accepting any other hypothesis.
Mr Smith was certainly not sent out to Assyria by
the Daily Telegraph for the purpose of upsetting
the Mosaic cosmogony; but if in the course of his
investigations he was led materially to modify his own
previous convictions, we think that in the interest of
science and of truth he is bound to tell us so. We
do not hesitate therefore, “ in limine,” to put to him
the crucial question, Does he or does he not ascribe
to the Assyrian tablets an earlier origin than to the
Mosaic record? Eor it is upon this “pivot” that the
question of the inspiration of the Jewish record turns.
The art of reading Assyrian cuneiform is one of those
astonishing results of modern scientific research, which
appears destined to upset the time-honoured opinions
and beliefs of the greater part of the civilized world.
We know not whether to be sorry or glad; but few
there will be amongst those who have entered the last
decade of life, who will see without pain and sadness
that they have been trusting to the support of broken
reeds, and that they have to spend the remainder of
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
5
their lives in unlearning that which has taken them so
much time and pains to acquire.
Who that has passed middle life can there be who
has not thought long and seriously upon the origin and
destiny of the human race 1 Who has not waded
through innumerable works upon religion, history, and
science, in the hope of attaining an unassailable con
viction that the persuasions and convictions of his
earlier years were founded upon incontrovertible facts ?
Yet with every desire to stand by the ancient and timehonoured beliefs, truth compels us to say, the evidence
upon which we trusted, when weighed in the balance,
has been found wanting.
We cannot close our eyes to the light which is now
shining upon the dark pages of the primeval history of
man. The light will pierce whether we will or no.
Let us not waste the few remaining hours of life in
unavailing regrets, but rather thank God for the true
light which now shineth, and follow its beacon.
It is scarcely possible to speak of the “ Chaldean
Genesis ” without hurting the feelings of the orthodox.
My. desire is to speak tenderly and reverently of
writings which are still held sacred by the vast
majority of Christians, and of convictions which I
myself fully shared for the greater part of my life,
which are interwoven with all our dearest sympathies
and associations, hut still to speak with perfect sin
cerity.
If we hope to induce others to lay aside any of their
early prejudices, and to take heed to the results of
modern scientific discovery, we must lay aside all
hatred and uncharitableness, and in a calm and loving
manner place before them the results of the patient
labours of men, not a whit more irreligious than the
most orthodox of churchmen, and leave the remedy to
work its own cure.
The “Times” of December 4, 1875, reviewed with
its usual ability “ The Chaldean Account of Genesis,”
�6
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
but I venture in all humility to dissent in part from
the verdict of the writer in the leading journal. The
writer says “ that exegetical theology will see in it a
strong confirmation of the truth of an universal deluge.”
Possibly it may, but nobody else will. The existence
of the story at that early period, and of a universal
belief in it, would be no proof of the fact, but only of
the belief. It is the quod semper quod ubique quod
cd) omnibus, which never can prove a physical impossi
bility. Geological science no doubt proves that every
part of the stratified crust of the earth has not only
once, but repeatedly, been below the level of the sea;
but that fact will never prove “that the tops of the
highest hills ” were at one and the same time covered
with water.
It is also proved, by Geological Science, that at
sundry periods in past geological time the crust of the
earth has been unusually convulsed, great changes of
climate, great upheavals, great subsidings have occurred;
it is possible that not one, but several of these convul
sions may have happened since man first made his
appearance upon the earth, that a tradition of such a
catastrophe may have been retained by the early in
habitants, and clothed during the subsequent ages with
all the miraculous adjuncts natural to ages of ignorance.
The universal prevalence of such legends could only
strengthen a rational belief in local catastrophes.
Diodorus Siculus says, “ the ignorance prevailing re
garding the sense of the myths, on which religion is
founded, results from the thread of tradition having
been violently snapt by that great catastrophe which
we call the deluge, which caused the Pelasgians, the
ancestors of the Greeks, to lose the remembrance of
anterior events, and even the meaning of the graphic
signs destined to transmit them to posterity.” Hence
we may ask, can the Noachian deluge have occurred
anywhere near the Pelasgian era? Can we identify
the deluge of Diodorus with that of Berosus, with the
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
7
Assyrian tablets, and with the deluge of Noah ? We
find in Smith’s Classical Dictionary under Diodorus,
that in compiling his history, Diodorus exercised
neither judgment nor criticism. He simply collected
what he found in his different authorities, and thus
jumbled together history, myths, and fiction. He
cannot therefore be a trustworthy authority. Like
those impecunious Frenchmen who habitually ascribe
their poverty to having lost all “ dans la revolution,”
he ascribes his own ignorance, and that of his con
temporaries of these “graphic writings,” to the deluge.
May not these “graphic writings” have been these
very cuneiform inscriptions of which we are now
writing ? Of the Pelasgians we know very little, and
their fabled progenitor Pelasgus may have arisen out
of the sea like Joannes, or any other fabulous person
age ; but it is quite possible that Diodorus when on
his travels may have come across the same tradition of
a deluge which was related by Berosus.
Mr G. Smith has, we think, satisfactorily established
the identity of Noah, Hasisadra, and the Xisithrus of
the Assyrian tablets,—at least, the following accounts
from the “ clays” so exactly tallies with the Genesis
version of the flood that Noah and Xisithrus can
only be one and the same person. “ In the time of
Xisuthrus, tenth King of Chaldea, happened a great
deluge,” which is thus described : “ The Deity Cronos
appeared to Xisuthrus in a vision and warned him that
on the 15th day of the month Dsesius there would be
a flood by which mankind should be destroyed. Cronos,
therefore, enjoined Xisuthrus to write a history of the
beginning, procedure, and conclusion of all things, and
to bury it in the city of the Sun at Sippara, and to
build a vessel, and take with him into it his friends
and relations, and to convey on board everything neces
sary to sustain life, together with the different animals,
both birds and quadrupeds, and trust himself fearlessly
to the deep. Having asked the Deity Cronos (another
�8
‘ The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
name for Saturn)* whither he was to sail, he was
answered, “to the Gods,” upon which Xisuthrus offered
up a prayer for the good of mankind. He forthwith
obeys the “ divine admonition,” he builds a vessel of
five stadia in length and two in width, (we do not
know whether this is equivalent to Noah’s three hun
dred cubits) and conveys into it all the quadrupeds, and
his relations and friends. “ After the flood had been
upon the earth, and was in time abated, Xisuthrus sent
out birds from the vessel, which not finding any food,
nor any place whereupon they might rest their feet,
returned to him again; he sent them forth a second
time and they returned with their feet tinged with
mud;” the parallel between the two accounts is further
continued : “ Noah when he left the ark built an altar
unto the Lord, and took of every clean beast and of
every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the
altar.” “ Xisuthrus when he found his birds returned
no more the third time judged the surface of the earth
had appeared above the waters; he therefore made an
opening in the vessel, and upon looking out found it
was stranded upon the side of some mountain, upon
which he inmediately quitted it with his wife, his
daughter, and the pilot.” “ On reaching terra firma,”
we read, “ Xisuthrus then paid his adoration to the
earth; and having constructed an altar offered sacri
fices to the gods, and with those who had come out of
the vessel with him disappeared.” In Genesis we
read, that on descending from the ark, Noah also
offered sacrifice; but he did not disappear, and, hence
forward, the two accounts differ. The parallelism
between the Chaldean and the Genesis accounts of the
* In the Greek and Latin inscriptions of Syria, lately published
by Mr Waddington, we find mention of monuments of the worship
of Cronos or Kronos, as the Greeks called El. This word El means
chief or greatest, “ The Supreme.”
According to the great
Phoenician authority, Sanchoniathon, Kronos or Saturn was called
El by the Phoenicians. The God of Israel was also El-Elion, ElShaddai, El-Kanna. El in the Semitic pantheon is equivalent toDjaus in the Indo-European, the prefix of all gods.
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
9
flood up to this point are, however, so striking, that we
cannot resist the conclusion that the one springs from
the other.
If we turn for a moment to compare the account of
creation in the first chapter of Genesis with the Greek
cosmogony, we shall also find a parallelism.
In the cosmogony of the Greeks we read, according
to’ a learned authority, that “ Zeus,” the Supreme God
of the Greeks, engendered “ Ether and Chaos,” from
which he formed the egg of the world. Here we may
indeed be said to have arrived at the beginnings of
everything ! In all cosmogonies the “ Supreme God”
had somehow to engender this egg; the author of
“ Les Temps Mythologiques ” writes, “ Plutarch relates
that Osiris having produced the egg of the world there
shut up twelve white figures, but Typhon the Ethiopian
God, the genius of evil, introduced into it twelve black
figures, whence arose the mixture of good and evil.
The simple explanation of this is the fusion of the
black and white races.”
The Egyptian hieroglyphics very often place the
“ egg of the world” in the mouth of the viper Hof,
emblem of the sovereignty of Egypt.
In most of the cosmogonies the primordial egg is
floating on the waters ; Genesis repudiates the cos
mogonic egg, but we find there the primitive waters
anterior to all creation; “ And the Spirit of God moved
on the face of the waters.” * “ We have seen that all
mythologies express this singular idea of the waters
being coexistent with God before the formation of the
world, and in the Egyptian Ritual of the Dead there is
a passage which has perhaps served as text for the first
line of all cosmogonies. It is I,” said Osiris, “ who
have navigated the waters with the Celestial Gnomon,
* We may here remark how Professor Huxley’s scientific dicta
regarding all generative beginnings receives testimony from the
texts of these ancient cosmogonies, for he proves from long research
into the secrets of the womb of nature, that without a state of
fluid there is no possibility of life being engendered.
�io
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
and have manifested myself.” The very term “Spirit
of God ” is of Egyptian origin, and the Serpent holding
in his mouth the egg of the world is often called “ the
Spirit of God.”*
To quote again “Les Temps Mythologiques: ”—“The
most important truth that results from the study of
comparative mythologies is the identity of the principle
•on which all are based ; and we can only conclude that
there was but one theme on which all those documents
were based, and on which each successive race impressed
the genius of its special character.
“ Under what inspiration did this thesis spring to life ?
Was it due to the rhapsodical and imaginative East ?
to the pantheistic naturalism of India, which reached
the far off West ? Is it the heritage of the profound
wisdom of Egypt carried into Asia by her colonists,
and must we here seek for vestiges of the most ancient
of peoples ? There is no doubt that as time went on
the learned priests of different ages assembled together
to elaborate the grave questions as to the formation of
the world and the birth of man, in which, assisted by
the rare documents that had escaped the deluge, they
constructed the cosmogonies of their different countries.
“ Thus are explained the variations in the Phoenician
document, without doubt the nearest to our own times,
and which variation has greatly puzzled both French
and German savans as to them, there appeared many
cosmogonies, the same au fond but different in form.
This which first suggested doubts as to the authenticity
of the document became instead the strongest proof in its
support.”
In the Assyrian version of the deluge we read that
“ Xisuthrus deposited his account of all that had been
the procedure and the end of all things, in the City of
the Sun, Sippara.”
By a very singular coincidence, the writings of
Thoth are also said to have been discovered at this
* “Monsieur de Rouge.”
�The Chaldean Account of Cenesis.
1 I
same city of Sippara in Chaldea. Philon of Byblos,
who lived about a.d. 24, published in Greek a trans
lation of Sanchoniathon’s “History of the Phoenicians;”
the work is lost, a few fragments only of it being
preserved by Eusebius. Sanchoniathon is by some
thought to have been a contemporary of Semiramis,
b.c. 2000, by others of Moses, b.c. 1700; others again
as low as b.c. 1200. In the fragments preserved of
Philo, Byblos’ Greek translation, he states, that his
-document regarding the creation of the world was
written before the flood.
We read under the head of Thoth in Bouillet’s
“Dictionary of Universal History,” that Thoth was an
Egyptian God, that it was he who sent Osiris to the
earth. That the forty-two volumes of Egyptian sacred
books were written by him. He was represented
sometimes with an Ibis’ head. By some he is con
sidered the same as the Greek Hermes or Mercury;
and the Hermes Trismegistus of the Alchemists’ Trismegistus, meaning thrice great. This entirely fabulous
personage is placed also at B.c. 2000, at which distance
of time the invention of language, of the alphabet, of
writing, geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, and medicine,
together with all the arts and sciences, may be safely
attributed to him, for no one will be at the pains to
disprove it. Bouillet further states, that a quantity of
religious books were attributed to him, called “ Livres
hermetiques,” and that Hermes Trismegistus appears
to have been for the Ancients at once “ the symbol of
the divine intelligence, the Logos of Plato, and the
personification of the Egyptian priesthood.” Of these
works one remains entitled “ On the Nature of Things
and the Creation of the World,” probably as apo
cryphal as Hermes himself. The singularity, however,
remains, of the existence of the tradition that the
works of an Egyptian should have been buried in
Sippara, a city of Chaldea. We have probably here
also an identity of different phases of the same mythus,
�12
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
with a confusion of names and places. This would alsoexplain why “ the various cosmogonies that have come
down to us all bear such a family likeness, the Hebrew,
the Greek, and the Phoenician have all drawn from
the same source.”
The writer in the 11 Times,” to whom we must now
revert, says: “It is evident that the Chaldean
account differs essentially from the deluge of Noah.”
That the Hebrews had retained a simpler and conse
quently older version of the deluge is clear, for the
scriptural narrative at all events is prior to the building
of ships and construction of rudders.” In my opinion
the “ simpler” version of the Jews proves the compara
tively modern and improved edition of an old story
more suitable to the advanced conceptions of the Jews
at the time of the Babylonian captivity, during which
they had ample opportunities of studying the Baby
lonian records, when we know that the Old Testament
was in great part re-written.
Is it likely that at a time when the Jews as a nation
were non-existent, when they were a set of “ wandering
Nomads in search of a home,” * they should have been
in possession of more authentic records than a nation in
so high a state of civilization as the Babylonians ?
The “ Times ” continues, “ every effort will be made
to rescue and preserve the pieces which lie hidden in
the recesses of the valley of the Tigris. Till all these
pieces are visible to the eye of the discoverer, the pro
blems of chronology, mythology, and history, are am
biguous oracles or inexplicable riddles. They will
neither disturb faith nor dissipate doubt, but will be
the raw material for the intellect to spin and weave
into a connected woof.”
I venture to think that if every baked brick in
Assyria were discovered tomorrow, we should be no
nearer the solution of the “ inexplicable ” than we are
* Vide Introduction to Pentateuch and book of Joshua, by a
Physician. Scott’s Series.
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
13
now. History and chronology can never be founded on
myths or legends. Facts are what the historian wants.
Now the facts which have been proved by the
Assyrian discoveries are the following :—
The Assyrian baked bricks date from the fifteenth
century b.c. lt There is reason to think (says the
‘ Times ’) that some of the transcripts are as old as
twenty, and certainly not later than fifteen centuries
B.c. At such an early period the pentateuch could not
have been written (w'cte Introduction to Pentateuch,
before quoted), for it has long since been definitely
shown that writing in the proper sense of the word
appears not to have been practised by the Jews so
relatively recent as the days of David.
“ The Hebrew word for ink is of Persian derivation,
and the art of writing on prepared sheep and goat skins
among them, dates from no more remote an age than the
Babylonian captivity.”
We find, then, amid a vast series of records of myths,
legends, or whatever we may please to call them—stories
of the creation, of the fall, the tree of life, the serpent,
the war in heaven, and the casting out of the dragon,
the flood with the ark or ship, and the sending forth of
the raven and the dove, the grounding of the ark upon
a mountain; of the institution of the Sabbath, and of
the building of the tower of Babel, besides Bel and the
dragon, and many other fabulous tales. What are we
to infer from these things ? Is it not infinitely more
probable that the Jews copied from the Babylonians
during the captivity, adapting many things to their
then more advanced conceptions, than that the Baby
lonians copied from the Jews? We find that the
Assyrians did so, for these are all transcripts or copies,
and the Assyrians tell us so. Why not the Jews also ?
We know they took subsequently many religious ideas
from the Persians. But what follows if they did ? The
reverse of what the “ Times ” states, for faith will be
shaken and doubts will be disseminated. The faith of
�14
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
those who, in spite of all the biblical critics, Colenso,
Kalisch, Kuenen, and the rest, still believed in the
historical accuracy of Genesis ; for if the Mosaic narra
tive instead of being inspired from on high turns out to
be a copy, or rather an adaptation of an ancient tradi
tion, how can it do otherwise than shake their belief 1
“ The pious people who, in person or by delegate, have
been so busy excavating in Palestine and Babylonia
with a view to demonstrate the divine origin and his
torical truth of the Hebrew scriptures, seem verily to
be pursuing their work to their own discomfiture.” *
Those who doubted before will have their doubts
confirmed, for such an amount of cumulative evidence
it is impossible to withstand.
It is quite possible that Abraham, supposing him to
have been an historical personage, and to have come
from Ur of the Chaldees, may have brought away with
him many of the Babylonian traditions.
The author of the Chaldean Genesis modestly and
wisely refrains from dogmatising or pronouncing any
opinion which might excite the “ odium theologicum.”
He says, page 284, “ Biblical criticism is, however, a
subject on which I am not competent to pronounce an
independent opinion,” and that he “ could not take up
any of the prevailing views without being a party to the
controversy.” He thinks, however, “that all will admit
a connection of some sort between the biblical narrative
and the cuneiform texts.” I cannot, however, admit
that there was “ such a total difference between the
religious ideas of the two peoples (as he states), the
Jews believing in one God, the Creator and Lord of
the Universe, while the Babylonians worshipped gods
and lords many, every city having its local deity, and
these being joined by complicated relations in a poetical
mythology, which was in marked contrast to the severe
simplicity of the Jewish system,” p. 285. The pure
monotheistic worship to which the Jews ultimately at* Introduction to Book of Joshua, by a Physician.
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
15
tained was the work of ages.* Their entire history
proves how prone they were to worship the gods of the
surrounding nations. The great value of the inscrip
tions describing the Flood, p. 286, consists not in the
fact that they form an independent testimony in favour
of the biblical narrative at a much earlier date than any
other evidence, for the earlier narrative cannot testify
in favour of the later.
The two accounts are no doubt records of the same
event, of which other versions, over and above that of
Berosus, may one day be discovered, but the endeavour
to reconcile their many conflicting statements is about
as hopeless an affair as the endeavour to reconcile the
Mosaic cosmogony with modern geological science.
With regard to the vexed question of our chronology
and its correctness, I have no pretensions as a chronologist, but in so far as I have studied the subject I
must confess that I have no faith in the correctness of
any date prior to the first Olimpiad, or b.o. 776. The
verification of any dates subsequent to that, the identi
fication of the names of different kings in divers ancient
historical tablets downwards from a firm historical
standpoint is no doubt an interesting subject of study
for the archeologist, but from the moment we ascend
into the mythical period all chronology must be at
fault and whether we take the lists of Manetho,
Berosus, or his 380,000 years, the ante-diluvian
patriarchs or any other, we are compelled to class them
all together as rude attempts to explain the inexplicable,
to construct fact out of fiction.
Far easier would it be to write the history of our
paleolithic and neolithic ancestors, for they at any rate
have left no lying legends behind them to confuse us.
They have not left records of any ancestors with heads
* Sabaoth, the Jehovah of the Gnostics, recalls very closely
the Jupiter Sabazius of antiquity that the Jewish colony adored
in Rome, 139 B.c., and for which cause they were expelled from
the city, and even from Italy. Jao is also a name for Bacchus,
Sabazius, or Saturn.
�16
The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
of birds or of beasts. They had no need to invent
tales of the slaughter of giants and other fabulous
monsters of sea and land to bolster up their courage
with posterity, for the testimony of the rocks is there
to tell of their heroic deeds, of the ages they lived and
reigned upon this our earth. They needed no baked
bricks, for deep down in the bowels of the earth their
fossil bones lie buried side by side with those of the
elephas primigenius and other gigantic but real animals
with whom, in their hard struggle for existence, they
had to contend, and the simple instruments they wielded
in the contest. On the horns of the reindeer are admir
ably etched the portrait of the Mammoth, proving the
love of art even in that remote age.
When I look at these simple relics of an heroic
people, when I think of the “ antres vast and deserts
idle” in which they were compelled to live, of the
struggle for existence they were compelled to endure
with the huge extinct mammals, I am lost in admiration
at their hardihood and in pity at their fate; but when
I turn to look at a picture of Izdubar struggling with
a rampant bull, one hand holding the tail and the
other a horn, I am simply disgusted at such ludicrous
absurdity.
Izdubar may have been for all that a real king and
a hero, but when we come to fix his reign as the start
ing point of history, that is quite another matter.
Mr G. Smith puts the age of Izdubar, i.e. Nimrod, at B.c.
The deluge of IS oah, according to our chronology, was ,,
Menes founds the Egyptian monarchy
.
.
„
Nimrod, according to our chronology, founds Assyrian
monarchy ...
....
2500.
2348.
2233.
2233.
If our chronology is to be trusted, the two great
monarchies, the Egyptian and the Assyrian, were
founded 115 years after the flood. Where did the
people come from ? every soul having perished except
Noah and his family 115 years before.
If Smith’s date for Izdubar is right he must have
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
17
lived 152 years before the flood, and could not there
fore have founded an empire which that catastrophe
must have destroyed. The earliest monuments known,
date, according to Mr Smith, 250 years later than the
time of Izdubar, and the traditions on which those
legends are founded arose shortly after his death.
“ Chaldean Genesis,” p. 106.
Surely the flood, if it. happened at all, must have
swept away the traditions as it did the people.
Amid such a mass of fable the search for historical
truth is very like searching for the needle in the hay
stack.
Compare Izdubar, b.c.
Joshua, ,,
Hercules, ,,
Gideon,. „
Samson, ,,
2500 j
1451 ; also Deluge of Noah, b.c. 2348
1330
Deluge of Ogyges, ' „ 1796
1245!
Deluge of Deucalion ,, 1503
1136 J
If from mythical events, we turn to mythical in
dividuals, we cannot fail being struck with the extraor
dinary family likeness in the characters and deeds of
the different heroes. Mr Smith in speaking of Izdubar,
p. 294, says :—“Every nation has its hero, and it was
only natural on the revival of his empire, that the
Babylonians should consecrate his memory,” and in
another place he says that, “ the natural tendency of
those superstitious times was to invest their great men
with all sorts of miraculous powers, to attribute to
them heroic deeds, that we are not on that account
justified in doubting the real existence of the King or
Hero in question. He is of opinion that Izdubar was
the Nimrod of Genesis, that Hasisadra was the Noah
of Genesis, and that the Xisuthrus of Berosus, and his
account of the flood was only another version of the
Babylonian legend.
The labours of Hercules, and the deeds of Samson
are strangely alike, as are also the births of Moses and
Sargon the first, the latter having been placed by his
mother in an ark of rushes, launched upon the Euphrates,
�18
. •
The. Chaldean Account of Genesis.
and rescued by a water-carrier, who brought him up as
his son.” (Smith’s “ Assyrian Discoveries,” p. 228.)
Without entering upon the vexed question of the
dates of these legends, it must be allowed at all events,
that priority belongs to the profane rather than to the
sacred legends. The Assyrian Tablets constitute there
fore our earliest “ Book of Origins,” origins, it must be
allowed, not of history, for no one in his senses would
attempt to found history, or base his religion upon what
are after all nothing but the rude attempts of the most
ancient civilized nation we know of, to dive into the
secrets of the early ages of mankind. They are deeply
interesting and poetical myths, nothing more. What
then should be our conclusion 1
If the so-called Mosaic account “ turns out after all
to be neither history, nor original revelation from
Jehovah to the Jews, but stories found among neigh
bours.” If we have found out at last that we have
been building our house upon the sand, what then ?
Let us not be downhearted, neither let us be dismayed,
rather let us say, “ let God be true and every man a
liar.” Let us be thankful to God for the light given
to us in this our day, through the unwearied labours of
men like Rawlinson, Smith, Layard, Loftus, Rassam,
earnest seekers after truth and lovers of science. Dog
matic theology may suffer ; but true religion will never
suffer from any scientific discovery. The tendency not
of one, but of all the sciences, is to exalt all our religious
conceptions. Theology has debased them !
In concluding these remarks, I cannot do better than
by again quoting from the work of the able physician
(Pentateuch and Book of Joshua, p. 14).
“ Shah we who measure our distance from the sun
and fixed stars, calculate their masses, weigh them as
in a balance, analyse their light, and thereby learn that
they are all units in one stupendous whole, continue to
look with respect on tales that tell of the arrest of the
sun and moon in their apparent path through heaven,
�The Chaldean Account of Genesis.
19
to the end that a barbarous horde may have light
effectually to exterminate the unoffending people,
they have come—by God’s command, too, it is said—
to plunder and to murder ? It were surely time to
quit us of such worse than childish folly.”
May the spirit of truth guide us into all truth, to .
the truth which will break our fetters and make us free
indeed, to the truth which will widen our vision/
strengthen and exalt our hopes, and enlarge our
charity.
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, GEORGE STREET, EDINBURGH.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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The Chaldean account of Genesis
Creator
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Denys, George William [Sir, Bart.]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 19 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. A critique of 'The Chaldean Account of Genesis' by George Smith (Sampson and Low, 1876).
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
Date
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[1877]
Identifier
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CT202
Subject
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Bible
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The Chaldean account of Genesis), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Bible-O.T.-Genesis
Book Reviews
Conway Tracts
George Smith