We are all familiar to some extent with the creation stories in the Bible and the Babylon story of Gilgamesh and the Garden of Eden and how they seem to correspond in many ways. Some use these simulators in an attempt to discredit the Biblical account but in my opinion they are overlooking two very important points. One there were two creations of mankind, in Genesis 1:27 and 1:28. Male and female were created to have dominion over all the animals and to subdue and “replenish” the earth.
Has this happened before? How do you replenish something that hasn’t been there before? Makes 2012 a little more interesting wouldn’t you think?
The second creation is in Genesis 2:7. He created Adam and placed him in Eden and after a while God gave him a wife. I’ll bet that made him happy until he had to start taking out the trash.
I know the creation of two (maybe more) kinds of humans is horrifying to the politically correct crowd but if you were to read a book on anthropology written before 1950, you would know there are several anatomical differences in humans. This was (is) how they track tribal movements in pre-history.
Adam was more of a spiritual being as he talked to God and lived in the garden while the other people were busy having dominion over the beast of the field and subduing (civilizing) and replenishing the earth.
The point I’m trying to make is they were contemporary; in fact the people outside the garden were here first. Where do you think Cain got his wife and why put a mark him as Adam and his family already knew he killed Abel. These other people had to know of the garden and more than likely tried to enter it. Tales of these attempts would have been told over and over each time growing in heroism and mysticism. I also have no doubt there is some truth in the Gilgamesh story. Something has to happen for any myth to start and it must be believable at that time to be told and retold through the centuries.
The second point pertains to Abraham who no doubt brought the story of the creation with him when he left Ur. Some say because the story of Gilgamesh was written before the Old Testament that Abraham borrowed the story from the Babylonians. As I see it the only similarity of the two stories is the place where they happened. Gilgamesh is a story of an ancient hero trying to get into the garden, while the Biblical story is how Adam got kicked out.
It is my opinion that both stories are rooted in truth and come to us from two different people who lived in the same region but had an entirely different ancestral history.
One thing I must make clear. The Bible is a history of the Jewish people and their mysticism, (in my world magic and miracles are one and the same) not of the world and all religious text are more about religion than historical fact.
Adam was the first Jew. That is what makes them the chosen people and the most envied and hated people in the world. Deep down we all know this and it makes many hate them for their special relationship with God, forgetting Jesus and His promise, that we all can have a place in God's house.
So all of you out there that still hold a grudge after two thousand years give it up. It was all preordained by God and no one could have changed it. For someone to hate the Jews for Jesus’ death is to question the will of God, and what about poor Judas. He had no choice.
You do have a choice you can give the hate to God, he has big shoulders.
Thomas