Commissioned by God: True and Parody

Koot van Wyk (Dlitt et Phil; ThD)

 

Heat will not be in heaven, Christ says through John in Revelation 7:16 “neither shall the sun light on them nor any heat”. With a week of unprecedented tempatures of heat and 65 people dying in Japan because of heatwaves, one can be glad that heaven will not have heat.

It was in the heat of 1450 BCE at the age of 40 that Moses was looking for shade in Midian. A bush was suddenly on fire and he wanted to see. God saw him coming and told him not to come close. It was the beginning of his commission to lead the people out of Egypt. Moses was in touch with the “Invisible” and rejected the umbrella of safety and glory of Egypt for his religion, says Hebrews 11:24-27.

Exodus 3:2-8 recorded Moses meeting with God. God’s message to Moses is that he must not look at God or try to look at God.

It was in the heat of the desert around the Sphinx in 1420-1418 BCE that Thutmosis IV, the grandson of the Napoleon of Egypt who died in the Red Sea at the Exodus of Israel from Egypt in 1450 that fateful March, that he was looking for some shade. Thut IV found shade as a young teenager next to the Sphinx. He fell asleep and dreamed that the god appeared to him and asked him to look at him. So different from Moses. He also wanted to make him a glorious king of Egypt. His complaint was that dust and sand is covering the Sphinx and that it is in need of cleaning.

What Thut IV was doing is to take the famous history of Moses thirty years later, which he also heard about, and to make a parody of it fitting his own calling. All that God said to Moses that he will do with them and with him, Thut IV turned around and said the god want to do with him, not leaving Egypt. The true calling and the fake parody. The recasting of the true. But not the true. A non-existent fake god spoke to Thut IV in the dream.

Jesus appeared to the disciples in Matthew 28:16-20. He promised that He will be with them until the end of time. What he commissioned them to do is to teach everything He taught and commanded. What did He teach? What did He commanded? He taught the whole Bible revealing Himself and the work of the Trinity. So the fake will be an attempt to have Christ without doctrines. Just Christ, no doctrines. “Teach them and baptise them” said Christ in this great commission. But what will be the fake? Baptise them as babies while they know nothing and inted to teach them many years later. What a recasting of the commission of Christ.  

Commissioned sketches.jpeg

 

Source: Koot van Wyk, A Commentary on Archaeological Elements in the Book of Judges. Doctor of Theology dissertation, Rikkyo University, Tokyo, 2008, pages 113-115

Extract from dissertation. . . .

I46 Thutmosis IV Sphinx Stela (lines 8-13)

Source: Kasia Szpakowska 2003 Transliterations

Transliteration and Translation

wʿ m nn hr.w pr.wt pw jrj.n s3-nzw Djwtj-ms r stwt

one of these days it happened that was son of king Thutmosis strolling

r tr nj mtr.t

pw jr(w).n=f n šw.t n.t nr pn ʿ3

he relaxed in the shadow of god this great (one)

jj.n sw ʿ.wy nqdd m 3.t rʿ m wp.t

overcame him sleep and slumber at the moment the sun was at zenith.

(9) gm.n=f m nj nr pn šps r md.t m r3=f s=f mj-qd

he found the majesty of this god venerable speaking from his mouth his own

like

jtj=f r s3=f m d

his father to his son saying

m33 wj rk dgj wj rk s3=j Ḏḥwtj-ms

look at me gaze at me my son Thutmosis

jnk jtj=k r-m-3.t-prj-Rʿ-Tm

I am your father Horem Akhet-khepri-ra-atum.

dj(=f) n=k nzw.t=j (10) [tp t3=j n.t ʿn.w

I shall give to you my kingship upon my land the head of the living

jw]=k ws ḥḏ.t=s n.t=s r s.t Gb rpʿ.t

you shall carry its white crown, its red crown upon the seat of Geb the heir.

jw n=k t3 m 3w=f ws=f s:ḥḏ.t 3.t Nb-r

shall belong to you the land in its lenghth and its breadth that which illuminates

the eye of the lord of all

f3.w r=k nw nw t3.wy

provisions to you from within the two lands

jn.w ʿ3 nj 3s.wt nb

gifts great from foreign lands, all ʿḥʿ.w nw tr ʿ3 m rnp.t

a lifetime of time great in years

jw r=j n=k jb=j n=k jw=k n=j

belongs my face to you my heart to you, you to me

(11) [mk sr=j mj wnn m šnw ḥʿ.w=j nb stp]

[behold my condition is like one suffering my limbs (all) are ruined

sj wj šʿ.w nj 3s.wt t3 wn.t.n=j r=s

faces me the sand of desert land upon which I used to be

sjn.n=j r rdj.t jrj=k ntt wn m jb=j

I have waited it is in order to cause that you do what is in my heart

r=kw r-d ntk s3=j n.t=j

for I know it is said to you my son my savior

s3 rk

arrive behold

mk wj nʿ=k

I am together with you

jnk (12) [sšm=k

I am [your guide

sʿrq md.t tn

completed this speech

wn.jn s3-nzw pn gg.w n s]m=f [nn...............r

stared son of the king this, he heard this speech

r.n=f md.t nr pn

he understood the words of this god

rdj.n=f gr] m [jb=f]

he placed silence in his mouth

Van Wyk notes:

I47 There are strong parallels between the encounter that Moses had in the wilderness of Midian with the Lord in Exodus 3 in 1450 BCE and this encounter that Thutmosis IV had with his god, the Sphinx in 1420-1418 BCE. There are enormous differences:

1. The Lord of Moses is the savior not Moses. Thutmosis IV is called Savior of the god.

2. In both cases it is said that the Lord will be with Moses and the god of Thutmosis IV is together with him.

3. Both the Lord and the god of the dream of Thutmosis IV wanted their subjects to do what is in their hearts.

4. Moses is called to leadership and Thutmosis IV is called to kingship.

5. The god wants Thutmosis IV to gaze upon him but in the case of Moses he could not see the Lord and took of his sandals.

6. A land is promised to Thutmosis IV in similar vein as the Lord promised to Moses a land thirty years before.

7. In the case of Moses in 1450 BCE the appearance was real and in a theophany. In the case of Thutmosis IV in 1420-1418 BCE the appearance of the god was in a dream.

8. It is almost that the calling of Moses annals from 1450 BCE is

plagarized by the scribe of Thutmosis IV in 1420-1418 BCE.

9. In the light of what we know of the calling of the upcoming

leader Moses in 1450 BCE and what we can see here 30 years later in the life of an upcoming new pharaoh, is that one cannot miss the attempt to (probably for superstitious reasons) to mirror the same events that gave the Israelites the victory of the

pax-Egyptica in 1450 BCE, namely the Lord in His theophany during Moses' calling, in the calling of Thutmosis IV to be pharaoh.

They probably reasoned that if Thutmosis IV follows the same

events that happened in the life of the successful Moses in 1450

BCE, he would also have success in his cause. That means, the priority of religion of the calling God is very important. As Moses used the principle of equal distribution for all tribes of Israel, so Thutmosis IV thought that he would use the same principle for taking care of all the sanctuaries of Egypt. It was as if Thutmosis IV was taking Moses as his role-model for success.

10. What we have here is a process of simulation of popular world literature. Anyone who has studied Ptolemaic Alexandria by P. M. Fraser (1972) in four volumes, will know that the phenomenon of simulation of popular literature of the Umwelt, and the creation of new literature on the basis of old frames or mirroring techniques that others successfully used in the past, was common.

We also know that Hittites translated Sumerian and Babylonian

works into Hittite. A reworking of the annals of Moses about his calling into a plagarized form applied to Thutmosis IV in the dream stela is thus not such a farfetched idea. The iconography of the pharaoh stepping on the enemies was plagiarized during this time by nearly all pharaohs with attribution of the facts to themselves. The dream stela is evidence of the same phenomenon, but from Israelite literature. The book of Joshua says that the Exodus event was on all lips of the Levant.