Were
our first ancestors civilized or uncivilized? Did they wander constantly, hunt
and fish for a living? Could they write? Modern science once thought our first
ancestors were the most ignorant barbarians. However, the recent findings of
archaeologists have altered this concept. Dr. W.W. Dawson, a Canadian scientist,
has this to say in his book, The Bible Confirmed by Science. "Neither in Egypt
nor in Babylonia has any beginning of civilization been found. As far back as
archaeology can take us, man is already civilized, building cities and temples,
carving hard stone into artistic forms, and even employing a system of picture
writing. Of Egypt it may be said, the older the country the more perfect it is
found to be. The fact is a very remarkable one, in view of modern theories of
development, and of the evolution of civilization out of barbarism. Such
theories are not borne out by the discoveries of archaeology. Instead of the
progress we should expect, we find retrogression and decay. Where we look for
the rude beginnings of art, we find an advanced society and artistic perfection.
Is it possible that the Biblical view is right after all, and that civilized man
has been civilized from the outset?
W.W.
Prescott in his book, "The Spade and the Bible" says, "Not a ruined city has
been opened up that has given any comfort to unbelieving critics or
evolutionists. Every find of archaeologists in Bible lands has gone on to
confirm and confound its enemies." Life centered on the temple. The temple
towers of Babylonia were of the same design, a series of vast, almost square
platforms, with stairways leading up. The shrine for the god was on the top.
The
ziggurats at Ur had three to eight platforms. The shrine at the top was in blue
glazed brick with a golden metal roof. The Babylonian word ziggarat means a
pinnacle on top of a mountain. The theory is that the ancient conquerors of
these plains were mountaineers who, either from homesickness or from religious
conservatism or both wished to worship their god on the high places as they had
always done. In Chaldea they had to make the high places with their own hands.
The account of the building the tower of Babel is the record of such an event.
In
Genesis 11:2-3 we read, "And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the
east, that they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick and burn them
thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and asphalt had they for mortar. And
they said, Go to, let us build a city and a tower, whose top may reach into
heaven." These temples were not only places of worship. Around their courts were
storehouses for the tithes and offerings brought in by the faithful worshipers,
or paid as rent by tenants. There were living quarters for the priests and the
temple servants. There were workshops and factories where the men and women,
attached to the temple were employed, spinning and weaving into cloth the wool,
which the farmers brought. There was also casting and hammering into art objects
the copper and silver paid as tithes by the merchants of the city.
Exhaustive
accounts were kept of what was received and what was disbursed. Immense cattle
yards were kept where the livestock, given to the temple, were cared for.
Contracts were found setting forth their responsibilities and regulating their
profits, documents referring to granaries, freight boats, etc.
The
temple stood in relation to the people as the state does in modern times and the
records here are of administration. The records show an efficient and
well-organized community. Each person had a cylinder seal, which was rolled
across the wet clay and used in place of a signature. These seals are very
small, some only 5/8ths of an inch long. It took great skill and very tiny tools
to carve these. Various semi precious stones were used. One of gold was found in
the tomb of a queen.
About
3750 B.C., the art of the seal reached perhaps its highest expression. They
carved figures whose physical characteristics were emphasized realistically. At
the center of the composition there was a panel containing an inscription. One
inscription shows a bearded hero watering buffalo from a vase out of which
flowed two streams, and then it shows water and a rock border at the bottom. The
inscription names Ibnisharrum as the owner of the seal and dedicates it to
Shargalisharri, king of Akkad. He was a grandson of Sargon, or Cain, as we know
him. This whole scene was on a cylinder seal less than an inch long and perhaps
the size of my little finger. No modern jewel engraver could do better.
Because
it is difficult to imagine life other than in terms of that which they knew,
they assumed that man's occupations and needs hereafter would be similar to what
they have been in the past, that the next world is a continuation of this world.
Whatever a man used in this lifetime he will use after death. The woman took her
spindle, needle, mirror and her cosmetics. The carpenter took his saw and
chisels, the soldier his weapons of war. The king must be provided with a goodly
sample of his pomp on earth. It is not surprising then that the archaeologist
derives most of his material from the cemeteries of the old world. What he finds
illustrates not only their beliefs and burial customs, but also their life
style. From the royal tombs at Ur, dating about 3000 B.C., come some very
beautiful things. The famous gold dagger of Ur, a weapon whose blade is gold,
its hilt of lapis lazuli decorated with gold studs, and its sheath of gold
filigree work. With it was another object scarcely less remarkable. It was a
cone shaped container of gold, ornamented with a spiral pattern and containing a
set of little toilet instruments, tweezers, lancet and pencil, also of gold.
The
royal graves all had a harp. The most magnificent yet found, has a sounding box
bordered with a broad edging of mosaic in red, white and blue. The two uprights
were encrusted with white shell and lapis lazuli and red stone arranged in zones
separated with wide gold bands. Shell plaques engraved with animal scenes
adorned the front. Above these projected a splendid head of a bearded bull
wrought in heavy gold, with a lapis lazuli beard.
Queen
Shubad, on her deathbed, wore an ornate headdress of a long gold hair ribbon
covered by beaded wreaths with gold pendants. She also wore heavy gold earrings
and a golden Spanish type comb with five points ending in lapis centered flowers
of gold. By the side of the body lay a second headdress. On a diadem, made of
soft white leather, had been sewn thousands of minute lapis lazuli beads.
Against this background of solid blue, were set a row of exquisitely fashioned
gold animals, stags, gazelles, bulls and goats. Between them there did their
leaves shield clusters of pomegranates, three fruits hanging together. There was
a helmet of beaten gold made to fit low over the head with cheek pieces to
protect the face. It was in the form of a wig, the locks of hair hammered in
relief, the individual hairs shown by delicate lines. The ears were rendered in
high relief and are pierced so as not to interfere with hearing.
Sir
Leonard Wooley, who headed the expedition at Ur said, "As an example of the
goldsmiths work, this is the most beautiful thing we have found. If there were
nothing else by which the art of these ancient Sumerians could be judged we
should still, on the strength of it alone, accord them high rank in the roll of
civilized races.
The
content of the tombs illustrates a very highly developed state of
society. Not all
the world had a high culture for basically only those who have it now, had it
then. Sir Charles Marston in his book, The Bible Comes Alive says, "All stages
of civilization exist today throughout the world, and so far as we are aware,
always have existed. And where glorious monuments certify to a great past, those
who now dwell around them often testify to a great decay." The old truths of the
Bible, which are ever new, will abide. Like their author, they are "The same
yesterday, and today, and forever." They can't be shaken. Current world history
is fulfilling the Bible's prophecies. Its truth is written on the ruins of
earthly kingdoms. Neither the Bible nor Babylonian excavations know anything of
uncivilized man. Life at the beginning was necessarily simple, but it was not
only enlightened, it was cultured.