mysteries of egyptian zodiacs - HiddenMysteries Information Central

”... the Christian chronographers put secular chronography
into the service of sacred history ... Jerome’s compilation
became the standard of chronological knowledge in the West
...”
“J. Scaliger, the founder of modern chronological science,
aimed at reconstructing the work of Eusebius ... The dating
of Eusebius, often transmitted incorrectly in manuscripts, are
of little use to us today ...” 6
Ambiguities and speculative character of these cabalistic
calculations of the “date of the creation of the world” resulted
in a wide range of postulated dates. Let us list some of them 7
as an example:
5969 B.C. — the Antiochian dating according to Theophilus;
5872 B.C. — Septuagint date also called the
“dating of the seventy interpreters”
5551 B.C. — St. Augustine’s date
5515 B.C. — the Theophilus’ date, also 5507 B.C.
5508 B.C. — the Byzantine date also known as
“the Constantinopol version”
5500 B.C. — according to Hippolytus and
Sextus Julius Africanus
5493 B.C. — the Alexandrian date, the Annian era,
also 5472 B.C or 5624 B.C.
5199 B.C. — according to Eusebius of Caesarea
4700 B.C. — the Samaritan date
4004 B.C. — according to Ussher, the Hebrew date
3941 B.C. — according to Hieronymus
3761 B.C. — Jewish date
The above examples are just a small fraction of all the existing
dates of the “creation of the world,”or the so-called “Genesis
date.” There are about 200 such dates. Notice the substantial
differences between these dates reaching up to 2200 years
(2208 years to be more precise). In fact, the choice of the
correct “date of Genesis” was not at all artificial. It was crucial
for the dating of the majority of documents in which the
dates of the described events were indicated in years since the
“creation of the world” without indicating, however, which
“creation” they actually mean. Since there are many possible
variants to choose from, the resulting from it discrepancies
in dating of these documents could reach up to 2200 years.
The Catholic and Protestant Church sanctioned approval of
the “date of creation” prevented up to the 18th century any
critical revision or analysis of the ancient chronology.
J. Scaliger and D. Petavius were the first to use the astronomical
methods for the confirmation of the late medieval version
of the chronology. However, these methods were not applied
for its critical analysis or verifications. Nevertheless, for
many contemporary commentators this gives sufficient reasons
to consider the Scaliger version of chronology as built
on a “scientific” basis. In this way the chronology of the
Catholic Church suddenly became “scientific.” There are not
many people who know that Scaliger and Petavius achieved
6 See [67], pp. 87-88.
7 See [69], p. 73 for more examples.
1.1 Creation of the Contemporary Chronology of the Ancient Times 3
the highest levels of “perfection” in their “absolutely precise”
dating of all the principal historical events: they quoted
the year, month, day, and even the time of day for these
events. Strangely, the modern textbooks usually quote the
years according to Scaliger-Petavius, conveniently omitting
the month, day and hour.
This shade of “scientific approach,” which was supported
strongly by the Church and political authorities, gave to the
17th- and 18th-century chronologists sufficient pretext to regard
this version of chronology as completely reliable. The
chronological dates were further rigidified and supported by
unquestioning belief in their correctness. By the 19th century,
the chronological data had expanded so much that it
caused a priori respect by its very existence only. Chronologists,
didn’t perceive any need for its revision and were only
able to make small insignificant changes into the chronology of
ancient times. In the 20th century, the problem of establishing
the chronology was basically regarded as solved. Chronology
has been portrayed to be unchanged in its form that surfaced
from the “scriptures” of Eusebius, Jerome, Theophilus, Augustine,
Hippolytus, Clement of Alexandria, Ussher, Scaliger,
and Petavius. For a historian of the 20th century, the very
thought that there could be a chronological mistake seemed to
be a complete absurd. Such an idea would contradict the accepted
“tradition” and the cultural knowledge absorbed since
childhood.
Nevertheless, in the 17th–19th centuries it was discovered
that there exist serious contradictions between various
chronological data sources and the established traditional
chronology. For example, it was discovered that Jerome had
made an error of one hundred years 8 .
There are essential discrepancies between the chronological
data of ancient sources and the global chronology,
which were discovered in Egyptian chronology, where a number
of documents contradicted each other chronologically.
For example Herodotus names Cheops as a successor of the
Pharaoh Rhampsinitus, what implies that he places them
chronologically next to each other. Contemporary commentators
“correct” Herodotus explaining that he mixed up Egyptian
chronology. According to this explanation Rhampsinitus
(Ramses II) was Pharaoh of the 19th dynasty (1345–1200
B.C.) while Cheops was from the 4th dynasty (2600-2480
B.C.). That means Herodotus made a mistake of 1200 years.
There is another example of a “mistake” made by Herodotus:
immediately after a pharaoh of the 4th dynasty (ca. 2480
B.C.) he placed a pharaoh of the Ethiopian rule in Egypt (ca.
715 B.C.). In this case the gap is 1 800 years.
Let us point out that the choice of a particular chronological
version is not always obvious, which can be illustrated
by the rivalry between the supporters of the so-called shorter
and longer chronology of Egypt. Opinions among Egyptologists
can be very divided. For example, according to Champollion,
the coronation of Menes took place in 5867 B.C.; according
to Le Sueur – in 5770 B.C.; according to A. Mariette
8 See [67], p. 89.