| Welcome to Free Thinkers! Log in, register an account, or post as a guest. |
| Garden of Eden originally a Pygmy myth? | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Dec 13 2011, 01:14 AM (1,246 Views) | |
| allegiance to truth | Dec 13 2011, 01:14 AM Post #1 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Garden of Eden originally a Pygmy myth? http://freethoughtnation.com/contributing-writers/63-acharya-s/562-garden-of-eden-originally-a-pygmy-myth.html In one of the most fascinating books I've ever read, Pygmy Kitabu, Belgian anthropologist Dr. Jean-Pierre Hallet relates numerous detailed legends of the Pygmy people of the Ituri Forest in the Congo, including their origin and savior myths. Hallet, who spent some 30 years living off and on with the Pygmies, including one 18-month stint completely immersed with the Efé people, relies not only on his own copious firsthand experiences but also the works of other scientists, such as the Jesuit missionary and anthropologist Dr. Paul Schebesta, who likewise lived among and visited the Ituri Forest people for many years from the 1920s to through the 1950s. As have been others who studied the Pygmies, both scientists were stunned to discover what appeared to be the origins of much biblical and other religious traditions, and both were quite certain that these isolated people were completely uninfluenced by any outside agencies, including Christian missionaries. Indeed, in Pygmy Kitabu, Hallet spends considerable time essentially proving that the Pygmy legends are their own homegrown stories, possibly representing the earliest such traditions still extant anywhere in the world. "Hallet does a thorough job addressing criticisms that the Pygmy were influenced by other cultures, such as the Judeo-Christian." In other words, Hallet does a thorough job addressing criticisms that the Pygmies were influenced by other cultures, such as the Judeo-Christian - indeed, he addresses this contention throughout the book, which is seemingly written for just such a purpose. It is obvious that critics who continue to bring up this issue of possible influence have not read his book; hence, they cannot be deemed experts on the subject. "The Pygmies are certainly one of the oldest races on Earth." Hallet first shows that the Pygmies are certainly one of the oldest races on Earth. He then demonstrates that their legends and myths are likely the basis of much Egyptian myth, which in turn influenced biblical stories. Hence, there is no need to suppose that the Pygmies were influenced by Bible stories. In reality, there is absolutely no evidence of any such influence, including and especially in the Pygmy language, which would have reflected biblical intrusions such as the names of "Jesus" and "Moses," etc. In this regard, Hallet with his colleague Alex Pelle also created an 8,000-word Efé lexicon that reveals some stunning comparisons to various Indo-European languages, including and especially Germanic ones such as Old Norse/Norwegian. Again, it appears that this old and isolated people may be the originators of much language as well. "In the Pygmy religion, we discover an apparently very ancient account of the 'Garden of Eden,' as well as a Father God and a mortal savior who overcomes evil." In the Pygmy religion and mythology, we discover an apparently very ancient account of the "Garden of Eden," as well as a Father God and a mortal savior who overcomes evil. Moreover, in the Pygmy traditions we also find equivalents to the biblical Exodus story, as well as much Egyptian, Semitic, Indian and Scandinavia mythology. The Pygmy account of the first man and the "garden" is detailed and reflects Pygmy culture and surroundings, without a hint of any external influence. The extra details, in fact, are indicative of this tale being an original source that was pared down over the millennia, as it passed through various lands and among a variety of peoples. The tale is remarkably like the biblical account in germane ways but clearly not derived therefrom, as the differences prove. The Pygmy first man, paradise and forbidden tree legend Remarkably, the Pygmy origin story largely revolves around a monotheistic God the Father who resides in heaven, as was related to Hallet by Efé elders of the Erengeti region: One fine day in heaven, God told his chief helper to make the first man. The angel of the moon descended. He modeled the first man from earth, wrapped a skin around the earth, poured blood into the skin, and punched holes for the nostrils, eyes, ears and mouth. He made another hole in the first man's bottom, and put all the organs in his insides. Then he breathed his own vital force into the little earthen statue. He entered into the body. It moved... It sat up... It stood up... It walked. It was Efé, the first man and father of all who came after. God said to Efé, "Beget children to people my forest. I shall give them everything they need to be happy. They will never have to work. They will be lords of the earth. They will live forever. There is only one thing I forbid them. Now--listen well--give my words to your children, and tell them to transmit this commandment to every generation. The tahu tree is absolutely forbidden to man. You must never, for any reason, violate this law." Efé obeyed these instructions. He, and his children, never went near the tree. Many years passed. Then God called to Efé, "Come up to heaven. I need your help!" So Efé went up to the sky. After he left, the ancestors lived in accordance with his laws and teachings for a long, long time. Then, one terrible day, a pregnant woman said to her husband, "Darling, I want to eat the fruit of the tahu tree." He said, "You know that is wrong." She said, "Why?" He said, "It is against the law." She said, "That is a silly old law. Which do you care about more--me, or some silly old law?" "There it was--the forbidden tree of God. The sinner picked a tahu fruit." They argued and argued. Finally, he gave in. His heart pounded with fear as he sneaked into the deep, deep forest. Closer and closer he came. There it was--the forbidden tree of God. The sinner picked a tahu fruit. He peeled the tahu fruit. He hid the peel under a pile of leaves. Then he returned to camp and gave the fruit to his wife. She tasted it. She urged her husband to taste it. He did. All of the other Pygmies had a bit. Everyone ate the forbidden fruit, and everyone thought that God would never find out. Meanwhile, the angel of the moon watched from on high. He rushed a message to his master: "The people have eaten the fruit of the tahu tree!" God was infuriated. "You have disobeyed my orders," he said to the ancestors. "For this you will die!" (Hallet, 144-5) Another version has God creating the man and woman, and placing them in the forest, where they wanted for nothing. However, after the woman gets pregnant, she desperately desires the tahu fruit, and forces the man to pick it for her, much to his objection. Angered, God says: "You broke your promise to me! And you pulled that poor man into sin! Now I'm going to punish you: both of you will find out what it is to work hard and be sick and die. But you, woman, since you made the trouble first, you will suffer the most. Your babies will hurt you when they come, and you will always have to work for the man you betrayed." (Hallet, 119) "There is no reason to suspect that the Pygmy 'Garden of Eden' story is anything but original, and there is much reason to suggest it may well be the oldest account we possess." In the Pygmy origins legend, we find a sky-god father-figure; a man created out of earth; a paradisaical "garden" or, appropriately, forest; a forbidden tree/fruit; and a woman blamed for the downfall of mankind, for which she is punished by pain in childbirth--motifs all found in the Bible. As noted, this story is detailed in ways absent from the biblical version, contains language and imagery appropriate for a Pygmy setting, and reveals no intrusions from external influences whatsoever. There is no reason to suspect that the Pygmy "Garden of Eden" story is anything but original, and there is much reason to suggest it may well be the oldest account we possess--and the first. What this development suggests, of course, is that the biblical account did not originate in the Middle East and was not originally handed down to Semitic "chosen people." The same can be said for other biblical myths, such as the Exodus and Christ stories, both of which appear to have emanated from the same Pygmy source as well. Further Reading Pygmies in 'The Christ Conspiracy' The Jean-Pierre Hallet Estate The Pygmy Fund Note also that the Pygmies are perpetually abused and endangered, and are in desperate need of assistance. For humanitarian reasons, as well as that they may well represent the oldest source of various linguistic, religious and mythological ideas, we need to help protect the Pygmies and preserve their culture! Add New Search Comments (39) |2011-07-25 17:40:50 FTL * Notice the cross around the Pygmy neck in the image above? Anyway, I wanted to post the relevant parts from the inside flap or jacket cover of Pygmy Kitabu: "In Pygmy Kitabu, Jean-Pierre Hallet discusses an array of intriguing facts and legends of the little-known Pygmy culture. The highlight of his many observations is the meticulously documented evidence that the African Pygmies are actually the surviving roots of man's racial, religious and linguistic origin, that they are the direct ancestors of all the races. Remarkable parallels exist between the Pygmy legends and the legends of many world cultures-especially the Egyptians and Judeo-Christian. Today the Pygmies still tell the original myths of Osiris, Isis and Horus-the murdered father, immaculate mother, and avenging son, whose story is regarded by most Egyptologists as an older version of the Christ story. The Pygmies also recount the original Adam and Eve legend, the giving of commandments, and the second coming of the Pygmy messiah. Since before the rather recent invasion by the Negro tribes, the Ituri Pygmies were isolated from the rest of the world for some 4,000 years, they could not have been "indoctrinated" by any other cultures or missionaries. Through this new study, modern man can trace his origins back to the "Center of the Earth" at the foot of the fabled Mountains of the Moon, near the historical Source of the Nile-the true "Garden of Eden." |
![]() |
|
| allegiance to truth | Dec 14 2011, 03:39 AM Post #2 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Here are some Pigymies tribes from Hidden Canyon China & lost Pygmie tribe from Australia Hidden Canyon, some great photos; http://canyonlovers.com/canyons/hidden-canyon-of-chinas-lost-tribe-of-mystical-pygmys/ Lost Pygmie tribe from Australia; http://www.mysteriousaustralia.com/our_lost_pygmy_tribe.html Our Lost Pygmy Tribe by Rex Gilroy Our Lost Pygmy Tribe The Director of the Aboriginal research Centre at Melbourne's Monash University, Mrs Eve Fesl, says she has met Aboriginal family groups which are small in stature-in comparison with other Aboriginals. "There are groups of Aboriginals in the Millgimbi area, in Arnhem Land in which the males would only come up too my shoulder. I am small, standing about 163 cm, and as they only come up to my shoulder, they would be about 20cm smaller than I am. But, I wouldn't call them 'pygmies'-just small people." Mrs Fesl said one should be careful in describing Aboriginal groups as "tribes", or to say they were "shy". "Since my early childhood, I was taught to be careful of strangers approaching, to run and hide when white men came near-a fear of being caught and placed in institutions. "Aboriginals are always careful with strangers and thier behaviour depends a lot on who approaches them. It is also true that even today there are Aboriginal family groups who have had very little contact with strangers. "My careful answer would have to be: if there are Aboriginal people who haven't made contact with thee modern world-why force them? Obviously, they would like to be left alone. Professor T. Reynolds, who is head of the Department of Anthropology at the James Cook University in Townsville {Q} said he had heard of small Aboriginal groups who allegedly live in the rainforest areas of Northern Queensland. "Stories about these small people go back at least two decades, " he said, 'but I do not have any first-hand information on them." Warwich Dix, Acting Principle of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal studies in Canberra said there was no doubt that extremely small Aboriginals-the 'Birranbindins'-had lived in Queensland's rainforests. "But I don't think they are there now," he said, "and I don't think they could have survived undetected. But you never know." Our Lost Pygmy Tribe "They were 1 metre to 1.3 metres tall, black, crinkly-haired naked males, and carried spears". That was how one startled farmer described three small natives that he saw moving through a mountainside rainforest near his Tully, north Queensland farm in January 1982. Local residents are convinced that the farmer had seen members of a "lost pygmy tribe", long reputed to inhabit the rugged mountain country behind the town. Further South, in the mountains behind Townsville, in 1981 two bushwalkers claimed they sighted a small group of pygmy-sized, animal skin clothed natives, scavenging rainforest soil for food. Having seen the vast, taipan-infested jungles of northern Queeensland-through the Atherton Tableland to Cape York during my many wanderings as a naturalist-I can easily accept such tales. In that wild country any number of these tribes could wander unseen. Many remote parts of Australia are not fully explored, areas so inaccessible that the tales of "lost tribes" should not always be dismissed out of hand. After all, there were still unknown Aboriginals living in remote areas of Central Australia until comparatively recent times, until Europeans first ventured into their area. And it was only about 60 years ago that an Aboriginal was found in the Bulloo Channels country of north-western New South Wales, who had never seen a white man before. Tales of European contacts with pygmy tribes in north Queensland date back at least 100 years. Until European settlement finally drove the tribes deeper into the mountains, these natives had created a problem for the farmers with their repeated foraging raids on crops and livestock for food. Such foraging raids had become rare nowadays. In 1914, farms in the Mareeba district inland from Cairns were having frequent pygmy raids. On one occasion a very frightened male was cornered in a stockyard by a rifle-brandishing farmer, when the little Aboriginal had tried to sneak through the farm in the early morning light, loaded with vegetables he had picked nearby. After calling out his family, to have a good look at the terrified man the farmer let his prisoner escape. At Tully in 1942, another farmer was aroused one morning by his fowls at the rear of the house. Suspecting dogs he dashed outside with his shotgun, only to find two Aboriginals crouched in a corner of a shed. Lowering his gun he tried talking to them, but seeing they could not understand him he realised they were still wild natives. He judged their height to be just over one metre. The farmer motioned to them and go and they bolted for the nearby scrub. In 1977, a small Army group made contact with a party of 20 pygmies while exploring an area about 80 km south of Cape York. At another location further south they later stumbled upon an abandoned pygmy camp. Here the men found tree shelters and several bark humpies. They also retrieved a number of small stone implements scattered across the soil. Scientific interest in the pygmies was first aroused in the late 1800's, their habits being studied in 1913 by Swedish anthropologist Dr E. Mjoberg, while he was engaged in a survey of Aboriginal tribes of far north Queensland. But who were the north Queensland pygmies? One theory of anthropologists is that they are merely a smaller type of Aboriginal, their smallish size the result of generations of adaption to their rainforest environment. Another theory, first put forward by Australian anthropologist Norman B. Tindale and American professor Joseph Birdsell in 1939, suggested their ancestors migrated to Australia thousands of years ago from south-east Asia. To support thier theory Tindale and Birdsell pointed to the general Negroid features, crinkly hair and small stature {their height rarely exceeds 1.43 metres}. Perhaps they are related to the now extinct Tasmanian negritos, whose smallish physcial features were similar to those of these little natives. They are shy and secretive, preferring the remoter wilderness regions. According to Aboriginal traditions, they were hunted from the more open country by the fiercer Aboriginals centuries ago, forcing them to seek shelter in the more inaccessible mountainous regions of eastern Australia. A distinctive cultural feature of these forest dwellers in the art of roasting the poisonous alkaloids from many of the seeds and nuts of the rainforest, then crushing them up and sifting the powdered remains so they can be eaten. Large piles of nutshells betray pygmy camp sites in the Queensland jungles, and stonepiles-believed to be pygmy graves-occur in many locations of these vast rainforest. There are also numerous cave paintings, often thousands of years old, believed made by these people, hidden deep in jungle-covered rock shelters throughout the Atherton-Cape York ranges. In 1978, I made an inspection of one of these cave art sites, which besides depicting the stenciled arms and hands of these small artists, included various animals and hunting scenes of long ago. Hard to believe, though it may seem, old settlers traditions and recent sightings claims suggest, that pygmy tribes may still exist in other eastern Australian mountain ranges. About 20 years ago, a farmer near the base of the rugged Carrai Range west of Kempsey, northern New South Wales, claimed he fired shots at a group of small Aboriginals after they had emerged from jungle to spear and butcher a cow. Bushmen living in the Barrington Tops near Muswellbrook, northern New South Wales, last century {1800's} claimed pygmy-sized Aboriginals had been seen roaming the forests of the high country, sometimes watching cattlemen mustering stock. It was these early bushmen who first gathered information on the culture of the pygmies. They knew, for example, that these natives were more primitive than the Aboriginals, lacking the spear-thrower and boomerang and various stone tools of the Aboriginals. In 1975, Mr Craig Francis, while mending a property fence in the Barrington mountain range foothills one day, spotted a group of small figures huddled in nearby bushes. He immediately realised he was being watched by several small Aboriginals, both males and females, some clothed in animal skins. "I had no sooner spotted them than they turned and dashed off into the scrub", Craig told me. Some stockman often had the uneasy feeling of being watched while mustering cattle in this scrub, and some farm hands after experiencing this feeling have often refused to work unaccompanied in lonely areas. Pygmy-sized natives claimed to have been seen in the vicinity of "the wilderness", a vast region extending for hundreds of square kilometres north of the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, between Kurrajong and Singleton on its eastern side, and the Newnes district to the west. Like most inaccessible regions of our continent, this wilderness area has been mapped from the air, but is largely unexplored on the ground. Its interior remains unknown. In 1978, bushwalker Steve Curtis, while fighting his way through valley scrub north-west of Kurrajong, spotted smoke rising through trees ahead of him. Believing it to be another hiking party's fire he pushed on in that direction. Finally reaching the spot, he found before him three crude bark shelters. A few stone implements {which he salvaged} littered the cleared area about which were also numerous little bare human footprints. It was apparent that his noisy approach had alerted the occupants of what looked to be a modern say stone-age camp. Steve soon had the uneasy feeling that he was being watched from the surrounding forest, so he hastily left the area. Claims of still-wild, pygmy-sized natives inhabiting this wilderness are not new. In the early 1900's two timber cutters while logging in wild country near Kurrajong came face to face with a hunting party of five small Aboriginals carrying spears and two wallabies they had killed. In 1955, a farmer living at the north-eastern tip of 'The Wilderness' near Singleton, was shocked one night when he caught two 1.3 metres tall black natives in the act of uprooting vegetables from a back paddock garden in the glare of his torch. They escaped into nearby scrub. In the Newnes district near Lithgow seven years ago-on the western side of the wilderness-three bushmen were exploring dense forest in an isolated gully when they discovered a huge crack in a cliff big enough to walk through and which descended into a deep valley further below. As they climbed down through this crack they spotted below them a small, naked black native. Seeing the men the native fled into scrub, leaving tracks which the men found in powdery soil at the cliff base. Nearby, etched into the wall of a rock shelter, the men later found cave paintings, stencils of human hands and arms more common to Aboriginal cave art, but much smaller than average Aboriginal examples. Were these stencils the work of ancient-Aboriginal artists, or the work of long-dead pygmies? These cave paintings were examined by me during a recent visit to the area. They are centuries old, and if indeed the work of pygmies are an indication of just how long these secretive little forest dwellers have inhabited these wild mountain ranges. Australasian Post Articles Chapter1 Chapter2 Chapter3 Chapter4 Chapter5 Chapter6 Chapter7 Chapter8 Chapter9 Chapter10 Chapter11 Chapter12 Chapter13 Chapter14 Chapter15 Chapter16 Chapter17 Chapter18 Chapter19 Chapter20 Chapter21 Chapter22 Chapter23 Chapter24 Chapter25 Chapter26 Chapter27 Chapter28 Chapter29 Chapter30 Chapter31 Chapter32 Chapter33 The Author Commendation Preface Acknowledgements Foreword Introduction |
![]() |
|
| « Previous Topic · General Discussion · Next Topic » |





![]](http://z6.ifrm.com/static/1/pip_r.png)




