documents, papyri, and I need help!
I’m posting a question about Harpur’s book, The Pagan Christ
“According to the historian Herodotus, the ‘father of history,’ the Egyptian Jesus, known as Iu-em-hetep, or Iusu, was one of the eight great gods who were described in the papyri almost twenty thousand years ago” (p. 39).
In my research I finally found the quote in Herodutus that I think he’s appealing to:
“In fact however Heracles is a very ancient Egyptian god; and (as they say themselves) it is seventeen thousand years to the beginning of the reign of Amasis from the time when the twelve gods, of whom they count that Heracles is one, were begotten of the eight gods” (Histories 2.43).
I’m guessing that the 17,000 years plus the approximately 3,000 that have passed since Herodutus = the 20,000 years he’s referring to (and he seems to be talking about Heracles, not Iu-em-hetep). But what documents? What papyri? Can anyone help me here? I’ve yet to find any extant papyri older than approximately 3,000 BCE. I like to check sources as I go along. So help me here!
Hey Dave,
I’m just taking a break from thesis work…sigh…but yeah, I remembered seeing some fragmented papyri documents in the British Museum, so I ‘googled it’ (it’s actually a verb now) and got this:
http://aic.stanford.edu/sg/bpg/annual/v12/bp12-10.html
Maybe it will be useful, or at least give you some leads - ie., its got a good bibliography.
Good luck,
Nathan
…here’s something that also may be of interest:
Fragments of an Unknown Gospel and Other Early Christian Papyri by H. Idris Bell, T. C. Skeat
Review author[s]: Ernest Cadman Colwell
Journal of Religion, Vol. 16, No. 4 (Oct., 1936) , pp. 478-480
I think he is referring to Herodotus’ sources. Have a look at this thread in a quality forum on this topic:
http://www.egyptsearch.com/forums/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=8;t=003771
Many links there.
Thanks Jake. I’ll definitely check it out. More y’all?
I’m staying out of this one. However, the link from Jake nicely summarizes the situation.