QUOTE(Vagrant Dreamer @ Feb 7 2009, 08:10 AM)
No, most certainly not. When it was written into the bible, it was intended to refer to the then Judaic God, adapted to refer to the 'Father' of the christian trinity later on when the gospels were co-opted into what is now called Christianity.
Actually when Christ revised this prayer , he taught a new way to say it and gave this to those gathered in Aramaic as you suggest below , speaking in his tongue using a non gender specific for God ,Abwûn.This is translated as Mother and Father God today but it is one word meaning a genderless God . Or conveying as in Ain Soph Aur above Kether the Either , the Neither and Both . For in the Kaballah Godhead has a duality also , there are Mother and Father God ;Ama and Abba .
http://www.thenazareneway.com/lords_prayer.htmhttp://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09356a.htmQUOTE
Anu was not a popular god of the region at the time. It is unlikely there is any connection. Although there is an aramaic version of this prayer, it is not mentioned until the new testament, and Jesus, if he existed, is thought to have spoken aramaic, so it's possibly he simply delivered this prayer originally in aramaic, which may have been a commonly understood tongue in the region. It is speculated that the Lord's prayer is intended as a structural example of a prayer, not as an actual prayer to be repeated by the congregations. Given that it isn't mentioned until the new testament, chances are it is not some sort of ancestral prayer - it would have been referenced in the old testament if that were the case.
Actually Christ revised an ancient prayer which has its root in sacred Jewish Scripture . The O.T was not collected , bound or named as it is today and the N.T was not even considered until decades after Christ died depending on sources ,25 to 250 years A.D.
What is called the Bible today was preformatted by Bishop Irenaeus who imprisoned , tortured and had killed men who defied his version . He burnt , buried and hid codices that were not in keeping with his opinion including the recently rediscovered Gospel of Judas . Then a Greek Translation into English became standardised in the King James Version . Rarely was the Hebrew Lexicon consulted when another version of the Bible erupted . Usually the KJV was revised instead .
QUOTE
The semitic gods hail from Egypt, not sumeria. Those gods are an independent pantheon with characteristically different natures and organization schemes. In other words, there is no evidence to suggest that one can superimpose babylo-sumerian gods over 'biblical' gods, or Egyptian gods for that matter.peace
But the prayer predated Christ , having Babylonian origins . Recall that sacred scripture began as oral tradition which was written into scrolls , codices and eventually into books . But this continues to be revised over millennium .
QUOTE
Relation to Jewish prayer
There are similarities between the Lord's Prayer and both Biblical and post-Biblical material in Jewish prayer especially Kiddushin 81a (Babylonian).[21] "Hallowed be thy name" is reflected in the Kaddish. "Lead us not into sin" is echoed in the "morning blessings" of Jewish prayer. A blessing said by some Jewish communities after the evening Shema includes a phrase quite similar to the opening of the Lord's Prayer: "Our God in heaven, hallow thy name, and establish thy kingdom forever, and rule over us for ever and ever. Amen." There are parallels also in 1 Chronicles 29:10-18.[22]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%27s_Prayerhttp://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?searc...29:18&version=9http://72.14.235.132/search?q=cache:MiZUSg...lient=firefox-aQUOTE
One of their hymns recalls to our minds the Lord's Prayer; and it is still more strongly recalled by the following prayer which King Nebuchadnezzar, on his accession to the throne of Babylon six hundred years before the birth of Christ, or in 604 B.C., addressed to the great sun-god Marduk:
O eternal ruler, Lord of the universe!
Grant that the name of the king whom thou lovest,
Whose name thou hast mentioned, may flourish as seems good to thee.
Guide him on the right path.
I am the ruler who obeys thee, the creation of thy hand.
It is thou who hast created me,
And thou hast entrusted to me sovereignty over mankind.
According to thy mercy, O Lord, which thou bestowest upon all,
Cause me to love thy supreme rule.
Implant the fear of thy divinity in my heart.
Grant to me whatsoever may seem good before thee, Since it is
thou that dost control my life.
Had I the slightest interest in such matters, I would recommend this prayer for the accession-service of the next king of England! Seriously, if these Babylonian hymns and prayers had had the good fortune to be translated into English by the poetic generation which translated the Old Testament, we should hear no more about the superiority of the latter.
There are hundreds of such hymns, scores to Shamash as well as Marduk. Here is one that might have been taken as the very model of the Lord's Prayer, yet the Rev. Professor Sayce, who translates and reproduces it, tells us that it was chanted in the temple of Sin at Ur as long ago as 2500 B.C.:
Father, long-suffering and full of forgiveness, whose hand
upholds the life of all mankind!
First born, omnipotent, whose heart is immensity, and there is
none who may fathom it!
In heaven, who is supreme? Thou alone. ...
On earth, who is supreme? Thou alone. ...
As for thee, thy will is made known in heaven, and the angels
bow their faces.
As for thee, thy will is made known upon earth, and the
spirits below kiss the ground.
He is the source of all light and life and strength, the creator and merciful farther of all. One prayer runs:
The law of mankind dost thou direct.
Eternally just in the heavens art thou;
Of faithful judgment towards all the world art thou.
O Shamash, supreme judge of heaven and earth art thou.
O Shamash, on this day cleanse and purify the king, the son of his God.
Whatsoever is evil within him, let it be taken out.
The constant reference in these prayers to the "supremacy" of the one or the other god raises the question of Monotheism. It may be said at once that there was never a time when the whole people of Babylonia believed in the existence of only one god. One wonders if there was ever such a time in Judea. Certainly during nearly the whole period covered by the Old Testament the Jews did not deny the existence of other gods. They merely insisted that Jahveh was supreme and alone worthy of worship. So it was, at different periods of Babylonian history, with Sin, Shamash, or Marduk. A god becomes "unique" only when political circumstances enable his priests to suppress his rivals. That was possible in the little kingdom of Judea. It was not possible in a land where great cities, three thousand years old, with special deities and powerful priesthoods, rivaled the metropolis.
But we have, fortunately, found positive proof that the educated Babylonians were monotheistic four thousand years ago. We have discovered a tablet of about 2000 B.C. -- the period when the rise of Babylon made Marduk supreme -- in which the other gods are represented as merely different aspects of Marduk. Thirteen of the chief deities of Babylonia (Bel, Sin, Nebo, Nergal, etc.) are thus explained, and the list goes no farther only because the tablet is broken. Monotheism was thus the religion of educated Babylonians seven centuries before Moses, and of educated Egyptians, not much later.
This post has been edited by Aunt Clair: Apr 19 2009, 07:38 PM
The Lord's Prayer, Sumerian king God
Jan 15 2009, 07:05 PM
