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Major Civilizations After Babel

The Major Civilizations after Babel

Everyone, even the non-believer, is certainly familiar with the fabulous ancient remains found in Egypt and Mesopotamia, especially Sumer where the ancient city of Ur (NOT Abraham’s Ur) was found. But little is heard of the incredibly advanced civilization that arose in the Indus Valley in present-day Pakistan and then simply disappeared. It is from the evidences found in these 3 regions that the advanced technical knowledge of mankind in his earliest times is fully demonstrated. What we have discovered in gathering our research on these subjects is that the things which have been found that cannot be explained except by the Biblical account have been virtually forgotten- eliminated from most publications except perhaps the original excavation reports or other obscure books and papers. And I believe that some of what you are about to read will perhaps surprise you.

One Major Center- Destroyed In a Few Instants

After Babel, we know that the people began to migrate to the different regions of the world. In the last hundred or so years, discoveries have been made that have shown that the earliest and most advanced civilizations were along the fertile rivers of the Middle and Near East- areas that were once lush and beautiful but today are desolate, barren desert regions. One very advanced early civilization leaves us no evidence whatsoever except ashes and shapes. The Canaanite cities of the Jordan Valley, Sodom & Gomorrah and the cities of the plain, were without a doubt a most important center in the ancient world, for they were attacked by 4 kings of entire nations with their armies. Now that we know where they were located and their sizes, we know that they rivaled the early great cities of Egypt and Mesopotamia in all ways. Sadly, we cannot look upon their homes and temples except to view the ashen shapes.

Archaeology has revealed 3 major civilizations that virtually spring up from “nowhere”, so to speak,- they were highly civilized and had governments, possessed vast technology (though different in different areas), and each produced writing (all three had picture writing, then two develop a writing system). I believe there is no room for doubt that these were the 3 earliest large civilizations formed just after Babel. And what we have discovered in their ancient remains is evidence that these people were very intelligent and far more advanced than the civilizations that followed them for many hundreds of years. The evolutionist believes things evolve into “higher” or better states. However, the laws of nature (God’s laws) show that everything evolves into a chaotic state. There’s a saying that we begin to die the moment we are born. Well, that’s the way with all things. Mankind began to lose knowledge the moment he was “born” after the flood. And we would have degraded into a complete loss of technical knowledge and ability except for the Divine assistance provided in fulfillment of prophecy:

Dan 12:4 But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”

It is our belief that the time of the end began in 1798 and if we examine the history of man, we see that the VAST majority of achievements in technology of every kind was made from this time forward. But those who study and know God’s Word can see and understand that this increase in knowledge has a Divine purpose- for not only do we have this great knowledge, we have access to information and understanding that sheds great light on the validity of the Biblical account and the understanding of His prophecies. The frustrating part is that Satan is ever fighting to twist and misinterpret these things to further confuse man about God’s Truth. For those who want His Truth, there can be no denying what the evidence shows- everything happened exactly as the Bible said.

THE INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION

When the numerous groups left Babel, just as when they left their original homes near Noah, they had to follow a river or coastline as much as possible. Following the Euphrates or the Tigris to the delta region near the Persian Gulf, then following the coastline east through present-day Iran into present-day Pakistan, we find the Indus River. Along this valley has been found evidence of a very advanced, very unique civilization that sprang up suddenly and existed at the same time as earliest Sumer- a unique civilization built by those who left Babel.

The Indus Valley today lies in Pakistan which came into being at the time of the Partition of British India in 1947. But, for all practical purposes, it is a part of India. Physically, India (with Pakistan) is cut off from the greater part of Asia by the Himalayas to the north. Today, this Indus region is not a pleasant place. Except for the narrow strip of green along the river where artificial irrigation systems have been built, this is a forbidding, sandy desert, 120 degrees in the shade in the summer. It is one of the last places on earth one would expect to find the remains of cities. Yet, all along this river a civilization stretched 1,000 miles long, covering more than twice as large an area as Ancient Egypt or Sumer.

A Completely Unknown Civilization Comes to Light

The early Indus civilization was completely unknown until early in this century when the railroad was being built and workmen found the ruins when they noticed the bricks. When excavated, cities were found that were technologically advanced to the extent that they rivaled some of today.

“These discoveries establish the existence… during the fourth and third millennium B.C., of a highly developed city life; and the presence, in many of the houses, of wells and bathrooms as well as an elaborate drainage system, betoken a social condition of the citizens at least equal to that found in Sumer, and superior to that prevailing in contemporary Babylon and Egypt… Even at Ur the houses are by no means equal in point of construction to those at Mohenjo-Daro.” (OH, pp. 394-5).

We’ll use the most famous of these cities, Mohenjo Daro, for most of our examples as it has been the most thoroughly excavated and is so well preserved. The discoveries made here have completely baffled the secular scholars, as happened with this discovery in the Indus Valley:

“One of the disturbing things about archaeology is the way it is always upsetting the established order of things. Whenever a scholar sits down to write a work of history, a nagging fear must plague him: perhaps, before he can see his book through the press, some new archaeological find will explode his whole view of history. His work will be out of date before it even appears! The history of ancient India is a good case in point…. Overnight, the whole pattern of early Indian history was overthrown.” (ED, pp. 91-3).

These cities are not only built of brick, they are built of BAKED brick. These burnt-bricks, or kiln-baked bricks, as they are variously called, are costly materials. But, unlike the simple sun-dried mud-brick, these baked bricks required entire forests of wood to fuel their kilns. But the advantage of baked over sun-dried is that the baked remains intact throughout rain, mud or whatever, and this decision on their part is the singular reason that their cities remained until today. However, it may also be the reason that their civilization disappeared:

“For a thousand years, the furnaces burned, and the tree grew fewer. A forest breathes, though; it gives off water-vapor, which collects in the atmosphere and returns in the form of rain. Remove the trees and the cycle is interrupted. In their lust for baking bricks, the Harappans [the name given this civilization by archaeologists] may well have turned their own valley into a desert…. Once there was a mighty civilization in that valley. Today, there is a desert.” (ED, p. 99). A similar fate has befallen most of the early civilizations.

The Earliest “Pre-Planned City Ever Found

When people set out from Babel, they were equipped with great knowledge. From Noah and his sons they had learned about cities and technology. When they founded their own civilizations, they used that knowledge to plan their cities: …

Mohenjo-Daro,… is the earliest pre-planned city ever found anywhere in the world. It consists, like most Indus towns, of a large residential area at its lowest level overlooked from the west by a high citadel, a fortified and much smaller area. Below the citadel, the city was carefully designed for about 40,000 people in a grid pattern apparently of 12 main earth-paved streets, each about 9-13 metres (30-45 feet) wide. This street grid enclosed blocks of fairly even size, each block consisting of hundreds of houses very close together and opening off narrow lanes. The lanes vary in width from about 1.2 to 3 metres (4-10 feet), and are built with frequent right-angle bends- probably as a break against the winds. Most of the houses excavated were quite spacious, with several rooms around a central courtyard, a well and stairs to an upper story.” (LO, p. 75). Their boundaries were over 5 kilometers (3 miles) in circumference, which is no small town.

Many of the accounts of these cities mention the fact that there are no doors or windows on the main streets, and as we read in the above account, they like to attribute this to some sort of “wind control” or other such explanations. But I suggest that this design is, once again, for protection from the wild animals that are reproducing far more rapidly than the human population.

Advanced Construction- Drainage Systems, Water Mains, Bathrooms in Every House

But what is most amazing is the advanced design and construction of these cities: “Some of the houses are so well preserved that they could be occupied today, and use made of the bathroom as well as the irrigation and drainage services-… For a primitive town, in fact, the city of the Indus lacked neither grandeur nor comfort. The principal avenues were sometimes over 35 feet wide, and some of them crossed the town from one end to the other…. their drainage system has been miraculously preserved and, according to archaeologists, is the most ingenious and complete systems known to antiquity. The brick conduits, arranged under the streets, received the efflux from pipes placed in each house, and were linked to stone sewers. At intervals these sewers were supplied with cesspools which were easy to clean, while it was only necessary to move a few bricks to clean out the small drains in the streets if they became blocked up…. They constructed a whole system of water mains which collected the water from the rain falling outside the city and distributed it via ingenious brick conduits which conducted it to wells in each house…. These water mains fed the bathrooms. Each house possessed its own- and they were much the same as those still in use in India today…. Roads have been found covered with a sort of Macadam made of fragments of pottery and bits of crushed brick, soaked and tamped, probably to avoid the dust and mud which are the scourge of Far Eastern towns.” (WA, vol 1., pp. 97-8).

“`The noteworthy and recurrent features,’ writes Mortimer Wheeler, `are the insistence on water-supply, bathing and drainage…. In some houses a built seat-latrine of Western type is included on the ground or first flood, with a sloping and sometimes stepped channel through the wall to a pottery-receptacle or brick drain outside. These brick drains are remarkably well made and cleverly designed. Nowhere else in the ancient world- except in the palace of King Minos of Crete, at Knossos- is there the same modern approach to waste disposal.'” (ED, p. 108). I suspect that this advanced knowledge of waste-disposal, etc. came from one who had expert knowledge of the subject after living with seven other people over a year in a ship filled with animals of every kind.

The Incredibly Large Grain Storage Bin

Inside the well fortified citadel of Mohenjo-Daro is a very large building, 150 feet long, 75 feet wide, with walls 20 feet high. This is positively identified as their granary, as others of similar size and design were found in other Indus cities. They are thought to have served the same function as a modernday bank or treasury, and hence their position in the city.

“What is left of the state granary today is only the ruined bases of the building- the wheat and rice would have been stored in a series of high spaces, probably of timber construction , above this podium. But the approach for the carts bringing the grain from the outlying farms, the unloading platform and the system of underfloor air-ducts to keep the grain dry, can all be seen.” (LO, p. 77).

The Mohenjo-Daro granary had 27 blocks with a recessed unloading bay for the carts bringing the grain. The granary at Harappa, another Indus Valley city of the same date, was built in 2 rows of six split by a street. Triangular ventilation shafts lined the back of the granaries. Outside, there were 17 round platforms for workers to process, or pound, the grain into flour.

Dice, Chess-Men, Lipstick, Perfume and Eye-Shadow-…even Dogs & Cats!

The people of this Indus civilization not only knew city planning and construction, they raised wheat, melons, barley, dates and COTTON. They fished the river with nets. They raised cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry. Their craftsmen made statuettes and figurines of such quality that one would think they came from Greece over 1,000 years later. They fashioned elaborate jewelry of gold, silver, copper, shell and stone. They had auger drills, as well as “…household utensils and toilet outfits; pottery painted and plain, hand-turned and turned on the wheel; terra cottas, dice and chess-men; coins older than any previously known;… faience work of excellent quality; stone carving superior to that of the Sumerians; copper weapons and implements, and a copper model of a two-wheeled cart (one of our oldest examples of a wheeled vehicle); gold and silver bangles, ear-ornaments, necklaces, and other jewelry `so well finished and so lightly polished’, says Marshall,` that they might have come out of a Bond Street jeweler’s of today rather than from a prehistoric house of 5,000 years ago'”. (OH, p. 395). They even had lipstick, eye makeup which is still used today (kohl) and perfume!: “Near this, the first lipstick known to antiquity was found in the shape of a rectangular piece of red ochre, which elegant women at this remote time already used to enhance the natural color of lips and cheeks. This stick, one end of which is worn- to whose lips was it last applied five thousand years ago?- lay on a small low table beside vases of kohl, flasks of perfume, hairpins and bronze razors.” (WA, vol. 1, p. 113.) They even had cats and dogs within their cities which indicates that they were domesticated. The proof of this comes from a brick found in the city of Chanhu-Daro which bears the footprint of a cat slightly overlapped by that of a dog. When the brick was laid out to dry prior to going into the kiln, the cat must have whisked across the bricks at a high rate of speed, followed by the speeding dog, which is evidenced by the deep impress of their footpads.
All of this gives a whole new meaning to “there is nothing new under the sun…”

Picture Writing and Strange Animals

Their writing comes mainly from engraved seals, but is also found on fragments of pottery and tablets. It is a picture-writing of which about 400 different signs have been identified; however, it has not been deciphered

because there is no other known language with which to compare it to. I don’t know what this may mean, but the ONLY other place that writing similar to this has been found is on Easter Island where the huge, black carved heads are found. Whereas both Sumer and Egypt began as picture writing, or hieroglyphic, then went on to develop an actual writing system, there is no evidence that these people ever developed beyond the picture stage. This may have been because their civilization came to an end too soon.

Their beautiful carved seals found in great abundance tell us of the animals there- we see monkeys, hares, doves, tigers, bears, rhinoceros, parrots, deer and great humped cattle. Since no monkeys or parrots live in this barren wasteland today, this is good evidence that this valley was once a jungle land. But some of these also show very strange creatures, such as a beast with three heads, an ox-like creature with only one horn, and two-headed snake-like creature.

The major difference between this civilization and the other 2 major civilizations of Egypt and Sumer is the absence of any temples, which is usually the first thing found when an ancient site is excavated. Without deciphered writings and temples, it is difficult to know anything about their religion. Except,- there are the strange looking creatures on some of their seals which can only represent some mythical god-like creature. Some of these resemble the later gods of the Hindu religion, which are similar to those found in other parts of the world.

Links to Their Origins- and Nimrod

One seal betrays the fact that, in spite of the uniqueness of this society, the people had a common origin with the other 2 major civilizations- a seal (photo at left) with the “lion-slayer” (Nimrod, the great hunter) holding 2 lions or perhaps tigers at bay on each side. The other evidence which they have in common with the earliest peoples in Anatolia, is the presence of the “mother-goddess”: “A curious statuette of the Mother-Goddess also dates back to this period,…” (WA, vol 1., p. 112).
Evidence of Communication with Other Early Civilizations of Southern Mesopotamia

When the people left Babel, those who traveled the same basic route to their various destinations knew where those who settled along that route were located. The people of the Indus Valley most certainly knew of those who settled in Sumer, which was along the basic route to the Indus Valley from Babel. “The Harappans [the civilization of the Indus Valley] were in contact with the other civilized nations of the ancient world. This, too, we know from archaeological evidence. About 2300 B.C., when Sargon of Akkad ruled in Mesopotamia, there was trade between Sumer and Harappa. We know this because engraved seals of Harappa manufacture have been found in Sumerian cities dating from the time of Sargon.” (ED, pp. 111-2). On the island of Bahrain of the east coast of Saudi Arabia (believed to be “Dilmun” of ancient records) are found seals of the Indus Valley designs along with those of Sumer, which place these 2 earliest civilizations as contemporary.

What Happened to the People of this Early Civilization in the Indus Valley?

The presence of ancient dams shows that flooding was a problem, just as it was in ancient Sumer as evidenced by the so-called “flood layer” which Woolley incorrectly believed represented the flood of Noah’s time. (He believed in the “local-flood” theory, not the universal flood of the Bible). All delta regions are subject to flooding, some more than others- this is dependant upon the source of the river involved. The Indus begins in the Himalayas where in the spring, the melting snows can cause severe flooding. The evidence shown by the rebuilding after each flood indicates the most likely cause of their disappearance. “… it seems likely that the people had simply exhausted the timber available from the great forests that once had surrounded them. Earlier, Mohenjo-Daro had been flooded at least three times, and each time they had simply rebuilt the city over the mud left by the waters. But their building materials were timber and baked brick, and more timber was needed to fire the huge quantities of bricks used in the city. Without wood at a reasonable distance, repairs and rebuilding were neglected. Later dwellings are jerry-built and the spacious houses of the great period were often divided.” (LO, p. 79).

Evidence of contact between the Indus Valley and Sumer disappears suddenly, which indicates that something happened to the actual civilization itself. The later occupation levels of the rebuilt cities indicate that they simply left the region when they had exploited the natural resources and turned the region into a desert.

Cuneiform records found in Sumer mention a land called “Meluhha” from which came gold, ivory, carnelian and lapis-lazuli. These have long been exports of India and we know the beads of gold and ivory from the Indus Valley were found in ancient Sumer. Could this “Meluhha” be the Indus Valley? In one of the Vedic (Indian) hymns the “Mleccha” are mentioned as the people that the Aryans, who took over the region much later, conquered. This may be further confirmed by a discovery made in Mohenjo-Daro in the last occupation level: “In 1925 and 1926, Vats and Hargreaves were fortunate to exhume several corpses from the ruins of a house. The convulsive and painful positions they were found in showed that they had died a violent death. There was a group of fourteen of these skeletons in one room, and another group of six in a road, some of which are decapitated. The most moving is undoubtedly that of a woman who had fallen head first down a stairway which led to a well below the street. Mr. Wheeler found a group of skeletons of men, women and children in the ruins of the citadel, exhumed in 1946, probably belonging to the same family. This was probably a family of ivory sculptors, because two elephant tusks were discovered near the corpses. The man had carried them away in his flight,… After the fall of the citadel, the invaders stripped the fugitives of all their possessions and killed them, but they left the tusks behind.” (WA, vol 1., p. 116). The fact that so few people were in the city during this attack is further confirmation that the majority of the population had long since deserted the area. All evidence of trade had ceased. Then, the Aryans took over the region. It appears that when they attacked, there were but a very few still in the cities at that time, as evidenced by the small number of skeletons found in this last occupation level.

A Mystery Solved

The archaeologists and scholars tell the tale themselves, of this civilization that seemingly “came from nowhere”: “A civilization as complex as that of the Indus Valley does not spring full-blown out of nowhere. But that is exactly what appears to have happened at Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa. They are cities built from scratch. The archaeologists of the future will have to account for this mysterious improbable breakthrough of civilization in the Indus Valley, circa 2500 B.C.” (ED, p. 107). Well, the answer to this mystery is simple, and in fact, the ONLY answer. The pieces of the puzzle of mankind will never fit except in the context of the Biblical account.

THE EGYPTIAN AND MESOPOTAMIAN CIVILIZATIONS

There is no need to go into much detail about these civilizations as we did with the Indus Valley civilization for the simple reason that almost everyone is familiar with these. In fact, we will not discuss the evidences from Sumer which are so well known. The world has been fascinated with ancient Egypt for the last 150 to 200 years, and due to the abundance of artifacts, much is known about these early people. However, as usual, for the most part the evidences have been “explained” in light of men’s theories instead of the Biblical account and the true picture has been distorted. When “kings lists” have been found, they have been construed to be a continual list- one after another- when in fact, it is known that different kings ruled at the same time in different parts of Egypt. Because of this error, scholars proclaim that the Egyptians go back to a time prior to the flood.

It is the earliest period of Egypt that is the least known, but it is from these evidences that we find the information which relates to “where these people came from”. Most of the evidence of this earliest period comes from burials, which has revealed that Egypt’s earliest inhabitants were also highly civilized and in possession of technical knowledge. Although their earliest cities have not survived to tell their tales as the Indus Valley’s have, we have learned from their earliest burials that they had boats, wore elaborate jewelry, wore make-up, wore clothes of woven fabric, ate with ivory spoons, and worked in gold, silver and lead, just to mention a very, very few. The earliest object ever found made of plywood (other than the deck timber from Noah’s Ark) was in early Egypt- “a coffin whose sides were made of six thin superimposed layers of wood with the grain alternating as in modern plywood”. (“Saqqara”, p. 99 by Jean-Philippe Lauer).

Their common point of origin is again found. Below is seen some pottery from a pre-dynastic Egyptian burial. Note the ibex (goat with long, curved horns) on the vase at left. This same design is also seen on an early vase from Susa in ancient Elam (see photo above right). These 2 civilizations were very far apart and showed absolutely no evidence of early trade or communication. Yet, the design is so similar. Now, note the picture below right (top), which is a drawing of an ibex from the Palanh caves near Adyaman (a little west of Babel). Their common point of origin? The region of Babel.

Another similarity can be also be seen by comparing the Egyptian pottery with the design found on pottery in Arpachiyah, north of Nineveh and east of the Tigris. In the drawing (right), note the design of storks or herons. The repetition and usage of animals in designs are shared features that didn’t just “evolve” independently among these very separate early civilizations. These were designs, themes and motifs used when the people were one, united in language and purpose. After Babel, when they went their separate ways, they carried with them the methods and themes of design used by their families when they lived at their original home in Anatolia.

Another more impressive similarity is seen in the knives shown left. The first knife, found in a pre-dynastic Egyptian burial, is made of flint with a gold sheet handle. But of importance is the “snake” design on the handle. This same motif of a very similar “snake” design can be seen in the second drawing of a knife, also from a burial, also made of flint but with a bone handle. Where did this second knife come from? It came from south central Turkey, in a male burial at Çatal Hüyük- near Babel.

The Hero, the “Lion Slayer”, AGAIN

And, of course, we find the “lion slayer” theme in the very earliest times of pre-dynastic Egypt. In this drawing from a pre-dynastic tomb, we see the typical pose of the hero with the 2 lions on each side or in each hand. (See lower left of photo at left).

What is so very clear from studying the themes and designs on the earliest objects and artifacts is that certain events took place PRIOR to the dispersion of the people from the Babel area- and these things are found in the artwork (statues, wall and cave wall drawings, pottery designs, etc.) of each of the earliest civilizations. From there, we can then see how all the early pagan religions and earliest myths began with the same concepts, such as the “lion killer” and the “earth” of “mother goddess”. From there, though, they begin to develop their own peculiarities and distinctions- the result of being separated by the language barrier.

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