What Were They Thinking?

[Dennis1209]

Does human critical thinking and reasoning change with time and culture? Using the biblical account of the Exodus as an example, I have asked myself, "What were they thinking?" Sometimes I insert myself into biblical times and events as if I were there witnessing it all. Then think about what I would have thought, believed, responded to, and reacted to. Could I get so indoctrinated in pagan idol worship as to dismiss what I was living and witnessing?

About two million men, women, and children witnessed the Red Sea's parting. They saw pillars of smoke and fire, with manna and quail mysteriously appearing daily. Rocks burst forth a river of water, the mountain thundering. Moses's face shone. Pharaoh's entire Army swallowed up by the sea and not being charbroiled by the desert sun, etc.

It looks as if Satan and his minions had a stranglehold on the Egyptians and could access evil power through sorcery and black magic. Pharaoh and his sorcerers could duplicate some of God's miracles. The Israelites took all this in stride as if it were common everyday occurrences.

As a side note, what about the Great Pyramids? Were they eye candy, or did they serve a function and purpose? Interestingly, the Bible details the Tower of Babel to reach heaven, mentioning or inferring a few of the world's seven wonders. But not a peep on the greatest of the Seven Wonders. Even biblical experts differ if they existed pre- or post-deluge.

Why did Israel construct a molten golden calf, and Aaron allowed it? I guess I do not understand their logic and reasoning thought process.

[Mr. M]

28 minutes ago, Dennis1209 said:

Why did Israel construct a molten golden calf, and Aaron allowed it? I guess I do not understand their logic and reasoning thought process.

People without restraint do not follow reasoning or logic. Mob psychology results.

Exodus 32:25 Now when Moses saw that the people were unrestrained

(for Aaron had not restrained them, to their shame among their enemies)

[ChristB4us]

1 hour ago, Dennis1209 said:

Why did Israel construct a molten golden calf, and Aaron allowed it? I guess I do not understand their logic and reasoning thought process.

Following the crowd by their zeal for God as old habits or the familiar dies hard.

Israel as a nation backslid on numerous occasions and one would think they would learn its lesson.

And yet look at our selves in how many times we backslid or commit that same sin again?

The lesson?  No matter how much the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak, therefore what is impossible for man, is possible with God thru Jesus Christ our Lord.

We can ask for forgiveness and His help not to do that again as we run this race daily looking to the author & finisher of our faith to help us lay aside every "weight" ( provision for the flesh ) and not just the sin daily in walking in the light in fellowship with the Father & the Son as we place our confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ to finish His work in us to His glory.

1 John 3:1Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. 2 Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. 3 And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure......... 8 He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.

Philippians 1:6 Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:.... 11 Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.

Galatians 5:1 Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage..... 5 For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.

2 Timothy 4:18 And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom: to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Jude 1:24 Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, 25 To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.

Hebrews 12:1Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, 2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

1 John 1:3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. 5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. 8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Edited April 9, 2023 by ChristB4us

[AnOrangeCat]

2 hours ago, Dennis1209 said:

Does human critical thinking and reasoning change with time and culture? Using the biblical account of the Exodus as an example, I have asked myself, "What were they thinking?"

This is a good question. My personal take is that the mental processes themselves don't change, but the information on which we base them do. The Israelites had come out of Egypt, a society that claimed there were a number of gods. Surely they had some familiarity with the religious practices of other neighboring cultures as well. As you pointed out the Egyptians seemed capable of performing certain apparent miracles, whether through spiritual power with demonic forces or trickery. It was probably enough to give the Israelites some measure of belief in those false gods.

Fast forward to the Ten Commandments. Right off the bat what do we get? Prohibition against the worship of other gods. Considering where they came from this seems like a big shift in what they were used to, and looking at the Exodus story as a whole we also see that one of the attitudes that emerged at one point was "This God Moses is working for led us out into the wilderness to die."

In light of all that I feel like I can grasp the thought process even if I don't agree with it, and it's important to note that the Bible as we know it wasn't really around at the time. In essence the Israelites were asked to make a long lasting leap of faith, and that ended up being full of peril and doubt.

As an aside the phrase "critical thinking" itself can be a bit... nuanced these days. I had a very Christian education. The material was thankfully and and unashamedly so and included memorizing Bible verses as part of the curriculum. History and science were typically presented through a Christian lens. Some years ago I decided to look at the internet and see what the internet thought of it. "This doesn't teach critical thinking." came up and stood out to me, and in looking over reviews of other educational materials "critical thinking" often seemed paired with rejecting religious beliefs. It's since made me... critical... of the phrase.

[Justin Adams]

Perhaps reading or listening to "The Divine Council" or "UNSEEN REALM" would help.

The Deut-32 worldview is quite all-engompassing. It explains most everything supernatural that the 'modernchurch' has largely expunged and decried. It begins in Genesis and ends in Revelation. All will become clear to the astute reader and listener.

[LiveWire]

17 minutes ago, Justin Adams said:

Perhaps reading or listening to "The Divine Council" or "UNSEEN REALM" would help.

The Deut-32 worldview is quite all-engompassing. It explains most everything supernatural that the 'modernchurch' has largely expunged and decried. It begins in Genesis and ends in Revelation. All will become clear to the astute reader and listener.

8 When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
    when he divided mankind,
he fixed the borders of the peoples
    according to the number of the Sons of God.

9 But the Lord's portion is his people,
    Jacob his allotted heritage.

 

 

Psalms 82 

God has taken his place in the divine council;
    in the midst of the gods he holds judgment:

6 I said: ‘You are ‘gods’,
and you are all Sons of Elyon,

7 yet you will   die   like men,
and will fall like any of the princes.’”

[AdHoc]

4 hours ago, Dennis1209 said:

Does human critical thinking and reasoning change with time and culture? Using the biblical account of the Exodus as an example, I have asked myself, "What were they thinking?" Sometimes I insert myself into biblical times and events as if I were there witnessing it all. Then think about what I would have thought, believed, responded to, and reacted to. Could I get so indoctrinated in pagan idol worship as to dismiss what I was living and witnessing?

About two million men, women, and children witnessed the Red Sea's parting. They saw pillars of smoke and fire, with manna and quail mysteriously appearing daily. Rocks burst forth a river of water, the mountain thundering. Moses's face shone. Pharaoh's entire Army swallowed up by the sea and not being charbroiled by the desert sun, etc.

It looks as if Satan and his minions had a stranglehold on the Egyptians and could access evil power through sorcery and black magic. Pharaoh and his sorcerers could duplicate some of God's miracles. The Israelites took all this in stride as if it were common everyday occurrences.

As a side note, what about the Great Pyramids? Were they eye candy, or did they serve a function and purpose? Interestingly, the Bible details the Tower of Babel to reach heaven, mentioning or inferring a few of the world's seven wonders. But not a peep on the greatest of the Seven Wonders. Even biblical experts differ if they existed pre- or post-deluge.

Why did Israel construct a molten golden calf, and Aaron allowed it? I guess I do not understand their logic and reasoning thought process.

In his final speech Stephen pointed out that Israel " turned back to Egypt". And what was in Egypt? 400 years of idol worship by Israel (Josh.24:14). The Golden Calf was not new.

*I understand the pyramids to be astrological devices. The pagan "illumined ones" quickly discovered (after the flood when the host of heaven could be seen and not blocked by the "waters above") that if you go down a well past 33 feet (10 meters), you can see the stars during daylight. They also knew that there was a magnetic field over the earth. They built the pyramids round a shaft with an entry tunnel form the side. The bottom of the shaft had pol of water which reflected what one could see by looking up. The astrologer sat on a perch looking downward through a gunsight at the reflected stars to avoid parallax. The pyramids originally had a flat top. Very accurate star-plotting was enabled because the pyramid was accurately situated by magnetic grid. But the magnetic north pole is always moving and so after some years the pyramid became useless and another was built. But, as modern high-tech Air Force fighters have shown in their design, a capped pyramid can absorb energy. So a cap was placed on each redundant pyramid to capture the underworld's energy.

 

* People who knew these things lorded them over the common and uneducated man. The Egyptian "Illumined Ones" knew the shape of the earth, its circumference and that the poles were slightly flattened. They knew of the four seasons and the movement of earth round the sun. But 4,000 years later the Roman Church was burning people at the stake for saying these things. So these theories have been suppressed. I admit that this information is difficult to come by and is subject to controversy.

[Dennis1209]

4 hours ago, Justin Adams said:

Perhaps reading or listening to "The Divine Council" or "UNSEEN REALM" would help.

The Deut-32 worldview is quite all-engompassing. It explains most everything supernatural that the 'modernchurch' has largely expunged and decried. It begins in Genesis and ends in Revelation. All will become clear to the astute reader and listener.

Yep, I have all of the late Dr. Michael Heiser's books. 

[Dennis1209]

3 hours ago, AdHoc said:

In his final speech Stephen pointed out that Israel " turned back to Egypt". And what was in Egypt? 400 years of idol worship by Israel (Josh.24:14). The Golden Calf was not new.

*I understand the pyramids to be astrological devices. The pagan "illumined ones" quickly discovered (after the flood when the host of heaven could be seen and not blocked by the "waters above") that if you go down a well past 33 feet (10 meters), you can see the stars during daylight. They also knew that there was a magnetic field over the earth. They built the pyramids round a shaft with an entry tunnel form the side. The bottom of the shaft had pol of water which reflected what one could see by looking up. The astrologer sat on a perch looking downward through a gunsight at the reflected stars to avoid parallax. The pyramids originally had a flat top. Very accurate star-plotting was enabled because the pyramid was accurately situated by magnetic grid. But the magnetic north pole is always moving and so after some years the pyramid became useless and another was built. But, as modern high-tech Air Force fighters have shown in their design, a capped pyramid can absorb energy. So a cap was placed on each redundant pyramid to capture the underworld's energy.

 

* People who knew these things lorded them over the common and uneducated man. The Egyptian "Illumined Ones" knew the shape of the earth, its circumference and that the poles were slightly flattened. They knew of the four seasons and the movement of earth round the sun. But 4,000 years later the Roman Church was burning people at the stake for saying these things. So these theories have been suppressed. I admit that this information is difficult to come by and is subject to controversy.

I have read several theories about the pyramids, both secular and Christian. Yours is the first time I have heard this theory, which sounds logical. What is the source you obtained that information? I want to order and read it; it sounds very interesting. Everything about the pyramids is not happenstance or by trial and error. The structures scream Pi long before calculus mathematicians mathematically figured it out. The Babylonians and Egyptians may have been aware of Pi, but where and how did they obtain that knowledge?

I suspect the Egyptians may have tried to duplicate the Great Pyramids, the failures and rubble that are seen crumbling away today. Not vice versa.

For me, it is hard to accept the Egyptians had anything to do with its planning and construction. Some speculate Joseph built it; others suspect it was an old structure, and Abraham saw it. Yet others claim it was built before Noah’s flood and survived the deluge. Everything the Egyptians built had inscriptions and hieroglyphs for their Pharaohs and many gods, not the pyramids, which is telling.

The Pharaohs bragged about all their accomplishments, victories, and projects, and many of their writings are still preserved. One would think that their fantastic wonder of the world would have been boasted about all over the place, taking credit for it.

I suspect the chambers, rooms, passageways, and tiny tunnels pointing to a specific area in the constellations may tell a story. Some even suggest the symbology tells the Gospel story in advance.

The geography, placement, and alignment of where on earth these great pyramids were built were purposeful and mind-blowing. The mystery of the pyramids reminds me of how Nazi Germany jumped fifty years ahead in technology from the rest of the world. According to Wernher von Braun, when asked (admittedly controversial), we had help. The natural follow-up question was mysteriously never asked to my knowledge.

There is no controversy about “Operation Paperclip,” America, Britain, and Russia gobbling up all the Nazi war criminal scientists in an unprecedented, unconstitutional, and illegal ploy to gain their advanced technology. They put hundreds of Nazi war criminals as heads of NASA, giving them a free pass.

To my knowledge, from ground penetrating radar, there is much more hidden underground to be discovered with the Sphinx and pyramids. For some reason, Zahi Hawass and other officials will not permit any archelogy or further investigations, which is very suspicious.

If I were to gander a guess, these structures served as a “monument” to something or somebody. Or, they performed a technological function, as the most significant inventor of all time, Nikola Tesla, conjectured.

The Pharaoh's sorcerers imitated and mimicked God, the builders of the numerous precision megaliths around the globe and the pyramids. At the very least, it begs the question, where did these “illumined ones” obtain their advanced knowledge that suddenly disappeared from history?

[LearningToLetGo]

25 minutes ago, Dennis1209 said:

The Pharaohs bragged about all their accomplishments, victories, and projects, and many of their writings are still preserved. One would think that their fantastic wonder of the world would have been boasted about all over the place, taking credit for it.

Good point!