QUOTE(chimeraddraig @ Jun 10 2007, 06:23 PM) [snapback]1717911[/snapback]
draconic ,
" Isaiah never gives them a human form, only that they have arms legs wings and faces, nor are they referred to as anything but creatures or Seraphim... even the Jewish Encyclpedia admits they are winged reptilian dieties which saw their origin in Mesopotamia."
_Isaiah wrote they have "feet..hands". The Jewish Encyc. refers to kiridu and lammasu which are not reptiles, but bulls, lions etc. with wings, which were the most attractive element.
"They are depicted as winged and limbed dragons on the Sacred Temple Menorah, and described with wings and limbs in Jewish scriptures, such as the dragon who saws stone blocks to build the temple, in the Testament of Solomon."
_Dragon stone-masons? Unless dragons know karate martial-arts, they would need hands for the tools .
(quote) Anton Marks."The representation of the candelabrum on the Hasmonean coins provides us with our oldest picture of the Menorah. One notable feature of that depiction is that it seems to be standing on a sort of tripod. This would agree with the evidence of the Talmud (which speaks of an indeterminate number of "legs"), as well as with the three-legged Menorah images that were incorporated in much of Jewish art in later centuries.
This portrayal of a Menorah supported by a tripod base is not the one that springs most naturally to our minds. Most of us imagine the Menorah with a broad, solid base, like the one that appears in the official seal of the State of Israel. The source for this image is the Arch of Titus, erected around 81 C.E. to commemorate the Roman triumph over the Jewish insurrection. On that Arch we can see a meticulously detailed relief of the spoils of Jerusalem Temple being carried through the streets of Rome, and the Menorah is perhaps the most prominent of the treasures. However the base of Titus' Menorah is not a tripod, but the now-familiar two-tiered hexagonal structure.
There are many factors that testify to the authenticity of the depiction in Titus' arch: In general, Roman triumphal arches were designed as historical documents and towards that end strove to be as accurate as possible. In this case, almost all the details demonstrate to the sculptors' intimate knowledge of the Temple's vessels as described in the Bible and other Jewish sources. Moreover, the proportions of the candelabrum, with its oversized base, are in such blatant conflict with the classical notions of aesthetic form that it is inconceivable that a Roman craftsman would have invented them.
How then are we to explain the discrepancy between these two different renderings of the Menorah's base?
Some clues to this mystery are suggested by the ornamental designs that appear in Titus' Menorah. Though the images have been eroded over time, it is possible to discern vestiges of such figures as eagles and fish-tailed sea serpents or dragons. A similar base has been excavated from a Roman temple at Didymus, now in southern Turkey.
The eagles were, of course, the best-know symbol of Roman sovereignty. The dragons were a popular decorative motif in Roman art, and the whole candelabrum seems to testify to the strong Roman influence.
There are however some striking differences between Titus' candelabrum and its pagan counterparts. The Didymus lamp, for example, features a human figure, a water-nymph, seated on the back of the monster. It also portrays this creature with spiky rills issuing from its neck, an image that was explicitly prohibited by Talmudic law. Both these features are lacking in the image of the Temple Menorah. While both these facts argue for its Jewish origins, they cannot offset the strong Roman influence perceptible in the design.
As some scholars have observed, this mixture of a positive disposition towards things Roman, mitigated by a Jewish antipathy towards pagan images, fits the personality of King Herod, the despotic monarch whose prolonged and unpopular rule over Judea was made possible by his slavish obedience to his Roman masters. Throughout his career he tried to impose Roman social and religious institutions upon his reluctant subjects.
It is thus entirely characteristic of Herod's approach to introduce into the Temple itself a candelabrum that was adorned with the symbols of Roman authority and values. As in similar cases, Herod was unable to completely ignore the popular resistance to human images or explicitly pagan motifs. If this is correct, then the Menorah that was plundered by the Roman legions was not the symbol of religious freedom that had been created by the Maccabees, but a despot's monument to foreign oppression. This fact might account for the absence of the Menorah from the coinage of the Jewish rebellions in 69-70 and 135, which made much use of other symbols from the Temple worship.
When the Menorah did regain popularity as a decorative theme in Jewish art from the third century onwards, it was the original three legged lamp that was chosen by the Jewish craftsmen as a symbol of religious pride and messianic hope.
Another inconsistency between different designs of the Menorah includes the shape of the branches of the Menorah. Generally, these branches are depicted as semi-circular or oblong in shape. However, Rashi in his commentary to the Torah, explicitly writes that the branches "extended upward in a diagonal." Indeed, the very Hebrew word which the Torah uses to describe the branches, "kinim", implies a straight line.
Part of the confusion concerning the shape of the branches of the menorah stems from the fact that the Rambam makes no definite statement regarding this issue, neither in his Commentary on the Mishnah, nor in his Mishneh Torah. For that reason, several commentaries were led to the conclusion that he also agrees that the branches were semi-circular. Nothing, however, could be further from the truth. The Rambam does not describe the shape of the branches of the menorah, because it is unnecessary. In both his Commentary on the Mishnah and his Mishneh Torah, he adds drawings in which he depicts the menorah. And in both instances, he shows the branches as extending diagonally, in straight lines. Unfortunately, at the time the Rambam wrote these works, printing presses had not been invented. It was not until several centuries after his passing that his texts were printed, and in these printings, his original drawings were omitted.
Equally clear evidence of the Rambam's perspective can be gleaned from the commentary to the Torah written by his son, Rabbeinu Avraham. When describing the manner in which the menorah was fashioned, Rabbeinu Avraham states:
"The six branches... extended upward from the center shaft of the menorah in a straight line, as depicted by my father, and not in a semi-circle as depicted by others."
Our Sages teach that the menorah is "testimony to all the inhabitants of the world that the Divine Presence rests within Israel." How unfitting is it that instead of drawing that symbol according to its conception by Torah sages, the conception from the arch which proudly states "Judea is vanquished" is used instead!
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This article belongs to the following subjects:
Judaism » Holidays with a Twist » Chanukah
Judaism » Jewish Symbols (end quote).
"The Brazen Serpent of Moses was not a replica of a mere snake, nor were mere snakes the creatures sent by Yahweh to punish the Israelites, but the heavenly wing "Drakones" as the Jews themselve would call them later on. But immediately after a king destroyed Yahweh's idol, 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel were conquered and destoryed by Assyria, and when future kings failed to restore Yahweh's idol, Babylon captured and destroyed Jerusalem and the temple."
_Jesus called it "ophin" Gr. "snake" at John 3.14. The 10 tribes refused to follow Hezekiah's destruction of the wrongly-idolised seraph "burning snake", and they were defeated while Hezekiah in Judah was specifically protected by Yahweh against Sennacherib. Babylon destroyed the Temple which Yahweh condemned for its "creeping beasts" idols ( Ezekiel 8.10), and no mention of lost idols.
You really haven't disputed anything I said. Regarding the Menorah, there is no Roman religious monument that looks anything like the menorah or its dragon-decorated base. And unlike spiny pagan dragons, these dragons conform to Talmudic law. And why would there even be talmudic laws that specifically instructed how "holy" dragons could be depicted? Probably becasue Jewsih priests and Rabbis acknowledged the Seraphim of Isaiah around the throne of God as Drakones. This is actually confirmed in the DEAD SEA SCROLLS!
And it is not me who stated that a dragon sawed stone blocks to make Solomons's temple, ancient Jewish scriptures did.
The Yahweh idol is called Nahashtan in the Old Testemant, Nahash - serpent Tan(nin) - Dragon. Serpent Dragon, the winged Sumerian Mushrushu just as the storm dragon who flooded the world is called in the story retained by the Hebrews, only renaming Enlil to Yahweh. The association of dragons and floods was so well known in this region that the dragon in Revelation spews water from his mouth to flood the earth.
It was Jewish propoganda that that tried to hide Hezekiah's disgrace. There is absolutley no historical evidence an angel killed 150,000 Assyrian soldiers. On the Contrary, EVERY Israelite city except Jerusalem was cpatured by the Assyrians, and 10 of the 12 tribes lost to oblivion. And a surviving Assyrian stele explains how Hezekiah gave the assyrians a huge tribute of silver and gold taken from the temple to prevent them from destorying Jerusalem. No wonder the angel story was invented! And why would there still be idols of creeping things in the temple if Hezekiah cleaned them out?
Christians have invented a "fairytale Bible" that contradicts the original Hebrew scritures and archaeology. In the real Bible, the Seraphim are winged reptiles, even the Jewish encyclopedia admits it and the Dead Sea scrolls confirm it. But Christians have turned them into Pagan Grecian swan winged demi-gods. Yahweh forbade the golden calf idol, but he ordered Moses to make the winged seraph dragon, becasue it was HIS image. NO GOD orders an image to be made unless it IS HIM! All the facts say this is true, but again, Christian fairytales say it was not an idol. And as soon as Yaheweh's idol was detroyed, TERRIBLE things began to happen to Israel was at its greatest glory, in the days of Solomon, when the dragon idol was worshipped. It would seem that this pleased Yahweh, for nothing bad happened until the idol was broken. What part of that don't you understand?
Get over it. Yahweh is a dragon. His idol is a dragon, he floods the world like the storm dragon Enlil in the original flood story the Hebrews copied, the bible says he breaths fire from his mouth, and smoke from his nostrils, he consumes people, his closeset associate are dragons, the Jews decorated the temple furniture with dragons, even the Perisans and gnostic Christians said he was a dragon. Its not like he's God. He's a dragon that works for God that was been confused with God. Its just a simple and understandable case of mistaken identity.
Good Christians should be elated over all the scriptural proof that Yahweh is a dragon. After all, every human culture believed in them, so these may all be aspects of Yahweh as well. Just because there are many childish myths of human heroes slaying dragons, there is not a shred of evidence this has ever occurred.