Devil's History

Author: Paul Carus (USA)
Translator: Wang Yu'er / Country: United States
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-06-01
Features: This book has been reviewed and approved by the Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs. This monumental work on evil is the work of Paul Carus in the early 20th century. This extraordinary figure is also the author of other works such as "The Teachings of Buddha." In the history of humanity, evil seemed to have been submerged at one point by the overwhelming tide of rationalism and modernism, and the devil had fallen into the role of a literary character, busily engaged in endless foolish transactions to capture souls. Various polls show that most Americans believe that the devil really exists in this world. The devil is a rebel in the universe, a lone wanderer in the kingdom of tyranny, the opposite of unity, a discordant note in cosmic harmony, an exception in the rules, a special in the general, and an unpredictable possibility. God is God precisely because of the devil's existence. Milton's Satan is a noble rebel because he would rather suffer eternal torment than suffer even the slightest humiliation. There are few examples where people who do business with the devil are asked to sign a contract, swear an oath, or provide proof of their commitment, because his honesty has never been questioned. It is the scattered, trivial flaws in Satan that have shaped the greatness of humanity and the nature of humanity. A moral machine alone, whether unremarkable or not, cannot evoke sympathy. The 20th century brought humanity total war, genocide, death camps, nuclear weapons, biological weapons, deception, ecological destruction, and judgmentless group terrorism.
The origin of Eden is around 300 BC. Before the rise of the Semites in the Mesopotamian region, a powerful nation called the Akkadians lived there. Among the Semites, the Babylonians, Assyrians, Jews, and Arabs successively held dominant positions. Strangely, the Akkadians were not of the white race but of the black race, hence they were called "Black-Headed" or "Black-Faced." However, we cannot conclude that their skin was truly as black as the Ethiopians, because on bilingual tablets found in Babylonian tombs, we see that people at the time called them Adamatu (Adamatu) or "Red-Skinned." This discovery may mean that their skin was not black but rather reddish-black or brown. The rule of the Akkadians ended around 1500 BC. During the reign of the Assyrian King Sargon II (722–705 BC), their language began to decline. As for how much the Akkadians contributed to the Semites, we can infer from the following facts: Most of the religious systems, legends, and customs of the Semites originated from the Akkadians. Therefore, we can be certain that the Semites had a seven-day week. Their Sabbath was a sacred day of rest. In Akkadian, the word literally means "a day when work is forbidden," while the Assyrian translation was "a day for the soul to rest." Furthermore, the Akkadians were already familiar with the legends of creation, the Tree of Life, and the flood that destroyed the world in the Book of Genesis and Assyrian records. We can see traditional forms of the Tree of Life on most ancient patterns, with cones of fir trees. From this, we can infer that this idea was an ancient tradition brought from a colder homeland by the Akkadians, a homeland of fir-covered peaks, such as Media. Many Jewish names also remind us of the Akkadian tradition. Without a doubt, this progress proves the profound influence of the ancient Akkadian civilization.
The names of the rivers mentioned in the Book of Genesis as flowing from Eden are in Babylonian. In Babylonian, the Tigris or Puraf means a river with turbulent waves; the Euphrates or Tiggur means a tidal river. Hfd—Dekhel, meaning "a river with very high banks," is another name for the Tigris River, written as Idikla or Idikrla in inscriptions. Some Assyriologists believe the name of the Kermes River is Araxes, while Rawlinson considers it Jukha. King Sargon even praised Elam as a "country of four great rivers." The names of the rivers in Eden indicate that the creators of the myth of Eden must have lived on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Based on these clues, we astonishingly discover a fertile land on the western side of the Tigris desert, called Edinna, which sounds very similar to Eden. During the time of Alexander, a Babylonian priest named Berossus wrote a very interesting book on the history and religion of Babylon. Although this book no longer exists, many Greek writers extensively quoted his work. Based on this, we can understand the information he provided about his kingdom. All of this is quite interesting, but there is no evidence to prove its credibility. The legends of Babylon may have originated from the Old Testament of the Bible, but the successful establishment of the Assyrian stone library undoubtedly gave us precise evidence about the origin and history of these legends, and most of this was left behind by the ancient Akkadians. P022-023