Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Brian,

> Akhenaten's henotheism has been suggested as providing insight into 
> the framework-inspiration of some of the earliest Hebrew henotheism. 
> "The Hymn to the Aten"  which dates to his reforms (14th century 
> B.C.E.)  praises the beneficence of the sun in language that is 
> echoed in Psalm 104 regarding the Hebrew God. Can this coincidence 
> of religious synchronicity be interpreted (without much danger of 
> over-extension) as a genesis (pardon the pun) for Hebrew religion? 
> John Day (a Jehovah's Witness scholar, which I disclose so you can 
> judge for yourself how much this plays into his research) posits 
> that the creation Hymn to the Aten served as a source for the 
> biblical writer P. He also sees linguistic connections between the 
> two traditions.
>
> "The expression l-mw'dym "for seasons" is found in the OT only in 
> Psalm 104:19 and Genesis 1:14, and both are mentioned in reference 
> to luminaries. Similarly, chytw "beast" is found in Psalm 104:11-12 
> and Genesis 1:24, and is elsewhere restricted to poetry in the OT. 
> This suggests at minimum that P is dependent on a poetic passage, 
> and probably Psalm 104.
>
> The greater mythological character of the psalm clearly establishes 
> the direction of dependence. In Psalm 104:7 we actually have an 
> allusion to the divine conflict with the sea, whereas in Genesis 
> 1:6-7, God's control of the waters is merely work, and in  Psalm 
> 104:26 we encounter God's creation of Leviathan while Genesis 1:21 
> speaks in demythologized terms of "great sea monsters". The allusion 
> to thwm "deep" in Genesis 1:2 can thus be traced to Psalm 104:6 
> which specifically refers to the waters by this name." (see 
> http://www.jehovahs-
> witness.com/10/73734/1.ashx )
>
> Any thoughts?


HH: The God who created heaven and earth predates Akhenaten, and it 
is He who revealed Himself to Abraham far earlier than Akhenaten.

                                        Yours,
                                        Harold Holmyard