Nephilim, Anunnaki and Nibiru / Christmas - Letter to a Prisoner

Below is a letter I wrote in response to an inmate's request to provide him information refuting the ancient astronaut theory proposed by Zechariah Sitchen as well as the subject of Christmas.

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Hi M***. This is George Young. I have been running Joseph’s ministry for a couple of years now after he had a stroke. He is doing well now but he cannot perform at his previous level. Yahweh sent me to help keep things going.

I received your letter asking for information regarding the Anunnaki and Nibiru (aka Planet X). I am not an expert on the subject and Joseph does not have any writings covering it. The thing is there isn’t really much in the historical record supporting the “ancient astronaut” story. What is used as “evidence” is spun out of context and exaggerated or just plain fabricated into the conspiracy theory we know today. I’ll do my best to provide you some basic, concise info debunking the stories surrounding the Sumerian texts without getting too deep into scholarly jargon.

There is much that is hotly debated including the meaning of the word Nephilim, where or what exactly Nibiru is, whether the Anunnaki have any relation to the Nephilim, the authenticity of the book of Enoch… There really is a lot we don’t understand about ancient cultures. It is my belief that people are trying too hard to assign meaning and understanding to something that is out of their reach. That is a dangerous place to be. What we do know, biblically speaking, is that the Nephilim were giants and they existed both before and after the flood. Goliath was one of them.

We can address extra-biblical sources as well to find some answers. According to scholars, there isn't a single text in the entire cuneiform record that:

• Has nibiru as a planet beyond Pluto
• Connects nibiru with the Anunnaki
• Has nibiru cycling through our solar system every 3600 years 

The theory of Planet X arose out of a mathematical anomaly that couldn’t be explained before 1992. This anomaly suggested that due to Neptune’s estimated size certain gravitational laws should be in place but the math was slightly off, enough that astro-physicists speculated that there might be something unseen causing a gravitational shift in the outer planets. Since 1992, data from Voyager 2 has cleared that up. Neptune was not quite as large as we thought it was. That small difference was enough to resolve the mathematical anomaly.

If there was something out there coming even remotely close to our solar system we would know it because it would be throwing off orbits and astronomy programs across the world would suddenly all be wrong. People would notice, starting with the very stable Kuiper belt surrounding our solar system. We’ve done pretty well with predicting comets and asteroids after all. The only next argument a person can make is that Planet X is a space ship. All I can say is what evidence is there of that?

Speaking of evidence, there is none that shows Zecharia Sitchin really even understood the ancient languages he claimed to. In fact, there were several elementary errors in his translations. Many knowledgeable scholars say this proves he was not a master of those languages but a hobbyist at best, a hobbyist with a clear bias towards a certain interpretation. I do not mean to say that since scholars scoff at someone it means we shouldn’t take that person seriously. There are plenty of errors in academia and the scientific community. What matters are the facts and what is true. Sitchin’s claims are simply unfounded. Here are a few more facts that should cause anyone seeking the truth to question the ancient astronaut fable:

• The Cylinder Seal VA 243 does not contain any reference or indication that the celestial bodies depicted on its top left side are of this solar system. In fact, it does not even contain the image of the sun, which is always a star with wavy lines completely enclosed in a circle. What we see is a prominent six-sided star surrounded by 11 smaller dots, which is an indication that it is probably a reference to a constellation with 12 stars.
• There is no evidence the Sumerians knew of more than 5 planets in our solar system.
• The inscription on the cylinder states, “Dubsiga, Ili-illat, your/his servant.” There is nothing to support anything in the ancient astronaut theory.
• Sitchen’s translation of the word nephilim demonstrates a lack of knowledge and respect to the Akkadian, Aramaic and Hebrew languages he purports to be an expert in. Here is what scholar Michael Heiser says to that fact:

Sitchin assumes "nephilim" comes from the Hebrew word "naphal" which usually means "to fall." He then forces the meaning "to come down" onto the word, creating his "to come down from above" translation. In the form we find it in the Hebrew Bible, if the word nephilim came from Hebrew naphal, it would not be spelled as we find it. The form nephilim cannot mean "fallen ones" (the spelling would then be nephulim). Likewise nephilim does not mean "those who fall" or "those who fall away" (that would be nophelim). The only way in Hebrew to get nephilim from naphal by the rules of Hebrew morphology (word formation) would be to presume a noun spelled naphil and then pluralize it. I say "presume" since this noun does not exist in biblical Hebrew -- unless one counts Genesis 6:4 and Numbers 13:33, the two occurrences of nephilim -- but that would then be assuming what one is trying to prove! However, in Aramaic the noun naphil(a) does exist. It means "giant," making it easy to see why the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible) translated nephilim as gigantes ("giant")… It is most likely that nephilim is an Aramaic term imported into Hebrew during the final editing of the Hebrew Bible in Babylon (where Aramaic was the lingua franca) and then the ending was corrected to Hebrew rules of word formation. Both phenomena are known in the Hebrew Bible… The verb "to go down" in biblical Hebrew is not naphal; it is yarad. The verb naphal  can mean something approximate to "came down" under one condition: it must occur in the Hiphil ("causative") stem in Hebrew grammar. If you know Hebrew, you know this is because the Hiphil stem adds either a prefixed letter to the verb and an a-class vowel (or both) in the verb conjugations, and any such occurrences in the Hebrew Bible are therefore not spelled "nephilim."

Since I quoted Michael Heiser I feel I need to attach a disclaimer. He is an anti-trinitarian and so if you ever read any of his works bear that in mind. I believe the Bible clearly reveals a triune God, despite the few isolated verses and word studies that anti-trinitarians cite. They lack understanding of our God. This is the danger of isogesis and one of the problems I have with academics. The whole Bible must be taken into account when attempting to prove a doctrine. Even the scientific method has a way of trying to disprove a theory to see if it stands in the face of opposition. Bias is a strong force in our psyche (translated as “soul” in the Bible). I recall a very wise statement, “Never underestimate the power of denial.”

If you are thinking about trying to change someone else’s point of view, ask yourself first whether they are open to listening. I have a friend who believes the earth is flat. I challenged him with some very compelling questions that he couldn’t answer (Explain the coriolis effect with the flat earth model. the procession of the equinoxes.  the curved shadow on the moon…) but that didn’t change his mind. Truth only makes it through a stony heart if someone knows there is something wrong with what they believe. You can’t reason with a fool. The Bible tells us this repeatedly.

I’m sure there is much more I could add but this should give you and your friend some food for thought. I have also modified your newsletter queue so that “Attractive Deception” (about the Hebrew Roots movement) and some of the Christmas teachings will come next. For now, here is something I’ll share with you that gave me pause. I came across this quote from Tertullian’s "On Idolatry" last holiday season. It is the smoking gun I was looking for in my search for evidence of idolatry and syncretism regarding the holiday season in the very early church. Read this quote multiple times considering what it would mean if the church were, even today, leading heathens "into the fold" by means of false doctrines and idolatrous traditions. I must also add a disclaimer to this quote, because there is some error in it. I will highlight those parts in red.

But, however, the majority (of Christians) have by this time induced the belief in their mind that it is pardonable if at any time they do what the heathen do, for fear the Name be blasphemed. Now the blasphemy which must quite be shunned by us in every way is, I take it, this: If any of us lead a heathen into blasphemy with good cause, either by fraud, or by injury, or by contumely, or any other matter of worthy complaint, in which the Name is deservedly impugned, so that the Lord, too, be deservedly angry. Else, if of all blasphemy it has been said, By your means My Name is blasphemed, we all perish at once; since the whole circus, with no desert of ours, assails the Name with wicked suffrages. Let us cease (to be Christians) and it will not be blasphemed! On the contrary, while we are, let it be blasphemed: in the observance, not the overstepping, of discipline; while we are being approved, not while we are being reprobated. Oh blasphemy, bordering on martyrdom, which now attests me to be a Christian, while for that very account it detests me! The cursing of well-maintained Discipline is a blessing of the Name. If, says he, I wished to please men, I should not be Christ's servant. But the same apostle [Paul] elsewhere bids us take care to please all: As I, he says, please all by all means. 1 Corinthians 10:32-33 No doubt he used to please them by celebrating the Saturnalia and New-year's day! [Was it so] or was it by moderation and patience? By gravity, by kindness, by integrity? In like manner, when he is saying, I have become all things to all, that I may gain all, 1 Corinthians 9:22 does he mean to idolaters an idolater? to heathens a heathen? to the worldly worldly? But albeit he does not prohibit us from having our conversation with idolaters and adulterers, and the other criminals, saying, Otherwise you would go out from the world, 1 Corinthians 5:10 of course he does not so slacken those reins of conversation that, since it is necessary for us both to live and to mingle with sinners, we may be able to sin with them too. Where there is the intercourse of life, which the apostle concedes, there is sinning, which no one permits. To live with heathens is lawful, to die with them is not. Let us live with all; let us be glad with them, out of community of nature, not of superstition. We are peers in soul, not in discipline; fellow-possessors of the world [we do not possess the world as of yet. It has not been taken from the “ruler of this age” yet, who is Satan. See 2 Corinthians 4:4, 1 John 5:19, Ephesians 2:2], not of error. But if we have no right of communion in matters of this kind with strangers, how far more wicked to celebrate them among brethren! Who can maintain or defend this? The Holy Spirit upbraids the Jews with their holy-days. Your Sabbaths, and new moons, and ceremonies, says He, My soul hates. By us, to whom Sabbaths are strange, and the new moons and festivals formerly beloved by God, the Saturnalia and New-year's and Midwinter's festivals and Matronalia are frequented — presents come and go — New-year's gifts — games join their noise — banquets join their din! Oh better fidelity of the nations to their own sect, which claims no solemnity of the Christians for itself! Not the Lord's day, not Pentecost, even it they had known them, would they have shared with us; for they would fear lest they should seem to be Christians. We are not apprehensive lest we seem to be heathens! If any indulgence is to be granted to the flesh, you have it. I will not say your own days, but more too; for to the heathens each festive day occurs but once annually: you have a festive day every eighth day [I would cut out the word “eighth” because we are not living in the eighth day. We haven’t even reached the 7^th yet, which is what the Sabbath represents – see Hebrews 4.]. Call out the individual solemnities of the nations, and set them out into a row, they will not be able to make up a Pentecost. (Tertullian. On Idolatry, Chapter XIV, c. 155 – c. 240 AD)

Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis (c. 310–320 - 403AD) says that at Alexandria Aion's birth from Kore the Virgin was celebrated January 6: "On this day and at this hour the Virgin gave birth to Aion." The date, which coincides with Epiphany, brought new year's celebrations to a close, completing the cycle of time that Aion embodies...In Ptolemaic Alexandria (305 BC-30 BC), at the site of a dream oracle, the Hellenistic syncretic god Serapis was identified as Aion Plutonius. The epithet Plutonius marks functional aspects shared with Pluto, consort of Persephone and ruler of the underworld in the Eleusinian tradition. -wikipedia.org/wiki/Aion_(deity)

In the Eleusinian tradition, dating back to the 4th century BC, Persephone was taken to the underworld in the winter months, causing her goddess mother Demeter to withdrawal her blessing on the land so that it would get cold and nothing would grow, nothing but the evergreen and holly, of course, which are symbols in Norse and Germanic cultures of life even in the dead of winter. You can see this in the tradition of the Holly King and the Oak King, although much of these ancient traditions is only speculative. There is, however, enough glimpses into ancient tribal and pagan cultures to make an educated guess at what they were about.

A winter tradition resembling Yuletide is illustrated partly in Jeremiah 10. We see nature worship there and pagan winter holidays were clearly a long standing tradition before the book of Jeremiah was written. God told us not to worship as the heathen do. Do not declare a feast day unto Yahweh, and do not presume that God is pleased with your "holy" day. Holy = “apartness, set-apartness, separateness, sacredness.” Christians have inserted Christ into something Christ was not in to begin with.

“We have no superstitious regard for times and seasons. Certainly we do not believe in the present ecclesiastical arrangement called Christmas. First because we do not believe in any mass at all, but abhor it, whether it be sung in Latin or in English: Secondly, because we find no scriptural warrant whatever for observing any day as the birthday of the Savior; and consequently, its observance is a superstition, because not of divine authority. Superstition has fixed most positively the day of our Savior’s birth, although there in no possibility of discovering when it occurred. It was not till the middle of the third century that any part of the church celebrated the birth of our Lord; and it was not till long after the western Church had set the example, that the eastern adopted it. Because the day is not known. Probably the fact is that the “holy” days were arranged to fit in with the heathen festivals. We venture to assert that if there be any day in the year of which we may be pretty sure that it was not the day on which our Savior was born it is the 25th of December. Regarding not the day, let us give God thanks for the gift of His dear Son.” —C. H. Spurgeon Dec. 24, 1871 (Spurgeon, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, p. 697)

“No evidence remains about the exact date of the birth of Christ. The December 25 date was chosen as much for practical reasons as for theological ones. Throughout the Roman Empire, various festivals were held in conjunction with the winter solstice. In Rome, the Feast of the Unconquerable Sun celebrated the beginning of the return of the sun. When Christianity became the religion of the Empire, the church either had to suppress the festivals or transform them. The winter solstice seemed an appropriate time to celebrate Christ’s birth. Thus, the festival of the sun became a festival of the Son” (Holman Bible Dictionary, entry for Christmas)

The basic premise that appears to go back as far as Babylon and Egypt is this: In winter the sun shines its light the least compared to the rest of the year, essentially dying, and therefore everything else withers and dies, except the evergreen. Pantheists believe that “God” is in everything and that there are spirits in the evergreens which help them survive the winter. That is why they are central to this season and why they are brought indoors to be worshiped. You are bringing that "life" into your home as a symbol of... (What is all paganistic idolatry about?) Fertility. Fertility of the land and fertility of the womb to conceive. The holly wreath on your door is a symbol of the womb and the tree is the penis bringing life and the spark of light into it.

God told us not to worship as the heathen do. This is why I personally want nothing to do with Christmas and I find it difficult even to worship with those who do. They are inviting a spirit into their lives and their homes by participating in the holy-daze. This spirit stays around and invites others to come in.

When an unclean spirit comes out of a man, it passes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ On its return, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and brings seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and dwell there. And the final plight of that man is worse than the first.” Luke 11:24-26

You can unwittingly become an idolater by the works of your own hands and by this one can become possessed. What does the Bible say about associating with those who call themselves brethren but are idolaters?

But now I am writing you not to associate with anyone who claims to be a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a verbal abuser, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business of mine is it to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 1 Corinthians 5:11-12

It would behoove the "church" to consider exactly why they do what they do. Is your worship based on what God has shown you by the Holy Spirit or by vain traditions of men?

May Yahweh bless you and keep you by His Holy Spirit.

George