Why Middle East?

[dtango]

Tyrant god-kings like tyrant human-kings always believe they are being plotted against, and they consistently respond very poorly to their suspicions in both cases. In imagining gods that are very much like ourselves, why would such a narrative surprise you?

What surprises me is not the narrative but the way it is treated by the Egyptologists.
You may not have “Tyrant god-kings” with the god idea absent. You have to find out how the idea of gods came to be and then resort to deification. That’s common sense, pal!

In proposing that these myths have a bearing on factual history in the manner in which you suggest, why is the lack of evidence not troubling to you?

You cannot find something that you are not looking for! There is plenty of evidence buried below plenty of excuses.
The people all around the earth are purifying themselves in a lot of different ways, from ridiculous to criminal. Why do they do it?
Why do they kill their firstborns?
Why are they artificially deforming the skulls of their children?

Because the myths, they themselves created about gods, taught them what the gods were expecting from them!!

To continue a discussion along lines that are familiar to us, how does your theory address pantheons which are not revolted against, those that actively pursue our interests and we theirs, as communal imperatives (The Norse and Gaelic pantheons immediately spring to mind, as do the many "assistant/familiar" dieties of the Native N/S/C American pantheons. No such discord exists, no such revolt is plotted. Why)?

It is unrealistic to expect to find the entire story in every culture. It had been broken into bits and pieces out of which myths were created. Moreover, after the events in the Near East and the dispersal, the various peoples had different experiences. The Germanic tribes (the gods) were forced to leave nice and warm Mesopotamia and seek new land in Northern Europe. There they met the Neanderthals and it is the story of their encounter with them that they relate in their myths. The Israelites (the only group of the gods that insisted in remaining in the Near East) relate the story of the extinction of the Eastern Neanderthals. The Indians of the Americas accomplished an unbelievable feat in going through the Canadian ice sheets and yet, all of them retained parts of the original story and especially the theme of the messengers which is the concluding one.

How would your theory handle the African myths of men who were the equals or betters (most certainly not slaves, to say the least) of their "deities" in the most popular of stories?

The African myths are pure; uncontaminated by philosophy/theology. They retained the custom of the “God of the village,” as the expression is in the Egyptian texts, up to the time of the colonizers. Frazer has recorded some very interesting reports of men living just outside of the village and playing god.

How would your theory handle the evidence uncovered in Botswana, by a Professor Sheila Coulson of Oslo University and printed in "Apollon" (a peer reviewed research publication printed by the same) describing ritual and religious practices that are 70,000 years old (older than the earlier "oldest" known practices, found in Europe, and dated to 40,000 years old).

“The shaman, who is still a very important person in San culture, could have kept himself hidden in that secret chamber. He would have had a good view of the inside of the cave while remaining hidden himself. When he spoke from his hiding place, it could have seemed as if the voice came from the snake itself. The shaman would have been able to control everything. It was perfect.” The shaman could also have “disappeared” from the chamber by crawling out onto the hillside through a small shaft.”

Even if the Professor is right in imagining the above ritual, it does not mean that it was a religious practice. For religion the god is a prerequisite, and for god the prerequisite is anthropogony (creation of humans).

Did your egyptians have in their possession a fucking time machine? Again, I hardly think so.

According to Plato the Egyptian priest told Solon that they kept records of their and the other nations’ history for 9,000 years, meaning that the Egyptian priesthood was 9,000 years old at the time of Plato. How could they have kept track of the time passed?
Herodotus, who visited Egypt a little after 449 BCE, wrote that the priests showed him 345 statues of the archpriests. He thus calculated the age of the Egyptian priesthood to be 11,340 years (341 generations).

I've often criticized your "theory" for having too wide a scope than your arguments (even if they are given to you in full, for the sake of discussion) can support. Will you ever address this? After reading this (and I assume you would) are you going to return to me with stories of how we were the slaves of a giant magical python in reality? That pythons engaged in eugenics and sometimes interbred with us? This would be surprising news to me indeed.
(this is old news btw, for all I know older sites have since been discovered)

If instead of criticizing from the very start you chose to discuss the matter without prejudice, you may have changed attitude by now.
And, of course, to discuss you do not jump from one topic to another. You stay on one topic until it is exhausted.