SEMIRAMIS, QUEEN OF BABYLON
by Bryce Self
Any effort to trace the origins of the myth, legend, and lore
of goddess-worship will eventually lead one back to a single historical
figure---Semiramis, wife of Nimrod and queen of Babylon, and this
is especially true when considering the goddess/planet Venus.
Before we can begin to deal with Semiramis though, we must
(as with any historical figure) gain at least a general understanding
of her cultural and temporal setting. Since I have found in my
researches that neither proven scientific truth nor gleanings
of fact from the body of ancient legends in any way contradicts
a proper understanding of biblical revelation, I will use the
scriptural framework of history as a basis upon which to reconstruct
the story of Semiramis the woman.
When Noah and his family left the ark after the flood, they
settled first at the northern feet of Ararat facing what is today
Georgia, USSR. From here, these eight souls began to spread out
into the surrounding districts of northern Iran and Syria, as
well as eastern Turkey. After a considerable period (perhaps 5
to 6 hundred years), the families of Noah's descendants began
to scatter a bit more widely due to increasing population, and
perhaps some degree of rivalry or even enmity between the families
of Japheth, Shem, and Ham. In this way we find that within about
half a millennium the entire "fertile crescent", as well
as the Nile valley, the Anatolian and Iranian plateaus, Arabia,
and Ethiopia have been sparsely settled---but with a decided majority
of Noah's descendants living in the lower regions of Mesopotamia
(which would come to be called Sumer and Akkad).
Modern archaeology has confirmed the fact that the first inhabitants
of these areas were homogeneous in both race and culture, and
the most reliable researches indicate that it was from here that
population, animal husbandry, metallurgy, agriculture, and "citification"
spread throughout the earth. The scientific and scriptural views
are in exact agreement upon the origin and spread of races and
civilization---the only point of difference is the time scale
involved! Whereas the scriptures clearly indicate the existence
of all these elements of civilization long before the flood; orthodox
science, by it's denial of the bible is required to construct
a mythical stone age several millennia long in order to account
for the same phenomena.
It was in Mesopotamia that the first cities were built after
the flood, and the first of these was quite naturally named after
the very first city built by man before the flood---Enoch. Due
to vagaries of linguistic permutation, this name has come down
to us as Erech or Uruk in Sumeria. In all there were seven major
cities built near the head of the Persian Gulf, leading to the
name "Land of the Seven Cities" commonly found in the
early mythologies of the world. These seven cities are enumerated
in Genesis as those which were conquered by Nimrod, establishing
the world's first empire. The earliest Babylonian legends tell
of a conquering people who came up out of the Persian Gulf and
established an empire from these cities. This seems to fit well
with what we know of the movements of Nimrod in his early career.
He was a native of Ethiopia and was widely traveled among the
few populated areas of those days. When he set out to build himself
an army of conquest, he recruited from his "cousins"
the descendants of Sheba and Dedan who had come up through Arabia
to settle on the Asian mainland at the Straight of Hormuz and
on the Indus river in what is now Afghanistan (these people were
the Dravidians who were driven southward into India by the later
Aryan invasion). After raising his army, Nimrod ferried them up
the gulf in the world's first naval armada, and conquered his
empire. The best estimates place the time of the conquest as about
4000 to 3500 BC, and about 1000 years after the flood of Noah.
In the midst of the tumult of war Nimrod and Semiramis met--and
in none too savory circumstances, for tradition states that she
was an inn/brothel keeper in the city of Erech---leading one to
speculate upon the nature of their initial acquaintance. Semiramis
was a native of Erech, which as evidenced by it's name seems to
have been built by a Hamitic family (Ham's wife was said to have
been descended from Cain who built the first Erech in honor of
his son). The name Semiramis is a later, Hellenized form of the
Sumerian name "Sammur-amat", or "gift of the sea."
The initial element "sammur" when translated into
Hebrew becomes "Shinar" (the biblical name for lower
Mesopotamia), and is the word from which we derive "Sumeria".
This one tarnished woman then, had such a lasting impact upon
world history that not only do we call by her name the land from
which civilization flowed, but God himself through the sacred
writer has let us know that its distinguishing characteristic
was that it was "the Land of Shinar," or Semiramis.
Very little has come down to us through the millennia concerning
Semiramis' rise to power, but it is safe to assume that it was
initially upon Nimrod's coattails that she rode, although later
in life as well as throughout history her influence overwhelmingly
obscured that of her husband. Of course, it would not do to have
an ex-harlot upon the throne, so the "polite fiction"
was invented that she was a virgin sprung from the sea at Nimrod's
landing, and hence a suitable bride for the emperor(thus the title
Semiramis which has totally obscured her original name).
Semiramis was the instigator in forming the false religion
aimed at supporting their rule, and of course her suggestion fell
upon open ears. The religion she invented was based primarily
upon a corruption of the primeval astronomy formulated by Noah's
righteous ancestors before the flood. In the original this system
depicted by means of constellations the story of Satan's rebellion
and the war in the heavens, his subversion of mankind, the fall
of Adam and Eve, the promise of One to come who would suffer and
die to relieve man from the curse of sin then be installed as
Lord of Creation, and the final re-subjugation of the cosmos to
God through Him.
These eternal truths were corrupted by her (rather, quite obviously,
by the evil one controlling her) into a mythic cycle wherein the
great dragon is depicted as the rightful lord of the universe
whose throne has been temporarily usurped by One whom we can recognize
as the God of the Bible. The serpent creates man in his present
miserable state, but promises that a child would one day born
of a divine mother---which child would supplant God, become a
god himself, and return rulership of the Earth to the serpent.
These fables were based upon the then widely-known story of the
constellations, and were introduced under the guise of revealing
the hidden esoteric knowledge concealed in them (regardless of
the fact that the original was quite straightforward).
Although this esotericism was the second element in Semiramis'
cult, it only masked the actual goal which was the worship of
the "heavenly host," which the Bible equates with Satan's
army of fallen angels. Satan was quite willing to receive worship
"by proxy", hence the third major element of the mystery
religion was emperor-worship. This religion was propagated by
a hierarchy of priests and priestesses, to whom were assigned
the task of initiating the populace at large into it's ascending
degrees of revelation, culminating at the highest level in both
direct worship of Satan and demon-possession.
Although Nimrod was a brilliant strategist, he made a fatal
blunder when he allowed Semiramis to retain full control over
this religious hierarchy, and through it the minds and hearts
of the people; for when a schism occurred between them she was
able to turn it from a tool of support into a deadly weapon. The
rift between husband and wife occurred when the queen bore an
illegitimate son, and the king threatened her with both dethronement
and exposure of her true origin. Semiramis, of course would not
allow this to take place, and devised a plot to overthrow Nimrod.
During the course of the New Year's festivities at which the
advent of Nimrod's rule was celebrated, there was a certain feast
exclusively for the royal family and the upper echelons of the
priesthood. During this feast, which included "courses"
of psychedelic and hallucinogenic drugs, a year-old ram was traditionally
sacrificed by being torn limb-from-limb while still alive, and
it's flesh eaten raw. This ram symbolized the old year passing
into the heavens to allow room for the new year. A new-born lamb
was then presented which, symbolizing the new year, would be kept
and fattened for the next year's ceremonies. This year Semiramis
directed the ritual according to the formula, with the exception
that when the time came for the ram to be slaughtered, it was
the king who was torn to pieces at the hands of the drug-crazed
priesthood and Semiramis' bastard son was installed as king. Thus
Nimrod, the mighty hunter, died a horrible death as a trapped
beast himself.
Semiramis named her son Damu (from the Sumerian "dam,"
or blood), which in the later Babylonian language became Dammuzi,
in Hebrew Tammuz, and in Greek Adonis. Of course, Semiramis assumed
the regency for her infant son, and ruled as absolute monarch
for 42 more years. In order to avoid having to kill her son on
the next New Year's Day, she instituted an annual nation-wide
sports competition, the winner of which would have the "honor"
of taking Damu's place and ascending into heaven to become a god.
Semiramis was not unopposed in her arrogation of the regency,
however, or her rule as a woman. The military arm of the government
was divided into two camps for and against her, and a short war
ensued which ended when the populace (roused by the priesthood)
not only refused to support the "rebels" but actively
opposed them. In the course of this war, though, things became
so close that Semiramis was forced to build a system of walls,
towers, and gates around Babylon to defend herself. She was thus
the first to build fortifications and her crown afterwards was
in the form of the turreted walls of Babylon. To oppose the accusations
of "mere" womanhood laid against her, she had herself
deified as the mother of the god Damu (since only a god can beget
a god) , and installed as "The Queen of Heaven" pictured
in the constellation Cassiopeia, which the ancients had intended
as a corporate representation of those people faithful to God
who will be enthroned by Him after the end of the age.
In spite of her cleverness, though, she also sowed the seeds
of her own destruction. As she raised her son, she imbued him
with divinity in the eyes of the priests and people as the means
of retaining control as the divine mother without seeming to aggrandize
herself. As Damu grew he became used to having every whim instantly
gratified by a subservient, indeed groveling, populace. For safety's
sake he had a personal bodyguard/companion group which he was
never without, and which formed an elite corps of soldiery loyal
and accountable to him alone. Upon coming to maturity and demanding
of his mother to be installed as king, she not only refused him
this--but, seeing him now as a challenge to her rule, slated him
for the same death she had meted to his father. Damu caught on
to her scheme, and pre-empted his "assumption" by slaying
his mother with his own sword, and putting down any priestly protests
by purging the hierarchy of all who would not vow allegiance to
him. Thus Semiramis died after reigning as queen over Babylon
for 102 years.
These events laid the groundwork for all of the pagan religious
systems of antiquity, as well as many alive today. Semiramis,
in particular was the model and original of every goddess and
female cult figure in the ancient and modern worlds (either directly
or by derivation); and thus it essential to know her story in
order to discern what is factual legend and what is merely myth.
by Bryce Self
onesimus@ix.netcom.com
4/28/84.
Resources:
SEMIRAMIS:
Legendary Mysterious Great Queen of Assyria, edited by George
E. Foryan
The
Original Goddess: Semiramis of Babylon, by Yisrayl Hawkins,
House of Yahweh
Semiramis,
Queen of Assyria, (Amazon Nation)
The Two Babylons by Alexander Hislop
BABYLONIAN RELIGION
By Harry A. Ironside
As we go back into the dim twilight of history with Scripture, we
learn that the founder of Bab-el, or Babylon, was Nimrod, of whose
unholy achievements we read in the 10th chapter of Genesis. He was the
arch-apostate of the patriarchal age. He is described as a "mighty
hunter before the Lord" -- "a hunter of the souls of men," the rabbis
said. Going out from the presence of the Lord, he impiously sought to
gather a multitude about himself, and in defiance of the express command
of God to spread abroad upon the face of the earth, he persuaded his
associates and followers to join together in "building a city and a
tower which should reach unto heaven."
Not surely as some of us were taught in our childhood a tower by
which they might climb up into the skies to escape another possible
flood, but a tower of renown, rising to a great height, to be recognized
as a temple or rallying center for those who did not walk in obedience
to the word of the Lord. With all the effrontery of our modern
apostates, they called their city and tower Bab-El, the gate of God; but
it was soon changed by divine judgment into Babel, Confusion. It bore
the stamp of unreality from the first, for we are told, "they had brick
for stone, and slime had they for mortar." An imitation of that which is
real and true has ever since characterized Babylon in all ages.
Nimrod, or Nimroud-bar-Cush, as he is called on the monuments,
was a grandson of Ham, the unworthy son of Noah, whose character is
revealed in his exposure of his father's shame. We know that Noah had
brought through the flood the revelation of the true God, for he was a
preacher of righteousness, and his utterances on more than one occasion
show that he had the prophetic gift. Ham on the other hand seems to have
been all too readily affected by the apostasy that brought the flood,
for he shows no evidence of self-judgment, but the very opposite. His
name, as spelled out upon Egyptian monuments is Khem, and this agrees
with the literal sound of the Hebrew word rendered Ham in our Bibles. It
means "swarthy," "darkened," or more literally, "the sun-burnt." The
name indicates the state of the man's soul. For what is a sun-burnt
person? One who is darkened by light from heaven. Ham had been granted
wonderful mercies; he was saved from the flood because of his father's
faith, but he abused his privileges and "turned the grace of God into
lasciviousness." He was actually darkened by the burning rays of light
that God caused to shine upon his soul. Thus his conscience became
seared as with a hot iron, and he became the founder of a race that
departed from the living God and led the way into idolatry, worshipping
and serving the creature more than the Creator.
We know something of what this means. We speak of people today
who have become, as we say, gospel-hardened. They too have been darkened
by the light, and are often the ringleaders in apostasy: "If the light
that is in thee becomes darkened, how great is the darkness." There are
many in the world tonight who used to listen with tears in their eyes to
the story of the matchless grace of God as revealed in the cross of
Christ, but are unmoved now though that story be told ever so tenderly;
they have become hardened in their sins, and their seared consciences no
longer feel the Spirit's breath. It is a most dangerous thing to trifle
with the light from heaven.
But to proceed with our theme, Ham became darkened by the light.
We know his failure and sin. But when Noah had recovered himself and
knew what his son had done unto him he pronounced, by the spirit of
prophecy, a curse upon Canaan, not on Ham. Do you wonder at that? I did,
until I saw that God had already pronounced a blessing upon all three
sons of Noah-Shem, Ham, and Japheth. So Noah passes over his unworthy
son and utters a curse upon Canaan, who we can well believe was, as we
say, "a chip off the old block." Ham begat a son named Cush, "the black
one," and he became the father of Nimrod, the apostate leader of his
generation.
Ancient lore now comes to our assistance, and tells us that the
wife of Nimrod-bar-Cush was the infamous Semiramis, the First. She is
reputed to have been the founder of the Babylonian mysteries and the
first high-priestess of idolatry. Thus Babylon became the fountainhead
of idolatry, and the mother of every heathen and pagan system in the
world. The mystery-religion that was originated there spread in various
forms throughout the whole earth, and as we shall see in a few minutes,
it is with us today. It is identical with the mystery of iniquity which
wrought so energetically in Paul's day, and shall have its fullest
development when the Holy Spirit has departed and the Babylon of the
apocalypse holds sway.
Building on the primeval promise of the woman's Seed who was to
come, Semiramis bore a son whom she declared was miraculously conceived,
and when she presented him to the people, he was hailed as the promised
deliverer. This was Tammuz, whose worship Ezekiel protested against in
the days of the captivity. Thus was introduced the mystery of the mother
and the child, a form of idolatry that is older than any other known to
man. The rites of this worship were secret. Only the initiated were
permitted to know its mysteries. It was Satan's effort to delude mankind
with an imitation so like the truth of God that they would not know the
true Seed of the woman when He came in the fullness of time. To this
Justin Martyr bears definite witness.
From Babylon this mystery-religion spread to all the surrounding
nations, as the years went on and the world was populated by the
descendants of Noah. Everywhere the symbols were the same, and
everywhere the cult of the mother and child became the popular system.
Their worship was celebrated with the most disgusting and immoral
practices. The image of the queen of heaven with the babe in her arms
was seen everywhere, though the names might differ as languages
differed. It became the mystery-religion of Phoenicia, and by the
Phoenicians was carried to the ends of the earth. Ashtoreth and Tammuz,
the mother and child of these hardy adventurers, became Isis and Horus
in Egypt, Aphrodite and Eros in Greece, Venus and Cupid in Italy, and
bore many other names in more distant places. Within 1,000 years,
Babylonianism had become the religion of the world, which had rejected
the Divine revelation.
Linked with the central mystery were countless lesser mysteries,
the hidden meaning of which was known only to the initiates, but the
outward forms were practiced by all the people. Among these were the
doctrines of purgatorial purification after death, salvation by
countless sacraments (such as priestly absolution), sprinkling with holy
water, the offering of round cakes to the queen of heaven (as mentioned
in the book of Jeremiah), dedication of virgins to the gods (which was
literally sanctified prostitution), weeping for Tammuz for a period of
40 days prior to the great festival of Istar (who was said to have
received her son back from the dead); for it was taught that Tammuz was
slain by a wild boar and afterwards brought back to life. To him the egg
was sacred, as depicting the mystery of his resurrection even as the
evergreen was his chosen symbol and was set up in honor of his birth at
the winter solstice, when a boar's head was eaten in memory of his
conflict and a yule log burned with many mysterious observances.
The sign of the cross was sacred to Tammuz, as symbolizing the
life giving principle and as the first letter of his name. It is
represented upon vast numbers of the most ancient altars and temples,
and did not, as many have supposed originate with Christianity.
From this mystery-religion, the patriarch Abraham was separated by the
divine call, and with this same evil cult the nation that sprang from
him had constant conflict, until under Jezebel, a Phoenician princess,
it was grafted onto what was left of the religion of Israel in the
northern kingdom in the day of Ahab, and was the cause of their
captivity at the last. Judah was polluted by it, for Baal-worship was
but the Canaanitish form of Babylonian mysteries, and only by being sent
into captivity to Babylon itself did Judah become cured of her fondness
for idolatry. Baal was the Sun-God, the Life-giving One, identical with
Tammuz.
When Christ came into this world the mystery of iniquity was
everywhere holding sway, save where the truth of God as revealed in the
Old Testament was known. Thus, when the early Christians set out upon
the great task of carrying the gospel to the ends of the earth, they
found themselves everywhere confronted by this system, in one form or
another; for though Babylon as a city had long been but a mystery, her
mysteries had not died with her. When the city and temples were
destroyed, the high-priest fled with a company of initiates and their
sacred vessels and images to Pergamos, where the Symbol of the serpent
was set up as the emblem of the hidden wisdom. From there, they
afterwards crossed the sea and immigrated to Italy, where, they settled
on the Etruscan plain.
There the ancient cult was propagated under the name of the
Etruscan Mysteries and eventually Rome became the headquarters of
Babylonianism. The chief priests wore mitres shaped like the head of a
fish, in honor of Dagon, the fish-god, the Lord of life-another form of
the Tammuz mystery, as developed among Israel's old enemies, the
Philistines. The chief priest when established in Rome took the title
Pontifex Maximus, and this was imprinted in on his mitre. When Julius
Caesar (who was an initiate like all young Romans of good family) had
become the head of the States, he was elected Pontifex Maximus, and this
title was held henceforth by all the Roman emperors down to Constantine
the Great, who was at one and the same time, head of the church, and
high priest to the heathen. The title was afterwards conferred upon the
bishops of Rome, and is borne by the pope today, who is thus declared to
be, not the successor of the fisherman-apostle Peter, but the direct
successor of the high priest of the Babylonian mysteries, and the
servant of the fish-god Dagon, for whom he wears, like his idolatrous
predecessors, the fisherman's ring.
During the early centuries of the church's history, the mystery
of iniquity had wrought with such astounding effect, and the Babylonian
practices and teachings had been so largely absorbed by that which bore
the name of the church of Christ, that the truth of the Holy Scriptures
on many points had been wholly obscured, while idolatrous practices had
been foisted upon the people as Christian sacraments, and the heathen
philosophies took the place of gospel instruction. Thus was developed
that amazing system which for a thousand years dominated Europe and
trafficked in the bodies of souls of men, until the great Reformation of
the 16th century brought in a measure of deliverance.
First Melchizedek, as the first king of Jerusalem.
