By James Donahue

The name “Nimrod” has always negative connotations.  The dictionary says the name implies a hunter, or a person regarded as “silly, foolish or stupid.”

The name was marked by the writer of the ancient Book of Genesis who named Nimrod as the son of Cush, who was the firstborn son of Ham. Thus he was a great grandson of Noah.

Genesis 10:8-11 describes Nimrod as “a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Sininar. Out of that land went forth Ashur, and builded Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth, and Calah: the same is a great city.”

So how did the very name of Nimrod get twisted from that of a mighty hunter, builder of great cities and first emperor of the known world, to that of a fool? It appears that the Hebrew historian Josephus portrayed Nimrod as an evil king who declared himself to be the God Marduk and demanded that the people of his ancient kingdom of Mesopotamia worship him.

Thus in the eyes of the Hebrew people, and the Christians who followed, Nimrod was a wicked and foolish man.

In fact, the very name Nimrod comes from the Hebrew verb “marad,” which means “rebel. Adding the “n” before the “m” means “The Rebel.” Thus Bible archaeologist Dr. David P. Livingston  suggests that Nimrod is not the real name of this great king, but rather he is Gilgamesh, the hero of the ancient epic told on clay tablets uncovered in the ancient ruins of Nineveh.

While the tablets portray Gilgamesh as a great hero, the Hebrew writings depict this king as a rebel against God because he founded the first empire after the flood, and encouraged his people to build ziggurats. Livingston suggested that the great “sin” at the Tower of Babel in the City of Babylon was that the people attempted to build a tower high enough that if the earth ever suffered another flood, they would have a way to survive it.

Livingston probably is correct in his argument that Nimrod is not the correct name of the great emperor who conquered the territory and built the great cities of ancient history. But Gilgamesh may also be a fictitious name. Historian Dudley F. Cates in his book, The Rise and Fall of Nimrod, suggests that the real name for this fellow was Etana of Kish, who was the first known ruler of Mesopotamia.

Cates writes that various city-states rose in Mesopotamia until about 2,800 BC, when they were united under the rule of Etana. It is likely they were united be force, or conquered. This may have been how this king was marked in Genesis as “The Hunter.” And if Livingston’s theory is correct, the name Nimrod may also refer to this king as a “hunter of men” who sought to turn them away from the concept of one god.

From all we can learn, King Etana was the ruler of the area now referred to by historians as the Golden Crescent of Civilization, which includes both Iran and Iraq.

This king may have had another, more elaborate name. Justin’s Histori Romani Scriptorium identifies this same king as Tukulti-Ninurta I, or Ninus for short. Justin wrote: “Ninus strengthened the greatness of his acquired dominion by continued possession. Having subdued, therefore, his neighbors, when, by an accession of forces, being still further strengthened, he went forth against other tribes, and every new victory paved the way for another, he subdued all the people of the east.”

Cates concludes that if the Genesis verse is correct, and Nimrod was the builder of Nineveh, then Ninus and Nimrod are the same person. He said the word Nineveh means “the habitation of Ninus.”

Plowing into the known history of Ninus turns up clods of very interesting dirt, for sure. It seems he married Queen Semiramis, and together Ninus and Semiramis declared themselves god and goddess over their kingdom. Ninus was known as Marduk. The origins and mythology surrounding that ancient Mesopotamian god is extremely complex and difficult to grasp. Those who choose to study it maygrasp the name Semiramis gave herself as joint deity over the kingdom. It was Astarte

Historian George Foryan, in an essay “The Legend of Semiramis,” said the only compete significant documentation he found intact about this woman is by Greek historian Diodorus Siculus, who lived at about the same time as Julius Caesar. Thus he was not a contemporary. Some scholars argue that the Siculus text is plagiarized “and based on historical legends colored with elaborations of thought and disguised fantasies.”

We can just hear Foryan respond to that with a shrug and a glib “well, that’s all we got.” Foryan knew, as do most serious historians, that myths and legends passed down through time can often be rooted in historical fact. Before the written word, the stories passed down by the elders to their children around the evening campfires were a way of keeping traditions and tribal history alive.

King Tukulti-Ninurta, or Nimrod, is said to have ruled the land of Shinar and founded several great cities, including Babylon, at about 2,182 BC. The link between the two names is this: The Genesis story claims Nimrod founded the City of Nineveh. Justin’s work, however, gives the credit of founding Nineveh to the Assyrian king Tukulti-Ninurta I, who lived from 1246 to 1206 B.C.

Semiramis was the wife of Tukulti-Ninurta. She was said to have been very beautiful and also politically powerful. She and Nimrod established themselves as the gods Marduk and Astarte. The construction of the towers, or ziggurats throughout Mesopotamia was, in some way, connected to this religious system.

There are several versions about how Semiramis became the first recorded “Mother of God” in the history of world religious systems. It seems that after the death of Nimrod, Semiramis magically bore a son, Tammuz. Since she could not have conceived the child from the dead Nimrod, she proclaimed it to have been a miracle conception and that Tammuz was Marduk reborn.

Thus Semiramis created the first trinity who was mother of the divine son conceived by the seed of the Holy Spirit. Thus the father’s position as a god figure was diminished and the center of worship became the image of the mother with the god-incarnate son in her arms.

The worship of mother and child has since spread throughout the world. Ancient Germans worshipped the virgin Hertha with child. Scandinavians called her Disa. The Egyptian mother was Isis with the infant Horus. In India the mother Devaki bore the child Krishna. The image of the mother and child became so firmly entrenched in the pagan mind that it was quickly adopted by the Roman Catholic Church after Christianity arrived. Thus arrived the story of the Virgin Mary and her son, Jesus.

As phony as the story appears, the Christians argue that Semiramis and all the other virgin mothers with their deity children were false images designed by Satan to lead people astray when the real thing came along.

Nothing in the Jesus story, however, was original. It was all plagiarized in bits and pieces, and sometimes blatantly intact, from ancient god/man mythology passed down by Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Persian cultures.
 
For example the story of the Persian sun-god Mithra, dating back to about 1400 BC, talks about a hero born of a virgin in a stable on the winter solstice. He was attended by shepherds who brought gifts. He was said to have taken a last supper with his followers before returning to his father, the god of all. Mithra was believed not to have died, but ascended directly to heaven. Followers believed he would return at the end of time to raise the dead in a physical resurrection for a final judgment. At that time, the world will be destroyed by fire. And yes, followers of Mithra were granted immortal life following baptism.