SAKSI YEHUWA (21)
pdt. Budi Asali M.Div.
Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa mengatakan: “teologi kuno memiliki sejumlah dewa-dewa utama, dengan banyak titisan dewa-dewi, Kristen-kafir ini (jika kita boleh mencipta sebuah kata) mulai menyusun kembali daftar untuk teologi yang baru. Maka, pada waktu itulah, doktrin mengenai tiga Allah diciptakan - Allah Bapa, Allah Anak, dan Allah Roh Kudus.” - ‘Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa Pemberita Kerajaan Allah’, hal 125
Catatan: kata-kata ini lagi-lagi merupakan suatu fitnahan, karena Kristen tidak percaya kepada tiga Allah!
Perhatikan juga kutipan-kutipan dari buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’ di bawah ini:
· “Diseluruh dunia zaman purba, di Babel dulu, ibadat kepada dewa-dewa kafir yang dikelompokkan dalam tiga serangkai, sangat umum. Pengaruh itu juga umum di Mesir, Yunani, dan Roma pada abad-abad sebelum, selama, dan setelah Kristus. Dan setelah rasul-rasul meninggal, kepercayaan kafir tersebut menyusup ke dalam kekristenan” (hal 9,11).
· “Sejarawan Will Durant mengatakan: ‘Kekristenan tidak memusnahkan kekafiran; ia menerimanya. ... Dari Mesir datang gagasan mengenai trinitas ilahi.’ Dan dalam buku Egyptian Religion Siegfried Morenz berkata: ‘Tritunggal merupakan hal yang terutama menyita perhatian para teolog Mesir ... Tiga allah digabung dan diperlakukan seperti satu pribadi tunggal, disapa dalam bentuk tunggal. Dengan cara ini kekuatan rohani dari agama Mesir memperlihatkan hubungan yang langsung dengan teologi Kristen.’” (hal 11).
· “A Dictionary of Religious Knowledge menyatakan bahwa Tritunggal ‘adalah suatu penyelewengan yang dipinjam dari agama-agama kafir, dan dicangkokkan ke dalam iman Kristen’. Dan The Paganism in Our Christianity berkata: ‘Asal usul (Tritunggal) seluruhnya kafir’ (hal 11).
· “... menyatakan tentang salah satu dari rangkaian tiga allah tersebut di daerah Mesopotamia: ‘Alam semesta dibagi dalam tiga bagian yang masing-masingnya menjadi daerah kekuasaan dari satu allah. Bagian milik Anu adalah langit. Bumi diberikan kepada Enlil. Ea menjadi penguasa lautan. Bersama mereka membentuk tiga serangkai dari Allah-Allah yang Agung’” (hal 9).
· “Itu sebabnya, dalam Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, James Hastings menulis: ‘Dalam agama di India, misalnya, kita temukan kelompok tiga serangkai Brahma, Syiwa, dan Wisnu; dan dalam agama Mesir kelompok tiga serangkai Osiris, Isis, dan Horus ...’” (hal 11).
· “Tritunggal Hindu. Buku ‘The Symbolism of Hindu Gods and Rituals’ mengatakan mengenai suatu tritunggal Hindu yang telah ada berabad-abad sebelum Kristus: ‘Syiwa adalah salah satu dari allah-allah Tritunggal itu. Ia disebut sebagai allah perusak. Kedua allah lain adalah Brahma, allah pencipta dan Wishnu, allah pemelihara ... Untuk menunjukkan bahwa ketiga proses ini adalah satu dan sama, ketiga allah itu digabung dalam satu bentuk.’” (hal 12).
Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa juga memberikan beberapa ‘Tiga Serangkai’ beserta gambarnya dalam kepercayaan kafir, yaitu:
1. Mesir: Tiga serangkai dari Horus, Osiris, Isis, milenium ke 2 S. M.
Tetapi pada hal 2 dari buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, juga diberikan gambar dari karya pahatan tiga serangkai Ramses II, Amon-Ra, dan Nut dari Mesir pada milenium kedua (S.M.)
2. Babel: Tiga serangkai Istar, Sin, Samas, milenium ke 2 S. M.
3. Palmyra: Tiga serangkai dari allah bulan, Tuhan dari Langit, allah matahari, kira-kira abad ke 1 M.
4. India: Tritunggal (keilahian) Hindu, kira-kira abad ke 7 M.
5. Kamboja: Tritunggal (Keilahian) Budha, kira-kira abad ke 12 M.
Lalu Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa menambahkan lagi 5 contoh dimana Tritunggal dalam kalangan Kristen, dipatungkan / digambarkan, yaitu:
a. Norwegia: Tritunggal (Bapa, Anak, roh kudus), kira-kira abad ke 13 M.
b. Perancis: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 14 M.
c. Italia: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 15 M.
d. Jerman: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 19 M.
e. Jerman: Tritunggal, abad ke 20 M.
Catatan: dalam buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 10, semua contoh ini diberi gambar dari ‘Tritunggal’ tersebut.
Juga dalam buku yang sama pada hal 2, mereka memberikan gambar lagi dari karya pahatan dari Allah Tritunggal dari abad ke 14 M. Dan mereka memberikan kata-kata: “Karya pahatan Tritunggal dari Yesus Kristus, Bapa, dan roh kudus dari abad keempat belas (M.). Perhatikan ada tiga pribadi tetapi hanya empat kaki” - ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 2.
Bantahan:
a) Pertama-tama saya akan membahas Tritunggal-Tritunggal dalam kalangan kafir, yang mereka katakan merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal dalam kalangan Kristen.
Setelah mempelajari tentang dewa-dewa yang merupakan ‘tiga serangkai’ yang mereka sebutkan itu dalam Encyclopedia Britannica, saya mendapat kesimpulan bahwa Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa hanya menceritakan sebagian kecil dari ajaran tentang dewa-dewa tersebut, dan menutup sebagian besar lainnya, sedemikian rupa sehingga menjadi mirip dengan ajaran tentang Allah Tritunggal.
Sebagai illustrasi: kalau di depan saya ada saudara, dan juga ada seekor gorila, maka jelas bahwa keduanya sebetulnya berbeda jauh. Bagaimana caranya supaya bisa ada kemiripan antara keduanya? Saya menutup sebagian besar dari gorila tersebut, dan hanya menyisakan matanya, lalu membandingkan mata itu dengan mata saudara. Tentu lalu jadi mirip. Dan saya lalu mengatakan saudara adalah gorila, atau berasal dari gorila. Inilah taktik kotor yang dipakai oleh Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa dalam serangan di tempat ini.
Karena itu, untuk membuktikan ketidak-benaran serangan mereka dalam hal ini, saya akan memperjelas dan menguraikan contoh-contoh ‘Tritunggal’ / ‘Tiga Serangkai’ dari kepercayaan kafir tersebut, supaya saudara bisa mendapatkan gambaran yang lebih lengkap tentang kepercayaan dalam agama-agama kafir itu, sehingga saudara bisa melihat apakah contoh-contoh itu ada hubungannya dengan ajaran Kristen tentang Allah Tritunggal, atau tidak
1. Pertama-tama saya akan membahas ajaran ‘Tiga Serangkai’ dari Mesopotamia kuno yang mereka sebutkan di atas.
Saya kutip ulang kata-kata mereka sebagai berikut:
“... menyatakan tentang salah satu dari rangkaian tiga allah tersebut di daerah Mesopotamia: ‘Alam semesta dibagi dalam tiga bagian yang masing-masingnya menjadi daerah kekuasaan dari satu allah. Bagian milik Anu adalah langit. Bumi diberikan kepada Enlil. Ea menjadi penguasa lautan. Bersama mereka membentuk tiga serangkai dari Allah-Allah yang Agung’” - ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 9.
Catatan: contoh ini tidak mereka berikan gambarnya.
Bagaimana sebetulnya kepercayaan di Mesopotamia kuno itu? Ini tentu tidak bisa didapatkan dari Kitab Suci, karena dewa-dewa itu tidak ada dalam Kitab Suci. Saya menyelidikinya melalui Encyclopedia Britannica (kutipan ada di bawah), dan saya mendapatkan bahwa dalam kepercayaan di Mesopotamia kuno, dewa-dewa diorganisir dalam suatu pemerintahan, dan setiap dewa mempunyai daerahnya sendiri-sendiri. Pada tingkat nasional ada Majelis Umum, yang merupakan otoritas tertinggi dalam alam semesta.
· Yang tertinggi dari kumpulan dewa-dewa itu adalah An / Anu, dewa dari langit / surga.
· Setelah itu ada Enlil, dewa dari angin dan pertanian, pencipta dari cangkul.
· Setingkat dengan An dan Enlil, ada dewi dari tanah berbatu dan pegunungan, yang bernama Nintur atau Ninmah. Ia juga adalah dewi kelahiran.
· Bersama dengan dewa dewi ini, juga ada dewa lain yang kelihatannya merupakan dewa sekunder, yaitu Enki atau Ea, dewa dari air manis dari sungai dan rawa. Ia adalah dewa yang paling pandai dan ahli dalam menangani kesukaran / kerusakan, dan baik dewa-dewa maupun manusia sering memohon kepadanya.
· Anak-anak laki-laki dari Enlil adalah dewa bulan Nanna atau Sin, dan dewa dari hujan badai, banjir, dan bajak, yang namanya Ninurta, dan juga dewa-dewa lain yang menguasai dunia orang mati seperti Meslamtaea, Ninazu, dan Ennugi.
· Anak-anak lelaki dari Sin adalah dewa matahari dan hakim dari dewa-dewa, yaitu Utu, dewa hujan yaitu Ishkur / Adad, dan anak perempuannya adalah dewi perang, cinta, yaitu Innana / Ishtar.
An, atau Anu, adalah dewa langit dalam kepercayaan orang-orang Mesopotamia, dan merupakan anggota dari tiga serangkai keilahian, yang dilengkapi oleh Bel (atau Enlil), dan Ea (atau Enki). Seperti kebanyakan dewa langit, sekalipun secara teoritis Anu adalah dewa yang tertinggi, tetapi hanya mempunyai peranan kecil dalam mythology, nyanyian pujian, dan kepercayaan Mesopotamia. Ia adalah bapa bukan hanya dari semua dewa, tetapi juga dari roh-roh jahat dan setan-setan!
Ea, atau Enki, adalah dewa air dari Mesopotamia. Dari suatu dewa lokal yang disembah di kota Eridu, Ea berkembang menjadi dewa yang besar / utama, Tuhan dari air segar di bawah bumi (sekalipun kata Enki arti hurufiahnya adalah ‘Tuhan dari bumi’). Ea memerintah seni sihir dan mantera! Ia juga dianggap sebagai bapa dari Marduk, dewa nasional dari Babilonia.
Kesimpulan dari semua penjelasan tentang kepercayaan Mesopotamia kuno itu adalah bahwa:
· ada lebih dari tiga dewa yang mereka percayai.
· masing-masing dewa mempunyai keahlian, kekuasaan dan daerah sendiri-sendiri.
· dewa yang satu lebih besar / tinggi dari dewa yang lain.
· selain dewa, juga ada dewi.
· dewa bisa mempunyai anak dewa lain, dan bahkan setan / roh jahat.
· ada dewa yang berkuasa atas seni sihir dan mantera.
Pikirkan sendiri, apakah semua ini mempunyai kemiripan dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Anu, Mesopotamian Religion: The gods and demons’:
“The gods were, as mentioned previously, organized in a polity of a primitive democratic cast. They constituted, as it were, a landed nobility, each god owning and working an estate--his temple and its lands--and controlling the city in which it was located. On the national level they attended the general assembly of the gods, which was the highest authority in the cosmos, to vote on matters of national import such as, for example, election or deposition of kings. The major gods also served on the national level as officers having charge of cosmic offices. Thus, for example, Utu, the sun god, was the judge of the gods, in charge of justice and righteousness generally. Highest in the pantheon--and presiding in the divine assembly--ranked An (Akkadian Anu), god of heaven, who was responsible for the calendar and the seasons as they were indicated by their appropriate stars. Next came Enlil of Nippur, god of winds and of agriculture, creator of the hoe. Enlil executed the verdicts of the divine assembly. Equal in rank to An and Enlil was the goddess Ninhursag (also known as Nintur and Ninmah), goddess of stony ground: the near mountain ranges in the east and the stony desert in the west with its wildlife--wild asses, gazelles, wild goats, etc. She was also the goddess of birth. With these was joined--seemingly secondarily--Enki (Ea), god of the sweet waters of rivers and marshes; he was the cleverest of the gods and a great troubleshooter, often appealed to by both gods and men. Enlil’s sons were the moon god Nanna or Sin; the god of thunderstorms, floods, and the plough, Ninurta; and the underworld figures Meslamtaea, Ninazu, and Ennugi. Sin’s sons were the sun god and judge of the gods, Utu (the Akkadian Shamash); the rain god Ishkur (the Akkadian Adad); and his daughter, the goddess of war, love, and morning and evening star, Inanna (the Akkadian Ishtar). Inanna’s ill-fated young husband was the herder god Dumuzi (the Akkadian Tammuz). The dread netherworld was ruled by the goddess Ereshkigal and her husband Nergal, a figure closely related to Meslamtaea and Ninurta. Earlier tradition mentions Ninazu as her husband”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Anu’:
“(Akkadian), Sumerian An, Mesopotamian sky god and a member of the triad of deities completed by Bel (Sumerian: Enlil) and Ea (Enki). Like most sky gods, Anu, although theoretically the highest god, played only a small role in the mythology, hymns, and cults of Mesopotamia. He was the father not only of all the gods but also of evil spirits and demons; Anu was also the god of kings and of the yearly calendar. He was typically depicted in a headdress with horns, a sign of strength.
His Sumerian counterpart, An, dates from the oldest Sumerian period, at least 3000 BC. Originally he seems to have been envisaged as a great bull, a form later disassociated from the god as a separate mythological entity, the Bull of Heaven, which was owned by An. His holy city was Erech, in the southern herding region, and the bovine imagery suggests that he belonged originally to the herders’ pantheon. In Akkadian myth Anu was assigned a consort, Antum (Antu), but she seems often to have been confused with Ishtar (Inanna), the celebrated goddess of love”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ea’:
“(Akkadian), Sumerian Enki, Mesopotamian god of water and a member of the triad of deities completed by Anu (Sumerian An) and Bel (Enlil). From a local deity worshiped in the city of Eridu, Ea evolved into a major god, Lord of Apsu (also spelled Abzu), the fresh waters beneath the earth (although Enki means literally ‘lord of the earth’). In the Sumerian myth, ‘Enki and the World Order,’ Enki is said to have fixed national boundaries and assigned gods their roles. According to another Sumerian myth Enki is the creator, having devised men as slaves to the gods. In his original form, as Enki, he was associated with semen and amniotic fluid, and therefore with fertility. He was commonly represented as a half-goat, half-fish creature, from which the modern astrological figure for Capricorn is derived.
Ea, the Akkadian counterpart of Enki, was the god of ritual purification: ritual cleansing waters were called ‘Ea’s water.’ Ea governed the arts of sorcery and incantation. In some stories he was also the form-giving god, and thus the patron of craftsmen and artists; he was known as the bearer of culture. In his role as adviser to the king, Ea was a wise god although not a forceful one. In Akkadian myth, as Ea’s character evolves, he appears frequently as a clever mediator who could be devious and cunning. He is also significant in Akkadian mythology as the father of Marduk, the national god of Babylonia”.
Catatan: saya tidak memberikan terjemahan untuk ketiga kutipan ini, tetapi ringkasan / hal-hal yang penting dari kutipan-kutipan ini telah saya berikan di atas. Demikian juga dengan kutipan-kutipan selanjutnya dari Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dalam bagian ini.
2. Sekarang saya akan membahas ajaran ‘Tiga Serangkai’ dari Mesir yang mereka sebutkan di atas.
Saksi Yehuwa mengatakan bahwa ada Tiga serangkai dari Horus, Osiris, Isis (milenium ke 2 S. M.). Tetapi anehnya, mereka juga mengatakan ada tiga serangkai Ramses II, Amon-Ra, dan Nut dari Mesir, yang juga berasal dari milenium kedua S.M.
Ini menunjukkan kebodohan dari Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa dalam memberikan contoh, karena ini berarti ada 2 macam tiga serangkai. Bagaimana mungkin yang seperti itu merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
a. Sekarang saya akan membahas tiga serangkai Mesir yang pertama, yaitu Horus, Osiris, dan Isis.
Pertama-tama, dari gambar / foto yang diberikan dalam buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 10, jelas terlihat ada 3 patung, bukan 3 dewa / patung yang menjadi satu, dan tiga patung itu bentuknya berbeda-beda. Jadi ini jelas adalah polytheisme, dan karena itu jelas bukan merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal.
Hal kedua yang perlu diketahui adalah hubungan Horus, Osiris, Isis, dan dewa lain yang bernama Seth:
Osiris Û Isis - Seth
Horus
Osiris dan Isis adalah suami istri, dan Horus adalah anak mereka. Seth adalah saudara dari Isis, tetapi musuh dari Osiris dan Horus.
Sekarang mari kita memperhatikan cerita tentang perdewaan ini secara lebih terperinci.
Horus yang dalam bahasa Mesir adalah HOR atau HAR, dalam agama Mesir kuno adalah dewa dalam bentuk burung falcon (semacam elang), yang matanya adalah matahari dan bulan. Horus mempunyai musuh kekal, yaitu dewa lain yang namanya Seth. Horus adalah anak dari dewa yang namanya Osiris, yang juga bermusuhan dengan Seth, dan mati dibunuh oleh Seth. Horus lalu membalas dendam atas kematian ayahnya dengan mengalahkan Seth, tetapi dalam pertempuran itu Horus rusak pada mata kirinya, dan disembuhkan oleh dewa lain yang namanya Thoth. Horus ini muncul sebagai dewa lokal di banyak tempat. Belakangan Horus ini oleh orang-orang Yunani disamakan dengan dewa Apollo.
Isis yang dalam bahasa Mesir adalah ASET atau ESET, adalah salah satu dewi yang paling penting dari Mesir kuno. Ia adalah istri dari Osiris, yang mati dibunuh oleh dewa Seth, dan ia berkabung karena kematian suaminya. Ia menemukan potongan-potongan dari tubuh suaminya yang mati dibunuh itu, dan dengan kekuatan magicnya, ia menggabungkannya kembali sehingga Osiris hidup kembali. Isis menyembunyikan anaknya, Horus dari kejaran Seth, sampai Horus cukup besar untuk membalas dendam atas kematian ayahnya. Isis ini juga adalah saudara perempuan dari Seth, sehingga pada pertempuran Horus dengan Seth, ia terombang-ambing. Ia kasihan kepada Seth, yang dipenggal oleh Horus.
Perlindungan yang ia berikan kepada Horus menyebabkan ia menjadi semacam dewi pelindung, dan kekuatan magicnya, yang membangkitkan suaminya, menyebabkan orang-orang berdoa kepadanya untuk kesembuhan dari penyakit. Dan bersama dengan dewi-dewi lain seperti Nephthys, Neith, dan Selket, Isis melindungi orang-orang mati.
Osiris, juga disebut USIRI, adalah seorang dewa lokal dari Busiris, dan ia adalah dewa kesuburan. Ia dibunuh atau ditenggelamkan oleh dewa Seth, yang mencabik-cabik mayatnya menjadi 14 potongan dan melemparkan / menyebarkannya ke seluruh Mesir, kecuali zakarnya, yang nanti memberi kehidupan kembali kepada Osiris. Selama mati, ia menjadi penguasa dan hakim di dunia orang mati. Isis membangkitkan Osiris kembali, dan lalu melahirkan anaknya, Horus, dari Osiris.
Kesimpulan dari semua penjelasan tentang kepercayaan Mesir kuno itu adalah bahwa:
· Tiga Serangkai Mesir ini adalah bapa, ibu dan anak!
· ada lebih dari 3 dewa, dan ada yang perempuan (dewi), yang kekuatannya berbeda satu sama lain.
· dewa bisa bermusuhan, berkelahi dan membunuh dewa lain.
· dewa-dewa itu mempunyai tubuh yang bisa dirusak / dibunuh, juga bisa disembuhkan / dihidupkan kembali oleh dewa / dewi yang lain.
· dewa bisa kawin dengan dewi dan mempunyai anak, yang juga adalah dewa.
· anak dewa bisa bertumbuh dan bertambah kuat.
· dewi bisa sedih karena kematian suami.
· pada saat seorang dewa mati, ia bisa tetap berkuasa dalam dunia orang mati.
Pikirkan sendiri, apakah ini mempunyai kemiripan dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
Ada sesuatu yang ‘lucu’ yang perlu saya tambahkan. Dalam buku mereka yang berjudul ‘Pencarian Manusia Akan Allah’, hal 277, Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa memberikan gambar / foto dari 3 buah patung. Yang di sebelah kiri adalah gambar / foto dari patung Isis yang menggendong bayi Horus dari Mesir; yang ada di tengah adalah gambar / foto dari patung Maria yang menggendong bayi Yesus; dan yang di sebelah kanan adalah gambar / foto dari patung Mater Matuta (Matuta adalah nama seorang dewi) dari Roma yang juga menggendong seorang bayi. Dan mereka memberikan komentar sebagai berikut: “Pemujaan Maria dengan anak, di tengah, menggemakan ibadat yang lebih tua kepada dewi-dewi kafir”.
Yang perlu dipertanyakan adalah: tadi di atas mereka menuduh bahwa Tritunggal (Bapa, Anak, Roh Kudus) asalnya dari tiga serangkai Osiris, Isis, dan Horus. Tetapi sekarang mereka mengatakan bahwa Maria dan Yesus berasal dari Isis dan Horus. Yang mana yang benar?
Kesimpulan saya: dalam menyerang, dan berusaha membuktikan bahwa kekristenan / doktrin Allah Tritunggal berasal dari kekafiran, Saksi-Saksi (palsu) Yehuwa yang sesat dan bodoh ini membuat serangan secara asal-asalan, tanpa peduli bahwa serangan mereka bertentangan satu sama lain!
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Horus’:
“Egyptian HOR, OR HAR, in ancient Egyptian religion, god in the form of a falcon whose eyes were the sun and the moon. Falcon cults were widespread in Egypt. At Nekhen (Greek: Hierakonpolis), however, the conception arose that the reigning king was a manifestation of Horus and, after Egypt had been united by the kings from Nekhen, this conception became a generally accepted dogma. The first of the Egyptian king’s five names was the Horus name--i.e., the name that identified him with Horus.From the 1st dynasty (c. 2525-2775 BC), Horus and the god Seth were perpetual antagonists who were reconciled in the harmony of Upper and Lower Egypt. In the myth of Osiris, who became prominent about 2350 BC, Horus was the son of Osiris. He was also the opponent of Seth, who murdered Osiris and contested Horus’ heritage, the royal throne of Egypt. Horus finally defeated Seth, thus avenging his father and assuming the rule. In the fight his left eye (i.e., the moon) was damaged--this being a mythical explanation of the moon’s phases--and was healed by the god Thoth. The figure of the restored eye (the wedjat eye) became a powerful amulet. Horus appeared as a local god in many places and under different names and epithets: for instance, as Harmakhis (Har-em-akhet, ‘Horus in the Horizon’); Harpocrates (Har-pe-khrad, ‘Horus the Child’); Harsiesis (Har-si-Ese, ‘Horus, Son of Isis’); Harakhte (‘Horus of the Horizon,’ closely associated with the sun god Re); and, at Kawm Umbu (Kom Ombo), as Haroeris (Harwer, ‘Horus the Elder’). Horus was later identified by the Greeks with Apollo, and Edfu was called Apollinopolis (‘Apollo’s Town’) in the Greco-Roman period.In the Ptolemaic period, the vanquishing of Seth became a symbol of Egypt triumphing over its occupiers. At Edfu, where rebellions frequently interrupted work on the temple, a ritual drama depicting Horus as pharaoh spearing Seth in the guise of a hippopotamus was periodically enacted”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000, dengan topik ‘Isis’:
“Egyptian ASET, OR ESET, one of the most important goddesses of ancient Egypt. Her name is the Greek form of an ancient Egyptian word that is perhaps associated with a word for ‘throne.’ Little is known of Isis’ early cult. In the Pyramid Texts (c. 2350-c. 2100 BC), she is the mourner for her murdered husband, the god Osiris. In her role as the wife of Osiris, she discovered and reunited the pieces of her dead husband’s body, was the chief mourner at his funeral, and through her magical power brought him back to life. Isis hid her son, Horus, from Seth, the murderer of Osiris, until Horus was fully grown and could avenge his father. She defended the child against many attacks from snakes and scorpions. But because Isis was also Seth’s sister, she wavered during the eventual battle between Horus and Seth, and in one episode Isis pitied Seth and was beheaded by Horus during their struggle. Despite her variable temperament, she and Horus were regarded by the Egyptians as the perfect mother and son. The shelter she afforded her child gave her the character of a goddess of protection. But her chief aspect was that of a great magician, whose power transcended that of all other deities. Several narratives tell of her magical prowess, with which she could even outwit the creator god Atum. She was invoked on behalf of the sick, and, with the goddesses Nephthys, Neith, and Selket, she protected the dead. She became associated with various other goddesses who had similar functions, and thus her nature became increasingly diverse. In particular, the goddess Hathor and Isis became similar in many respects. In the astral interpretation of the gods, Isis was equated with the dog star Sothis (Sirius). Isis was represented as a woman with the hieroglyphic sign of the throne on her head, either sitting on a throne, alone or holding the child Horus, or kneeling before a coffin. Occasionally she was shown with a cow’s head. As mourner, she was a principal deity in all rites connected with the dead; as magician, she cured the sick and brought the dead to life; and, as mother, she was herself a life-giver. The cult of Isis spread throughout Egypt. In Akhmim she received special attention as the ‘mother’ of the fertility god Min. She had important temples throughout Egypt and Nubia. By Greco-Roman times she was dominant among Egyptian goddesses, and she received acclaim from Egyptians and Greeks for her many names and aspects. Several temples were dedicated to her in Alexandria, where she became the ‘patroness of seafarers.’ From Alexandria her cult was brought to all the shores of the Mediterranean, including Greece and Rome. In Hellenistic times the mysteries of Isis and Osiris developed; these were comparable to other Greek mystery cults”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000, dengan topik ‘Osiris’:
“also called USIRI, Osiris, bronze figurine of the Late Period; in the Egyptian Museum, Berlinone of the most important gods of ancient Egypt. The origin of Osiris is obscure; he was a local god of Busiris, in Lower Egypt, and may have been a personification of chthonic (underworld) fertility, or possibly a deified hero. By about 2400 BC, however, Osiris clearly played a double role: he was both a god of fertility and the embodiment of the dead and resurrected king. This dual role was in turn combined with the Egyptian concept of divine kingship: the king at death became Osiris, god of the underworld; and the dead king’s son, the living king, was identified with Horus, a god of the sky. Osiris and Horus were thus father and son. The goddess Isis was the mother of the king and was thus the mother of Horus and consort of Osiris. The god Seth was considered the murderer of Osiris and adversary of Horus.According to the form of the myth reported by the Greek author Plutarch, Osiris was slain or drowned by Seth, who tore the corpse into 14 pieces and flung them over Egypt. Eventually, Isis and her sister Nephthys found and buried all the pieces, except the phallus, thereby giving new life to Osiris, who thenceforth remained in the underworld as ruler and judge. Isis revived Osiris by magical means and conceived her son Horus by him. Horus later successfully fought against Seth and became the new king of Egypt.Osiris was not only ruler of the dead but also the power that granted all life from the underworld, from sprouting vegetation to the annual flood of the Nile River. From about 2000 BC onward it was believed that every man, not just the deceased kings, became associated with Osiris at death. This identification with Osiris, however, did not imply resurrection, for even Osiris did not rise from the dead. Instead, it signified the renewal of life both in the next world and through one’s descendants on Earth. In this universalized form Osiris’ cult spread throughout Egypt, often joining with the cults of local fertility and underworld deities. The idea that rebirth in the next life could be gained by following Osiris was maintained through certain cult forms. In the Middle Kingdom the god’s festivals consisted of processions and nocturnal rites and were celebrated at the temple of Abydos, where Osiris had assimilated the very ancient god of the dead, Khenty-Imentin. This name, meaning ‘Foremost of the Westerners,’ was adopted by Osiris as an epithet. Because the festivals took place in the open, public participation was permitted, and by the early 2nd millennium BC it became fashionable to be buried on the processional road at Abydos or to erect a cenotaph there as a representative of the dead. Osiris festivals symbolically reenacting the god’s fate were celebrated annually in various towns throughout Egypt. A central feature of the festivals was the construction of the ‘Osiris garden,’ a mold in the shape of Osiris, filled with soil and various drugs. The mold was moistened with the water of the Nile and sown with grain. Later, the sprouting grain symbolized the vital strength of Osiris.At Memphis the holy bull, Apis, was linked with Osiris, becoming Osiris-Apis, which eventually became the name of the Hellenistic god Sarapis. Greco-Roman authors connected Osiris with the god Dionysus. Osiris was also identified with Soker, an ancient Memphite god of the dead. The oldest known depiction of Osiris dates to about 2300 BC, but representations of him are rare before the New Kingdom (1539-1075 BC), when he was shown in an archaizing form as a mummy with his arms crossed on his breast, one hand holding a crook, the other a flail. On his head was the atef-crown, composed of the white crown of Upper Egypt and two ostrich feathers”.
b. Sekarang saya membahas tiga serangkai Mesir yang kedua, yaitu Ramses II, Amon-Ra, dan Nut.
Catatan: dalam versi bahasa Inggris, Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa menyebutkan bukan ‘Nut’ tetapi ‘Mut’ [‘Watchtower Library’ (CD)], padahal kalau dilihat dari Encyclopedia Britannica, Nut berbeda dengan Mut.
Pertama-tama, dari gambar / foto yang diberikan dalam buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 2, jelas terlihat ada 3 patung, bukan 3 dewa / patung yang menjadi satu, dan ketiga patung itu bentuknya berbeda-beda. Jadi ini jelas merupakan polytheisme, dan karena itu tidak mungkin merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal.
Sekarang, mari kita menyoroti dewa-dewa ini secara lebih terperinci.
Ramses II adalah nama raja / Firaun, dan ia adalah Firaun yang berkuasa pada jaman Musa, yang lalu menolak perintah YAHWEH untuk melepaskan bangsa Israel. Sepanjang yang bisa saya dapatkan dari Encyclopedia Britannica 2000, tidak ada dewa dengan nama seperti itu. Tetapi Ramses, sama seperti Firaun-Firaun yang lain, memang mengclaim diri sebagai dewa / bersifat ilahi.
Tetapi yang jelas, bahwa Ramses II, Amon-Ra, dan Nut, merupakan tiga serangkai, tidak bisa saya temukan dalam Encyclopedia Britannica 2000. Saya menduga, ini hanya merupakan suatu khayalan / dusta dari Saksi Yehuwa. Yang ada justru adalah tiga serangkai - tiga serangkai yang lain, yang akan saya tunjukkan di bawah.
Mut, adalah dewi langit dan juga ibu ilahi yang besar (kata ‘Mut’ berarti ‘ibu’). Bersama dengan dewa Amon, dan anak Mut yaitu dewa muda bernama Khons, ia membentuk tiga serangkai.
Khons adalah nama dewa bulan, yang biasanya digambarkan sebagai seorang pemuda. Ia dianggap sebagai anak dari dewa Amon dan dewi Mut.
Nut adalah dewi dari langit, dan ia kadang-kadang digambarkan sebagai seekor lembu, karena dalam bentuk inilah ia membawa dewa matahari Re pada punggungnya ke langit. Nut ini dikatakan melahirkan Osiris, Horus, Seth, Isis, and Nephthys.
Re, atau Ra, adalah dewa matahari dan dewa pencipta. Ia juga dibentuk dengan dewa-dewa lain sehingga timbul nama-nama Re-Harakhty, Amon-Re, Sebek-Re, dan Khnum-Re. Jadi Amon-Re, atau Amon-Ra, adalah penggabungan Re / Ra, dengan dewa Amon, dan Amon-Ra ini merupakan dewa utama dalam kumpulan dewa-dewa, atau ‘raja dari dewa-dewa’.
Amon adalah dewa Mesir yang dihormati sebagai ‘raja dari dewa-dewa’. Ia diidentikkan dengan dewa matahari Re, dan sebagai Amon-Re ia dianggap sebagai dewa nasional. Amon-Re disembah sebagai bagian dari tiga serangkai, bersama-sama dengan seorang dewi yang bernama Mut, dan dewa muda bernama Khons. Tetapi Amon, Ptah dan Re juga dianggap sebagai tiga serangkai. Juga ada pandangan lain dimana Amon dianggap sebagai dewa tunggal, dan Ptah dan Re merupakan manifestasi dari Amon.
Ptah, dalam agama Mesir, adalah dewa pencipta dan pembuat segala sesuatu. Bersama Sekhmet dan dewa muda Nefertem / Nefertum, ia adalah salah satu dari tiga serangkai. Tetapi belakangan posisi Nefertem dalam Tiga Serangkai ini diganti oleh Imhotep.
Kesimpulan dalam persoalan tiga serangkai Mesir ini adalah:
· tidak ada tiga serangkai Ramses II, Amon-Ra, dan Nut, dan bahkan tidak ada dewa bernama Ramses II.
· Ramses II adalah Firaun yang dikalahkan oleh YAHWEH pada jaman Musa, sehingga betul-betul lucu kalau doktrin Allah Tritunggal diambil dari Ramses II itu.
· ada lebih dari 3 dewa dalam kepercayaan / agama di Mesir, dan bahkan ada banyak tiga serangkai.
· seorang dewa dalam suatu tiga serangkai bisa digantikan tempatnya oleh dewa lain, seperti Nefertem / Nefertum yang digantikan oleh Imhotep.
· dewa-dewa ini tidak mahakuasa ataupun mahatahu (ini bisa dilihat pada salah satu dari kutipan di bawah).
· setiap dewa mempunyai daerah kekuasaannya sendiri-sendiri.
· istilah ‘dewa’ juga mencakup ‘demon’ (= setan).
· dewa tidak bisa membunuh / mengalahkan Apopis, simbol dari kejahatan dan kekacauan (ini bisa dilihat pada salah satu kutipan di bawah).
Hanya orang yang memang mau membutakan diri sendiri dan mau menipu orang lain yang bisa mengatakan bahwa ini adalah asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Nut’:
“in Egyptian religion, a goddess of the sky, vault of the heavens, often depicted as a woman arched over the earth god Geb (see ). Most cultures of regions where there is rain personify the sky as masculine, the rain being the seed which fructifies mother Earth. In Egypt, however, rain plays no role in fertility; all the useful water is on the earth (from the Nile). Egyptian religion is unique in the genders of its deities of earth and sky. As the goddess of the sky, Nut swallowed the sun in the evening and gave birth to it again in the morning. Nut was also represented as a woman wearing a waterpot or pear-shaped vessel on her head, this being the hieroglyph of her name. She was sometimes portrayed as a cow, for this was the form she took in order to carry the sun god Re on her back to the sky. On five special days preceding the New Year, Nut gave birth successively to the deities Osiris, Horus, Seth, Isis, and Nephthys. These gods, with the exception of Horus, were commonly referred to as the ‘children of Nut.’”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Geb’:
“also called Keb, in ancient Egyptian religion, the god of the earth, the physical support of the world. Geb constituted, along with Nut, his sister, the second generation in the Ennead (group of nine gods) of Heliopolis. In Egyptian art Geb was often depicted lying by the feet of Shu, the air god, with Nut, the goddess of the sky, arched above them. Geb was usually portrayed as a man without any distinguishing characteristics, but at times he was represented with his head surmounted by a goose, the hieroglyph of his name. He was the third divine ruler among the gods; the human pharaohs claimed to be descended from him, and the royal throne was referred to as ‘the throne of Geb.’”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Amon’:
“also spelled Amun, Amen, or Ammon, Egyptian deity who was revered as king of the gods. Amon may have been originally a local deity at Khmun (Hermopolis) in Middle Egypt; his cult reached Thebes, where he became the patron of the pharaohs by the reign of Mentuhotep I (2008-1957 BC). At that date he was already identified with the sun god Re of Heliopolis and, as Amon-Re, was received as a national god. Represented in human form, sometimes with a ram’s head, or as a ram, Amon-Re was worshiped as part of the Theban triad including a goddess, Mut, and a youthful god, Khons. Amon’s name meant The Hidden One, and his image was painted blue to denote invisibility. This attribute of invisibility led to a popular belief during the New Kingdom (1539-c. 1075 BC) in the knowledge and impartiality of Amon, making him a god for those who felt oppressed. Amon’s influence was, in addition, closely linked to the political well-being of Egypt. During the Hyksos domination (c. 1630-c. 1523 BC), the princes of Thebes sustained his worship. Following the Theban victory over the Hyksos and the creation of an empire, Amon’s stature and the wealth of his temples grew. In the late 18th dynasty Akhenaton (Amenhotep IV) directed his religious reform against the traditional cult of Amon, but he was unable to convert people from their belief in Amon and the other gods; and, under Tutankhamen, Ay, and Horemheb (1332-1292 BC), Amon was gradually restored as the god of the empire and patron of the pharaoh. In the New Kingdom, religious speculation among Amon’s priests led to the concept of Amon as part of a triad (with Ptah and Re) or as a single god of whom all the other gods, even Ptah (see ) and Re, were manifestations. Under the sacerdotal state ruled by the priests of Amon at Thebes (c. 1075-c. 950 BC), Amon evolved into a universal god who intervened through oracles in many affairs of state. The succeeding 22nd and 23rd dynasties, the invasion of Egypt by Assyria (671-c. 663 BC), and the sack of Thebes (c. 663 BC) did not reduce the stature of the cult, which had acquired a second main centre at Tanis in the Nile River delta. Moreover, the worship of Amon had become established among the Cushites of the Sudan, who were accepted by Egyptian worshipers of Amon when they invaded Egypt and ruled as the 25th dynasty (715-664 BC). From this period onward, resistance to foreign occupation of Egypt was strongest in Thebes. Amon’s cult spread to the oases, especially Siwa in Egypt’s western desert, where Amon was linked with Jupiter. Alexander the Great won acceptance as pharaoh by consulting the oracle at Siwa, and he also rebuilt the sanctuary of Amon’s temple at Luxor. The early Ptolemaic rulers contained Egyptian nationalism by supporting the temples, but, starting with Ptolemy IV Philopator in 207 BC, nationalistic rebellions in Upper Egypt erupted. During the revolt of 88-85 Bc, Ptolemy IX Soter II sacked Thebes, dealing Amon’s cult a severe blow. In 27 BC a strong earthquake devastated the Theban temples, while in the Greco-Roman world the cult of Isis and Osiris gradually displaced Amon”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Re’:
“also spelled RA, OR PHRA, in ancient Egyptian religion, god of the sun and creator god. He was believed to travel across the sky in his solar bark and, during the night, to make his passage in another bark through the underworld, where, in order to be born again for the new day, he had to vanquish the evil serpent Apopis (Apepi). As the creator, he rose from the ocean of chaos on the primeval hill, creating himself and then in turn engendering eight other gods. Originally most solar gods had falcon form and were assimilated to Horus. By the 4th dynasty (c. 2575-c. 2465 BC), however, Re had risen to his leading position. Many syncretisms were formed between Re and other gods, producing such names as Re-Harakhty, Amon-Re, Sebek-Re, and Khnum-Re. Aspects of other gods influenced Re himself; his falcon-headed appearance as Re-Harakhty originated through association with Horus. The influence of Re was spread from On (Heliopolis), which was the centre of his worship. From the 4th dynasty, kings held the title ‘Son of Re,’ and ‘Re’ later became part of the throne name they adopted at accession. As the father of Ma’at, Re was the ultimate source of right and justice in the cosmos. At Thebes, by the late 11th dynasty (c. 1980 BC), Re was associated with Amon as Amon-Re, who was for more than a millennium the principal god of the pantheon, the ‘king of the gods,’ and the patron of kings. The greatest development of solar religion was during the New Kingdom (1539-c. 1075 BC). The revolutionary worship of the sun disk Aton during the abortive Amarna period (1353-1336 BC) was a radical simplification of the cult of Re. During the New Kingdom, beliefs about Re were harmonized with those concerning Osiris, the ruler of the underworld”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ramses II’:
“Background and early years of reign. Ramses’ family, of nonroyal origin, came to power some decades after the reign of the religious reformer, Akhenaton (Amenhotep IV, 1353-36 BC), and set about restoring Egyptian power in Asia, which had declined under Akhenaton and his successor, Tutankhamen. Ramses’ father, Seti I, subdued a number of rebellious princes in Palestine and southern Syria and waged war on the Hittites of Anatolia in order to recover those provinces in the north that during the recent troubles had passed from Egyptian to Hittite control. Seti achieved some success against the Hittites at first, but his gains were only temporary, for at the end of his reign the enemy was firmly established at Kadesh, on the Orontes River, a strong fortress defended by the river, which became the key to their southern frontier.
During his reign Seti gave the crown prince Ramses, the future Ramses II, a special status as regent. Seti provided him with a kingly household and harem, and the young prince accompanied his father on his campaigns, so that when he came to sole rule he had already had experience of kingship and of war. It is noteworthy that Ramses was designated as successor at an unusually early age, as if to ensure that he would in fact succeed to the throne. He ranked as a captain of the army while still only 10 years old; at that age his rank must surely have been honorific, though he may well have been receiving military training. Because his family’s home was in the Nile delta and in order to have a convenient base for campaigns in Asia, Ramses built for himself a full-scale residence city called Pi-Ramesse (House of Ramses; biblical Raamses), which was famous for its beautiful layout, with gardens, orchards, and pleasant waters. Each of its four quarters had its own presiding deity: Amon in the west, Seth in the south, the royal cobra goddess, Buto (Wadjet), in the north, and, significantly, the <>
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ramses’, ‘Moses: Moses and Pharaoh’:
“Ramses II became king as a teenager and reigned for 67 years. He aspired to defeat the Hittites and control all of Syria, but in the fifth year of his reign Ramses walked into a Hittite trap laid for him at <>
Kadesh, on the Orontes River in Syria. By sheer determination he fought his way out, but in the light of his purpose the battle was an utter failure. Yet Ramses, like all the pharaohs, claimed to be <>divine; therefore, the defeat had to be interpreted as a marvellous victory in which he alone subdued the Hittites. His wounded ego expressed itself in massive building operations throughout Egypt, and before his reign ended the boast of his success literally filled acres of wall space. It was probably only a few years after the Kadesh incident that Moses and Aaron confronted Ramses with their demand, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Let my people go.’ ‘As a god in human form Ramses was not accustomed to taking orders from lesser gods, let alone an unknown like Yahweh. ‘Who is the Lord,’ he inquired, ‘that I should heed his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, and moreover I will not let Israel go.’ Thus the stage was set for a long struggle between a distrustful ruler with an outsize ego and a prophet with a new understanding of Yahweh and his power. Ramses increased the oppression of the Hebrews by the fiendish plan of requiring them to gather the straw binder for the bricks and still produce the same quota each day. Some of the Hebrews rebuffed Moses, and in frustration he asked Yahweh, ‘Why didst thou ever send me?’ Moses’ doubt was allayed by Yahweh’s promise to take action against Pharaoh. Scholars differ widely concerning the narrative about the plagues. Some claim that three sources have been combined, but more recent scholarship finds only the two traditions. While granting that some of the plagues had a core of historicity, older critics tended to discount the present accounts as fantastic stories with pious decorations. A recent school of research suggests that, notwithstanding some later additions, all the plagues probably had a historical core. The basic cause, according to one interpretation, was an unusually high flooding of the <>Nile. The White Nile originates in the lake region of east central Africa, known today as Uganda. The flow is fairly even throughout the year because of consistent equatorial rains. The Blue Nile, on the other hand, originates in the headwaters of the Ethiopian highlands, and it varies from a small stream to a raging torrent. At the time Moses was bargaining with Ramses, excessively heavy summer rains in Ethiopia washed powdery, carmine-red soil from the slopes of the hills. Around the Lake Tana region the blood-red torrent picked up bright red algae (known as flagellates) and their bacteria. Since there were no dams at that time, the Nile flowed blood-red all the way to the Mediterranean. It probably reached the delta region in August. Thus, this rare natural event, it is held, set in motion a series of conditions that continued until the following March. During these months Moses used the plagues of the frogs, gnats, mosquitoes, cattle murrain, boils, hail, locusts, and thick darkness to increase the pressure on Ramses. At first the King was adamant. The Hebrews were not the only disgruntled slaves, and, if he agreed to let them go, then other groups would want the same privilege. To protect his building program, he had to suppress the slave rebellion at its outset. Yet he could not discount the effect of the plagues, and grudgingly he began to acknowledge Yahweh’s power. As an expedient attempt to restore order, he offered to let the Hebrews sacrifice in Goshen. When this failed, he suggested that they make offerings to Yahweh at the edge of the Egyptian border. Moses, however, insisted on a three-day journey into the wilderness. Pharaoh countered by allowing the Hebrew men to make the journey, but this, too, was rejected. As his final offer Pharaoh agreed to let the people go. He would keep the livestock, however, as the guarantee of their return. Moses spurned the condition, and in anger Pharaoh drove him out. After nine rounds with Pharaoh it appeared that the deliverance of the Hebrews was no nearer, but, in contrast to his earlier periods of doubt and frustration, Moses showed no despair. Apparently he had an inner assurance that Pharaoh would not have the last word”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ramses II’, ‘King, Cosmos and Society’:
“The king was the centre of human society, the guarantor of order for the gods, the recipient of god-given benefits including life itself, and the benevolent ruler of the world for humanity. He was ultimately responsible for the cults of the dead, both for his predecessors in office and for the dead in general. His dominance in religion corresponded to his central political role: from late predynastic times (c. 3100 BC), state organization was based on kingship and on the service of officials for the king. For humanity, the king had a superhuman role, being a manifestation of a god or of various deities on earth. The king’s principal original title, the Horus name, proclaimed that he was an aspect of the chief god Horus, a sky god who was depicted as a falcon. Other identifications were added to this one, notably ‘Son of Re (the sun god)’ and ‘Perfect God,’ both introduced in the 4th dynasty (c. 2575-2465 BC), when the great pyramids were constructed. The epithet ‘Son of Re’ placed the king in a close but dependent relation with the leading figure in the pantheon. ‘Perfect God’ (often rendered ‘Good God’) indicated that the king had the status of a minor deity, for which he was ‘perfected’ through accession to his office; it restricted the extent of his divinity and separated him from full deities. In his intermediate position between humanity and the gods, the king could receive the most extravagant divine adulation and was in some ways more prominent than any single god. In death he aspired to full divinity but could not escape the human context. Although royal funerary monuments differed in type from other tombs and were vastly larger, they too were pillaged and vandalized, and few royal mortuary cults were long-lasting. Some kings, notably Amenhotep III (1390-53 BC), Ramses II (1279-13 BC), and several of the Ptolemies, sought deification during their own lifetimes, while others, such as Amenemhet III (1818-c. 1770 BC), became minor gods after their deaths, but these developments show how restricted royal divinity was. The divinized king coexisted with his mortal self, and as many nonroyal individuals as kings became deified after death. The gods, the king, humanity, and the dead existed together in the cosmos, which the creator god had brought into being from the preexistent chaos. All living beings, except perhaps the creator, would die at the end of time. The sun god became aged and needed to be rejuvenated and reborn daily. The ordered cosmos was surrounded by and shot through with disorder, which had to be kept at bay. Disorder menaced most strongly at such times of transition as the passage from one year to the next or the death of a king. Thus, the king’s role in maintaining order was cosmic and not merely social. His exaction of service from people was necessary to the cosmos. The concept of ma’at (‘order’) was fundamental in Egyptian thought. The king’s role was to set ma’at in place of izfet (‘disorder’). Ma’at was crucial in human life and embraced notions of reciprocity, justice, truth, and moderation. Ma’at was personified as a goddess and the creator’s daughter and received a cult of her own. In the cult of other deities, the king’s offering of ma’at to a deity encapsulated the relationship between humanity, the king, and the gods: as the representative of humanity, he returned to the gods the order that came from them and of which they were themselves part. Ma’at extended into the world of the dead: in the weighing of the heart after death, shown on papyri deposited in burials, the person’s heart occupies one side of the scales and a representation of ma’at the other. The meaning of this image is deepened in the accompanying text, which asserts that the deceased behaved correctly on earth and did not overstep the boundaries of order, declaring that he or she did not ‘know that which is not’--that is, things that were outside the created and ordered world. This role of ma’at in human life created a continuity between religion, political action, and elite morality. Over the centuries, private religion and morality drew apart from state concerns, paralleling a gradual separation of king and temple. It cannot be known whether religion and morality were as closely integrated for the people as they were for the elite, or even how fully the elite subscribed to these beliefs. Nonetheless, the integration of cosmos, king, and ma’at remained fundamental”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ptah’:
“also spelled PHTHAH, in Egyptian religion, creator-god and maker of things, a patron of craftsmen, especially sculptors; his high priest was called ‘chief controller of craftsmen.’ The Greeks identified Ptah with Hephaestus (Vulcan), the divine blacksmith. Ptah was originally the local deity of Memphis, capital of Egypt from the 1st dynasty onward; the political importance of Memphis caused Ptah’s cult to expand over the whole of Egypt. With his companion Sekhmet and the youthful god Nefertem, he was one of the Memphite Triad of deities. He was represented as a man in mummy form, wearing a skullcap and a short, straight false beard. As a mortuary god, Ptah was often fused with Seker (or Soker) and Osiris to form Ptah-Seker-Osiris. The sacred bull Apis had his stall in the great temple of Ptah at Memphis and was called a manifestation of the god who gave oracles”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Mut’:
“in Egyptian religion, a sky goddess and great divine mother. Mut may have originated either in the Nile River delta or in Middle Egypt. During the 18th dynasty (1539-1292 BC), she became the companion of the god Amon at Thebes, forming the Theban triad with him and with the youthful god Khons, who was said to be Mut’s son. The name Mut means ‘mother,’ and her role was that of an older woman among the gods. She was associated with the uraeus (rearing cobra), lionesses, and royal crowns. She was also identified with other goddesses, principally Bastet and Sekhmet. At Thebes the principal festival of Mut was her ‘navigation’ on the distinctive horseshoe-shaped lake, or Isheru, that surrounded her temple complex at Karnak. Mut was usually represented as a woman wearing the double crown (of Upper and Lower Egypt) typically worn by the king and by the god Atum. She was also occasionally depicted with the head of a lioness”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Khons’:
“also spelled KHONSU, KHENSU, OR CHONS, in ancient Egyptian religion, moon god who was generally depicted as a youth. A deity with astronomical associations named Khenzu is known from the Pyramid Texts (c. 2350 BC) and is possibly the same as Khons. In Egyptian mythology, Khons was regarded as the son of the god Amon and the goddess Mut. In the period of the late New Kingdom (c. 1100 BC) a major temple was built for Khons in the Karnak complex at Thebes. Khons was generally depicted as a young man with a side lock of hair; on his head he wore a uraeus (rearing cobra) and a lunar disk. The latter combination of forms may refer to the phases of the moon. Khons also was associated with baboons and was sometimes assimilated to Thoth, another moon god associated with baboons”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Mut’, ‘Egyptian Religion: The Gods’:
“Egyptian religion was polytheistic. The gods who inhabited the bounded and ultimately perishable cosmos varied in nature and capacity. The word netjer (‘god’) described a much wider range of beings than the deities of monotheistic religions, including what might be termed demons. As is almost necessary in polytheism, gods were neither all-powerful nor all-knowing. Their power was immeasurably greater than that of human beings, and they had the ability to live almost indefinitely, to survive fatal wounds, to be in more than one place at once, to affect people in visible and invisible ways, and so forth. Most gods were generally benevolent, but their favour could not be counted on, and they had to be propitiated and encouraged to inhabit their cult images so that they could receive the cult and further the reciprocity of divine and human. Some deities, notably such goddesses as Neith, Sekhmet, and Mut, had strongly ambivalent characters. The god Seth embodied the disordered aspects of the ordered world, and in the 1st millennium BC he came to be seen as an enemy who had to be eliminated (but would remain present). The characters of the gods were not neatly defined. Most had a principal association, such as that of Re with the sun or that of the goddess Hathor with women, but there was much overlap, especially among the leading deities. In general, the more closely circumscribed a deity’s character, the less powerful that deity was. All the main gods acquired the characteristics of creator gods. A single figure could have many names: among those of the sun god, the most important were Khepri (the morning form), Re-Harakhty, and Atum (the old, evening form). There were three principal ‘social’ categories of deity: gods, goddesses, and youthful deities, mostly male. Gods had regional associations, corresponding to their chief cult places. The sun god’s cult place was Heliopolis, Ptah’s was Memphis, and Amon’s was Thebes. These were not necessarily their original cult places. The principal cult of Khnum, the creator god who formed people from clay like a potter, was Elephantine, and he was the lord of the nearby First Cataract. His cult is not attested there before the New Kingdom, however, even though he was important from the 1st dynasty (c. 2925-2775 BC). The main earlier sanctuary there belonged to the goddess Satet, who became Khnum’s companion. Similarly, Mut, the partner of Amon at Thebes, seems to have originated elsewhere. Deities had principal manifestations, and most were associated with one or more species of animal. For gods the most important forms were the falcon and bull, and for goddesses the cow, cobra, vulture, and lioness. Rams were widespread, while some manifestations were as modest as the millipede of the god Sepa. Some gods were very strongly linked to particular animals, as Sebek was with the crocodile and Khepri with the scarab beetle. Thoth had two animals, the ibis and the baboon. Some animal cults were only partly integrated with specific gods, notably the Ram of Mendes in the Delta and the Apis and Mnevis bulls at Memphis and Heliopolis, respectively. Animals could express aspects of a deity’s nature: some goddesses were lionesses in their fiercer aspect but were cats when mild. These variable forms relate to aspects of the person that were common to gods and people. The most significant of these were the ka, which was the vital essence of a person that was transmitted from one generation to the next, the ba, which granted freedom of movement and the ability to take on different forms, principally in the next world, and the akh, the transfigured spirit of a person in the next world. The chief form in which gods were represented was <>
human, and many deities had only human form. Among these deities were very ancient figures such as the fertility god Min and the creator and craftsman Ptah. The cosmic gods Shu, of the air and sky, and Geb, of the earth, had human form, as did Osiris, Isis, and Nephthys, deities who provided a model of human society. In temple reliefs the gods were depicted in human form, which was central to decorum. Gods having animal manifestations were therefore shown with a human body and the head of their animal. The opposite convention, a human head and an animal body, was used for the king, who was shown as a sphinx with a lion’s body. Sphinxes could receive other heads, notably those of rams and falcons, associating the form with Amon and Re-Harakhty. Demons were represented in more extravagant forms and combinations; these became common in the 1st millennium BC. Together with the cult of animals, they were mocked by Greek and Roman writers. Apart from major deities--gods who received a cult or had a significant cosmic role--there were important minor figures. Several of these marginal beings had grotesque forms and variable names. The most prominent were Bes, a helpful figure with dwarf form and a masklike face, associated especially with women and children, and Taurt, a goddess with similar associations whose physical form combined features of a hippopotamus and a crocodile. Among demons, the most important figure was Apopis, shown as a colossal snake, who was the enemy of the sun god in his daily cycle through the cosmos. Apopis existed outside the ordered realm; he had to be defeated daily, but, since he did not belong to the sphere of existence, he could not be destroyed”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Apopis’:
“also called Apep, Apepi, or Rerek, ancient Egyptian demon of chaos, who had the form of a serpent and, as the foe of the sun god, Re, represented all that was outside the ordered cosmos. Although many serpents symbolized divinity and royalty, Apopis threatened the underworld and symbolized evil. Each night Apopis encountered Re at a particular hour in the sun god’s ritual journey through the underworld in his divine bark. Seth, who rode as guardian in the front of Re’s bark, attacked him with a spear and slew him, but the next night Apopis, who could not be finally killed, was there again to attack Re. The Egyptians believed that they could help maintain the order of the world and assist Re by performing rituals against Apopis”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Sekhmet’:
“also spelled Sakhmet, in Egyptian religion, a goddess of war and the destroyer of the enemies of the sun god Re. Sekhmet was associated both with disease and with healing and medicine. Like other fierce goddesses in the Egyptian pantheon, she was called the ‘Eye of Re.’ She was the companion of the god Ptah (see ) and was worshiped principally at Memphis. She was usually depicted as a lioness or as a woman with the head of a lioness, on which was placed the solar disk and the uraeus serpent. Sekhmet was sometimes identified with other Egyptian goddesses such as Hathor, Bastet, and Mut”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Nefertem’:
“also spelled NEFERTUM, OR NEFERTEMU, in ancient Egyptian religion, youthful god associated with the lotus flower. Nefertem was an ancient god, mentioned in the Pyramid Texts (c. 2350 BC), but he became more prominent during the New Kingdom (1539-c. 1075 BC) and later. As a lotus he was believed to have emerged from the primeval waters, and he was connected with the sun god because lotus flowers open in the sun. He also had a warlike aspect and could be depicted as a lion. He was most commonly represented holding a scimitar with a falcon's head and wearing a headdress of a lotus with a menat (ritual necklace counterpoise) on each side and a pair of plumes above”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Imhotep’:
“Although no contemporary account has been found that refers to Imhotep as a practicing physician, ancient documents illustrating Egyptian society and medicine during the Old Kingdom show that the chief magician of the pharaoh’s court also frequently served as the nation’s chief physician. Imhotep’s reputation as the reigning genius of the time, his position in the court, his training as a scribe, and his becoming known as a medical demigod only 100 years after his death are strong indications that he must have been a physician of considerable skill. Not until the Persian conquest of Egypt in 525 BC was Imhotep elevated to the position of a full deity, replacing Nefertum in the great triad of Memphis, shared with his mythological parents Ptah, the creator of the universe, and Sekhmet, the goddess of war and pestilence. Imhotep’s cult reached its zenith during Greco-Roman times, when his temples in Memphis and on the island of Philae (Arabic: Jazirat Filah) in the Nile were often crowded with sufferers who prayed and slept there with the conviction that the god would reveal remedies to them in their dreams. The only Egyptian mortal besides the 18th-dynasty sage and minister Amenhotep to attain the honour of total deification, Imhotep is still held in esteem by physicians who, like the eminent 19th-century British practitioner Sir William Osler, consider him ‘the first figure of a physician to stand out clearly from the mists of antiquity.’”.
3. Babel: Tiga serangkai Istar, Sin, Samas, milenium ke 2 S. M.
Lagi-lagi, kalau dilihat dalam gambar / foto yang diberikan oleh Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa pada hal 10, terlihat bahwa ada tiga patung, yang tidak disatukan, dan ketiga patung itu bukan hanya berbeda bentuknya, tetapi juga besarnya. Dan bahkan kelihatannya, ketiga dewa ini mempunyai kedudukan yang berbeda-beda, karena yang satu digambarkan duduk di atas takhta, sedangkan yang dua berdiri di hadapannya. Jadi ini menunjuk kepada tiga dewa (polytheisme), dan karena itu jelas bukan merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal.
Sekarang mari kita mempelajari dewa-dewa ini secara terperinci.
Sin, kependekan dari Su-en, adalah nama dalam bahasa Akkadian, dan dalam bahasa Sumerian ia disebut Nanna. Sin adalah dewa bulan, dan ia adalah ayah dari dewa matahari, yaitu Samas / Shamash, dan dari Istar / Ishtar, dewi Venus, dan ketiganya membentuk ‘astral triad of deities’ (= keallahan tiga serangkai yang berhubungan dengan bintang-bintang). Ia memberikan kesuburan dan kemakmuran kepada kawanan ternak. Istrinya, yaitu Ningal, adalah dewi buluh / alang-alang. Ayahnya bernama Enlil.
Samas / Shamash, adalah nama dalam bahasa Akkadian, dan dalam bahasa Sumerian ia disebut Utu. Ia adalah dewa matahari. Ia adalah anak dari Sin, dan sebagai dewa matahari ia mempunyai kuasa terang atas kegelapan dan kejahatan, dan karena itu ia dikenal sebagai dewa keadilan, dan ia adalah hakim bagi dewa-dewa dan manusia. Pada malam hari, Shamash menjadi dewa dalam dunia orang mati. Ia juga adalah penguasa dari seluruh alam semesta. Ia digambarkan duduk pada sebuah takhta, memegang dalam tangannya sebuah tongkat dan sebuah cincin, yang merupakan simbol dari keadilan dan kebenaran. Pasangan dari Shamash adalah Aya, yang belakangan diserap (absorbed) oleh Ishtar.
Istar / Ishtar, adalah nama dalam bahasa Akkadian, dan dalam bahasa Sumerian namanya adalah Inanna. Ia adalah dewi perang dan cinta sexuil. Ia kadang-kadang digambarkan sebagai anak perempuan dari dewa langit An, dan kadang-kadang sebagai istrinya. Dalam mitos yang lain, ia adalah anak perempuan dari Nanna / Shamash / Samas, dewa bulan, dan dari dewa angin, Enlil. Ia adalah dewi hujan dan badai / guntur, kesuburan, dan lumbung. Sebagai dewi Venus, yang senang dengan kasih / cinta secara jasmani, ia adalah pelindung dari pelacur dan rumah minum (minuman keras). Penyembahan terhadapnya mencakup pelacuran kuil, dan pusat dari ibadah terhadap Istar ini adalah Erech, yang adalah kota yang penuh dengan pelacur. Dalam mitos belakangan ia dikenal sebagai Ratu alam semesta, yang mengambil / menerima kuasa-kuasa dari An, Enlil dan Enki.
Kesimpulan dari penjelasan tentang kepercayaan Babel kuno ini adalah bahwa:
· lagi-lagi ada lebih dari 3 dewa, yang mempunyai kekuasaan dan keahlian sendiri-sendiri.
· yang disebut tiga serangkai adalah satu dewa dengan satu anak lelaki (dewa) dan satu anak perempuan (dewi). Tetapi sang bapa punya istri dewi lain, dan punya bapa, yang juga adalah dewa lain lagi.
· dewa bisa mempunyai kekuasaan / fungsi yang berbeda pada malam hari dan pada siang hari.
· ada dewa dan dewi yang bisa berpasangan / kawin dan mempunyai anak, yang juga adalah dewa / dewi.
· ada dewi yang melindungi kejahatan (pelacuran dan rumah minum). Dan penyembahan terhadap dewi tersebut mencakup pelacuran dalam kuil.
· dewa yang satu bisa mengambil / menerima kuasa dari dewa yang lain.
Pikirkan sendiri, apakah ini mempunyai kemiripan dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Sin’:
“(Akkadian), Sumerian Nanna, in Mesopotamian religion, the god of the moon. Sin was the father of the sun god, Shamash (Sumerian: Utu), and, in some myths, of Ishtar (Sumerian: Inanna), goddess of Venus, and with them formed an astral triad of deities. Nanna, the Sumerian name for the moon god, may have originally meant only the full moon, whereas Su-en, later contracted to Sin, designated the crescent moon. At any rate, Nanna was intimately connected with the cattle herds that were the livelihood of the people in the marshes of the lower Euphrates River, where the cult developed. (The city of Ur, of the same region, was the chief centre of the worship of Nanna.) The crescent, Nanna’s emblem, was sometimes represented by the horns of a great bull. Nanna bestowed fertility and prosperity on the cowherds, governing the rise of the waters, the growth of reeds, the increase of the herd, and therefore the quantity of dairy products produced. His consort, Ningal, was a reed goddess. Each spring, Nanna’s worshipers reenacted his mythological visit to his father, Enlil, at Nippur with a ritual journey, carrying with them the first dairy products of the year. Gradually Nanna became more human: from being depicted as a bull or boat, because of his crescent emblem, he came to be represented as a cowherd or boatman. Sin was represented as an old man with a flowing beard--a wise and unfathomable god--wearing a headdress of four horns surmounted by a crescent moon. The last king of Babylon, Nabonidus (reigned c. 556-539 BC), attempted to elevate Sin to a supreme position within the pantheon”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Shamash’:
“(Akkadian), Sumerian Utu, in Mesopotamian religion, the god of the sun, who, with the moon god, Sin (Sumerian: Nanna), and Ishtar (Sumerian: Inanna), the goddess of Venus, was part of an astral triad of divinities. Shamash was the son of Sin.Shamash, as the solar deity, exercised the power of light over darkness and evil. In this capacity he became known as the god of justice and equity and was the judge of both gods and men. (According to legend, the Babylonian king Hammurabi received his code of laws from Shamash.) At night, Shamash became judge of the underworld. Shamash was not only the god of justice but also governor of the whole universe; in this aspect he was pictured seated on a throne, holding in his hand the symbols of justice and righteousness, a staff and a ring. Also associated with Shamash is the notched dagger. The god is often pictured with a disk that symbolized the Sun. As the god of the sun, Shamash was the heroic conqueror of night and death who swept across the heavens on horseback or, in some representations, in a boat or chariot. He bestowed light and life. Because he was of a heroic and wholly ethical character, he only rarely figured in mythology, where the gods behaved all too often like mortals. The chief centres of his cult were at Larsa in Sumer and at Sippar in Akkad. Shamash’s consort was Aya, who was later absorbed by Ishtar”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Ishtar’:
“(Akkadian), Sumerian Inanna, in Mesopotamian religion, goddess of war and sexual love. Ishtar is the Akkadian counterpart of the West Semitic goddess Astarte. Inanna, an important goddess in the Sumerian pantheon, came to be identified with Ishtar, but it is uncertain whether Inanna is also of Semitic origin or whether, as is more likely, her similarity to Ishtar caused the two to be identified. In the figure of Inanna several traditions seem to have been combined: she is sometimes the daughter of the sky god An, sometimes his wife; in other myths she is the daughter of Nanna, god of the moon, or of the wind, Enlil. In her earliest manifestations she was associated with the storehouse and thus personified as the goddess of dates, wool, meat, and grain; the storehouse gates were her emblem. She was also the goddess of rain and thunderstorms--leading to her association with An, the sky god--and was often pictured with the lion, whose roar resembled thunder. The power attributed to her in war may have arisen from her connection with storms. Inanna was also a fertility figure, and, as goddess of the storehouse and the bride of the god Dumuzi-Amaushumgalana, who represented the growth and fecundity of the date palm, she was characterized as young, beautiful, and impulsive--never as helpmate or mother. She is sometimes referred to as the Lady of the Date Clusters. Ishtar’s primary legacy from the Sumerian tradition is the role of fertility figure; she evolved, however, into a more complex character, surrounded in myth by death and disaster, a goddess of contradictory connotations and forces: fire and fire-quenching, rejoicing and tears, fair play and enmity. The Akkadian Ishtar is also, to a greater extent, an astral deity, associated with the planet Venus: with Shamash, sun god, and Sin, moon god, she forms a secondary astral triad. In this manifestation her symbol is a star with 6, 8, or 16 rays within a circle. As goddess of Venus, delighting in bodily love, Ishtar was the protectress of prostitutes and the patroness of the alehouse. Part of her cult worship probably included temple prostitution, and her cult centre, Erech, was a city filled with courtesans and harlots. Her popularity was universal in the ancient Middle East, and in many centres of worship she probably subsumed numerous local goddesses. In later myth she was known as Queen of the Universe, taking on the powers of An, Enlil, and Enki”.
4. Palmyra: Tiga serangkai dari allah bulan, Tuhan dari Langit, allah matahari, kira-kira abad ke 1 M.
Di sini lagi-lagi, dalam gambar / foto yang diberikan Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa dalam hal 10, ada gambar / foto dari tiga buah patung / dewa, yang tidak disatukan.
Tidak banyak yang diceritakan oleh Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 tentang Palmyra dan dewa-dewanya. Kota Palmyra adalah kota kuno di Syria, 210 km di sebelah tenggara dari Damsyik. Dewa utama mereka bernama Bol, yang mungkin sama dengan Baal. Tidak lama kemudian Bol dikenal dengan nama Bel, oleh suatu percampuran dengan dewa Babilonia yang bernama Bel-Marduk. Kedua dewa ini menguasai pergerakan dari bintang-bintang. Dan Bel ini juga dicampur dengan dewa matahari yaitu Yarhibol dan dewa bulan yang bernama Aglibol. Tiga serangkai surgawi yang lain dibentuk di sekitar dewa orang-orang Fenisia Baal Shamen, ‘Tuhan dari langit’, yang lebih kurang sama dengan Hadad, yang adalah ‘dewa cuaca’, yang menguasai hujan, guntur / petir, dan badai. Ia mempunyai dua aspek, sebagai pemberi dan perusak kehidupan, karena hujan yang ia berikan membuat tanah menghasilkan makanan, tetapi badai yang ia timbulkan menghasilkan kematian. Juga dikatakan tentang Adad atau Hadad ini, bahwa berbeda dengan dewa-dewa lain yang lebih besar dari dia, ia tidak mempunyai pusat ibadah khusus untuk dirinya.
Baca Juga: Seminar Tentang Saksi Yehuwa di Medan
Pada abad kedua Masehi muncul kecenderungan pada kepercayaan terhadap satu Allah / dewa, dan sekte ini mempunyai dewa yang tidak bernama, dan hanya disebut sebagai ‘ia yang namanya diberkati / terpuji selama-lamanya, yang penuh belas kasihan dan baik’.
Sekalipun dalam persoalan kepercayaan Palmyra kuno ini tidak banyak data yang bisa didapatkan dari Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 tetapi itu sudah cukup untuk membuat suatu kesimpulan bahwa:
· dewa-dewa ini mempunyai aktivitas dan kekuasaan sendiri-sendiri (matahari, bulan, dan cuaca).
· tetap ada dewa yang lebih besar dan lebih kecil dari dewa yang lainnya.
· kelihatannya ada 2 macam tiga serangkai.
Pikirkan sendiri, apakah ini mempunyai kemiripan dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Palmyra’:
“also called TADMUR, TADMOR, or TUDMUR, ancient city in south-central Syria, 130 miles (210 km) northeast of Damascus. The name Palmyra, meaning ‘city of palm trees,’ was conferred upon the city by its Roman rulers in the 1st century AD; Tadmur, Tadmor, or Tudmur, the pre-Semitic name of the site, is also still in use. The city is mentioned in tablets dating from as early as the 19th century BC. It attained prominence in the 3rd century BC, when a road through it became one of the main routes of east-west trade. Palmyra was built on an oasis lying approximately halfway between the Mediterranean Sea (west) and the Euphrates River (east), and it helped connect the Roman world with Mesopotamia and the East. Although autonomous for much of its history, Palmyra came under Roman control by the time of the emperor Tiberius (reigned AD 14-37). After visiting the city (c. 129), the emperor Hadrian declared it a civitas libera (‘free city’), and it was later granted by the emperor Caracalla the title of colonia, with exemption from taxes. The city thus prospered, and the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD were the great age of Palmyra and its extensive trading activities, despite obstacles that interrupted caravan trade with the East, and also in the face of instability around the Roman-controlled Mediterranean. When the Sasanians supplanted the Parthians in Persia and southern Mesopotamia (227), the road to the Persian Gulf was soon closed to Palmyrene trade. These difficulties led the Romans to set up the personal rule of the family of Septimius Odaenathus at Palmyra. He was appointed governor of Syria Phoenice by the emperor Valerian (reigned 253-260), but it was apparently his son, the emperor Gallienus, who conferred on Odaenathus the title of corrector totius Orientis (‘governor of all the East’). Both Odaenathus and his eldest son, the heir apparent, were assassinated, however, reputedly at the command of Odaenathus’ second wife, Zenobia, who took control of the city and became an effective leader. Under her rule, the armies of Palmyra conquered most of Anatolia (Asia Minor) in 270, and the city declared its independence from Rome. The Roman emperor Aurelian, however, regained Anatolia in 272 and razed Palmyra the following year. The city remained the chief station on the strata Diocletiana, a paved road that linked Damascus to the Euphrates, but in 634 it was taken by Khalid ibn al-Walid in the name of the first Muslim caliph, Abu Bakr. After that, its importance as a trading centre gradually declined. The language of Palmyra was Aramaic; its two systems of writing--a monumental script and a Mesopotamian cursive--reflect the city’s position between East and West. The great bilingual inscription known as the Tariff of Palmyra and the inscriptions carved below the statues of the great caravan leaders reveal information on the organization and nature of Palmyra’s trade. The Palmyrenes exchanged goods with India via the Persian Gulf route and also with such cities as Coptos on the Nile River, Rome, and Doura-Europus in Syria. The principal deity of the Aramaeans of Palmyra was Bol (probably an equivalent to Baal). Bol soon became known as Bel by assimilation to the Babylonian god Bel-Marduk. Both gods presided over the movements of the stars. The Palmyrenes associated Bel with the sun and moon gods, Yarhibol and Aglibol, respectively. Another heavenly triad formed around the Phoenician god Baal Shamen, the ‘lord of heaven,’ more or less identical with Hadad. A monotheistic tendency emerged in the 2nd century AD with the cult of an unnamed god, ‘he whose name is blessed forever, the merciful and good.’ The ruins at Palmyra clearly reveal the network plan of the ancient city. Along the principal east-west street, named the Grand Colonnade by archaeologists, a double portico is ornamented with three nymphaea. To the south are the agora, the Senate House, and the theatre. Other ruins include a vast complex called Diocletian’s Camp and the chief Palmyrene sanctuary, dedicated to Bel, Yarhibol, and Aglibol. In architecture the Corinthian order marks almost all the monuments, but the influence of Mesopotamia and Iran is also clearly evident. In addition, art found on monuments and tombs reflects the influences of the surrounding Roman and Persian empires. The ruins of the ancient city of Palmyra were designated a UNESCO <>
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Malakbel’:
“(Hebrew: ‘Angel of Baal’), West Semitic sun god and messenger god, worshiped primarily in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra; he was variously identified by the Greeks with Zeus and with Hermes and by the Romans with Sol. His name may have been of Babylonian origin, and he was considered the equivalent of the Babylonian sun god Shamash. Engravings on the four sides of a marble altar from Palmyra depict the four annual stages in the life of Malakbel, symbolizing the yearly sequence of the sun. Most other representations portray Malakbel with Aglibol, the moon god”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Shamen’, ‘Syrian and Palestinian religion: Developments in the 1st millenium’:
“In the 1st millennium the written documentation shrinks to formulaic inscriptions, very occasionally developed into more expressive literary miniatures. Gods are often referred to in these texts by titles or by new names, so that it is often difficult to ascertain their relationship to the deities of the 2nd millennium, or indeed to determine their individuality in relation to one another. It appears that there was a tendency in this millennium to concentrate all divine power in one deity, as has been noted of Mesopotamia and as is most obviously and extremely the case in Israel. The storm god, Hadad, appears as the chief god of the Aramaeans in northern Syria in the 9th and 8th centuries. The moon god (under the name Sahar) also is prominent in this area. Some rulers speak of their own dynastic deity. A king who owes his position to the Assyrian emperor refers to the latter and the dynastic deity equally as ‘my master.’ It is clear that several different deities are referred to by the form Baal-X (‘Lord of X’). Hadad is probably represented by Baal-Shamen (‘Lord of the Heavens’). <>El
appeared under the tile Baal-Hammon--rarely on the mainland, but abundantly in the Phoenician colonies of Africa; under this name he becomes the chief deity of Carthage. In the Phoenician heartland the supreme goddess of Byblos--presumably Asherah--is called simply Baalat Gubl (‘the Lady of Byblos’). Anath becomes much less visible during the 1st millennium than at Ugarit. Athtart (Astarte), on the other hand, becomes more prominent. At Sidon, as earlier at Ugarit, she is referred to as ‘the Name of Baal,’ perhaps indicating that she was called upon as a mediator with the supreme Baal (Hadad). Alongside other long-familiar deities such as Resheph and Shamash appeared certain new names, including Eshmun (especially at Sidon), Melqart (‘king of the [underworld] city’; especially at Tyre), and, of course, Yahweh (in Israel--but also represented at least in personal names at Hamath and Larnaca). According to the Hebrew Bible, Asherah and Astarte were both worshiped in Israel during the first half of the millennium, and Hebrew inscriptions attest to a pairing of Yahweh and Asherah”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Hadad’:
“also spelled HAD, HADDA, OR HADDU, the Old Testament Rimmon, West Semitic god of storms, thunder, and rain. His attributes were identical with those of Adad of the Assyro-Babylonian pantheon. He was the chief baal (‘lord’) of the West Semites (including both sedentary and nomadic Aramaeans) in north Syria, along the Phoenician coast, and along the Euphrates River. As Baal-Hadad he was represented as a bearded deity, often holding a club and thunderbolt and wearing a horned headdress. The bull was the symbolic animal of Hadad, as of the Hittite deity Teshub, who was identical with him”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Adad’:
“weather god of the Babylonian and Assyrian pantheon. The name Adad may have been brought into Mesopotamia toward the end of the 3rd millennium BC by Western (Amorite) Semites. His Sumerian equivalent was Ishkur and the West Semitic was Hadad. Adad had a twofold aspect, being both the giver and the destroyer of life. His rains caused the land to bear grain, wine, and food for his friends; hence his title Lord of Abundance. His storms and hurricanes, evidences of his anger against his foes, brought darkness, want, and death. The bull and the lion were sacred to him. Adad’s father was the heaven god Anu, but he is also designated as the son of Bel, Lord of All Lands and god of the atmosphere. His consort was Shalash, which may be a Hurrian name. The symbol of Adad was the cypress, and six was his sacred number. In Babylonia, Assyria, and Aleppo in Syria, he was also the god of oracles and divination. Unlike the greater gods, Adad quite possibly had no cult centre peculiar to himself, although he was worshipped in many of the important cities and towns of Mesopotamia, including >
Babylon and Ashur, the capital of Assyria”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Hadad’, ‘Nature worship’:
“The withdrawn god. The god of heaven may be a Deus otiosus, who has, after completing the creation, withdrawn into heaven and abandoned the government of the world to the ancestors of men or to nature spirits that are dependent on him and act as mediators between him and men. This type of the god, who is able to intervene directly only when there are widespread existential necessities or needs (e.g., drought, pestilence, or war), can be found primarily where worship of the dead or worship of individual local ‘earth spirits’--not yet integrated into an all-inclusive earth deity--obscures everything else. This type of god occurs especially in areas of so-called primitive agriculture (e.g., large parts of Africa, Melanesia, and South America). The first among equals. The god of heaven also may be the head of a pantheon of gods, the first among equals, or the absolute ruler in a hierarchy of gods. This occurs in polytheism (belief in many gods) in its purest form. The deities associated with him are often related to him by family ties (genealogies of gods). Occasionally, the heavenly phenomena are distributed among members of the clan of gods, the god of heaven himself thus becoming rather vague. The divine pair heaven-earth represents only one among many possible combinations--e.g., Dyaus-pitri (= heaven, male) and Prthivi (= earth, female) in Vedic India or, with an unusual distribution of the sexes, Nut (= heaven, woman) and Geb (= earth, man) in ancient Egypt. Occasionally, generations of gods succeed each other (e.g., Greece, western Asia). In such instances, the more universal god of heaven is often replaced by the younger god of thunderstorms (e.g., Zeus of the Greeks, Teshub of the Hittites, or Hadad of the Semites) or is even relegated to the background by a goddess, such as Inanna-Ishtar (the love or fertility goddess in Babylonia) or Amaterasu, the sun goddess of Japan”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Palmyra’, ‘Shadrafa’:
“ancient West Semitic benevolent deity. His name may possibly be translated as ‘Spirit of Healing.’ He was often represented as a youthful, beardless male, standing on a lion above mountains, wearing a long, trailing garment and a pointed headdress, and holding a small lion in one hand and, perhaps, a whip in the other. In representations from Palmyra, Shadrafa is shown with serpents and scorpions. He was probably equated with the beautiful youth Adonis, who was prominent during Hellenistic times. Shadrafa was worshipped in North Africa as the tutelary deity of Leptis Magna, being equated there with Liber-Dionysus”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Bel, ‘Marduk’:
“in Mesopotamian religion, the chief god of the city of Babylon and the national god of Babylonia; as such he was eventually called simply Bel, or Lord. Originally he seems to have been a god of thunderstorms. A poem, known as Enuma elish and dating from the reign of Nebuchadrezzar I (1124-03 BC), relates Marduk’s rise to such preeminence that he was the god of 50 names, each one that of a deity or of a divine attribute. After conquering the monster of primeval chaos, Tiamat, he became ‘lord of the gods of heaven and earth.’ All nature, including man, owed its existence to him; the destiny of kingdoms and subjects was in his hands. Marduk’s chief temples at Babylon were the Esagila and the Etemenanki, a ziggurat with a shrine of Marduk on the top. In Esagila the poem Enuma elish was recited every year at the <>
New Year festival. The goddess named most often as the consort of Marduk was Zarpanit, or Zarbanit (She of the City Zarpan). Marduk’s star was Jupiter, and his sacred animals were horses, dogs, and especially the so-called dragon with forked tongue, representations of which adorn his city’s walls. On the oldest monuments Marduk is represented holding a triangular spade or hoe, interpreted as an emblem of fertility and vegetation. He is also pictured walking, or in his war chariot. Typically, his tunic is adorned with stars; in his hand is a sceptre, and he carries a bow, spear, net, or thunderbolt. Kings of Assyria and Persia also honoured Marduk and Zarpanit on inscriptions and rebuilt many of their temples”.
5. India: Tritunggal (keilahian) Hindu, kira-kira abad ke 7 M.
Berbeda dengan contoh-contoh sebelumnya, kali ini gambar / foto yang diberikan oleh Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa memang menunjukkan tiga dewa yang disatukan (patung dengan tiga wajah, yang menghadap ke depan, kiri, dan kanan). Tetapi tahun yang diberikan adalah abad ke 7 M., dan karena itu ini tidak mungkin merupakan asal usul dari doktrin Allah Tritunggal, yang sudah ada secara solid / kokoh sebelum saat itu. Tetapi karena agama Hindu sebetulnya memang sudah ada lebih dulu dari Kristen, maka saya tetap membahas contoh ini.
Dalam agama Hindu memang ada istilah ‘Trimurti’. Kata ‘Trimurti’ berasal dari bahasa Sansekerta, yang berarti ‘satu atau seluruhnya dengan tiga bentuk’. Dalam agama Hindu, Trimurti merupakan tiga serangkai Brahma, Wisnu, Syiwa.
Tentang Trimurti ini, Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 mengatakan:
“Although sometimes called the Hindu Trinity, Trimurti has little similarity to the Christian Trinity” (= Sekalipun kadang-kadang disebut Tritunggal dari Hindu, Trimurti mempunyai sedikit persamaan dengan Tritunggal Kristen).
Philip Schaff: “The Indian Trimurti, altogether pantheistic in spirit, is still further from the Christian Trinity” (= Trimurti India, sepenuhnya panteistik dalam artinya, adalah lebih jauh lagi dari Tritunggal Kristen) - ‘History of the Christian Church’, vol II, hal 566.
Catatan: pantheisme adalah kepercayaan yang mencampur-adukkan Allah dengan ciptaanNya. Jadi mereka beranggapan bahwa ‘segala sesuatu adalah Allah’ dan ‘Allah adalah segala sesuatu’.
Wisnu sering dianggap sebagai perwujudan khusus dari aspek pemeliharaan, dan Syiwa sebagai perusak. Brahma, sang pencipta, berada di latar belakang, sebagai dewa sekunder. Brahma jarang mempunyai penyembah, dan kebanyakan pemeluk agama Hindu bukan menyembah Wisnu atau Syiwa, tetapi satu atau lebih dari dewa-dewa Hindu lain yang tak terhitung banyaknya (ada yang mengatakan jumlah dewa mereka 33 juta!).
Sekarang mari kita soroti ketiga dewa utama ini satu per satu.
Brahma adalah salah satu dewa utama / besar dalam agama Hindu, tetapi perlahan-lahan ia dipudarkan oleh 2 dewa yang lain, yaitu Wisnu dan Syiwa. Dikatakan bahwa Brahma lahir dari telur emas dan lalu menciptakan bumi dan sesuatu yang ada di atasnya. Tetapi ada juga yang mengatakan bahwa ia muncul dari teratai yang keluar dari pusar dari Wisnu. Brahma biasanya digambarkan dengan 4 muka dan 4 lengan, dan istri-istrinya, yaitu Savitri dan Sarasvati, sering menyertainya.
Wisnu adalah salah satu dewa utama / terpenting dalam agama Hindu, disembah sebagai pelindung dan pemelihara dari dunia dan pemulih dari keteraturan moral (dharma). Ia terutama dikenal melalui inkarnasinya, sebagai Rama dan Kresna. Wisnu menyatakan sebagian dari dirinya kapanpun ia dibutuhkan untuk memerangi kejahatan, dan pemunculannya tidak terhitung, tetapi dalam prakteknya ada 10 yang dikenal secara umum. Istri-istrinya adalah Laksmi (yang juga disebut Shri) dan Bhumidevi (Bumi).
Syiwa adalah salah satu dewa utama dari agama Hindu, dan ia disembah sebagai dewa tertinggi oleh suatu sekte di India. Nama Syiwa berarti ‘yang menguntungkan’, dan merupakan salah satu dewa yang paling komplex di India, dan merupakan perwujudan dari kwalitet-kwalitet yang saling bertentangan. Ia adalah perusak, sekaligus pemulih, pertapa yang agung dan juga simbol dari hawa nafsu, gembala yang penuh kebajikan dari jiwa dan pembalas yang penuh kemurkaan. Istri Syiwa dikenal dengan banyak nama, yaitu Uma, Sati, Parvati, Durga, dan Kali. Syiwa kadang-kadang juga dipasangkan dengan dewi tertinggi, yaitu Shakti. Pasangan ini, mempunyai anak-anak laki-laki, yaitu Skanda yang berkepala enam, dan Ganesha yang mempunyai kepala gajah.
Kesimpulan dari penjelasan tentang kepercayaan India / Hindu ini adalah bahwa:
· lagi-lagi ada jauh lebih banyak dari 3 dewa.
· masing-masing dari Trimurti itu mempunyai fungsi / keahlian sendiri-sendiri.
· Brahma dilahirkan / ditetaskan dari telur, dan ia mempunyai istri-istri. Wisnu juga sama-sama menganut polygamy. Syiwa juga kawin dengan seorang dewi, dan mempunyai anak-anak, yang juga adalah dewa-dewa.
· Wisnu berinkarnasi berkali-kali.
· Dari 3 dewa dalam Trimurti itu, yang satu lebih ditonjolkan dari yang lain.
Pikirkan sendiri, apakah ini mempunyai kemiripan dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal?
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Brahma’:
“in the late Vedic period of India, one of the major gods of Hinduism; with the rise of sectarian worship, he was gradually eclipsed by Vishnu and Shiva. Brahma (a masculine form not to be confused with Brahman, the neuter noun, which denotes the supreme power, or ultimate reality, of the universe) is associated with the Vedic creator god Prajapati, whose identity he came to assume. Brahma is said to have been born from a golden egg and in turn to have created the Earth and all things on it. Later sectarian myths describe him as having come forth from a lotus that issued from Vishnu’s navel. In classical times an attempt to synthesize the diverging sectarian traditions is evident in the doctrine of Trimurti, which considers Vishnu, Shiva, and Brahma as three forms of the supreme, unmanifested deity. By the 7th century, when the Smartas initiated their worship of five deities, omitting Brahma, he had lost all claims as a supreme deity. Today there is no cult or sect that exclusively worships Brahma, and few temples are dedicated to him. The only prominent one is at Pushkar, near Ajmer (Rajasthan state). Nevertheless, all temples dedicated to Shiva or to Vishnu must contain an image of Brahma. Brahma is usually depicted in art as having four faces, symbolic of the four Vedas (earliest sacred scriptures of India), the four yugas (‘ages’), and the four varnas (social classes). He is usually shown with four arms, holding sacrificial instruments, prayer beads, and a book, and either seated or standing on a lotus throne or on his mount, the hamsa (‘swan’). His consorts, Savitri and Sarasvati, frequently accompany him. In painting he is depicted with a yellow complexion, wearing white garments and garlands”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Vishnu’:
“Sanskrit VISNU, one of the principal Hindu deities, worshiped as the protector and preserver of the world and restorer of dharma (moral order). Vishnu, like Shiva (the other major god of Hinduism), is a syncretic personality who combines many lesser cult figures and local heroes. He is known chiefly through his avatars (incarnations), particularly Rama and Krishna. Vishnu was not a major deity in the Vedic period. A few Rigvedic hymns (c. 1400-1000 BC) associate him with the sun and relate the always popular legend of his three strides across the universe (which later formed the basis of the mythology of his avatar Vamana, the dwarf). Legends of other avatars are found in the early literature and by the time of the Mahabharata they begin to be identified with Vishnu. In theory, Vishnu manifests a portion of himself anytime he is needed to fight evil, and his appearances are innumerable; but in practice, 10 are most commonly recognized (see avatar). Temple images of Vishnu depict him either sitting, often in the company of his consorts Laksmi (also called Shri) and Bhumidevi (Earth); standing holding various weapons; or reclining on the coils of the serpent Shesa, asleep on the cosmic ocean during the period between the periodic annihilation and renewal of the world. The standing Vishnu is dressed in royal garments and holds in his four (sometimes two) hands the shankha (conch), cakra (discus), gada (club), or padma (lotus). On his chest is the curl of hair known as the shrivatsa mark, a sign of his immortality, and around his neck he wears the auspicious jewel Kaustubha. In painting, Vishnu is usually shown as dark complexioned, a distinguishing feature also of his incarnations.Vishnu’s mount is the bird Garuda; his heavenly abode is called Vaikuntha. Among the 1,000 names of Vishnu (repeated as an act of devotion by his worshipers) are Vasudeva, Narayana, and Hari”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Shiva’:
“also spelled ShIWA, OR SHIVA, one of the main deities of Hinduism, worshiped as the paramount lord by the Shaiva (Shaivite) sects of India (see Shaivism). Shiva (Sanskrit: ‘Auspicious One’) is one of the most complex gods of India, embodying seemingly contradictory qualities. He is both the destroyer and the restorer, the great ascetic and the symbol of sensuality, the benevolent herdsman of souls and the wrathful avenger. Though some of the combinations of roles may be explained by Shiva’s identification with earlier mythological figures, they also arise from a tendency in Hinduism to combine complementary qualities in a single ambiguous figure. Shiva’s female consort is known under various manifestations as Uma, Sati, Parvati, Durga, and Kali (Shiva is also sometimes paired with the supreme goddess, Shakti). The divine couple, together with their sons--the six-headed Skanda and the elephant-headed Ganesha--are said to dwell on Mount Kailasa in the Himalayas. Shiva’s mount and animal image is the bull Nandi; a sculpture of Nandi sits opposite the main sanctuary of every Shiva temple. In temples and in private shrines Shiva is worshiped in his fundamental form of the linga, or phallus.Shiva is usually depicted in painting and sculpture as white or ash-coloured, with a blue neck (from holding in his throat the poison thrown up at the churning of the cosmic ocean, which threatened to destroy humankind), his hair arranged in a coil of matted locks (jatamakuta) and adorned with the crescent moon and the Ganges (according to legend he brought the Ganges River to earth by allowing her to trickle through his hair, thus breaking her fall). He has three eyes, the third eye bestowing inward vision but capable of burning destruction when focused outward. He wears a garland of skulls and a serpent around his neck and carries in his two (sometimes four) hands a deerskin, a trident, a small hand drum, or a club with a skull at the end.Shiva is represented in a variety of forms: in a pacific mood with his consort Parvati and son Skanda, as the cosmic dancer (Nataraja), as a naked ascetic, as a mendicant beggar, as a yogin, and as the androgynous union of Shiva and his consort in one body, half-male and half-female (Ardhanarishvara). Among his common epithets are Shambhu (‘Benignant’), Shankara (‘Beneficent’), Pashupati (‘Lord of Beasts’), Mahesha (‘Great Lord’), and Mahadeva (‘Great God’)”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Hindu, Hinduism’:
“Magic rites, animal worship, and belief in demons are often combined with the worship of more or less personal gods or with mysticism, asceticism, and abstract and profound theological systems or esoteric doctrines. The worship of local deities does not exclude the belief in pan-Indian higher gods or even in a single high God. Such local deities are also frequently looked upon as manifestations of a high God”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Hindu, Polytheism’:
“Certain gods of no great importance in the Vedic tradition came to dominate classical Hinduism, above all Shiva and Vishnu. The latter was associated with belief in avatar, or incarnation. Most male gods in the Hindu pantheon also came to be represented with a female consort, symbolizing the shakti, or creative power of the deity. The increasing elaboration of Hindu cults as different groups were absorbed into a systematized social fabric has led to the estimate of as many as 33,000,000 Hindu gods. It has been common practice for devotees to select the form under which the divine is worshipped, and such a deity is called the istadevata. Most Hindus are inclined to interpret the many gods as being symbols of the one divine reality”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Trimurti’:
“(Sanskrit: ‘Three Forms’), in Hinduism, a triad of the three great gods, Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. Scholars consider the Trimurti doctrine as an attempt to reconcile different monotheistic approaches with one another and with the philosophic doctrine of ultimate reality (Brahman). Although sometimes called the Hindu Trinity, Trimurti has little similarity to the Christian Trinity. The doctrine was given classical expression in Kalidasa’s poem Kumarasambhava (c. 4th-5th century)”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Trimurti, Hinduism’:
“from Hinduism. Concepts of istadevata and Trimurti. Although those Hindus who particularly worship either Vishnu or Shiva generally consider one or the other as their ‘favourite god’ (istadevata) and as the Lord (Ishana) and Brahman in its personal aspect, Vishnu is often regarded as a special manifestation of the preservative aspect of the Supreme and Shiva as that of the destructive function. Another deity, Brahma, the creator, remains in the background as a demiurge. These three great figures (Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva) constitute the so-called Hindu Trinity (Trimurti, ‘the One or Whole with Three Forms’). This conception attempts to synthesize and harmonize the conviction that the Supreme Power is singular with the plurality of gods in daily religious worship. Although the concept of the Trimurti assigns a position of special importance to some great gods, it never has become a living element in the religion of the people. Moreover, Brahma has had no major cult since ancient times, and many Hindus worship neither Shiva nor Vishnu but one or more of the innumerable other Hindu gods”.
6. Kamboja: Tritunggal (Keilahian) Budha, kira-kira abad ke 12 M.
Gambar yang diberikan tentang contoh ini mirip dengan gambar dalam Tritunggal India tadi, yaitu satu patung dengan tiga wajah, yang menghadap ke kiri, ke depan, dan ke kanan.
Ada beberapa hal yang ingin saya persoalkan di sini:
· Tahun yang diberikan adalah abad ke 12 M., dan ini jauh setelah doktrin Allah Tritunggal muncul. Lalu bagaimana yang belakangan bisa menjadi asal usul dari yang lebih dulu?
· Saya tidak pernah tahu bahwa dalam Buddha ada Tritunggal. Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 sendiri, selain menyatakan Buddha sebagai Polytheisme (kepercayaan terhadap banyak allah / dewa), juga mengatakan bahwa agama yang termasuk monotheisme hanyalah Yudaisme / agama Yahudi, Kristen, dan Islam.
· Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa sendiri tidak menyebutkan nama-nama dari ‘Tiga Serangkai’ / ‘Tritunggal’ dalam Buddha itu.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000, dengan topik ‘Buddha’, ‘Polytheism’:
“Buddhism’s tolerance of popular cults, provided that the main essentials of the faith are maintained, means that in most Buddhist cultures several gods are worshipped”.
Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 dengan topik ‘Polytheism’:
the belief in many gods. Polytheism characterizes virtually all religions other than Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which share a common tradition of monotheism, the belief in one God.
Kesimpulan dari semua ini: Jelas bahwa Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa hanya mengutip sedikit dari perdewaan dalam agama-agama kafir ini, dan lalu menggunakan bagian itu untuk mengatakan bahwa doktrin Allah Tritunggal berasal dari agama kafir. Padahal kalau cerita perdewaan itu diuraikan seluruhnya, terlihat secara sangat menyolok, bahwa itu sama sekali berbeda dan tidak ada hubungannya dengan doktrin Allah Tritunggal. Tidak ada agama lain yang mempunyai konsep Tritunggal (1 hakekat, 3 pribadi yang setingkat). Yang ada pada mereka adalah kepercayaan terhadap 3 allah / dewa (Polytheisme / Tritheisme), dan 3 dewa itu mempunyai daerah kekuasaan dan kemampuan sendiri-sendiri, dan kekuatan yang berbeda satu dengan yang lain, dan masih ditambah lagi dengan banyak dewa dan dewi yang lain, dan kadang-kadang bahkan masih ditambah dengan banyak tiga serangkai yang lain. Ini sangat berbeda dengan konsep kristen tentang Allah Tritunggal. Penceritaan ‘half-truth’ (= setengah kebenaran) ini jelas-jelas merupakan suatu fitnah! Dan fitnahan seperti ini membuktikan bahwa mereka sebetulnya bukanlah ‘Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa’ tetapi ‘Saksi-Saksi Palsu Yehuwa’!
Sebagai tambahan ingin saya katakan bahwa saya berpendapat bahwa pada waktu Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa melihat pada ajaran-ajaran / agama-agama kafir itu, mereka mempunyai persamaan dengan orang yang melihat pada awan. Apa persamaannya? Orang yang melihat awan, bisa menganggap bahwa awan itu membentuk apa saja, sesuai dengan apa yang ia pikirkan. Demikian juga pada waktu Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa melihat pada agama-agama kafir itu. Karena mereka ingin sekali menemukan bukti bahwa doktrin Allah Tritunggal itu berasal dari agama-agama kafir itu, maka itulah gambaran yang mereka dapatkan!
b) Andaikatapun ajaran tentang Allah Tritunggal dari kekristenan mempunyai kemiripan / persamaan dengan agama-agama kafir, itu tidak membuktikan bahwa ajaran itu diambil oleh orang-orang kristen dari agama-agama kafir tersebut.
Bahwa ada manusia yang mirip dengan monyet, tidak berarti bahwa manusia memang berasal dari monyet, seperti yang dipercayai oleh Teori Darwin / evolusi. Tetapi itulah cara yang khas dari Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa dalam menuduh bahwa kekristenan berasal dari kafir.
Dalam buku mereka yang berjudul ‘Pencarian Manusia Akan Allah’, hal 33, mereka memberikan gambar / foto dari dua buah patung. Yang satu adalah Dewi belas kasihan dalam agama Budha di Cina dengan anak bayi; yang lain adalah Perawan Maria dengan bayi Yesus dalam Katolik. Lalu mereka menambahkan bahwa orang Budha di Tibet menggunakan roda doa dan tasbih, sedangkan orang Katolik menggunakan rosario. Lalu mereka berkata: “Agama Budha dan agama Katolik Roma - mengapa tampaknya mempunyai banyak persamaan?”.
Saya sama sekali tidak mendukung Katolik, tetapi saya tetap harus mengatakan bahwa serangan seperti ini adalah serangan yang tidak pada tempatnya. Karena kalau semua kemiripan berarti pengadopsian kepercayaan, maka saya juga bisa melakukan serangan yang serupa terhadap Saksi Yehuwa, misalnya dengan:
· menunjuk kepada berhala / dewa yang hanya terlihat sebagai satu makhluk / binatang, seperti Baal, atau Dagon, dan lalu mengatakan bahwa ajaran Monotheisme mutlak, seperti yang dianut oleh Saksi Yehuwa, berasal dari agama kafir.
· atau menunjuk kepada agama Islam, yang juga mempercayai Allah yang tunggal secara mutlak, dan lalu mengatakan bahwa ajaran Saksi Yehuwa berasal dari Islam.
· atau, karena Saksi Yehuwa mempercayai bahwa perbuatan baik mempunyai andil dalam keselamatan, dan itu sama seperti yang dipercayai oleh agama-agama Hindu, Buddha, Islam, dsb, maka saya bisa mengatakan bahwa Saksi Yehuwa berasal dari agama-agama itu!
Dan ada satu hal lagi yang saya pertanyakan: karena Allah memang menyatakan diri melalui alam semesta dan hati nurani manusia (wahyu / penyataan umum), apakah tidak mungkin bahwa itu yang menyebabkan orang-orang kafir itu lalu mempunyai ‘Tiga Serangkai’, yang ada kemiripannya dengan Allah Tritunggal? Dosa telah merusak hati nurani, dan tidak memungkinkan manusia mengenal Allah dengan benar, sehingga ‘Tiga Serangkai’ mereka menjadi rusak dan berbeda jauh dengan Allah Tritunggal yang sebenarnya.
Catatan: ini hanya pemikiran saya, tetapi saya tidak mempunyai keyakinan apapun dalam hal ini. Juga saya tidak pernah menjumpai pemikiran ini dalam buku-buku tafsiran maupun theologia.
c) Sekarang saya akan membahas Tritunggal yang dipatungkan / digambarkan dalam kalangan-kalangan Kristen. Ada 5 contoh yang diberikan oleh Saksi-Saksi Yehuwa, yaitu:
1. Norwegia: Tritunggal (Bapa, Anak, roh kudus), kira-kira abad ke 13 M.
2. Perancis: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 14 M.
3. Italia: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 15 M.
4. Jerman: Tritunggal, kira-kira abad ke 19 M.
5. Jerman: Tritunggal, abad ke 20 M.
Untuk kelima contoh ini, semuanya adalah patung dari Tritunggal dalam negara-negara Kristen / Katolik. Aneh kalau Tritunggalnya bisa digambarkan / dipatungkan, karena dalam kekristenan itu dilarang. Mungkin ini hanya dalam sekte-sekte tertentu saja (atau Katolik), atau sekedar gambar / patung yang bersifat seni (sekalipun ini tentu salah!).
Bdk. Ulangan 4:15-18 - “(15) Hati-hatilah sekali - sebab kamu tidak melihat sesuatu rupa pada hari TUHAN berfirman kepadamu di Horeb dari tengah-tengah api - (16) supaya jangan kamu berlaku busuk dengan membuat bagimu patung yang menyerupai berhala apapun: yang berbentuk laki-laki atau perempuan; (17) yang berbentuk binatang yang di bumi, atau berbentuk burung bersayap yang terbang di udara, (18) atau berbentuk binatang yang merayap di muka bumi, atau berbentuk ikan yang ada di dalam air di bawah bumi”.
Calvin: “his spiritual nature forbids our imagining anything earthly or carnal of him” (= sifat / hakekatNya yang rohani melarang kita untuk membayangkan apapun yang bersifat duniawi atau daging tentang Dia) - ‘Institutes of the Christian Religion’, Book I, Chapter XIII, no 1.
Ini juga berlaku untuk kata-kata dan gambar / foto yang mereka berikan dalam buku ‘Haruskah Anda Percaya Kepada Tritunggal?’, hal 2, dimana mereka memberikan gambar dari karya pahatan dari Allah Tritunggal dari abad ke 14 M, disertai dengan kata-kata: “Karya pahatan Tritunggal dari Yesus Kristus, Bapa, dan roh kudus dari abad keempat belas (M.). Perhatikan ada tiga pribadi tetapi hanya empat kaki”.
Ini lagi-lagi merupakan suatu serangan bodoh, karena jelas bahwa ‘empat kaki’ tidak menunjukkan ketunggalan, kecuali kalau Allahnya dianggap sebagai binatang berkaki empat! Selain itu, kalau saudara memperhatikan gambar yang mereka berikan, mungkin sebetulnya gambar itu bukannya hanya mempunyai empat tetapi enam kaki, karena kaki-kaki dari pribadi yang di tengah tidak terlihat karena tertutup oleh kaki-kaki dari pribadi yang ada di kanan dan di kirinya (ketiga patung bukan menghadap ke depan, tetapi agak menyudut).
d) Doktrin Allah Tritunggal jelas berasal dari Kitab Suci, karena dalam Kitab Suci / Firman Allah inilah Allah mewahyukan / menyatakan diriNya kepada kita supaya kita bisa mengenal Allah yang benar.
Manusia tidak bisa mengerti doktrin Allah Tritunggal itu secara keseluruhan; lalu bagaimana mungkin manusia bisa menciptakannya?
Loraine Boettner: “We should notice that the doctrine of the Trinity is the distinctive mark of the Christian religion, setting it apart from all the other religions of the world. Working without the benefit of the revelation made in Scripture, men have, it is true, arrived at some limited truths concerning the nature and Person of God. The pagan religion, as well as all philosophical speculations, are based on natural religion and can, therefore, rise no higher conception than that of the unity of God. In some systems we find monotheism with its belief in only one God. In others we find polytheism with its belief in many separate gods. But none of the pagan religions, nor any of the systems of speculative philosophy have ever arrived at a trinitarian conception of God. The fact of the matter is that apart from supernatural revelation there is nothing in human consciousness or experience which can give man the slightest clue to the distinctive God of the Christian faith, the triune, incarnate, redeeming, sanctifying God. Some of the pagan religions have set forth triads of divinities, such as, for instance, the Egyptian triad of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, which is somewhat analogous to the human family with father, mother and child; or the Hindu triad of Brahma, Vishnu, and Schiva, which in the cycle of pantheistic evolution personifies the creative, preservative and destructive powers of nature; or the triad set forth by Plato, of goodness, intellect and will, - which are not examples of true and proper tri-personality, not real persons who can be addressed and worshipped, but only personifications of the faculties or attributes of God. None of these systems have anything in common with the Christian doctrine of the Trinity except the notion of ‘threeness’” (= Kita harus memperhatikan bahwa doktrin Tritunggal merupakan ciri yang khusus / membedakan dari agama Kristen, memisahkannya dari semua agama-agama lain di dunia. Bekerja tanpa manfaat dari wahyu yang dibuat dalam Kitab Suci, memang manusia telah sampai pada beberapa kebenaran yang terbatas mengenai hakekat / sifat dasar dan Pribadi dari Allah. Agama kafir, maupun semua spekulasi yang bersifat filsafat, didasarkan pada agama alamiah, dan karena itu, tidak bisa membangkitkan konsep yang lebih tinggi dari pada konsep tentang kesatuan Allah. Dalam beberapa sistim / agama, kita mendapati monotheisme dengan kepercayaannya kepada hanya satu Allah. Dalam sistim / agama yang lain kita mendapati polytheisme dengan kepercayaannya kepada banyak allah-allah yang terpisah. Tetapi tidak ada dari agama kafir, ataupun sistim dari filsafat spekulatif manapun, yang pernah sampai pada konsep tritunggal tentang Allah. Faktanya adalah, bahwa terpisah dari wahyu supranatural, tidak ada apapun dalam kesadaran atau pengalaman manusia yang bisa memberikan manusia petunjuk yang paling kecil kepada Allah yang khusus / membedakan dari iman Kristen, Allah yang tritunggal, yang berinkarnasi, menebus, menguduskan. Beberapa dari agama-agama kafir telah mengajukan / menyatakan tritunggal-tritunggal dari keilahian, seperti misalnya, tritunggal Mesir dari Osiris, Isis dan Horus, yang agak analog dengan keluarga manusia dengan bapa, ibu dan anak; atau tritunggal Hindu dari Brahma, Wisnu, dan Syiwa, yang dalam siklus dari evolusi yang bersifat pantheisme mempersonifikasikan kuasa-kuasa alam yang mencipta, memelihara dan merusak; atau tritunggal yang diajukan / dinyatakan oleh Plato, dari kebaikan, intelek dan kemauan / kehendak, - yang bukan merupakan contoh-contoh dari tiga kepribadian yang benar, bukan benar-benar pribadi yang bisa dipanggil / disapa / diajak bicara dan disembah, tetapi hanya personifikasi dari kemampuan atau sifat-sifat dari Allah. Tidak ada dari sistim-sistim ini yang mempunyai persamaan apapun dengan doktrin Kristen tentang Tritunggal kecuali gagasan tentang ‘ketigaan’) - ‘Studies in Theology’, hal 80-81.SAKSI YEHUWA (21)