Biblical Stories

[Rennie`]

Hiya

Well it's the time of year where all the films on TV are all biblical as it is Christmas soon. I've seen three films and ironically have Egypt in all of them:
arrow The Ten Commandments
arrow Soloman and Sheba
arrow Joseph and the amazing technicolour dream coat

The first two films really make Egypt look like a bad place (or make the Pharaoh's look bad). In 'The Ten Commandments' they make it look like the slaves were treated badly but in fact the slaves in Egypt we treated very well (especially the slaves who built the Pyramids, they were given food and a place for them and their families to stay). In 'Soloman and Sheba' they make the Egyptians look like they can't win battles, but I can't judge on that one because I breifly watched it and I found that film very random.

Why would you think Christians hated Egypt so much? When I saw the temples in Egypt the faces of Gods (like Osiris and Horus) were chipped away as well as their cartouche. Could this be the fact that the Egyptians worshipped a different religion?  

[Anknest Ra Horakhty]

I think that they just didn't like the fact that the Egyptians "enslaved" them, despite the fact that they were treated well.  

[Lunar Kissed]

I have recently seen a wonderful movie set during the reign of Ankhenaten called The Egyptian.  

[Rennie`]

Fantasy Moon

I have recently seen a wonderful movie set during the reign of Ankhenaten called The Egyptian.

Is it a good film? If so I'll have to look on Ebay and get it.  

[Lunar Kissed]

Rennie`

Fantasy Moon

I have recently seen a wonderful movie set during the reign of Ankhenaten called The Egyptian.

Is it a good film? If so I'll have to look on Ebay and get it.

Yep. I really enjoyed it.  

[Mortiferia]

Just thought I'd add to the conversation...

Slaves didn't build the pyramids; they were mostly Egyptian architects, and treated quite well, actually. Probably somewhat better than the rest of the population, as they were doing such a great service to the Pharoah, after all. They had whole towns built near the pyramids for them even. (Deir El Bahari could be considered one of these, for example.)

Not to say they didn't have slaves... But even then, they were pretty well off. Not that I think their enslavement was a good thing. sweatdrop  

[Lokun]

I have so much to say about this, but my english is just not enough... sweatdrop

Anyway, even if the egyptian slaves where treated very varying, I am sure that they had it much better compared to the rest of the worlds slaves about that time. They didn't realy have any rights, but it wasn't unusually that the family let the slave married the familys daughter eek The slave stop being a slave and evolved to a husband! biggrin

And yes, the people who build the pyramids (maybe both slaves and workers) was not treated badly!
I have figured out that they where as bad/good treated as school-students.
They worked about 6 month a year, did not need to work if they where sick, they got food and water at the work and could even take a day off for doing something else!
They could even go on strike if they where unhappy with something.
But the big different is probably that the egyptians did this by free will. I think they thought it was an great honour to serve the great pharao, wich is the same as God himself in many cases.

If it is something in this information that isn't correct, please let me know. cool  

[TheOneTheyKnowAsSorrow88]

They hate any other religion because to Christian's any other Gods or Goddesses etc are false and wrong and heathens. O_o

So even though we have evidence of them being treated very good, Christian's will never believe that. Jews. Whatever  

[Lunar Kissed]

TheOneTheyKnowAsSorrow88

They hate any other religion because to Christian's any other Gods or Goddesses etc are false and wrong and heathens. O_o

So even though we have evidence of them being treated very good, Christian's will never believe that. Jews. Whatever

Movie audiences are also a bit sadistic. They want to see someone being beat down so that they have someone to root for. Hence those in power are usually made to be the bullies.  

[WebenBanu]

This is an interesting subject, and I've a few things to add to the discussion- unfortunately I'm running out of time on my lunch break, so this reply will likely have to be broken up over a few days.^_^

As mentioned earlier, it is highly doubtful that slave labor was used to build the pyramids; it is discounted today by most Egyptologists. What we have found is that the teams which were used for unskilled, manual labor (hauling bricks, transporting materials, etc.) were the farmers whose fields were underwater during the Innundation. When the Nile flooded, it brought with it rich silt for the farmers to cultivate... but it took a few months for those waters to subside enough to actually get to it. wink During that time, the farmers had no work- and unless they had one heck of a store room set up, that meant no livelihood until the fields resurfaced. But the Egyptian government provided for its citizens, and one of the mechanisms which they instituted for dealing with this problem was the offer of employment on the monuments.

As said earlier, working on the king's tomb or their monuments to Egyptian culture was a great honor- and we have graffitti (in Egyptian language) from various work gangs boasting of their presence on different sites. If the Egyptians really had enslaved an entire race of people to do this work for them- and we'll ignore, for the time being, the lack of any evidence that this happened outside of biblical scriptures- then there would have been riots in the streets. It would have done tremendous damage to the native Egyptians' welfare, likely causing massive famine and widespread unemployment by depriving people of the work which would otherwise have ensured their economic security during the season of the flood.  

[Amon-Bennu]

Most of us forget that in the bible its self say that during the whole Joseph thing the Pharaoh let his whole family move down there and said that life was good for the family in egypt for some time.  

[King Robert Silvermyst]

I highly suggest the Discovery video 'Ramses II: Wrath of God or Man?' It shows many interesting things that relate entirely to the exodus. For instance, the thing with te walls of water was found to be false. There was actually a mistranslation from the ancient texts to biblical texts. It was the reed Sea, which was more of a swamp. Also, there was no tenth plague. It was instead linked to the fact that it was Ramses's first born that led the chase after Moses and ultimately died in a battle at the Reed Sea since chariots could not move well in a swamp-like area. Also, Moses was not a child sent down the Nile but an actual son of the Pharoah who took up worship of Aton, a cult that believed in Aton as being the one true God, Aton's name then being changed to something starting with an E (I'll look it up later) and then to Jehova (According to the book 'Eden in Egypt', a book I highly reccomend reading) Now weather or not the slaves were ill treated is up for debate. Normally, they were not, but in any culture, including egyptian culture, you do have those who actually do that, and there have been some pharoahs with rather bad judgement, such as the husband of Nefertiti. There was evidence that he and nefertiti decided to try and destroy the old faith and bring everyone ino the faith of Aton, before the time of Moses, and actually not only destroyed peoples' household shrines but even executed others who refused to give up the old faith, even launching an attack on and pilaging the temple of Atum, which was at the time the largest of the cults, as well as the most powerful, as it was said that their power rivaled that of the pharoahs themselves. (Another video from Discovery 'Resurrection of Nefertiti')  

[WebenBanu]

Yeah, "poor judgement" is a good term to describe it- the entire reign of that king was a tragedy which was never meant to have happened, and he was not prepared for it at all. He was trained to be a priest, not a king- and he would have made a very good priest... but, as it turns out, he made a very bad king. The decisions which he made had catastrophic effects on the economy and people of Egypt. sad

People like to idolize him as the "Father of Monotheism" ...even though what he practiced was more of an increasingly militaristic henotheism than a true monotheism. But at any rate, I wonder if the monotheists would be as eager to claim him if they really knew what sort of effect his religious agenda had on the country?  

[LynUridain]

Very fascinating conversations, all of them... too bad I haven't seen any of the movies mentioned from start to finish. sweatdrop

I will say this, though. No way slaves built the pyramids. They were built with far too much precision to have been raised by a group of people without serious passion for their work. I agree with the aforementioned notion that they were constructed by a well-trained group of architects-- those who knew the secrets of Building. 3nodding It's all I know to be possible.  

[Akladios]

I recommend the oh-so-long movie "Antony and Cleopatra" it's very long, with a couple of wrong facts but it AMAZING.

I got that for my birthday and I just love the film! It's abou 4 hours long but when you have a cold or bored stiff it's great to watch.