http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caduceus

Yeah you are right. I think its related to Greek Mythology in some fashion. Its very old. It might be pre-bible noise Im guessing.

I was right

well im reading the koran as to the tree the koran mentions a tree but no mention of the tree as described in the bible - not one of good and evil. very different take on that. im seeing alot of diff. but it will take me some time to comment further - its a diff read then the bible for sure, everyting is not put together in order so you have to look for it much more so that the B.

The "One God"(skygod) cast the serpent out of Heaven and Eden and cursed the serpent(earth god) to crawl upon the ground for all of its days just as the Olympians(skygods) overthrew the Titans(earth gods) and imprisoned (most of)them in the earth and Tarterus. And so on and so on with all religions. The new order always overthrows the old. This exchange of gods always happens in conjunction with the progression of a society from hunter/gatherer to agrarian. The old gods become the devils of the new religion.

This belief in good and evil powers had its origin in the fact that man was surrounded by what he was pleased to call good and evil phenomena. Phenomena affecting man pleasantly were ascribed to good spirits, while those affecting him unpleasantly or injuriously, were ascribed to evil spirits. It being admitted that all phenomena were produced by spirits. the spirits were divided according to the phenomena, and the phenomena were good or bad as they affected man. Good spirits were supposed to be the authors of good phenomena, and evil spirits of the evil -- so that the idea of a devil has been as universal as the idea of a god.



http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/gods.html

The caduceus or wand of Hermes is typically depicted as a short herald's staff entwined by two serpents in the form of a double helix, and sometimes surmounted by wings.

ITS ABOUT THE DOUBLE HELIX. DNA....

interesting observation J.B.

i agree with that-

Oh by the way Tribo, I was right about the true history of religion. And I dont need to cite any sources. I am the source. If its such a big deal to you then YOU can cite sources to prove me wrong. But you cant do it because Im NOT wrong. The best you will be able to do is maybe argue some kind of semantic definition of a particular word or two. Thats usually how these discussions go isnt it? I stand by my statements. The earth gods preceded and were replaced by the skygods. Happens in every society when it evolves from nomadic hunter/gatherers to an agricultural society. And you know the more I think about it,the more it bothers me. I deal with this stuff everyday. I live it. I dont have to prove squat.I dont have to cite sources because I know and comprehend the material. I dont need to make stuff up like other people around here do, and ask the same old questions over and over and over again Because I understand and I have the answers. You people are the ones asking the questions, not me I can answer questions from my own personal knowledge because I am the source.

More importantly - WHY would anyne want to refute this.

good for you mirror, thats great, continue with your new found fearlessness -

Well, I didnt plagarize anyone and its not my opinion and its not a research paper so Im not sure what sources you and Krimsa expected me to cite.The best I could do on short notice was cite my college textbook. When you tell someone that the sky is blue you dont need to cite a source, do you? I just felt like that was an unfair expectation you and Krimsa threw on me.Im not sure if you were accusing me of plagarism or saying that what I stated was inaccurate. But it is accurate, and I am the source. So I guess in this instance, I could be used as a source citation.

No one can refute a creation myth of a particular people anywhere on the planet. Just as no one can substantiate Genesis as the Christian Creation Mythology. How can you prove that Jesus, born of a virgin (incidentally the Jews feel that word was mistranslated) and that god lives up in the heavens? They are all Creation myths.

Okay Mirror, Im sorry for even making an attempt at addressing this story and the possible motivations of its writer's and to offer a new insight for people who perhaps had never been exposed to this information. I will subjugate myself and lay passive to your command henceforth.

A little more information about the "Skygods"


The Peripheral Invaders

At first it was like the proverbial biblical cloud "no bigger than a man's hand"-the activities of seemingly insignificant nomadic bands roaming the less desirable fringe areas of our globe seeking grass for their herds. Over millennia they were apparently out there in the harsh, unwanted, colder, sparser territories on the edges of the earth, while the first great agricultural civilizations spread out along the lakes and rivers in the fertile heartlands. To these agricultural peoples, enjoying humanity's early peak of evolution, peace and prosperity must have seemed the blessed eternal state for humankind, the nomads no more than a peripheral novelty. We have nothing to go by but speculation on how these nomadic bands grew in numbers and in ferocity and over what span of time.' But by the fifth millennium B.C.E., or about seven thousand years ago, we begin to find evidence of what Mellaart calls a pattern of disruption of the old Neolithic cultures in the Near East.' Archaeological remains indicate clear signs of stress by this time in many territories. There is evidence of invasions, natural catastrophes, and sometimes both, causing large-scale destruction and dislocation. In many areas the old painted pottery traditions disappear. Bit by devastating bit, a period of cultural regression and stagnation sets in. Finally, during this time of mounting chaos the development of civilization comes to a standstill. As Mellaart writes, it will be another two thousand years before the civilizations of Sumer and Egypt emerge.6 In Old Europe the physical and cultural disruption of the Neolithic societies that worshiped the Goddess also seems to begin in the fifth millenniUM B.C.E., with what Gimbutas calls Kurgan Wave Number One. "Thanks to the growing number of radiocarbon dates, it is now possible to trace several migratory waves of steppe pastoralists or 'Kurgan' people that swept across prehistoric Europe," reports Gimbutas. These repeated incursions and ensuing culture shocks and population shifts were concentrated in three major thrusts: Wave No. 1, at c. 43004200 B.C.E.; Wave No. 2, c. 3400-3200 B.C.E.; and Wave No. 3, c. 30002800 B.C.E. (dates are calibrated to dendrochronology).' The Kurgans were of what scholars call Indo-European or Aryan language-speaking stock, a type that was in modern times to be idealized by Nietzsche and then Hitler as the only pure European race. In fact, they were not the original Europeans, as they swarmed down on that continent from the Asiatic and European northeast. Nor were they even originally Indian, for there was another people, the Dravidians, who lived in India before the Aryan invaders conquered them. But the term Indo-European has stuck. It characterizes a long line of invasions from the Asiatic and European north by nomadic peoples. Ruled by powerful priests and warriors, they brought with them their male gods of war and mountains. And as Aryans in India, Hittites and Mittani in the Fertile Crescent, Luwians in Anatolia, Kurgans in eastern Europe, Achaeans and later Dorians in Greece, they gradually imposed their ideologies and ways of life on the lands and peoples they conquered.

There were other nomadic invaders as well. The most famous of these are a Semitic people we call the Hebrews, who came from the deserts of the south and invaded Canaan (later named Palestine for the Philistines, one of the peoples who lived in the area). The moral precepts we associate with both Judaism and Christianity and the stress on peace in many modern churches and synagogues now obscures the historical fact that originally these early Semites were a warring people ruled by a caste of warrior-priests (the Levite tribe of Moses, Aaron, and Joshua). Like the Indo-Europeans, they too brought with them a fierce and angry god of war and mountains (Jehovah or Yahweh). And gradually, as we read in the Bible, they too imposed much of their ideology and way of life on the peoples of the lands they conquered.

These striking similarities between the Indo-Europeans and the ancient Hebrews have led to some conjecture that there may here be some common origins, or at least some elements of cultural diffusional' But it is not the bloodlines or cultural contacts that cannot be found that are of such interest. It is what seems most definitely to unite these peoples of so many different places and times: the structure of their social and ideological systems. The one thing they all had in common was a dominator model of social organization: a social system in which male dominance, male violence, and a generally hierarchic and authoritarian social structure was the norm. Another commonality was that, in contrast to the societies that laid the foundations for Western civilization, the way they characteristically acquired material wealth was not by developing technologies of production, but through ever more effective technologies of destruction.

"All of which takes us to the next, and final, chapter of this book, where we come full circle to what we began with: the myths and images that shape how we see ourselves and our world. For one of the great challenges we face today is to create and disseminate new myths and images that make it possible for us to see that we do have choices, that we are not doomed to eternal misery by "selfish genes" or "original sin"-and most important, that in the last analysis the choice of our future is up to us."

Riane Eisler- Austrian born American scholar, writer, and social activist

first of all, I don't like the translation. You are using the fundie Bible.

second of all, the only comprehension of good or bad that the characters in tale had is the fact that God give them an instruction. An instruction which is imprinted in their soul (As ourselves we know that killing is bad (unless for self-defense) that is imprinted, yet the characters in the tale decided go their own way.
The same as the murderer (not talking about the mentally insane) decides to kill even if he/she knows it's wrong.
That's it. Human beings have some sort of moral code inprinted in their souls. Such moral code is what we know divine or eternal law from which natural and human laws are derived. Whenever a human being decides to go against such inprinted moral code, is when we have evil.

good grief