Thursday, October 11, 2012

Pope Benedict XVI at Loreto: Mary became "a 'place' of dwelling for the Son of God"



5 October 2012
 
EXACTLY 50 years ago, John XXIII took a train from Vatican City to the Italian town of Loreto. It was all just days before the Second Vatican Council opened, so the Pope traveled there to pray to Our Lady so that the Council would be successful. Now, Benedict XVI has followed his footsteps. He traveled to that same town to pray so that the Synod of Bishops and the Year of Faith are a success. According to tradition, the Basilica holds the home, where Mary used to live in Nazareth. The Pope took a few minutes to pray before that site, which is where Archangel Gabriel visited her. As he celebrated Mass, the Pope talked about hope. He also explained why people need God to face and overcome daily challenges. Read the Pope's homily This visit marks the Pope's 30th trip in Italy. Video courtesy of Rome Reports Homily of Pope Benedict XVI in Loreto: "Without God, man ultimately chooses selfishness over solidarity and love." Your Eminences, Dear Brother Bishops, Dear Brothers and Sisters, "On 4 October 1962, Blessed John XXIII came as a pilgrim to this Shrine to entrust to the Virgin Mary the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, due to begin a week later. On that occasion, with deep filial devotion to the Mother of God, he addressed her in these words: “Again today, and in the name of the entire episcopate, I ask you, sweetest Mother, as Help of Bishops, to intercede for me as Bishop of Rome and for all the bishops of the world, to obtain for us the grace to enter the Council Hall of Saint Peter’s Basilica, as the Apostles and the first disciples of Jesus entered the Upper Room: with one heart, one heartbeat of love for Christ and for souls, with one purpose only, to live and to sacrifice ourselves for the salvation of individuals and peoples. Thus, by your maternal intercession, in the years and the centuries to come, may it be said that the grace of God prepared, accompanied and crowned the twenty-first Ecumenical Council, filling all the children of the holy Church with a new fervour, a new impulse to generosity, and a renewed firmness of purpose” (AAS 54 [1962], 727). Fifty years on, having been called by divine Providence to succeed that unforgettable Pope to the See of Peter, I too have come on pilgrimage to entrust to the Mother of God two important ecclesial initiatives: the Year of Faith, which will begin in a week, on 11 October, on the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council, and the Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, which I have convened this October with the theme “The New Evangelization for the Transmission of the Christian Faith”. Dear friends, to all of you I offer my most cordial greetings. I thank the Most Reverend Giovanni Tonucci, Archbishop of Loreto, for his warm words of welcome. I greet the other bishops present, the priests, the Capuchin Fathers, to whom the pastoral care of this shrine is entrusted, and the religious sisters. I also salute Dr Paolo Niccoletti, Mayor of Loreto, thanking him for his courteous words, and I greet the representatives of the government and the civil and military authorities here present. My thanks also go to those who have generously offered their assistance to make my pilgrimage possible. As I said in my Apostolic Letter announcing the Year of Faith, “I wish to invite my brother bishops from all over the world to join the Successor of Peter, during this time of spiritual grace that the Lord offers us, in recalling the precious gift of faith” (Porta Fidei, 8). It is precisely here at Loreto that we have the opportunity to attend the school of Mary who was called “blessed” because she “believed” (Lk 1:45). This Shrine, built around her earthly home, preserves the memory of the moment when the angel of Lord came to Mary with the great announcement of the Incarnation, and she gave her reply. This humble home is a physical, tangible witness to the greatest event in our history, the Incarnation; the Word became flesh and Mary, the handmaid of the Lord, is the privileged channel through which God came to dwell among us (cf. Jn 1:14). Mary offered her very body; she placed her entire being at the disposal of God’s will, becoming the “place” of his presence, a “place” of dwelling for the Son of God. We are reminded here of the words of the Psalm with which, according to the Letter to the Hebrews, Christ began his earthly life, saying to the Father, “Sacrifices and offering you have not desired, but you have prepared a body for me… Behold, I have come to do your will, O God” (10:5,7). To the Angel who reveals God’s plan for her, Mary replies in similar words: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38). The will of Mary coincides with the will of the Son in the Father’s unique project of love and, in her, heaven and earth are united, God the Creator is united to his creature. God becomes man, and Mary becomes a “living house” for the Lord, a temple where the Most High dwells. Here at Loreto fifty years ago, Blessed John XXIII issued an invitation to contemplate this mystery, to “reflect on that union of heaven and earth, which is the purpose of the Incarnation and Redemption”, and he went on to affirm that the aim of the Council itself was to spread ever wider the beneficent impact of the Incarnation and Redemption on all spheres of life (cf. AAS 54 [1962], 724). This invitation resounds today with particular urgency. In the present crisis affecting not only the economy but also many sectors of society, the Incarnation of the Son of God speaks to us of how important man is to God, and God to man. Without God, man ultimately chooses selfishness over solidarity and love, material things over values, having over being. We must return to God, so that man may return to being man. With God, even in difficult times or moments of crisis, there is always a horizon of hope: the Incarnation tells us that we are never alone, that God has come to humanity and that he accompanies us. The idea of the Son of God dwelling in the “living house”, the temple which is Mary, leads us to another thought: we must recognize that where God dwells, all are “at home”; wherever Christ dwells, his brothers and sisters are no longer strangers. Mary, who is the Mother of Christ, is also our mother, and she open to us the door to her home, she helps us enter into the will of her Son. So it is faith which gives us a home in this world, which brings us together in one family and which makes all of us brothers and sisters. As we contemplate Mary, we must ask if we too wish to be open to the Lord, if we wish to offer him our life as his dwelling place; or if we are afraid that the presence of God may somehow place limits on our freedom, if we wish to set aside a part of our life in such a way that it belongs only to us. Yet it is precisely God who liberates our liberty, he frees it from being closed in on itself, from the thirst for power, possessions, and domination; he opens it up to the dimension which completely fulfils it: the gift of self, of love, which in turn becomes service and sharing. Faith lets us reside, or dwell, but it also lets us walk on the path of life. The Holy House of Loreto contains an important teaching in this respect as well. Its location on a street is well known. At first this might seem strange: after all, a house and a street appear mutually exclusive. In reality, it is precisely here that an unusual message about this House has been preserved. It is not a private house, nor does it belong to a single person or a single family, rather it is an abode open to everyone placed, as it were, on our street. So here in Loreto we find a house which lets us stay, or dwell, and which at the same time lets us continue, or journey, and reminds us that we are pilgrims, that we must always be on the way to another dwelling, towards our final home, the Eternal City, the dwelling place of God and the people he has redeemed (cf. Rev 21:3). There is one more important point in the Gospel account of the Annunciation which I would like to underline, one which never fails to strike us: God asks for mankind’s “yes”; he has created a free partner in dialogue, from whom he requests a reply in complete liberty. In one of his most celebrated sermons, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux “recreates”, as it were, the scene where God and humanity wait for Mary to say “yes”. Turning to her he begs: “The angel awaits your response, as he must now return to the One who sent him… O Lady, give that reply which the earth, the underworld and the very heavens await. Just as the King and Lord of all wished to behold your beauty, in the same way he earnestly desires your word of consent… Arise, run, open up! Arise with faith, run with your devotion, open up with your consent!” (In laudibus Virginis Matris, Hom. IV,8: Opera omnia, Edit. Cisterc. 4, 1966, p.53f). God asks for Mary’s free consent that he may become man. To be sure, the “yes” of the Virgin is the fruit of divine grace. But grace does not eliminate freedom; on the contrary it creates and sustains it. Faith removes nothing from the human creature, rather it permits his full and final realization. Dear brothers and sisters, on this pilgrimage in the footsteps of Blessed John XXIII – and which comes, providentially, on the day in which the Church remembers Saint Francis of Assisi, a veritable “living Gospel” – I wish to entrust to the Most Holy Mother of God all the difficulties affecting our world as it seeks serenity and peace, the problems of the many families who look anxiously to the future, the aspirations of young people at the start of their lives, the suffering of those awaiting signs or decisions of solidarity and love. I also wish to place in the hands of the Mother of God this special time of grace for the Church, now opening up before us. Mother of the “yes”, you who heard Jesus, speak to us of him; tell us of your journey, that we may follow him on the path of faith; help us to proclaim him, that each person may welcome him and become the dwelling place of God. Amen!"

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Monday, October 8, 2012

Saint Augustine: “The New Testament lies hidden in the Old, and the Old Testament is unveiled in the New.”



 
Taken from http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/resources/sacraments/eucharist/what-a-difference-a-day-makes/

….

Another axiom of St. Augustine is: “the New Testament lies hidden in the Old, and the Old Testament is unveiled in the New.” In this column, and its second part, we will begin to see just what St. Augustine has in mind. Now I want to explore the Old Testament background for the Lord’s Day, and the necessity of keeping it holy.
Why an article on this topic? John Paul II said, “It seems more necessary than ever to recover the deep doctrinal foundations underlying the Church’s precept, so that the abiding value of Sunday in the Christian life will be clear to all the faithful” (Dies Domini 6).
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void” (Genesis 1:1-2). In the first six days of creation God goes about taking care of the formlessness and emptiness. The seventh was made for man alone to find rest in God (Genesis 2:2-3). God has thus made his creation, with Adam and Eve as the crown of creation, sacred. Just as the rainbow, circumcision, Passover, the Davidic throne, and the Eucharist would be with later covenants, the Sabbath day is the sign of the first covenant made with man.
There is one important point to note in the opening two chapters of Genesis, which helps to reconcile the two varied creation narratives, and to delve more deeply into the seventh day. The author in chapter one purposefully uses the generic Hebrew word for God, Elohim. In chapter two he uses the personal name for God, Yahweh. One name reflects the infinite power of the creator; the other reflects the covenant love of the Father. When the Sabbath is spoken of the word Yahweh is used, the one that indicates God’s fatherly, personal love.
This makes sense when one understands that a covenant was made by God to establish a sacred family bond between God and the one the covenant is made with. In this case, a sacred family bond is established between God, Adam and Eve. It is on the seventh day that Adam and Eve are made children of God, a state far different from their status with the animals on the sixth day. Yahweh made the Sabbath for his children.
Now we might ask, why the image of resting? God certainly doesn’t need it. He rested so that man would have a divine image to pattern themselves after. “The seventh day is the Sabbath of complete rest, sacred to the Lord” (Exodus 31:15). But what kind of rest? Rest in the Lord, which anticipates the eternal rest, worship and adoration of God in heavenly glory. We are called to rest in the Father’s blessing and holiness. “Creation was fashioned with a view to the Sabbath and therefore for the worship and adoration of God. Worship is inscribed in the order of creation” (CCC 347). So the Sabbath was made for divine rest, worship of God in spirit and truth (cf. John 4:24).
The created order is set aside for sacred purposes. Now creation can be seen as a temple, the garden of Eden as a sanctuary and Adam as a high priest, who is called to worship and offer sacrifice to God.
God entrusted the Sabbath to the Israelites as a sign of his covenant (cf. CCC 2171). The importance and holiness of the Sabbath fall under one of the Ten Commandments. We must understand the commandments from a proper perspective. They are gifts of love given to us by our heavenly Father. These gifts reveal God’s fatherly wisdom and his holy will (cf. CCC 2059). We must have in mind that the covenant is the means by which God fathers his people.
The commandments take on a much greater significance in this light. If they are not united to the covenant, then they can appear as oppressive laws, set down by some impersonal deity. The third of our Father’s heavenly 10 words are, “Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day” (Exodus 20:8). Also, in Exodus we read, “The Lord said to Moses…‘Take care to keep my Sabbaths, for that is to be the token between you and me throughout the generations, to show that it is I, the Lord, who make you holy…So shall the Israelites observe the Sabbath, keeping it throughout their generations, as a perpetual covenant” (31:12-13, 16).
The Sabbath was also the memorial of Israel’s liberation from the hands of the Egyptians (cf. Deuteronomy 5:15, CCC 2170). The Sabbath was to remind them that they had no rest at the hands of the Egyptians, but through the sign of the Sabbath, and God’s merciful love they are to have rest, and that that rest is service to him. It is not the service of a slave but that of a child to a loving Father who deserves their love and adoration. The Sabbath is set apart for the praise of God for his saving actions on their behalf.
This Old Testament background is crucial for us as Christians, so that we might fully understand Sunday as the Lord’s Day, the foremost holy day of obligation. (cf. CCC 2177) The Old is a preparation for the definitive revelation of Christ in the New. What a difference a day can make.
Printed with permission from the Northern Cross, Diocese of Duluth, Minnesota.
 
Brian Pizzalato is the Director of Catechesis, R.C.I.A. & Lay Apostolate for the Diocese of Duluth. He is also a faculty member of the Theology and Philosophy departments of the Maryvale Institute, Birmingham, England. He writes a monthly catechetical article for The Northern Cross, of the Diocese of Duluth, and is a contributing author to the Association for Catechumenal Ministry's R.C.I.A. Participants Book. Brian is currently authoring the regular series, "Catechesis and Contemporary Culture," in The Sower, published by the Maryvale Institute and is also in the process of writing the Philosophy of Religion course book for the B.A. in Philosophy and the Catholic Tradition program at the Maryvale Institute.

Brian holds an M.A. in Theology and Christian Ministry with a Catechetics specialization and an M.A. in Philosophy from Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio.

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Tomb of Joshua Son of Nun



 

A Record 15,000 Mark Joshua's Memorial Eve


A record 15,000 people were at the tomb of the Biblical leader Joshua on Thursday night to mark the anniversary of his death.
 
....

By Maayana Miskin

A record 15,000 people visited Joshua's Tomb on Thursday night to mark the anniversary of his passing. The Biblical leader Joshua was Moses' successor and led the Jewish people into the land of Israel upon their return from exile in Egypt.

He is buried in Heres, in Samaria, a village dating back to Biblical times which is now a Palestinian Authority-controlled town. His tomb lies next to those of Nun, his father, and Calev ben Yefuneh, another Biblical leader from the same time period.

Thursday night's visitors included Jews from across the religious spectrum, both men and women, of all ages, both Israelis and tourists.

The event was the first to be made an official state celebration. Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi Yona Metzger was present, as were Minister of Diaspora Affairs Yuli Edelstein and four Members of Knesset, Danny Danon (Likud), Uri Ariel (Ichud Leumi), Aryeh Eldad (Ichud Leumi) and Michael Ben-Ari (Ichud Leumi).

It was organized by several groups, among them the Samaria Regional Council, Shechem Echad, the Samaria Religious Council, and Yesod Olam.

At midnight, Rabbi Elyakim Levanon, the chief rabbi of Samaria, led the many thousands of worshipers in the prayer “Aleinu L'shabeyach.”

Samaria Regional Council head Gershon Mesika called on Israel's current leaders to learn from Joshua son of Nun. Joshua provided an example of how to lead, “with faith, strength, and national honor,” he said.

“When he had to conquer the land, he did not hesitate and think 'What will they say,'” Mesika added.

Rabbi Metzger spoke of Joshua and Calev's greatness as the only two of the 12 spies sent to Israel by Moses who remained faithful to their task and confident in G-d's ability to bring them into the land. He also called on the government to provide more regular access to Joshua's Tomb and to Joseph's Tomb which, he noted, was supposed to be under Israeli control under the Oslo Accords.

MK Danny Danon said, “We are standing by the tomb of Joshua son of Nun, conqueror of the land. We do not need to fear the word 'conquer' – there is no shame in conquering the land.”

Both MK Eldad and MK Ben-Ari noted that conquering the land is something that must be done “with action, not words.”

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Taken from: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/143779

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Our Choice For King So of Egypt: Pharaoh Tirhakah


 
 

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Hoshea’s Call to ‘King So of Egypt’







The Syro-Palestinian resistance to Assyria - a resistance now to be supported by Egypt -


will be a consistent factor throughout the reign of Hezekiah, who, unlike his father, Ahaz,


would choose to be politically ‘pro-Egyptian’, as would Hezekiah’s contemporary,


Hoshea of Israel. Hoshea’s decision to throw off the Assyrian yoke and to court pharaoh


‘So’ was simply the next link - and by no means the last - in the chain of Syro-Palestinian


rejections of Assyrian overlordship. The invitation to ‘So’ was apparently the first


Egyptian-related incident that occurred during the reign of king Hezekiah of Judah,


having taken place in approximately the latter’s first year (c. 727 BC). According to the


account of it in 2 Kings 17:4:


“Hoshea … sent messengers to King So of Egypt, and





offered no tribute to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year; therefore the king


of Assyria confined him and imprisoned him”.



The king of Assyria was then





“Shalmaneser” (v. 3), who, in my scheme, was none other than Tiglath-pileser III.






1058


Op. cit., p. 17.





1059


See e.g. Wikipedia’s Harsiese B.





1060


Op. cit, p. 299.





366


And Irvine has, as we shall read on pp. 371-372 below, considered serious conflict by


this same Tiglath-pileser against Samaria. Commentators have had the greatest of


difficulty once again in determining the true historical identity of the biblical pharaoh at


this time, ‘King So of Egypt’. And so have I. ‘So’ has been variously identified as (a)


from a


conventional point of view, Egypt’s Turtan, Si’be, of Sargon II’s records;1061





Osorkon IV,


1062 if not a reference to a place (Saïs), rather than to an actual person;1063 or,





(b) by


revisionists, as, for instance, Ramses II1064; or Shoshenq III.1065 My own general





opinion until recently has been, consonant with my ‘alternative’ chronology, that of


Velikovsky, that ‘So’ was


a Shoshenq.1066 Were this to be the case, then it might have





been appropriate that the Palestinians, in referring to ‘So’, had used an abbreviation,


more technically ‘hypocoristicon’, for the name ‘Shoshenq’, which name - as we saw in


reference to Shoshenq I (p. 191) - was in fact sometimes abbreviated in Egyptian writings


as ‘Shosh’. But I have now moved away from this view.


Anyway Rohl, whose placement of Shoshenq III is about two decades later than mine,


has offered the following brief account of his choice of this Shoshenq III for ‘So’:


1067





For a while the new king of Israel [Hoshea], established on the throne by his


Mesopotamian masters, continued to pay the annual tribute to Assyria, now under


the rule of S


HALMANESER V. But Hoshea was also writing to Pharaoh So, asking





for his help to throw off the Assyrian yoke. According to the New Chronology,


the senior monarch in Egypt at this time was the long-reigned U


SERMAATRE





S


HOSHENK III. The biblical name ‘So’ is thus a hypocoristicon of Sho[shenk]





(Assyrian


Su[sinku]). The reality was that Shoshenk III was in no position to





campaign in Canaan because of the growing threat of his southern border from a


Kushite line of pharaohs which would soon rule Egypt as the 25


th Dynasty.





Certainly ‘So’ as related to the name, Shoshenq (


So-senk), would be far preferable I think





to Courville’s obscure


So element in the unwieldy Suten Bat name of Ramses II, as well





as being preferable also to Sieff’s and others’ O


sorkon for ‘So’.





According to Boutflower, whose identification of ‘So’ with Shabaka I shall actually be


accepting:


1068 “The Hebrew characters read “So” should probably be read “Seve”.”





Rohl names Shoshenq III ‘the senior monarch’ then in the land of Egypt, implying that


there was now more than one ruler there. And indeed he has, in line with convention,


22nd and 23


rd dynasty rulers side by side, with the 20th dynasty no longer in existence.





1061


Cf. Boutflower, The Book of Isaiah, p. 126; Gardiner, op. cit, p. 342.





1062


Cf. Kitchen, The Third Intermediate Period …, p. 551; Grimal, A History of Ancient Egypt, p. 342.





1063


Thus Grimal, ibid.





1064


Courville, The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications, vol. I, p. 297. I have discussed this in Chapter





11,



pp. 266, 286-287.





1065


Rohl, The Lost Testament, p. 448.





1066


‘From the end of the 18th Dynasty to the time of Ramses II’, p. 8; cf. Ages in Chaos, I, p. 174.





According to Clapham, ‘A Solution for the Third Intermediate Period of Egypt’, p. 2: “It is a central


synchronism of Velikovsky’s revision that Pharaoh So of the Biblical narrative should be identified with


Shoshenq of the 22


nd Dynasty …”.





1067


Lost Testament, ibid.





1068


Op. cit, p. 126.





367


But I still have in contention that very last Ramesside, Ramses XI, who, I have suggested,


may have been Hezekiah himself. In fact Hezekiah may have been Ramesside on two


counts: a 20


th dynasty Ramesside on his paternal side (tracing back to Seti-nakht/Joash of





Judah), and a 19


th dynasty Ramesside from his mother, Abi, a daughter of Zechariah (see





pp. 372-373), and possibly, then, the daughter of the last 19


th dynasty king, Merenptah.





But, with the rise of Shoshenq III, the power of the 20


th dynasty was seriously weakened.





However, though I have biblically extended Shoshenq III, by tentatively identifying him


with Rezin, I do not think that he is the best candidate for ‘So’, as according to Rohl.


First of all, his reign seems to fall short - albeit only just - of the time of Hoshea’s call to


‘So’. And, even if a few more years could be squeezed out of him, he would by now have


been a very old pharaoh; something akin to Ramses II at the advanced stage that


Courville had identified him as So’. There is that other Shoshenq, I(B) - now generally


designated IV - closely following III, and IB’s approximately decade-long reign would


equip him nicely, chronologically, to be ‘So’. If this were the case, then Velikovsky


would have been right in a sense, though quite fortuitously, in his naming of Shoshenq IV


as ‘So’. However, this Shoshenq appears to have been a fairly ephemeral character, about


whom we know little. ‘So’, on the other hand, ought to be a character of real substance.


In attempting to ascertain, and explain, who I think ‘So’ actually was, I need to resort to a


further biblical principle; one that has stood me in good stead so far. It is this:


The Bible





does not generally introduce a person of note (in connection with Israel) in one isolated


case, but tends to identify, or round out, this person somewhere else.



We have just been





considering the case of the “son of Tabeel”, who seems to appear out of the blue, without


any specific identification - but I have looked to link him with the biblical Rezin. And in






Chapter 4



(p. 98), I had connected Jehu’s unknown officer, Bidkar, with Obadiah of the





same period.


1069 Can this principle offer us a clue also for the unqualified ‘King So’?





The clues at this time are scarce indeed. Apparently Egypt was of no vital interest at all to


the biblical scribes. The only scriptural character of note south of Judah who I think can


possibly complement ‘So’ at this time was Tirhakah, king Hezekiah of Judah’s ally;


though admittedly 2 Kings 19:9 specifically labels him “King Tirhakah of Ethiopia” -


‘So’, on the other hand, being a king of Egypt. But this Tirhakah will turn out to be a


figure of the greatest complexity, and significance, striding a very large stage indeed; he


being for instance, as we shall find, both a ruler of Egypt and Ethiopia. Tirhakah will in


fact be my primary key for unlocking the mysteries of this most complex period of


history and especially for the 25


th dynasty. He will of necessity be multi-identified,





beginning with Tirhakah = Shabaka, to be properly explained as this chapter develops.


As I briefly mentioned above, I shall be favouring Boutflower’s view that Shabaka (my


Tirhakah) was ‘So’. I shall also be favouring Boutflower’s rendering of ‘So’ as


Seve:1070





“S



eve” … is to be identified with Shabaka [Shabako] the son of Kashta, who succeeded





his father in 715” [sic].



The name ‘So’, it seems, can be variously rendered: e.g. Seve;





Sua; Soan



(Josephus1071); Soa, Soba, Segor (LXX).





1069


In my Job’s Life and Times, I connected Job of no genealogy or patronymic with Tobias of Tobit’s





substantial genealogy.






1070


Op. cit, p. 126.





1071


Antiquities, 9:14:1.





368


Most interestingly, in my new context, the Lucianic recension of the LXX has ‘So’ as an






“Ethiopian, living in Egypt”



(one Adrammelech). Presuming for the present, then, that





Tirhakah is Shabaka (i.e. ‘


Soba an Ethiopian in Egypt’), then this composite king of ours





has some attributes that might well qualify him for ‘So’: e.g. (i) his name


Soba-Shabaka





(cf.


So-Seve) – though ‘So’ is spelt with a samek and Shebna with the equivalent of a





shin,



the ‘Shibboleth’ factor (as discussed in Chapter 8, p. 191) might explain this





difference; (ii) his approximate chronological era; (iii) he was at least pro-Egyptian,


certainly anti-Assyrian; (v) he was of renowned military and strategic ability, as we are


going to find out. None of the pharaohs Shoshenq of this era, on the other hand, appears


to have ‘So’-like attributes, with only Shoshenq I, of an earlier era, having at least,


appropriately, campaigned in Palestine. I shall be developing this vital biblical character,

‘King So of Egypt’, further, especially in
7, in relation to Egypt’s TIP.


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