“The most High ruleth in the kingdom of men” (Daniel 4:17).
I recently visited the “King Tut and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs” display at the DallasMuseum of Art in Texas. We then went to the holocaust museum and had the rare privilege of hearing Max Glauben, a survivor of the Warsaw ghetto uprising. He described the horrible scenes of extermination that he experienced as a ten- to fifteen-year-old boy.
It is not without significance that these two peoples, Egyptians and Jews, confronted each other in the far distant era of Egypt’s New Kingdom (Dynasties 18-20–1539-1075 BC). Thiswasa period of power and glory after the native Egyptians drove out the Hyksos, a Semitic people from Asia who ruled Egypt for 150 years.
The Splendor of World Kingdoms
On the 26th of November 1922, archaeologist Howard Carter opened a hole through the sealeddoorway of Tutankhamun’s tomb. Behind him was standing his patron and financier Lord George Carnarvon. Carter inserted a candle through the hole and . . .
“Presently my eyes grew accustomed to the light, and details of the room within emerged slowly from the mist, strange animals, statues, gold, everywhere the glint of gold. For the moment . . . I was struck dumb with amazement, and when Lord Carnarvon inquired anxiously ‘Can you see anything?’ it was all I could do to get out the words, ‘Yes, wonderful things!'”
They went on to find three more rooms of treasures, chariots, thrones, chests, jewelry madeof gold, lapis lazuli, carnelian, glass, quartz, alabaster, and other precious metalsand stones. The burial room contained four gold-plated shrines (nested boxes) over the stone sarcophagus. Inside the stone box were two mummy forms–gold-plated coffins and a third inner one of solid gold. Each one had facial features, immaculate etchings in the gold, and was embedded with precious stones.
Inside the third coffin was the wrapped mummy that also had a gold face mask and many gold amulets in the wrappings. Inside the wrappings was the desiccated body of King Tut. (Ifany toes or fingers fell off in the long embalming process they were replaced with wood.)The spirit, of course, went back to God who gave it, awaiting the final judgment.
Howard Carter spent thirteen years recording all the artifacts from the tomb.
KingTutankhamun is thought to be the grandson of Amenhotep III who lived after Moses. KingTut’s father, Amenhotep IV, changed his name to Akhenaten and consolidated worship to one god-the Aten (the sun). Thutmose III and Amenhotep II are thought to be the pharaohs of Israel’s exodus. Scholars differ on these dates.
Revisionist Views and Historical Facts
A main reason for differing views today is the rejection of the historical Biblical perspective from which Mideast archaeology was done. The author of the book on King Tut says about Amenhotep IV changing his name to Akhenaten: “Many people think that Akhenaten was the first monotheist (which means that he only worshipped one god).” This denies the historical fact of the one true Jehovah God of the Israelites who were previously in Egypt. Like at Jericho, through denial and silence, revisionist scholars, the Arabs, and the media oppose the Jews.
Clifford Wilson gives evidence in his book The Bible Comes Alive (Vol. 2, page 23) that the Egyptians originally believed in one god. In the ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead (which Moses likely studied) it says that “there was a time when a god called ‘Tem’ existed byhimself and that it was he who created the heavens and the earth, and gods, and men, andevery creature which has life.” The Egyptians later descended into polytheism like theother people groups spreading out from Babel (Genesis 11:9).
In the time of Moses, the pharaohs became alarmed at the size and influence of the Jews andput them into slavery. Pharaoh finally tried to control them by killing the boy babies (Exodus 1:22). Later, when Moses came with a request from God that Pharaoh let the people go, he said, “Who is the LORD, that I should obey [him]?” (Exodus 5:2). God brought the Jews out, Pharaoh notwithstanding.
“Those That Are Appointed to Death” (Psalm 102:20)
The animosity and extermination of the Hebrews, God’s “chosen people,” has been repeatedmanytimes since the Egyptians. The Babylonians, Assyrians, Greek Helenizers, and Rome along with Spain, Russia, and Europe before Hitler’s Germany tried to assimilate or exterminate the Jews.
This implacable hatred is a growing reality today as it was in the past. I was in two friendly Palestinian homes recently on the Mount of Olives for evening meals. After the meal one from our tour group went with the young men into another room where they were watching videos of hate propaganda. (Israeli soldiers were supposedly shooting Palestinian children.) When the seventh grade boy was asked what he wanted, he said “To be part of the Jerusalem army” (that is to drive the Jews out of the land). Some Muslims are denying that Israel ever had a historical presence in the land.
Despite this record of persecution, who has endured through history? As each kingdom rose, had a flash of glory, and perished, the Jews continued on. They passed from culture to culture down through history carrying their ideas. These ideas were not a product of their own wisdom but the law that God had committed to them (Romans 9:1-5). This itself isevidenceof the one true creator God. He has preserved a people to whom He had committed the road map–the only good way for man to live. As Moses’ burning bush, they burn and burnbut are not consumed (Exodus 3:2). They produced no great architecture, produced no great works of art, had no great conquering armies, no weapons or monuments to be rememberedby. One historian has said of the Jews, “They remained not by might of arms butbythe might of their cohesive ideas.” These of course were the ethics in the law of God given on Mt. Sinai containing the Ten Commandments.
These principles, known only to God, preserved the Israelites from the diseases of the nations (Exodus 15:26). The Egyptian royalty often married their siblings or half brothers and sisters like their gods did. Being ignorant of duplicating genetic defects, they suffered the consequences. The law of sin and death affected them like all mortal men, disproving their claim of being gods. King Tut, “the boy king” who died around 20 years old, married his half sister Ankhenamun. We saw two tiny coffins at the Dallas exhibit, which were for their babies. One mummy was four months premature and the other had defects that caused death at birth.
The New Covenant
The Prophet Jeremiah says, “Behold, the days come . . . that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel. I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts ” (Jeremiah 31:31; Hebrews 8:8). The prophets also showed that this light would come to the Gentiles (lsaiah 49:6).
Today in the church, people of any race can be a part of the enduring people of God who last into eternity. This is not the larger body of “Christendom” who indulge in the world’s lusts and also receive her plagues (John 2:15-17 and Revelation 18:4). The children of God are those who love the Lord first of all and walk in obedience to the right ways of God. “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:127).
There is a practical benefit in life to following the Judeo-Christian ethics. But more important is the eternal life gained by receiving God’s salvation through Christ into our life. We can each live in a personal relation with Him.
Choose Your Kingdom!
If we will be part of the enduring Kingdom we must have a vision and commitment to the eternal kingdom like Abraham and Moses. “By faith Abraham . . . went out . . . for he looked for a city . . . whose builder and maker is God.” “By faith Moses . . . refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter [likely Hatshepsut]; choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a [short] season; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt” (Hebrews 11:8-10, 24-29).
Which kingdom would you rather be part of? The vain, cold kingdoms of passing world fame, full of intrigue, treachery, fear, and death; or the kingdom of God with its outward conflict and disrepute? But here is peace of heart, a community guided by righteousness, and an enduring kingdom.
When Jesus was on His way down to Jerusalem to be questioned, harassed, condemned, and give His life an atonement for sin, He said, “My peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” “I go to prepare a place for you . . . I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:27 and 2b, 3).
Resources:
The Bible Comes Alive, Vol. 2 – Clifford and Barbara Wilson
Tutankhamun: The Mystery of the Boy King – Zahi Hawass
Carnarvon & Carter -Fiona, 8th Countess of Carnarvon
Tells, Tombs, & Treasures – Robert Boyd
Jews, God, and History – Max Dimont
The Bible Knowledge Commentary – John F. Walvoord
-by Elvin Stauffer