1. Native American Indian Connections
One tale that
concerns us is that of the Chiapas Indians of Guatemala, whose
language, notes Rux, “has always confused scholars because of its
strong resemblance to Hebrew.”504 The Chiapas had a
legend
about an exiled king come came to stay with them, a white man-god who lived among them, traveling frequently, teaching them civilization and all their knowledge. His name was “Votan,” and his people were called the Chivim, “Serpents.” Not only is the name quite obviously the same as that of “Wotan” (which, in the German tongue, would be exactly pronounced “Votan”) and “Odin,” but it also cannot help but call to mind the great god of the American Indian Creation epic, the Chon-oopa-sa, named “Wo-kon.” Votan told them the story of the Tower of Babel, as “a great city where a magnificent temple was under construction which was intended to reach to heaven, but was doomed by a confusion of languages. ” He was associated with snakes, and with healing. Before his departure, he wrote a book in the Quiche language describing his travels and hidden treasures, which was burned by Bishop Nunez de la Vega in 1691.505
More will be said
about the connection of this “civilizing god” with snakes at a
subsequent point. Here what must command one’s attention is the
fact that the Guatemalan version of the story is almost identical
with that of the biblical, and yet no explanation exists for it! It
is, nonetheless, there.
Consider the
magnitude of the problem that this presents. On the standard theory
of Indian migration from Asia to North America via a land bridge
some tens of thousands of years ago, prior to all physical
connection between the two great world islands being lost, the
story could not possibly have come by this route, unless one posits
that it took place much earlier than standard biblical histories
will allow, or that communication between the two world islands was
maintained by a high seafaring culture, which standard theory
likewise discountenances to some extent, in spite of some
considerable evidence that such was precisely the
case.
The Tower of Babel,
however, is not the only such case to be explained. In Australia,
aboriginal peoples recount a legend of a sun god who comes down
from heaven, and conquers the earth with “intense heat after a
mighty and terrifying conflict.”506 This reference to a
sun god, to a kind of heat-based weapon, and to an obvious war,
resonates with the Egyptian sun-god Ra, and with his “eye” weapon,
as we shall see in a moment. But how would Egyptian and Australian
aboriginals recount almost the same war, in the same terms?
“Jungian archetypes” might be able to explain the coincidences of
“war legends” across various cultures, but it seems to stretch
their explanatory power to assume that they explain the detailed
similarities in weapons used and in the personages involved in
wielding them.