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Volume 1, Issue 7
| September 25, 2011 |
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| "If this is not Noah's Ark,
then tell me what it is!" Ahmet Ertugrul (Parasut)
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Greetings,
Over the past week, I had the opportunity to view 3 screenings of a film covering NAMI's discovery on Mount Ararat. The documentary's focus is the account of their discovery. As their name suggests, Media Evangelism who produced this documentary is an evangelical organization aiming their message at presenting the reality of God, including his judgment. Thus its title: Days of Noah - Apocalypse. (see trailer below)
Though moved by their account of this miraculous discovery, my chief interest concerned its scientific aspects. The first thing to note is its location. Aside from a few openings, it is completely buried under thousands of tons of ice and volcanic rock. On several occasions, the crew had to dodge as we watched rocks the size of bowling balls tumbling down the mountain. One member of the crew was posted to watch for falling rocks and warn the explorers to take shelter behind some boulder. That is just one of the numerous dangers besetting the climbers.
Great numbers of splinters found among the rocks support reports from the natives that the Ark had slid to its present position during the 1840 earthquake. How much of the Ark is intact at this location has to be determined. The covering of this organic structure by a deep layer of large rocks and ice presents a problem for ground penetrating radar. The answer may have to be determined through the slow and dangerous work of external probing and internal exploration.
It is impossible to have constructed the vessel at this location. Its great timbers support thousands of tons of ice and rock. As noted below, this is a vessel of great strength and expert design. Melting ice layers to insert the timbers would collapse the compartment. Moreover, the covering is a fan from a naturally occurring rock slide. The rock slides are occurring because, like Mount Everest, Ararat is growing at a significant rate.
Many want to know the species of brownish-red wood that you see in the photographs. Scientific reports on that have yet to be completed, but gopher wood appears to be Asian Cypress. Note: surface rot and partially rotted timbers preclude the recent fabrication of this artifact! Also of interest are the white pellets found on the floor of the widely publicized video. They are organic and not pellets from a modern sleeping bag. They may be chick peas, a common food from this time in mankind's history.
The videos show pottery and vessels in situa, on the floors and shelves. Some believe that some of this may be from later pilgrims. I do not think so. As explained below, they perfectly match the transition from Early to Middle Bronze. Those who have read my book know this is the cultural transition marking an abrupt change in archaeology due to Noah's Flood.
We saw the explorers measuring those beams having rows of 7 wooden pegs (see photo above), perfect for tying animals (or their feed sacks). We were able to see beams of different sizes, each containing 7 pegs. Those familiar with the biblical account of the Ark know that 7 of each kind of clean animal such as sheep or oxen were taken aboard the Ark. Finally for now, was their pointing to the door of that unexplored bottom room that emits a putrid smell. That too can be preserved as first frozen.
Regards to all,
Philip Williams
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Have we forfeited our common sense?
We need scientific study, but not to replace our common sense
Many have advised us to withhold judgment about NAMI's discovery until the completion of scientific study. Compare this great artifact to a live mammoth that somehow appeared in the lobby of a hotel in downtown Charlotte.
Its discovery has been reported to the media. Almost everyone is skeptical because mammoths are extinct and are not native wildlife of American cities. They have subscribed to the report from a carnival owner that this is a stuffed elephant created to take money from the gullible and draw spectators from his circus.
Videos of this hairy tusked animal walking and waving his large trunk have been posted on the Internet. The animal has left large piles of evidence in the hotel lobby.
A few of us are closely following the story. We are advised that we should not claim that this is an elephant until the biologist arrives and completes his DNA tests. We also need the opinion of a zoologist, but scientists are reluctant to become involved, knowing that mammoths are extinct and do not live in cities. A loud chorus are saying that we have been rushing to judgment.
Many have seen videos of this animal that looks exactly like a giant mammoth, but admitting their interest will get them into trouble with peers and employers. There's an elephant in the room, but we mustn't acknowledge it.
Scientists from reputable museums and universities will soon confirm that its a mammoth. Theories will be debated as to how it survived extinction and why it was first observed in the hotel lobby of an American city.
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Its maritime construction!
The internal design of NAMI's discovery resembles the interior of large wooden ships
Over the many years that I have been researching the subject, I often imagined how Noah's Ark may have been constructed. In line with some recent drawings, I supposed a long rectangular box, timbers lashed to bulkheads. Each floor would be largely open. There would be structural problems with my design, but I was focussed on the great labor, time, tools, and skills needed for its building. The structure that NAMI has discovered is far more sophisticated and stronger than the Ark I imagined.
Reuben Dedmont from Greenville, SC, who has viewed these screenings, compares what he witnessed to the VASA, one of the great wooden ships built in the eighteenth century. The strength of the Ark is not just due to the hull, but to internal rooms constructed of heavy timbers. Like these great eighteenth century ships, the interior consists of numerous specialized rooms and ladders, all made of heavy timbers to withstand stresses due to storms. There are heavy shelves, as shown above, built into its structure.
Dedmont points to the interlocking nature of the walls and the utilization of interlocking "halving" and "lap" joints as shown in the photo above. This is a critical engineering detail in that these joints maintain their integrity under great stress without the use of wooden pegs, nails, glue, or fasteners of any kind as long as the joint remains in compression.
The last point is the curved walls that we witness in the lower hull, keeping the Ark stable and upright as it rocked through the sweeping waters, a "detail" this land lubber had not considered. I had been infected by the modern conceit that has taught us to imagine ancient people as lacking sophistication. I had also read skeptical literature that has declared such large wooden ships an impossible feat of design. Consider this list of ancient ships compiled for Creationist Ministries International by Larry Pierce.
Like many other arts, maritime technology may have been even more sophisticated in the years before the Flood. A great loss of population also means loss of specialization. As I explain in my book below, there was a sudden rustification of technology in the centuries just following the Flood. We see the loss of many technologies, as those used to construct the Pyramids, due to Noah's Flood. |
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The pottery in NAMI's discovery matches its era.
And a unique 3rd millennium BC pottery that spreads from the mountains of Ararat.
Khirbet Kerak pot (left) from Italian Wiki
Animal figurine from Georgian State Museum, Tblilisi
A postulate from the methodology in my search for the Flood was: that no matter where in the world I started, I should be able to trace the archaeological spread belonging to cultures succeeding the burials from the Flood back to their source. As it turned out, archaeologists have already done this. It is a distinctive third millennium BC culture that spreads over much of the Near East, indicating new human migrations. It is called by various names: Khirbet Kerak, Transcaucasian, or Kura-Araxes. It consists of a black burnished pottery, animal figurines, and andirons, baked in open fires. It seems the early descendants of Noah lived chiefly in tents.
Archaeologists see the source of this pottery near the town of Shengavet, Armenia, nearly at the foot of Mount Ararat. One specializing in the Caucasian regions tell us that "Kura-Araxes traditions apparently emerge during a rapid burst of cultural evolution, the early stages of which remain undocumented or unrecognized." [Peter Glumac in Chronologies in Old World Archaeology (University of Chicago Press, 1992), 203.] They do not consider the Ark or Bible!
I dreamed that the Ark might be found and would contain pottery that might be related to this culture. In truth, I did not think the Ark would be found, and if found, that it would have pottery. In fact, it does.
Some of the pottery is made of hard basalt, no longer made after the Flood. Other is gray burnished ware that is closely related to the Kura-Araxes. A broken animal figurine is also among this pottery! My guess is that these figurines were modeled by Noah's family to share their experience in the Ark with their children, a tradition that has been passed down to the present day. Might the broken figurine have been dropped by a child taken to the site of the Ark by one of Noah's early descendants?
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About Us
Christian Leaders & Scholars is the newsletter and publication site of Philip Ernest Williams, author of The Archaeological Evidence of Noah's Flood (2011). The site is also a ministry not only to Christian leaders and scholars but all who are interested in the more difficult issues pertaining to the Bible and its implications for science and history. (Read more) |
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