Tags: Tower of Babel, Sasquatch, Elephant Intelligence, Pagan Worship, Links to the Past, Land of Shinar, UN Agenda, Animal Rights
Have I got a TALE for you!! You will most likely find this post to fantastic to believe.
There is shocking evidence of the truth of these reports. You will have to shake off the cob webs and tune in your discernment. Open you mind for a little bit and take a serious look at what is shared here.
I have a very unusual relationship with GOD, and I just believe EVERYTHING he tells me or shows me. That is because I KNOW who HE IS and how AMAZING HE IS.
So, when he showed me the information that I am about to share with you, I found it exhilarating! I still don’t have a full picture of what this story conveys to us, but I am learning. Today, I just hope to open your eyes to the realm of spiritual truth. It is a realm that we are about to experience on a much higher level than ever before. God wants to get you prepared for the unbelievable, sometimes frightening, positively amazing realm of the spirit. Not the DARKSIDE, The CREATOR’s SIDE, THE TRUE LIGHT! Not the imitation light of Lucifer.
We are all so wrapped up in our present that we forget that there are THOUSANDS of YEARS of history about which we no absolutely nothing, except what we have been ALLOWED to know. We have no understanding whatsoever of the truth of our past. Sometimes, we get little glimpses, and sometimes we feel the pull of the spiritual connection to our past. BUT, we have nothing that connects the dots and gives us understanding of our development. We like to believe we are so far “evolved” that our past doesn’t matter… but we are wrong!
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”,
STOP LETTING THE CONTROLLERS TELL YOU HOW TO THINK. USE YOUR CRITICAL THINKING. RESEARCH. ASK GOD FOR SPIRITUAL DISCERNMENT. Don’t get caught with your pants down!
And king Nimrod reigned securely, and all the earth was under his control, and all the earth was of one tongue and words of union. And all the princes of Nimrod and his great men took counsel together; Phut, Mitzraim, Cush and Canaan with their families, and they said to each other,Come let us build ourselves a city and in it a strong tower, and its top reaching heaven, and we will make ourselves famed, so that we may reign upon the whole world, in order that the evil of our enemies may cease from us, that we may reign mightily over them, and that we may not become scattered over the earth on account of their wars. And they all went before the king, and they told the king these words, and the king agreed with them in this affair, and he did so. And all the families assembled consisting of about six hundred thousand men, and they went to seek an extensive piece of ground to build the city and the tower, and they sought in the whole earth and they found none like one valley at the east of the land of Shinar, about two days’ walk, and they journeyed there and they dwelt there. And they began to make bricks and burn fires to build the city and the tower that they had imagined to complete. And the building of the tower was unto them a transgression and a sin, and they began to build it, and whilst they were building against the Lord God of heaven,they imagined in their hearts to war against him and to ascend into heaven. And all these people and all the families divided themselves in three parts;the first said We will ascend into heaven and fight against him; the second said, We will ascend to heaven and place our own gods there and serve them;and the third part said, We will ascend to heaven and smite him with bows and spears; and God knew all their works and all their evil thoughts, and he saw the city and the tower which they were building. And when they were building they built themselves a great city and a very high and strong tower; and on account of its height the mortar and bricks did not reach the builders in their ascent to it, until those who went up had completed a full year, and after that, they reached to the builders and gave them the mortar and the bricks; thus was it done daily. And behold these ascended and others descended the whole day; and if a brick should fall from their hands and get broken, they would all weep over it, and if a man fell and died, none of them would look at him. And the Lord knew their thoughts, and it came to pass when they were building they cast the arrows toward the heavens, and all the arrows fell upon them filled with blood, and when they saw them they said to each other, Surely we have slain all those that are in heaven. For this was from the Lord in order to cause them to err, and in order; to destroy them from off the face of the ground. And they built the tower and the city, and they did this thing daily until many days and years were elapsed. And God said to the seventy angels who stood foremost before him, to those who were near to him, saying, Come let us descend and confuse their tongues, that one man shall not understand the language of his neighbor, and they did so unto them. And from that day following, they forgot each man his neighbor’s tongue, and they could not understand to speak in one tongue, and when the builder took from the hands of his neighbor lime or stone which he did not order, the builder would cast it away and throw it upon his neighbor, that he would die. And they did so many days, and they killed many of them in this manner. And the Lord smote the three divisions that were there, and he punished them according to their works and designs; those who said, We will ascend to heaven and serve our gods, became like apes and elephants; and those who said, We will smite the heaven with arrows, the Lord killed them,one man through the hand of his neighbor; and the third division of those who said, We will ascend to heaven and fight against him, the Lord scattered them throughout the earth. And those who were left amongst them, when they knew and understood the evil which was coming upon them, they forsook the building, and they also became scattered upon the face of the whole earth. And they ceased building the city and the tower; therefore he called that place Babel, for there the Lord confounded the Language of the whole earth; behold it was at the east of the land of Shinar. And as to the towerwhich the sons of men built, the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up one thirdpart thereof, and a fire also descended from heaven and burned another third, and the other third is left to this day, and it is of that part which was aloft, and its circumference is three days’ walk. And many of the sons of men died in that tower, a people without number.
This story of the building of the Tower of Babel is more detailed than what is found in the Canonized Bible. I found it to be extremely eye opening. I have heard many teachings on this book of Jasher, but I have never heard ANYONE talk about this particular passage. Likely because they find it too fantastic to believe.
And the Lord smote the three divisions that were there, and he punished them according to their works and designs; those who said, We will ascend to heaven and serve our gods, became like apes and elephants; and those who said, We will smite the heaven with arrows, the Lord killed them,one man through the hand of his neighbor; and the third division of those who said, We will ascend to heaven and fight against him, the Lord scattered them throughout the earth.
Note that there were three divisions of people who participated in the planning and construction of the Tower. Their punishments were distributed to them “according to their works”. In other words the punishment fit their crime. 1)Those who set their minds to fight against God were scattered throughout the earth. (And we can say they are still fighting against GOD today) 2)Those who determined to KILL GOD, were killed by the hand of their neighbors. 3)But, the third group, those who determined to replace God with gods of their own choice, according to the what is written here, GOD turned into APES and ELEPHANTS.
First of all, how funny is that? God has a sense of humor. We can only speculate on the reasoning behind this choice of punishment. I am most convinced that God was leaving them with at least some opportunity for redemption, without the privilege of enjoying life as they had known it.
We never read that he returned them to their original form as he had with King Nebuchadnezzar.
Nebuchadnezzars punishment was for a set time:
I was still speaking when a voice was heard from heaven. It said, “King Nebuchadnezzar, here is what has been ordered concerning you. Your royal authority has been taken from you. You will be driven away from people. You will live like the wild animals. You will eat grass just as cattle do. Seven periods of time will pass by for you. Then you will recognize that the Most High God rules over all of the kingdoms of men. He gives them to anyone He wants.”
What had been said about me came true at once. I was driven away from people. I ate grass just as cattle do. My body became wet with the dew of heaven. I stayed that way until my hair grew like the feathers of an eagle. My nails became like the claws of a bird. – Daniel 4:31-33
At the end of that timeI, Nebuchadnezzar, looked up toward heaven. My mind became clear again. Then I praised the Most High God. I gave honor and glory to the One who lives forever. His rule will last forever. His kingdom will never end. He considers all of the nations on earth to be nothing. He does as He pleases with the powers of heaven. He does what He wants with the nations of the earth. No one can hold His hand back. No one can say to Him, “What have you done?”
My honor and glory were returned to me when my mind became clear again. The glory of my kingdom was given back to me. My advisers and nobles came to me. And I was put back on my throne. I became even greater than I had been before.
Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, give praise and honor and glory to the King of heaven. Everything he does is right. All of his ways are fair. He is able to bring down those who live proudly. – Daniel 4:34-37
It is very likely that your mind rejects this narrative. It is hard to believe that people can be shifted from a human form to an animal form. But, the WORD of GOD does not lie.
I believe 100% that GOD turned those people into Apes and Elephants. I also believe they remain in those forms even to this day. Hang with me.
First of all here is some information about who these people were and where the Tower Building took place.
And all the princes of Nimrod and his great men took counsel together; Phut, Mitzraim, Cush and Canaan with their families,
Hello i am a Somali, and in Somalia there is a region called ( translated to english) Puntland ( land of punt/phut) and it is belived all somalis came from that region Josephus writes: “Phut also was the founder of Libya, and called the inhabitants Phutites (Phoutes), from himself: there is also a river in the country of Moors which bears that name; whence it is that we may see the greatest part of the Grecian historiographers mention that river and the adjoining country by the appellation of Phut (Phoute): but the name it has now has been by change given it from one of the sons of Mezraim, who was called Lybyos.”[2]Pliny the Elder[3] and Ptolemy[4] both place the river Phuth on the west side of Mauretania (modern Morocco). Ptolemy also mentions a city Putea in Libya (iv.3.39). Wikipedia
Mizraim is the dual form of matzor, meaning a “mound” or “fortress,” the name of a people descended from Ham. It was the name generally given by the Hebrews to the land of Egypt and its people. Neo-Babylonian texts use the term Mizraim for Egypt. The name was, for instance, inscribed on the Ishtar Gate of Babylon.
Cush founded Ethiopia (just south of Egypt) and Put founded the country we now know as Libya (just west of Egypt). Ethiopia is called the land of Cush,not because it matches the location near Eden, but because its founding ancestor was named Cush. Havilah was also a region in the pre-flood world that is mentioned in Genesis 2:11.
Canaan was the name of a large and prosperous ancient country (at times independent, at others a tributary to Egypt) located in the Levant region of present-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Israel. It was also known as Phoenicia. The origin of the name ‘Canaan’ comes from various ancient texts and there is no scholarly consensus on precisely where the name originated nor what it meant.
According to the Bible, the land was named after a man called Canaan, the grandson of Noah (Genesis 10). Other theories cite ‘Canaan’ as derived from the Hurrian language for ‘purple’ and, as the Greeks knew the Canaanites as ‘Phoenicians‘ (Greek for `purple’) and as the Phoenicians worked in purple dye and so were called by the Greeks ‘purple people’, this explanation is the most probable. The theory has also been advanced that the name comes from the Hebrew root-verb kana which denotes order from chaos, a blending, or synchronous existence. Scholars J. Maxwell Miller and John H. Hayes claim no definitive meaning for the name citing ancient sources which used it simply as a place name
Genesis 10:9-12– He was a mighty hunter before The LORD. Therefore it is said, “like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before The LORD”. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land he went into Assyria, and built Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and the great city Calah.
You never know where he’s going to show up. A Sasquatch throws out the first pitch as the Philadelphia Phillies face the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on April 18, 2014 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)
Just another day, just another Bigfoot video. Or is it? This one may be better than any of the others we’ve seen over the years. A lot better.
A man named Josh Highcliff uploaded a video clip to YouTube that he says was shot on his hunting property about nine miles west of Tunica, Mississippi. According to LadBible, Josh took the video eight years ago, but commenters have brought attention to it again recently.
Highcliff says the video shows a “skunk ape,” also known as the Florida Bigfoot because of it’s southeastern roots. As if Bigfoot wasn’t scary enough, this one had to wander over from the crazy state of Florida!?! At first, Josh thought was just an animal,as he was out hunting for wild hogs. I thought it was a bear the first time I watched the footage.
“My first instinct was to run, I did not even think of shooting,” Highcliff said in the caption, adding, “Then I know no one will believe me.” But some people do believe. Bigfoot experts are saying that the video is the best ever captured of the creature without any CGI or editing. The “skunk ape” appears to be about seven feet tall as it digs inside a tree for something. Watch the clip below and decide for yourself.
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New addition. I found this today while researching Japan for my Olympics article.
The Solomon Islands experienced some of the fiercest fighting in World War II, and are most famous for the bloody Battle of Guadalcanal in 1942 and 1943.
Japanese forces had more to contend with than allied soldiers on the Solomon Islands. While traversing the islands’ numerous remote, thick rain forests, the soldiers often reported coming across giant, hairy hominids ranging from 10 to 15 feet in height, and covered in long, brown to reddish brown hair, with prominent brows, flat noses, and wide mouths. The creatures had immense arms and were known on occasion to even brandish crude weapons such as clubs.
It was reported that the giants were known to be quite aggressive and even attack on occasion. Several units described these terrifying beasts crashing through foliage to ravage squads of soldiers, or snapping apart trees and branches in threatening displays of power. Bullets were said to have little effect on them and soldiers would on many occasions be kept awake by inhuman wailing from the dark as the strange behemoths wandered the night.
Indeed, the Solomon Islands have a long history of mysterious giants, and the local people are well aware of them. There is a rich tradition of folklore, as well as sightings and footprint evidence of giant hairy hominids on the islands that continue right up to the present day.
Highlights The Gigantopithecus blacki is more closely related to orangutans than humans.
At nearly 10 feet tall, weighing more than 94 stones, it was truly king of the swingers.
But humans cannot claim a giant ape, which is the largest primate ever seen, as part of our family tree.
The Gigantopithecus blacki, which lived almost two million years ago, is in fact more closely related to modern-day orangutans, scientists have discovered.
This giant ape is a creature of fascination, having stood taller than some elephants at a hulking three metres (10 feet).
Its enormous teeth, once sold as ‘dragons’ teeth’ in Chinese drugstores, led some experts to believe it was part of the human family tree, as ancient humans we may have been related to had large molars.
But, despite the only fossil evidence of Gigantopithecus blacki being a few pieces of jaw bone and thousands of teeth, scientists have been able to work out its ancestry.
Gigantopithecus blacki was first named in 1935 by a scientist who came across a tooth being sold as ancient Chinese medicine in a drugstore in China.
Pagans worship their ancestors. The descendants of these humans who were turned into Apes and Elephants quite likely will have forgotten the truth about their past but have held on to the tales and myths they have been taught. They also quite likely feel connected to their ancestors even if they do not understand why.
It just makes me wonder why, after thousands of years, we not know so much more about these beings?
I also wonder what happens if they mate with animals? With Humans? With demons?
The fact that there are people across the earth who worship these animals should be a fairly good clue to the truth about their past. I don’t think people just randomly decided to start worshiping apes/monkeys or elephants.
Monkey lore in India dates from before 500 BC.1 One of the most popular Hindu gods is Hanuman the Monkey, in some tales said to be an incarnation of Shiva. He is revered for his bravery, strength, loyalty, devotion, and dedication to justice. His tale and heroic exploits are told in both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. It is common to chant the name of Hanuman when one needs heavenly intervention. Every year, his birthday is celebrated “on the full-moon day of Chaitra (April) at sunrise.”2Monkeys in general are revered in several parts of India, for bearing the likeness of Hanuman. He is connected to the sun, the wind, and thunder.
Monkey lore in China predates Buddhism, for the Monkey appears in the Chinese Zodiacal beliefs, believed by scholars to date to around 1100BC. In some parts of China, the Monkey (?) is worshipped as the “Great Sage Equal to Heaven.”3 Of interest is also that the rough Western equivalent for the Chinese astrological sign of Monkey is the sign of Leo (which I am). In Chinese mythology, the monkey god was Sun-Wukong, the Monkey King, a trickster god. He is the hero of the 16th-century Chinese book Journey To The West (Xiyou Ji).4 The Monkey God Festival is still celebrated in China and Hong Kong.
Before moving away from the Far East, I’d like to quote Shumacher’s summary of the monkey gods:
In the Americas, the Mayans of Guatemala and Mexico worshiped a howler monkey god ( sometimes depicted as twin-gods), who was the patron of the arts; music, scribes and sculptors.8 In the Mayan Calendar, the Howler Monkey corresponds to knowledge of history and rituals, as well as prophecy.9 There is a fabled “Ciudad Blanca” in Honduras, dedicated to the Monkey God, but so far its location is unknown—it is mentioned in pre-Columbian Toltec and Maya texts as “The ancient place where the aurora originates.”10In Aztec mythology of Mexico, the monkey was connected to the sun, and was guarded by Cochipilli (Kokopelli), the god of flower, fun, and fertility.
I was unable to find out anything about monkey beliefs in Africa. It is quite hard to imagine that a whole continent filled with monkeys would yield no monkey beliefs? Perhaps this just goes to show how disinterested the western world is in Africa in this as well as other areas. Please contribute if you possess any monkey information relating to Africa.
In ancient Egypt, baboons and monkeys often play a significant and mysterious role in religion and elsewhere. This somehow seems strange, as there are certainly no native monkeys or baboons to Egypt, nor have there been for some time stretching back to antiquity. However, it is clear that prehistoric Egyptians of the fourth millennium BC were familiar with monkeys, including the imposing and dangerous baboons and the African long-tailed monkey. Since that time, they have held a permanent place in ancient Egyptian religionas one of the more important animal forms into which the gods might be transformed. Also the very word “baboon” may be derived from ancient Egypt, perhaps from a linguistic root that characterized its sexual activities.
It seems likely that various types of monkeys inhabited the landscape of Egypt in the earliest of times. Prehistory saw a much wetter region with a landscape considerably greener than today, and the process of its drying out into mostly desert with only the fertile Nile ribbon cutting through the country, together with a few scattered oasis, may have been taking place even into Egypt’s Old Kingdom. It is very possible that even during the Old Kingdom times, baboons and monkeys may still have lived in the southern part of Upper Egypt, though today their range is limited to southern Arabia (hamadryas), Ethiopia (monkeys), and the steppes of the Sudan (baboon). However, irregardless of tomb paintings depicting monkeys during the Middle Kingdom, it is doubtful that there remained indigenous populations of these animals by that late date.
By the New Kingdom, monkeys were being imported to Egypt, usually from Nubia or the land of Punt. Apparently they were kept in various capacities, perhaps even as pets, but they also were held in colonies by the temples, as were other animals that were associated with the gods. Within these sacred troops, there were probably births, though the rearing of these animals was probably only partially successful. By the Late Period, we find buried in the necropolises various such animals including hamadryas or the sacred baboon (papio hamadryas), baboons (Papio cynocephalus anubis), green monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops), red monkeys (Cercopithecus pata), and the barbary ape (Macaca sylvanus).
A ring with a solar barque together with too baboons from the tomb of Tutunkhamun
Though many of these animals were considered to be a vessel that could be inhabited by the gods, and must have been given considerable care, investigations into the animal necropolises of Saqqara and particularly Tuna el-Gebel have revealed that their life expectancy in Egypt was very limited. Of the two hundred or so specimens that have been examined, hardly any lived into their sixth through tenth years. Unfavorable living conditions resulted in undernourishment and the lack of freedom of movement and sunlight led to rickets, degenerative bone diseases and probably tuberculosis. While the knowledge of the ancient Egyptians may even today be impressive to us, they seem to have lacked the ability to provide the proper care for these animals.
Baboons representing Thoth in the Greek Period tomb of Petosiris at Tuna el-Gevel
Beyond religious uses, monkeys were also certainly kept as pets in the houses of the upper class, though they were unlikely to have been allowed to roam the house, despite the depiction of green monkeys, as well as cats, geese and ducks, under the chair of the wife of a tomb owner. Green monkeys are actually dangerous animals, and they must have been kept firmly on leashes, as they are usually depicted in tribute scenes.
Monkeys and baboons were also later exported from, or at least through Egypt to various locales such as to the Assyrian court and to Syria. A few monkey keepers even appear in the Assyrian city of Nineveh.
The mysteriousness of the monkey in Egyptian art comes from an inference of symbiosis involving humans and monkeys. As early as the Old Kingdom, we find scenes depicting monkeys engaged in various human activities, many of which were questionable while some were impossible.Various scenes depict these creatures performing dances and playing music, participating in fig harvests or climbing dom palms and throwing the fruit down. They are present at winepresses or beer making, and even helping with the morning toilet in the women’s chamber.They appear unrealistically rigging sea going boats and in boat building scenes. During the New Kingdom, on ostraca and papyri, there are particularly common depictions of monkeys portrayed in various playful human poses. However, scholars such as Deiter Kessler believe that there were no trained monkeys in ancient Egypt, and that most such scenes have some sort of “religio-theological function“, though particularly on New Kingdom ostraca there may have also been an element of humor.
Baboons from the tomb of Tutankhamun
We probably do not completely comprehend the significance of monkeys and baboons in Egyptian religious symbolism, but there is no doubt that they were kept as ritual animals since the earliest periods of Egyptian history.The fact that baboons displayed human characteristics may have contributed to the early identification of the deceased ruler with the animal. It is even possible that mummified baboons were used to represent the deceased royal ancestors of the Predynastic chieftains. During the ceremony to renew the physical world and the person of the ruler, the individual ancestors were ritually deified in the form of baboons and received cultic offerings. The erection of wooden kiosks containing ancestor baboons at the sed-festival of royal rejuvenation may have developed from this earlier practice. An image of a baboon representing King Narmer, erected by an official, implicitly suggest the transformation of the king into a baboon,no doubt as part of a rejuvenation festival. The king was identified with a baboon god known as the “Great White One.” Some scholars believe that the title of this god is derived from the silver-gray mane of a dominant hamadryas. There are also small, Early Dynastic plaques that show the king or priests performing the Opening of the Mouth ceremony and transfiguration before monkeys.
Baboons worshipping the sun god with Ramesses III at Medinet Habu
Baboons worshipping the sun god with Ramesses III at Medinet Habu
However, monkeys were not necessarily considered benevolent creatures. There were rites involving monkeys that are documented by early illustrations and alter by religious texts that describe the danger of monkeys “who cut off heads”. In fact, the image of a baboon with raised tail serves as the hieroglyph for “enraged”. The baboon’s wildness made it into a dangerous, apotropaic intercessory, being the primordial creation in a mythical landscape. For example, four baboon-like creatures guarded the mythical “Lake of Fire” in the Egyptian underworld.
A conopic jar with the head of Hapy in the form of a baboon
Monkeys and baboons played an essential role in Egyptian cosmogony. Various gods were portrayed as these creatures, and some of the earliest deities were sometimes depicted with baboon heads. One of the Four Sons of Horus, Hapy, who was associated with mummification, was represented as a baboon-headed canopic god.The green monkey, particularly when depicted shooting with bow and arrows, was an aspect of the invisible primeval god, Atum.
The baboon also became an aspect of the sun god Re, as well as of the moon god Thoth–Khonsu. The ancient Egyptians who observed the baboon barking at the rising sun gave rise to a favorite theme in sculpture, paintings and reliefs of a baboon worshiping the sun with raised hands.Monkey demons as the companion of the sun god appear in the royal netherworld texts, though along side their positive role was the dangerous aspect of the baboon, whose form could also be assumed by the enemy of the gods such as Apophis and Seth.
Shrieking baboons at sunrise was perceived as a hymn to the sun god
Sexual potency and prowess were associated with the baboon god Bebon, who was closely related to another baboon god named Baba (Babi). The latter god had red ears, blue hindquarters and the features of Seth.
Of course, the squatting baboon became an early, visible and protective form of Thoth, one of Egypt’s most notable gods associated with knowledge and scribes. The baboon of Thoth (also called Isdes) became an assistant in the judgment hall in the underworld.
Thoth was also a moon god and the identification of the baboon with him eventually resulted in the baboon’s association with the moon god, Khonsu. At the Temple of Khonsu in Thebes, statues of Khonsu in the form of a baboon fronted the complex. In the Late Period, we know from a baboon tomb at Saqqara that the god Thoth-Khonsu became an important nocturnal oracle god, to whom written petitions for the priests were submitted. In this form, during the Greek Period, he was called Metasythmis, meaning “hearing ear”.
Statue of a scribe writing at the feet of Thoth as a lunar baboon
By the Late Period, titles such as “Priest of the Living Baboon” or “Priest of the Osiris-Baboon”were held by individuals who served gods in the court of the sanctuaries that had the form of baboon statues. They also looked after the sacred temple monkeys. The sacred troops of baboons functioned in small groups. The best known example are those from Memphis, and Ptolemaic texts from the Necropolis at Saqqara confirm that a colony of these animals was kept in the temple of Ptah “under his Moringa-tree” in the valley. There may have been a dozen or so in the colony at any one time. One of these would have been singled out as an oracular and given the name, “the face of the baboon has spoken“.
Unlike baboons, there was no personal worship of monkeys in Egypt. They were deified only after they died, and were kept exclusively as ritual animals in the temples prior to this. The ritual interment of these monkeys may very well have begun with those buried in a tomb during the reign of Amenhotep III in the Valley of the Kings at Thebes. The animals may have been used during the sed-festival of that king.
Not until the the 26th Dynasty were sacred baboons buried in the ibis necropolis near Tuna el-Gebel. However, by the Ptolemaic Period, monkey mummies are found alongside those of ibises and falcons in almost every animal necropolis. The highest quality burials of monkeys are found in the well documented baboon galleries of Memphis at Saqqara, but also in the animal cemeteries of Tuna el-Gebel, Abydos and the Valley of the Monkeys at Wadi Gabbanet el-Girud in southern Thebes. These burials all probably date to the late Greek and early Roman Periods.
At first, baboons were buried in simple wooden coffins. From the 26th Dynasty, mummified baboons were buried in wooden coffins. At the very beginning of the Greek Period under its first two rulers, the baboons were buried in special rooms where they were placed in costly limestone sarcophagi. During this period, they were sometimes interred in fairly large rock-cut chambers at Tuna el-Gebel. There, a special room at the foot of the entrance steps provided statues of Thoth in the form of a baboon and that of an Ibis. The rock cut chambers were lined with stone blocks and decorated with ritual scenes. In front of the (often several) chambers’ cult areas was a four-step staircase with offering stands and libation slabs. These cult areas of the early Greek Period had been sold to priestly families, who doubtless lived off the income from petitioners and the donations from the state on the occasion of religious festivals. After Ptolemy I and Ptolemy II, the practice of using wooden coffins returned.
Much of what we know of baboons and monkeys in ancient Egypt is derived from these burials. For example, we know from that sacred temple baboons had individual names, but there is no evidence for that with regard to green monkeys. In fact, the temple baboons of the Ptolemaic Period buried at Saqqara have their genealogies inscribed on their coffins, often along with their dates of birth and death. This was not always the case. The deified baboon first appears at Tuna el-Gevel as “Osiris-Baboon, justified“, with no individual name. The first time a personal name appears for a baboon was on a piece of linen from the 26th or 27th Dynasty. During the Ptolemaic period the names of baboons are known from the stone false door slabs of their coffin niches, from ritual scenes in the cult chambers of the sacred baboons, and from papyri that mention the cultic places of specific sacred baboonsin the galleries. The Hermopolitan baboons often had names such as “Thoth-has-come”, “Thoth-is-the-one-who-has-given-him”, “Thoth-has-been-found”, or “the-strong-featured-one-has-come”.
A representation of Thoth as a baboon at Hermopolis
It should also be noted that monkeys were readily used as decorative elements on three dimensional objects, such as toilet articles and toys. They also appear on scarabs and as statuettes. From the New Kingdom onward, temple statues of baboons are somewhat common. They frequently appear to be squatting on a raised platform, often accessed by a flight of stairs. In the Hermopolis of Middle Egypt, giant quartzite baboons belonging to the reign of Amenhotep III were found. These may have originally been grouped around a sacred lake. Other large statues of monkeys once stood in the entrance areas to the animal cemeteries. In the temple of Babylon in Old Cairo, a statue of a green monkey once stood in the forecourt as the town god.
Hence, from the beginning of Egyptian history through at least the beginning of the Christian period, baboons held a very consistent and important role in ancient Egyptian religion, in many different aspects, from demon to protector.They became associated with a number of the most important Egyptian gods, as well as the king,even though through most of the period, they would have had to be imported from abroad.
Hanuman, the mighty ape that aided Lord Rama in his expedition against evil forces, is one of the most popular idols in the Hindu pantheon. Believed to be an avatar of Lord Shiva, Hanuman is worshiped as a symbol of physical strength, perseverance, and devotion.
Hanuman’s tale in the epic Ramayana—in which he is assigned the task of locating Rama’s wife Sita who was abducted by Ravana, the demon king of Lanka—is known for its astounding ability to inspire and equip a reader with all the ingredients needed to face ordeals and conquer obstructions in the way of the world.
The Necessity of a Simian Symbol
Hindus believe in ten avatars of Lord Vishnu among a multitude of gods and goddesses. One of Vishnu’s avatars is Rama, who was created to destroy Ravana, the evil ruler of Lanka. In order to aid Rama, Lord Brahma commanded some gods and goddesses to take the avatar of ‘Vanaras’ or monkeys. Indra, the god of war and weather, was reincarnated as Bali; Surya, the sun god, as Sugriva; Vrihaspati or Brihaspati, the preceptor of the gods, as Tara; and Pavana, the god of wind, was reborn as Hanuman, the wisest, swiftest and strongest of all apes.
The Birth of Hanuman
According to the legend of Hanuman’s birth, Vrihaspati, the ruler of all the hymns and prayers addressed to the gods, had an apsara, a female spirit of the clouds and water named Punjikasthala. Punjikasthala roamed the heavens, where we mocked and threw stones at a meditating monkey (rishi), breaking his meditations. He cursed her, turning her into a female monkey who had to wander the earth—a curse that could only be nullified if she gave birth to an incarnation of Lord Shiva. Punjikasthala performed intense austerities to please Shiva and renamed herself Anjana. Shiva eventually granted her the boon that would cure her of the curse.
When Agni, the god of fire, gave Dasharath, the king of Ayodhya, a bowl of sacred dessert to share among his wives so they may have divine children, an eagle snatched a part of the pudding and dropped it where Anjana was meditating, and Pavana, the god of wind delivered the piece into Anjana’s outstretched hands. After she took the divine dessert, she gave birth to Hanuman. Thus Lord Shiva was incarnated as a monkey born as Hanuman to Anjana, by the blessings of the lord of the winds Pavana, who thus became Hanuman’s godfather.
Hanuman’s Childhood
The birth of Hanuman released Anjana from the curse. Before Anjana returned to heaven, Hanuman asked his mother about his life ahead. She assured him that he would never die, and said that fruits as ripe as the rising sun would be his food. Mistaking the glowing sun as his food, the divine baby leaped for it. The god of the heavens Indra struck him with his thunderbolt and hurled him back down to earth.
Hanuman’s godfather Pavana carried the burned and broken child to the netherworld or Patala. But as Pavana departed from the earth, he took all the air with him, and the creator god Brahma had to beg him to return. In order to appease Pavana, the gods conferred many boons and blessings on his foster child, making Hanuman invincible, immortal, and powerful: a monkey god.
Worshiping the Monkey God
Traditionally, Hindu people keep fast and give special offerings in honor of Hanuman as a weekly ritual week, on Tuesdays and, in some cases, Saturdays.
In times of trouble, it is a common faith among Hindus to chant the name of Hanuman or sing his hymn (“Hanuman Chalisa“) and proclaim “Bajrangbali Ki Jai” —”victory to thy thunderbolt strength.” Once every year—on the full-moon day of the Hindu month of Chaitra (April) at sunrise—Hanuman Jayanti is celebrated, commemorating the birth of Hanuman. Hanuman temples are among the most common public shrines found in India.
The Power of Devotion
The character of Hanuman is used in the Hindu religion as an example of the unlimited power that lies unused within each human individual. Hanuman directed all his energies towards the worship of Lord Rama, and his undying devotion made him such that he became free from all physical fatigue. And Hanuman’s only desire was to go on serving Rama.
In this manner, Hanuman perfectly exemplifies ‘Dasyabhava’ devotion—one of the nine types of devotions—that bonds the master and the servant. His greatness lies in his complete merger with his Lord, which also formed the base of his genial qualities.
See this stone? I’m going to make a really loud noise with it
MPI-EVA PanAf/Chimbo Foundation
All hail the sacred tree. I’ve often wondered aloud in the newsroom about the possibility of finding evidence of a chimp shrine, the discovery of a place where chimps pray to their deity.
This week, my half-whimsical dream almost came true. Biologists working in the Republic of Guinea found evidence for what seemed to be a “sacred tree” used by chimps, perhaps for some sort of ritual.
Laura Kehoe of the Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany, set up camera traps by trees marked with unusual scratches. What she found gave her goosebumps: chimps were placing stones in the hollow of trees, and bashing trees with rocks.
The behaviour could be a means of communication, since rocks make a loud bang when they hit hollow trees. Or it could be more symbolic.
“Maybe we found the first evidence of chimpanzees creating a kind of shrine that could indicate sacred trees,” Kehoe wrote on her blog.
Of course it’s not proof that chimps believe in any kind of god, as the Daily Mail would have it, but it is the latest evidence of their extraordinarily rich behaviour.
Even more intriguing than this, maybe we found the first evidence of chimpanzees creating a kind of shrine that could indicate sacred trees. Indigenous West African people have stone collections at “sacred” trees and such man-made stone collections are commonly observed across the world and look eerily similar to what we have discovered here. Source
I especially liked this last study, which found that juvenile wild chimps – more commonly females – played with sticks as children play with dolls, cradling them and even making nests for them to sleep in.
Jill Pruetz of Iowa State University, who observed the “fire dance” in 2006, said that the behaviour seems to suggest that chimps have a conceptual understanding of fire. Perhaps they are paying respect to it, in some way. I’ve also heard stories of chimps performing dances in front of waterfalls.
Maybe chimps have some understanding of impressive natural phenomena such as rain storms, wild fires and waterfalls and are paying “respect” to them. So I always hoped that we’d find evidence of a “temple” in the forest.
Pruetz, who is involved in the new study, thinks the chimps bang stones to communicate. Many males drum on root buttresses as the noise carries further than the standard chimp cry, the pant-hoot, she says. But often there aren’t any trees with buttress roots, so perhaps they bang stones instead.
Bang if you can hear me
What about chimps storing stones in hollow trees, though?
“It does seem to be a tradition found in some groups,” she says. “If that fits the definition of proto-ritualistic, I have no problem with it.”
“It’s such a cool observation,” says primate cognitive psychologist Laurie Santos of Yale University. “But I worry that we don’t yet know how to interpret it.”
“In my monkey behaviour experience, low noises often serve a communicative function – males trying to act dominant, etc. – so my instinct is that this behaviour might work a lot like that,” she says.
Naturally, it’s way too soon to conclude that this is proto-religious behaviour. For one thing, even pigeons have been described as showing “superstitious” behaviour. “We’d need more observation – and perhaps actual experiments – to know if chimpanzees are using the behaviour as anything like a ritual,” Santos says.
I don’t see it quite like that anymore. It’s hard to argue that we’re not unique when asked if chimps could build their own LHC, as one primatologist once asked me.
But I do see these stories as vital for the way they spectacularly illuminate our own roots. The evolutionary origin of religion is profoundly important to understanding human culture, for example. So it’s essential to examine any possible roots of this in other animals. And for their own sake, with all the conservation pressures chimps face, a deeper understanding of our closest relatives can only be a good thing.
What we saw on this camera was exhilarating—a large male chimp approaches our mystery tree and pauses for a second. He then quickly glances around, grabs a huge rock and flings it full force at the tree trunk.
But what we discovered during our now-published study wasn’t a random, one-off event, it was a repeated activity with no clear link to gaining food or status—it could be a ritual. We searched the area and found many more sites where trees had similar markings and in many places piles of rocks had accumulated inside hollow tree trunks—reminiscent of the piles of rocks archaeologists have uncovered in human history.
Videos poured in. Other groups working in our project began searching for trees with tell-tale markings. We found the same mysterious behaviour in small pockets of Guinea Bissau, Liberia and Côte d’Ivoire but nothing east of this, despite searching across the entire chimp range from the western coasts of Guinea all the way to Tanzani
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SO, we have seen that APES are worshiped in many places. Now, we are learning that apes/chimpanzees may be showing signs that they have rituals which may be signs of religion/worship. As if they are remembering ancient practices.pacer
Now, the mainstream has everyone convinced that Big Foot/Yetti/Sasquatch/Abominable Snowman/Grassman are not real. That the are the subjects of “Conspiracy Theorists”. Everyone that is, except those who have had personal experiences with these beings and/or those who believe their testimonies.
I hope you understand that Conspiracy Theories is a phrase they use to keep you ignorant. It is not a theory if there is evidence to support it. Though they love to belittle the people who share the truth, and call them liars because they have no DNA dead body to show. But, the Bible says… out of the mouth of two or three witnesses shall all things be established. There are many, many more than two or three witnesses for this and most other truths that are being poo pooed.
So, ask GOD to open your eyes and prepare you to receive the truth. Keep your mind and heart open to the HOLY SPIRIT who was sent to LEAD YOU TO ALL TRUTH.
Buckle your seat belt and let’s dive in. I am convinced that many people have seen and/or heard these APES/APE LIKE creatures all over the world.
Watch the film that started it all. In the mid-20th century, the most famous urban legend of the western world was born: Bigfoot. This Peter Graves documentary was the first to feature Roger Patterson’s 1967 original home movie. This footage sparked hysteria when it flashed onto television sets across America. From then on, Bigfoot became cemented into American culture irrevocably. Subscribe for more chilling documentaries: https://www.youtube.com/c/shiverchann…📺 It’s like Netflix for history… Sign up to History Hit, the world’s best history documentary service and get 50% off using the code ‘Shiver’ https://bit.ly/3kCbFUI Shiver is on TIKTOK! … https://www.tiktok.com/@shiverparanor… Follow Shiver on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShiverParano…… Content licensed by MVD to Little Dot Studios For any enquiries please email owned-enquiries@littledotstudios.com
EXPEDITION SASQUATCH | Director’s Cut | Bigfoot Documentary 2022 Mountain Beast Mysteries is a channel dedicated to providing information and stories on the subjects of Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch) and conspiracy theories relating to it. Do you want to see the best examples of Bigfoot caught on video? Do you want to enjoy hours of free Bigfoot documentary content? If the answer is yes then you have come to the right place!
What is the Monster of Whitehall? In 1976, in upstate New York, several police officers reported seeing an animal that they couldn’t identify. See more in Season 2, Episode 12, “Bigfoot In New York.” #MonsterQuest
Just miles from the industrial cities of Ohio, there is a bogeyman that has terrified local children for over a century. According to stories and sightings, the Grassman is similar to a Bigfoot. See more in Season 2, Episode 4, “Ohio Grassman.” Watch all new episodes of MonsterQuest Specials, returning soon, and stay up to date on all of your favorite The HISTORY Channel shows at http://www.history.com/schedule.
Classic Canadian Sasquatch Stories – Episode 1: The Agassiz-Harrison Valley From peeking through windows at hapless farmwives to hurling boulders at Chehalis fishermen, the legendary wildman of British Columbia’s lower Fraser Valley regularly made its presence known to the residents of the Agassiz-Harrison Valley throughout the 1920s, ‘30s, and ‘40s. Narrated by Bryan from the Unexplained Reality podcast: http://www.UnexplainedReality.comhttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast… Footage courtesy of Jason from Natural Gallant Bodybuilding: http://www.NaturalGallantBodybuilding…http://www.YouTube.com/NaturalGallant…0:00:00 – Introduction 0:01:20 – How the Sasquatch Got Its Name 0:24:11 – The Tale of Sasquatch Mountain 0:33:50 – The Sasquatch Capital of Canada Mysteries of Canada: Volume I MysteriesOfCanada.com/Canada/Mysteries-of-Canada-Volume-I/ Mysteries of Canada: Volume II MysteriesOfCanada.com/Canada/Mysteries-of-Canada-Volume-II/
Something has been attacking a remote cabin in Northern Ontario, Canada – and it may have left behind a blood trail. DNA analysis suggests that the creature is a non-human primate, in Season 2, Episode 20, “Sasquatch Attack II.” #MonsterQuest Do you love investigations of the unknown? Make sure to check out our new channel @TheUnXplainedZone, your portal to the paranormal. Click here to SUBSCRIBE! https://aetv.us/subscribe_unxplainedzone Subscribe for more from MonsterQuest and other great The HISTORY Channel shows: http://histv.co/SubscribeHistoryYT Check out exclusive The HISTORY Channel content: History Newsletter: www.history.com/newsletter Website – http://www.history.com Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/History Twitter – https://twitter.com/history “MonsterQuest” takes a scientific look at reported sightings of cryptozoological creatures (cryptids) and paranormal entities around the world, including the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot, and werewolves. The HISTORY® Channel is the leading destination for award-winning original series and specials that connect viewers with history in an informative, immersive, and entertaining manner across all platforms. The network’s all-original programming slate features a roster of hit series, premium documentaries, and scripted event programming.
GOVERNMENT ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF BIGFOOT | They Finally Go Public | MBM 198 Mountain Beast Mysteries is a channel dedicated to providing information and stories on the subjects of Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch) and conspiracy theories relating to it. Do you want to see the best examples of Bigfoot caught on video? Do you want to enjoy hours of free Bigfoot documentary content? If the answer is yes then you have come to the right place! Ohio DNR Video… https://youtu.be/Jp25KFcoMxo SUPPORT MOUNTAIN BEAST MYSTERIES https://www.gofundme.com/f/mountain-b…
MIND-BLOWING BIGFOOT FOOTAGE | Massive Bigfoot Caught on Camera | MBM 193 Mountain Beast Mysteries is a channel dedicated to providing information and stories on the subjects of Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch) and conspiracy theories relating to it. Do you want to see the best examples of Bigfoot caught on video? Do you want to enjoy hours of free Bigfoot documentary content? If the answer is yes then you have come to the right place!
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Now that I have made my case for the APES/Apelike Creatures. Let’s take a look at the other half of that reference from the Book of Jasher, the humans who were turned into Elephants.
2020 has been a very challenging year for all of us. None of us expected the unpredictable situation we are in now. Working from office, meeting near and dear ones, travelling, playing sports and many other activities are still a distant dream. We don’t know when the world will be normal like it was in pre-pandemic days.
As an icebreaker in our recent team meeting, we were asked the question “Which animal you would like humans to emulate in the year 2020 and Why?” Without a second thought the animal came to my mind was ELEPHANT for the following reasons:
Elephants are one of the most intelligent species and are also considered to be one of the most empathetic animals. Greek philosopher Aristotle had described the elephant as “the animal that surpasses all others in wit and mind.” The most important act required by humans is Empathy in this crucial year of survival.
Elephants in wild make their own path and destroy whatever obstructions come their way including uprooting trees. Their aim is to reach for the food which they consume in huge quantity every day. Elephant’s keen sense of smell helps them find water up to 12 miles away! Finding the stores and buying the right quantity of food for the family had been very challenging in the early days of lock-down. Everyone made their own path to buy the necessities and still continuous to do so using mobile apps. Usage of digital currency has increased multi-fold.
In Buddhism, the elephant is a symbol of mental strength. Elephants are among the most expressive of creatures including joy, anger, grief, compassion, and love. It seems the scientists have just scratched the surface when it comes to understanding how intelligent and expressive elephants are. The people who weren’t expressive before the pandemic have started expressing their emotions. Social media is full of such emotions. Many people have started new hobbies to keep themselves and their family busy & happy. We have also realized the importance of empathy.
Elephants have very few sweat glands. To cool themselves, they use resources available close to them including spraying of water or take mud baths. Mud baths also provides a protective layer to shield their body from the sun’s rays. They use the resources available around them to cool themselves. To cool off after a long day, we have started using the available resources around – listening to music, reading the books which we had bought long back in one of airport shops, watch online movies and series and many more.
Elephants are very good communicators. It seems they stamp their feet to make unique sound, which can be heard by another elephant few kilometres away. They use a wide range of sounds to talk to each other – including those which humans are not able to hear. Those who weren’t tech-savvy before started using video conferencing tools to communicate with their family and friends. They are communicating more with each other irrespective of the distance.
Elephants have most closely knit family. Elephants demonstrate concern for their family members. They take care of weak or injured members. The pandemic has brought many families together under one roof after many many years. They have started supporting those affected by pandemic.
Elephants are very attentive mothers, and they keep their offspring with them for many years.The pandemic situation has made mothers more attentive and protective to their kids. Mothers are becoming very innovative to make kids learn new things, since schools are closed still in many parts of the world.
There are many such elephant’s behavior that we can emulate, I’ve listed only few to make my point.
Another most important thing about elephant, my favorite god GANESHA has elephant face. Ganesha is widely worshiped to remove obstacles, as the patron of arts and sciences.
Ganesha symbolism:
Big Head – Think Big
Small Eyes – Concentrate
Large Ears – Listen more
Small Mouth – Talk less
Large Stomach – Peacefully digest all good and bad in life
Trunk – High efficiency and adaptability
Ganesha’s vehicle – Mouse – don’t allow desire to take you for a ride
On the auspicious day of Ganesha Chaturthi (birthday of Ganesha – 22 Aug 2020), may Ganesha remove all obstacles from your path and shower you with blessings and bounties.
Happy Ganesha Chaturthi 2020
Stay Safe and Healthy
Source : Internet articles about elephants
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It appears that ELEPHANTS may have been present in America in our distant past. SOURCE
Not some Hindus. Almost all theist Hindus worship Elephant in the image of Lord Ganesha himself.
Ganesha has a boon from Lord Shiva to be revered before every Prayer, Yagya, Sandhna and any auspicious event like birthday, marriage or Pooja for a new born baby.
Ganesh is one of the most beloved gods of the Hindu people, as well as the most important. The son of Shiva and Parvati, no spiritual worship in the Hindu belief system is initiated until the Lord Ganesh is invoked. The Lord Ganesha is not only celebrated amongst Hindus, but also Jains, Buddhists and pagans the world over.
Lord Ganesh is the remover of all obstacles. Before a devotee of Lord Ganesh begins a new endeavor, they pray to Ganesh to remove any and all obstacles, as well as to grant them the wisdom and intellect to succeed.
Whether the new project involves architecture, writing, or creating a business, those who follow Ganesh will always ask for his grace, protection and wisdom for the venture.
Hindu students who are nearing important projects or exams, will honor Lord Ganesh, as he is also the patron of letters and learning. Indeed, it was Ganesh who authored much of the Mahabharata Epic, which is an account of the Kurukṣetra War. The broken tusk that Lord Ganesh is sometimes seen holding, represents is act of writing parts of the Mahabharata Epic.
Imagery of Lord Ganesh is extremely symbolic. His image can be seen throughout India and in pagan households throughout the world. The Lord Ganesh has the head of an elephant with one broken tusk.
The broken tusk symbolizes the fact that a wise person is beyond duality. An elephant’s trunk is extremely strong, yet it can also handle delicate objects. This signifies that wisdom is strong, yet discriminates. The large ears symbolize the ability to hear all, and to apply wisdom to all one hears.
There are several celebrations that center around Lord Ganesh. First and foremost, his birthday, which occurs around August/September. Followers celebrate his birthday by constructing a Ganesh Pandal.
You can create the Ganesh Murti yourself or purchase one. After which, you immerse it in water, which represents how the Lord Ganesh will wash away your obstacles, which ensures a new beginning.
The Pancha Ganapati Festival happens in December and will last for five days, from December 21 to 25. Initiated in 1985, it represents a form of ‘Christmas’ for Hindus, also known as the Family Festival of Giving.
Instead of one day of gifts, the Hindu’s celebrate 5 days of gifts. This is a family festival where individuals work on reconciliations, blessings and creating harmony in their lives.
Though there are many temples in India devoted to Lord Ganesh, his followers will often have shrines set up within their homes or places of business. These shrines are unique, but have similar elements.
Many European pagans and wicca’s hold Lord Ganesh very highly in their personal pantheon of deities. They believe that the Lord Ganesh and his ability to remove obstacles, love of art and science enrich their lives.
European pagans and wicca’s often work to create a personal relationship with Ganeshand actively incorporate the Lord Ganesh into their own belief system. Western pagans and wiccas will often choose Wednesday as a preferred day to offer devotion, as Wednesday is the day of the planet Mercury, the planet for success.
Behold the Lord Ganesh, the god of success and the destroyer of obstacles, also called ‘Vighneshwara’. He blesses those who show devotion, wisdom, intelligence and compassion to all things.
Indeed, he is the symbol of all things new, the symbol of new beginnings. His followers are kind and respectful of others, and respect learning, entrepreneurship, spirituality and compassion. spacer
The largest land mammal, elephants have super-sized brains and display incredible emotional intelligence. In this episode of Wild Files, we get an intimate glimpse at elephants’ social ties and unique character. ubscribe: http://bit.ly/BBCEarthSub
Researchers listening to elephant sounds and observing their behavior are compiling an elephant dictionary. Bob Simon listens to the language of the forest elephants first hand.
View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/why-elephan… It’s a common saying that elephants never forget. But the more we learn about elephants, the more it appears that their impressive memory is only one aspect of an incredible intelligence that makes them some of the most social, creative, and benevolent creatures on Earth. Alex Gendler takes us into the incredible, unforgettable mind of an elephant. Lesson by Alex Gendler, animation by Avi Ofer.
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Living Gods October 29, 1997
It is elephants’ elevated standing in Indian culture that prevents them from being killed, even when
they bring destruction to people and property. Over 80 percent of Indians are Hindus, and to members of the Hindu religion, the elephant is a sacred animal. Elephants are sacred animals to Hindus. It is the living incarnation of one of their most important gods: Ganesh, an elephantheaded
deity who rides atop a tiny mouse.
“All obstacles, whatever they may be, will be rooted out by worshipping Ganesh,” promises an ancient Hindu text. Today, following Shiva’s command that anyone beginning a new undertaking worship Ganesh, Hindus often invoke the elephant god’s name at the beginning of worship, trips, and projects — such as the elephant taming adventure documented in The Elephant Men. Ganesh is also honored at the beginning of books, because he is said to have been a great scribe and patron of learning.He is depicted on many temples; some even keep stables of real elephants for ceremonial events. In south India, for instance, there is a fall festival called Dussehra that is famous for its parade of elephants decorated with paint and cloth.
Hindus, though, aren’t the only South Asians to worship elephants. Buddhists, for instance, believe so-called “white” elephants, a light-colored variant, carry special significance. In Thailand, white elephants are considered the king’s property, and wars have been fought over these relatively rare animals. While Asian elephants are revered today as spiritual icons, they were once also feared as potent weapons of war. Countless ancient armies surged across Asia on elephants.
Being built like a tank, elephants were used in war not only as a means of transport but also as an instrument of defence and offence. They were used to ram barricades and, as Ives points out “in time of war, they now and then fix a heavy iron chain to the end of their trunks, which they whirl around with such agility, as to make it impossible for an enemy to approach them at that time”. Source
Soldiers weren’t the only ones to fear elephants; prisoners also had reason to tremble. When convicted of serious crimes, felons could face death by elephant trampling.
Managing Trustee Biodiversity and Elephant Conservation Trust
In Śrī Lanka no other animal has been associated for so long with the people in their traditional and religious
activities as the elephant. This association dates back to the pre-Christian era, more than 5,000 years. Ancient
Sinhalese kings captured and tamed elephants which used to abound in the country.
Various methods of capture were employed, some indigenous, others introduced by neighbouring kings and
countries that conquered and ruled Sri Lanka. Gradually the number of elephants captured increased. All
elephants were kept by the king in his stables. The methods of capture were refined and modified as time went
on.
Elephants, suitably caparisoned, have and still take part in ceremonial, cultural and religious pageants and
processions. Elephants have been used by man in his wars in Europe and Asia. They have assisted him in his
logging operations and construction works. In this country too elephants have fought in wars and featured in
various sports and combat during Sinhala celebrations. In India they have provided transportation for sportsmen
indulging in shikars.
In Sri Lanka the variations in physical appearance amongst elephants were noticed and recorded in ancient
Sinhala manuscripts. There are ten such groups or ‘castes’. These differences do not seem important now.
The first record of the association between man and elephant in Sri Lanka was recorded in the 1st Century BC on
an inscription at Navalar Kulam in Panama Pattu in the Eastern Province, of a religious benefaction by a prince
who was designated “Ath Arcaria” or Master of the Elephant Establishment. The Elephant Establishment was
called the “Ath panthiya”. The ruins of the ancient cities in Sri Lanka abound with carvings of elephants in many
forms, attesting to the close association between man and elephant.
Sinhala literature of the 3rd Century BC indicates that the state elephant or Mangalahatti was the elephant on
which the king rode. This elephant was always a tusker and had a special stable called the hatthisala. The post to
which it was tethered was called the alheka.
In Śrī Lanka no other animal has been associated for so long with the people in their traditional and religious activities as the elephant. This association dates back to the pre-Christian era, more than 5,000 years. Ancient Sinhalese kings captured and tamed elephants which used to abound in the country.
The first record of the association between man and elephant in Sri Lanka was recorded in the 1st Century BC on an inscription at Navalar Kulam in Panama Pattu in the Eastern Province, of a religious benefaction by a prince who was designated “Ath Arcaria” or Master of the Elephant Establishment. The Elephant Establishment was called the “Ath panthiya”. The ruins of the ancient cities in Sri Lanka abound with carvings of elephants in many forms, attesting to the close association between man and elephant.
Sinhala literature of the 3rd Century BC indicates that the state elephant or Mangalahatti was the elephant on which the king rode. This elephant was always a tusker and had a special stable called the hatthisala. The post to which it was tethered was called the alheka.
A 12th Century inscription on a stone seat at Polonnaruwa records that King Nissanka Malla sat upon it while watching elephant fights. These fights were staged for the entertainment of nobles.
A rock sculpture of an elephant on the banks of the Mahaweli River was described thus by archaeologist H.C.P. Bell: “This piece of animal sculpture is probably unique in Ceylon. Cut in full round from a rock, life-size, are the head and shoulders of an elephant whose feet the river washed when low. The elephant stands in the water, looking slightly upstream, as though hesitating to cross. At present the river in semi-flood reaches its eyes. There are signs of ‘sets’ for some building’s foundations on a boulder adjoining, but no ruins or inscriptions are known likely to afford a clue to the object of this solitary tour de force of a skilful sculptor,” (Bell & Bell, 1893). Unfortunately this rock sculpture no longer exists having been blasted probably by fishermen dynamiting fish.
The first description of the capture of elephants in 40 AD is by Pliny. Here, the information that he gathered was from the Sinhalese ambassador to the court of the Emperor Claudius.
Elephants were used on all important ceremonial occasions especially where pomp and pageantry were required. The annual Perahera in Kandy, which dates back nearly 220 years, brings together well over a hundred elephants that parade the streets during the nights on certain pre-determined days in July-August each year. New Year festivities in Sri Lanka feature elephants in various sports and competitive combat. Elephant fights were a popular form of Sinhala sport in early times and was called “Gaja Keliya”. Being built like a tank, elephants were used in war not only as a means of transport but also as an instrument of defence and offence. They were used to ram barricades and, as Ives points out “in time of war, they now and then fix a heavy iron chain to the end of their trunks, which they whirl around with such agility, as to make it impossible for an enemy to approach them at that time”.
From the earliest of times there had been a significant demand for Sri Lankan elephants from other countries. Aelian, quoted by Emmerson Tennent in1859, says that the export of elephants from Ceylon to India had been going on without interruption from the period of the First Punic War. India wanted them for use as war elephants, Myanmar as a tribute from ancient kings and Egypt probably for both war and ceremonial occasions.
The elephants from Sri Lanka were found to easily adapt for war and were considered better than those from the mainland. Their excellent qualities were well known to the Greeks even as far back as the 3rd Century BC, in the time of Alexander the Great. Onescritus, who was an Admiral of the Fleet of Alexander the Great and probably the first European to describe the trained elephants of Ceylon, has stated that the elephants from Taprobane (later Ceylon and then Sri Lanka) “are bigger, more fierce and furious for war service than those of India,”. Greek writers like Megasthenes (circa 300 BC) and Aelian (44AD) corroborate this. Sixth Century writer Cosmos Indicopleustes says that the elephant from Sri Lanka was highly priced in India for its excellence in war.
Elephants from Sri Lanka were exported to Kalinga by special boats from about 200 BC. From the port of Mantai the present day Mannar. Such exports are also recorded by Ptolemy in 175 AD.
By this time Sri Lanka had also earned a reputation for skilled elephant management. The Sinhala kings had special elephant trainers. They were the Kuruwe people from Kegalle. Training elephants caught from the wild, for both traditional purposes and war, was the responsibility of these people. Even persons (mahouts) who looked after the elephants after their training were trained by the Kuruwe people. A brass model of an elephant with a number of movable joints was used in the training of the mahouts.
Records show that even though Sri Lanka was exporting a large number of elephants in the 5th and 6th centuries BC, a number of elephants were also imported into the country after the 4th Century BC. This is apart from the gifts that the ruling monarchs of India and Myanmar, (then Burma) sent from time to time.
The Culavamsa (Ch. LXXVI) records that during the reign of King Parakrama Bahu (1153-1186 AD), King Ramana of Myanmar decreed that the practice of selling elephants from his kingdom for export should henceforth be stopped. “Moreover with evil intent, the king also set a high price on the beasts, commanding that the elephants which were sold in former times for a hundred nikkhalas of silver, or a thousand, should now be sold for two thousand or three thousand and he likewise put an end to the ancient custom of giving an elephant to every ship that bore presents to the king [of Sri Lanka].” The chronicle goes on to say that Prakrama Bahu made war on the King of Burma and subdued him. Later, the Burmese relented and said “Take henceforth from us as yearly tribute, as many elephants as are necessary.”
Records of the 12th Century AD again show that elephants continued to be imported from Burma. The export of elephants too continued and this is confirmed from time to time by writers on Ceylon – Sinhala Chronicles (15th Century), Athanasius Nikitin the Russian traveller (1470). Add-er-Razzak (1442) refers to the trade in elephants between Calicut and Ceylon. Andrea Corsall and Durate Barbosa (1514) refer to the Royal monopoly of elephants – a good elephant fetched 1,500 ducats on the Malabar Coast at that time. Ribeiro (1836) states that “As the Ceylon elephant was superior, traders were prepared to pay twice or even up to four times for them compared to elephants from other countries.”
There are a number of references in early writings to man’s association with and his use of elephants. The Mahawamsa (Sri Lanka’s chronicle of history) details many such instances, especially that of Kandula the elephant on which King Dutugamunu (200 BC), rode to war. Dutch, Portuguese and British reports and books record several instances of elepant capture, their use by the Sinhala Kings in their armies, elephant fights and the execution of criminals by elephants. In certain instances the strength of a King or Potentate was judged by the number of elephants he used in war.
The King of Kandy maintained a special unit that dealt with all matters concerning elephants including their capture, training, conservation and export. This unit was under the chief officer known as the Gajanayake Nilame. The Gajanayake Nilame, was of a high caste and received many favours, including land, from the king. The elephant catchers and keepers were from the lower castes.
During the times of the Sinhala kings, even though there were tens of thousands of elephants in all parts of the country, this animal was afforded complete protection by royal decree. Accordingly, no elephant could be captured, killed or maimed without the king’s authority. All offenders were punished by death. Unlike today the cultivators of that time could not plead that the elephants were harmed in the protection of their crops. Any depredation or damage to crops by wild elephants had to be prevented by stout fencing together with organized and effective watching by the farmers. It is interesting to note that though there were many more elephants then than now, Sri Lanka was considered to be the granary of the East.
When the Portuguese captured the maritime provinces of Sri Lanka they found a flourishing export trade in elephants. They too, quickly got involved in the elephant export trade, and at first obtained their elephants as tribute from the Sinhala people through their leaders. Thereafter they captured animals on their own. The Portuguese also set up a revenue-gathering unit, similar to the king’s organization, known as the Elephant Hunt. Abeysinghe (1966) wrote that the Portuguese maintained an annual demand of 37 elephants for export from two kraals. These were valued at 9,250 rix dollars which was equal to 15% of the total revenue of the state.
The King’s Elephant Unit continued to operate within the Kandyan kingdom even after the Portuguese occupation of the Maritime Provinces. Latterly however, the function of the King’s Elephant Unit was only to supply the king’s army with elephants. This was because with the development of cannons and musketry, the elephant was both frightened and vulnerable, and its export demand as an instrument of war was greatly reduced. During the reign of the Portuguese the person in charge of the Elephant Hunt was called the Gajanayake. The Gajanayake was in charge of stables at Matara. This was a large establishment. In 1697 there were 97 elephants in the stables at Matara. Baldeus wrote, in 1704, of a place in Matara where captured wild elephants were tamed before they were sold to buyers who came from the Coramandel Coast and Bengal. A very large stable had been built to house these animals. These stables at Matara are the site of the present Kachcheri. The animals apparently were bathed twice a day in a nearby river, very likely the Nilwala. Tame elephants were used as monitors and trainers.
In 1586 the king of Kandy, Rajasingha I, led an army which included a strong force of 2,200 highly trained elephants for fighting and for other services, and laid siege on the Portuguese fort in Colombo. The siege however, was not successful.
It is recorded that, in 1706, the king of Kandy had in his stables over 300 tuskers. The elephant was used less and less for war and subsequently only for ceremonial occasions.
In 1656 the Dutch laid siege on the Fort of Colombo held by the Portuguese. Ribeiro, the Portuguese soldier and historian, records that all the elephants in the Fort excepting one, were eaten by the defenders as they ran short of food after a time. Only one elephant was spared because it was needed to carry timber to repair the defences that were being damaged by the attackers.
Robert Knox, a Scotsman, who was a prisoner in the Kandyan kingdom for nearly 20 years, writing in the 17th Century, stated “that the King makes use of them (elephants) as executioners: they will run their teeth [tusks] through the body, and then tear it in pieces, and throw it limb for limb. They have a sharp iron with a socket with three edges, which they put on their teeth at such times; for the elephants that are kept have all the ends of their teeth cut to make them grow better, and they do grow out again.
Sirr (1850) also says that elephants were used as executioners of criminals, by training them to crush the victim’s limbs and placing one of its legs on the man’s body, tear off the limbs. Fortunately, the use of the mild tempered elephants for such gruesome executions has long been stopped.
Pybus states that the Dutch had to obtain permission from the king of Kandy to capture elephants which were within his domain. The king generally agreed to the Dutch capturing 20 to 30 animals each year, but the Dutch constantly exceeded this figure, capturing around 150 each year and 200 in one year. They continued to use the elephant stables at Matara referred to earlier.
Elephants were also exported by the Dutch from Karativu island. The elephants were driven into the Jaffna peninsula by a shallow ford that separated it from the mainland. This ford has now been bridged and given the name Elephant Pass. The Dutch held an annual sale of elephants in Jaffna. Elephants caught in Kraals and those received as tribute were sold there. Buyers from the Coramandel and the Bengal coasts continued to attend these sales regularly.
The traditional methods of capture by noosing etc., were practised for a much longer period. However, in 1761 the Dutch Governor Becker made a decree prohibiting the use of pits and nooses for the capture of elephants. This was in a bid to keep the mortality rate among the captive elephants low. The form of noosing practised in northern Ceylon was different to the noosing methods of the Eastern Province and other parts of the country. A large noose was suspended from a strong tree with a man or several men on the tree to manipulate the noose. Elephants were then driven towards the tree with the noose. With this ban, kraaling became the only method of capture that could be employed.
When the British captured the Maritime Provinces from the Dutch in 1796, and later the Kandyan Kingdom in 1815, they continued the capture of elephants for some time but on a low-priority basis. The British however, indulged in the shooting of elephants as a form of sport. Elephant populations that had been able to withstand the detrimental effects of capture all these years now started diminishing rapidly with the wanton and indiscriminate destruction of the elephant herds.
Major Thomas Rogers is credited with having shot over 1,500 elephants. This works out to an average of one elephant being killed by him every day for four years. Two others, Captain Galleway and Major Skinner are reputed to have shot half that number each. Many other ‘sportsmen’ have shot in the region of 250-300 animals during this time.
As the elephant was a threat to the agricultural activities of the rural population, the British provided guns freely to villagers to keep away the marauding elephants from their cultivations. This action, which seemed necessary at that time, added to the destruction of the elephant. Farmers, who had hitherto protected their crops from marauding elephants by other means, now had a much easier method. They shot at them and either maimed or killed them.
The British were also interested in developing plantation crops in addition to subsistence crops. British planters, who were opening up the railways and roads along with coffee and later tea plantations, also shot trespassing elephants at will. Here again the purported protection of their crops seemed to justify their actions. The planters combined their sport and the protection of their plantations and shot elephants at will, so much so that the once large elephant population in the hills dwindled rapidly.
The British did away with the Elephant Department started by the Sinhalese and the Elephant Hunt maintained for the occupied areas by the Portuguese and the Dutch. They also greatly reduced the number of kraals that were held. In fact in 1828 the British passed a law prohibiting the capture of elephants except for the government. This law was rescinded in 1831. The Kandyan chiefs, however, continued holding kraals and it is recorded that from 1800 to 1900, fifty two kraals were held. The last Kraal was held in 1952.
Elephants that were once part of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus now have a spacious new home in Florida, thanks to the efforts of a nonprofit conservation group. Manuel Bojorquez has an exclusive first look. Each weekday morning, “CBS This Morning” co-hosts Gayle King, Anthony Mason and Tony Dokoupil deliver two hours of original reporting, breaking news and top-level newsmaker interviews in an engaging and informative format that challenges the norm in network morning news programs.
How do you move three enormous elephants 4000 kilometres? Very very carefully and bring lots of hay…. When the fifth estate joined the convoy taking 3 Canadian elephants overland to the PAWS sanctuary in California it was bound to be an incredible journey filled with tension, drama and unpredictability. The good news for the Toronto Zoo Elephants, Toka, Thika and Iringa is that the long battle over their welfare appears to have a very happy ending. Original Airdate : October 25, 2013
Animals can paint and make sculptures. But is it art?
In a study published in 2006, Gisela Kaplan and Lesley J. Rogers examined this question very carefully. The researchers considered how animals perceive colors — elephants only see two pigments, while humans can see three — and attempted to understand if they feel any pleasure from looking at their creations.
That is, Kaplan and Rogers sought to consider animals’ creations with paint and other materials from their perspective. To humans, the paintings of elephants may resemble abstract art, but to assume the elephant thinks the same overlooks their anatomy and physiology. Additionally, we do not know if animals produce art in their natural environments.
Nonetheless, studying animal artwork certainly shows that many are capable of more complex behaviors than had previously been thought. Kaplan and Rogers also note that a better understanding of animals’ aesthetic sense and abilities can have implications for animal welfare:
… might realize that sounds and colors matter as much as structures in the way housing for animals is organized, whether in zoos, research facilities, or other human settings, and that we should have a much broader perspective on the types of activities we make available to these animals. Ultimately, finding that some animals share a sense of aesthetics—as humans use the term—might well change our sensitivities and attitudes to animals overall, offering further evidence to dismantle the outworn claim that animals are “just” animals.
Here are five animals that make what we humans consider art.
1. GORILLAS
There have been numerous reports of captive primates painting. But not only have the gorillas Koko and Michael painted, they have also been able to explain what they have painted as they learned to sign.
Koko painted what looked like a bird with wings, albeit too many, and signed that she had painted a bird. A chimpanzee named Moja also communicated that she had painted a bird.
2. SEALS
Seals in captivity have been taught to paint with color. But as Kaplan and Rogers point out, the animals are colorblind. The cells of seal retinas contain only green cones, so they can only see green. It is not clear why or how the seals choose different colors of paint.
Other marine mammals, like whales and dolphins — which have also been known to paint in captivity— have the same monochromatic vision. Kaplan and Rogers believe the adaptation is ”likely to have evolved for life in the sea.”
3. COWS
Not only are there bovine artists, NPR reports, but they use quite an unusual medium: 50-pound cubes of salt.
Ranchers give the salt cubes to cows as nutritional supplements. A few years ago, Whit Deschner of Baker, Oregon, observed that the blocks, once licked over, had an array of grooves and curves that left them resembling “vertebrae from prehistoric creatures.” Others appeared to be “windswept sandstone formations you might see in canyon country.” Accordingly, Deschner dreamed up a crazy idea: the “Great Salt Lick Contest.”
While most were initially dubious about the idea, the contest has become a community effort to raise funds for research on Parkinson’s disease, a condition which Deschner himself has. The salt lick creations are auctioned off, with most selling for $200 or $300. The highest price tag ever was $1,000. Overall, more than $30,000 has been raised from “Deschner’s folly.” (So, the cows don’t really paint, this is misleading.)
4. ELEPHANTS
It is not entirely surprising that elephants can paint with a brush or their trunk. After all, they use a range of tools in captivity. Just like humans, different elephants have unique painting styles, which Kaplan and Rogers attribute to individual trunk movements.
While elephants paint in a number of colors, they can only see two pigments — bluish-violet colors and yellowish-red ones — a possible adaption for improved night vision.
5. BOWERBIRDS
Bowerbirdsselect objects for their shape and color and then arrange them in their bowers in what — to humans — seems a deliberately artistic ordering. Satin bowerbirds even paint their bowers with their saliva and plant extracts.
The Bowerbird is the only creature noted here that has been observed creating art in the wild and not in captivity. However, the question remains: Are animals in the wild actually being artistic? Or do animals only create art in zoos and water parks because they have nothing better to do?
What do you think? Are the paintings of elephants and seals, the drawings of chimpanzees and gorillas, the salt sculptures of cows and the trinket-filled bowers of bowerbirds “art”?
In my opinion, based on the information presented, the only two animals that are truly artistically creative, understanding what they are doing are the APES and ELEPHANTS!
South African conservationists are baffled by the behavior of a herd of elephants which appeared to raid an enclosure on a private game reserve “deliberately” to release a group of antelope captured by rangers as part of a relocation and breeding program. “The herd circled the fence and then the matriarch moved to the gate and very carefully and deliberately undid all the gate’s metal latches with her trunk and pushed it open.” The antelope took their chance and dashed back into the bush followed by the elephants, who did not give the food a second glance.
WOMEN GIVE BIRTH IN TREES
Fearing attacks by wild elephants, pregnant women of the east Indian state of Jharkhand are climbing trees to give birth to their babies. In the past two months, in the district of Dumka, at least a dozen pregnant women have delivered their babies on platforms built on treetops. Days before Sonia was to deliver her baby, her husband sensing trouble, built a platform on a tree about 7m above the ground. One night wild elephants attacked their village. He managed to take Sonia to the treetop platform moments before the rampaging elephants knocked down the mud wall of their house and raided their paddy stock. “Tribals who love rice beer brew the liquor at home. Elephants too are fond of this beer. “Often it is found that, attracted by the strong smell of the liquor, wild elephants tear down the tribal houses where the brew is stored.”(Comment: Now we know why it is called the district of “Dumka”).
We seek funds to help treat this child after bringing her to Delhi for better medical care. If you would like to help, please get in touch with us! In the small Indian town of Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh, lives 15 day old Lakshmi. She is born with an Elephant trunk which is one of the rarest facial deformities. If she is not operated on she will not be able to speak or breathe properly. Villagers from near Aligarh, have flocked to see the ‘divine’ girl in the belief, that she is an incarnation of the elephant-headed god Ganesha. According to the doctor her condition may well be a genetic mutation. This is the story of Lakshmi – born with a “trunk”. Lakshmi is the newest addition to the family of Omprakash and Sarvesh. They live in Aligarh in the state of Uttar Pradesh in India. Laksmi’s father Omprakash is a vegetable seller and her mother Sarvesh is a homemaker who takes care of their five children. When Sarvesh was told that she is pregnant and expecting their fifth child, both Sarvesh and Omprakash did not realise the future complications in the pregnancy. They did not take the advice of any doctor and never even went for an ultrasound. At the time of the delivery, the family preferred a home-delivery with only a mid-wife in attendance, due to lack of money. Laxmi was a normal delivery. The mid-wife was shocked to see the baby. When the family saw the baby for the first time, they all were shocked to see a baby with a trunk like that of an elephant. It was hard for them to accept the baby with such an obvious facial deformity. Her facial lump is between her eyes and appears to have divided her nose in two. A crowd of people from nearby villages came to see the girl with a trunk. Everybody believes that she is an incarnation of the Lord Ganesha. Whoever hears about her visits her home to get a glimpse of the baby and makes whatever offerings possible. Doctor Pradeep Bansal, a paediatrician, examined the baby girl to find out more about her condition. According to him, her condition could be a genetic mutation triggered by malnutrition. He referred her to the famous All India Institute of Medical Sciences at New Delhi. Due to lack of money Laxmi’s parents are unable to go to Delhi for treatment. Ompraksh and Sarvesh want to take Lakshmi for corrective surgery when she grows up and are looking for financial support. We hope that Lakshmi, a child born with one of the rarest facial deformities gets all the necessary help and proper medical care so she can grow up as normal child and not as an oddity. For more Best Of India videos , Subscribe To the Channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfxd… This footage is part of the professionally-shot broadcast stock footage archive of Wilderness Films India Ltd., the largest collection of HD imagery from South Asia. The Wilderness Films India collection comprises of 50, 000+ hours of high quality broadcast imagery, mostly shot on HDCAM / SR 1080i High Definition, Alexa, SR, XDCAM and 4K. Write to us for licensing this footage on a broadcast format, for use in your production! We are happy to be commissioned to film for you or else provide you with broadcast crewing and production solutions across South Asia. We pride ourselves in bringing the best of India and South Asia to the world… Please subscribe to our channel wildfilmsindia on Youtube for a steady stream of videos from across India. Also, visit and enjoy your journey across India at www.clipahoy.com , India’s first video-based social networking experience! Reach us at rupindang@gmail.com and admin@wildfilmsindia.com
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I found this last item as I was about to post the article. It is very interesting to me that the UN is now focused on raising money and awareness for these two groups. Fascinating. Of course, the article is written to reinforce the BS line that humans are threatening the animal life. It is propaganda used to raise money and sympathy for whatever project they have going. TRUST ME, it is not that they care about animals. Anymore than they care about humans. THE UN is a force for the NEW WORLD ORDER and wherever they go, it is bad for humans and animals. Anyway, you can read the full article by clicking the link. I only pulled what I found relevant.
This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English. I’m Bob Doughty. nd I’m Sarah Long.
This week — warnings about the danger of extinction for the great apes … and a study that may, or may not, offer good news for African elephants.
The United Nations says great apes are in danger of disappearing. Experts say some species will disappear soon, and others within fifty years. The great apes are gorillas, orangutans, chimpanzees and bonobos. They live in the wild in twenty-three countries in Africa and Asia. They are the closest relatives to humans.
An emergency meeting took place last month in Paris. Representatives from those twenty-three countries met with environmental groups and scientific experts. For three days they discussed how to save the great apes. They also discussed plans for a meeting of government ministers late next year.
The U-N Environment Program and UNESCO, the U-N cultural organization, organized a project in two-thousand-one. It is called the Great Apes Survival Project — or GRASP. Officials say sixteen of the twenty-three countries have begun taking measures to protect their great apes. The meeting organizers say they hope to expand these measures. The United Nations says at least twenty-five million dollars is needed to begin the effort.
Great apes share more than ninety-six percent of our genetic material. They stand upright, and hold things with hands like ours. Their ability to learn is of great interest to people.
Ian Redman heads the technical support team for the Great Apes Survival Project. He says the future of the planet is linked to their survival. He describes great apes, along with elephants, as the “gardeners” of the forest. They help keep it healthy. U-N officials note that to many scientists, if we lose a species of great apes, we destroy part of our humanity.
Human activities are the most serious threat to the great apes. Researchers say the two biggest problems are the destruction of forests and road building. A U-N report called “The Great Apes – the Road Ahead” examines the situation.
Great apes live in environments that contain resources valuable to people. Things like trees, minerals and oil.
The U-N meeting last month in Paris produced an international work plan to help end hunting of great apes. The delegates said countries with these animals must take urgent action. There were also calls for international help to expand protected areas and to increase forest conservation measures. Last year, at the Johannesburg environmental summit, the United States promised ninety-million dollars for such programs in central Africa.
From great apes, we turn to elephants in Africa. A new report says Africa is thought to have between four-hundred-thousand and six-hundred-sixty-thousand elephants. These numbers are higher than reported in nineteen-ninety-nine. But scientists are careful when they talk about the new findings. They say a number of things could explain the increase.
Julian Blanc helped write the report. He says the numbers say little about the condition of elephant populations across Africa. He says most elephant studies are restricted to protected areas. Elephants often flee to these areas to escape from humans. As a result, he says, large groups of elephants can give the misleading appearance that populations have increased.’ spacer
First Landscape Study of Apes and Elephants Released
Thomas Breuer/Wildlife Conservation Society / Western lowland gorillas in the Ndoki-Loukala Landscape
Newswise — The Wildlife Conservation Society announced the results of the first-ever evaluation of a large, “landscape-wide” conservation approach to protect globally important populations of elephants and great apes.
The study looked at wildlife populations in northern Republic of Congo over a mosaic of land-use types, including a national park, a community-managed reserve, and various logging concessions. It found that core protected areas – coupled with strong anti-poaching efforts – are critical for maintaining populations of forest elephants, western lowland gorillas, and chimpanzees.
The region, known as the Ndoki-Likouala Conservation Landscape, is considered one of the most important sites in Central Africa for all three species. The Wildlife Conservation Society has been working in the landscape since 1991 and helped establish Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park in 1993.
The study appears in the April 23rd edition of the journal PLoS One.
Authors include Wildlife Conservation Society researchers Emma Stokes, Samantha Strindberg, Parfait Bakabana, Paul Elkan, Fortuné Iyenguet, Bola Madzoke, Guy Aíme Malanda, Franck Ouakabadio and Hugo Rainey; Brice Mowawa of the Ministre de l’Economie Forestière, Republic of Congo; and Calixte Makoumbou, formerly with WCS Congo Program.
The authors found that protected areas remain a key component of the landscape for all three species. Chimpanzees and elephants are particularly sensitive to human disturbance outside the Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park, and the park plays a major role in their distribution. In fact Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park may be one of the most important sites for chimpanzees in the Congo Basin with some of the highest densities recorded in Central Africa.
The study also found that logging concessions that have wildlife management in place, including protection of key habitats and anti-poaching patrols, can support important populations of elephants and gorillas. However, the authors warn that logging concessions are only of conservation value if there are strict anti-poaching measures in place, and if they are close to protected areas free of human disturbance. As evidence, the study showed the results of surveys in a logging concession without any anti-poaching measures or wildlife management where abundance of all three species was very low.
“Protected areas free of human disturbance, logging, or roads remain key to the protection of great apes and elephants,” said WCS researcher Emma Stokes, the study’s lead author. “Landscape conservation should focus on protected areas surrounded by other land-use types that also have wildlife management in place.”
The forests of the Congo Basin are one of the last remaining tropical wildernesses and a top priority for biodiversity conservation.
Commercial logging is prevalent throughout much of the Congo Basin, with over 30 percent of native forest allocated to logging concessions compared to only 12 percent under protection. More than 50 percent of the current range of western gorillas and chimpanzees is estimated to lie in active logging concessions.
“This study shows that landscape-wide conservation can work in Central Africa – provided there are the resources and political will to save wildlife over large areas,” said James Deutsch, Director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Africa programs. “Conservation on this scale is difficult and expensive, but absolutely necessary if we hope to save viable populations of elephants and great apes. At the same time, the government’s capacity to follow up and take legal action against poachers should be strengthened and is a key to maintaining the protection of the forests and their wildlife.”
The authors estimated elephant and great ape density using distance sampling surveys of elephant dung piles and great ape nests.
The surveys presented in this paper were made possible through generous funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development Central Africa Regional Program for the Environment (CARPE) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Great Ape Conservation Fund.
Currently, WCS advocates the speedy passage of HR 4416, the Great Ape Conservation Reauthorization Act, which would continue government support for the Great Ape Conservation Fund, and applauds Rep. George Miller (D-CA) for leading the effort. In January, Dr. Deutsch testified before a Congressional panel on behalf of WCS in support of the legislation.
The Wildlife Conservation Society saves wildlife and wild places worldwide. We do so through science, global conservation, education and the management of the world’s largest system of urban wildlife parks, led by the flagship Bronx Zoo. Together these activities change attitudes toward nature and help people imagine wildlife and humans living in harmony. WCS is committed to this mission because it is essential to the integrity of life on Earth. Visit: www.wcs.org
This is not living in harmony with nature… this is sacrificing human interest for animals and forests. We all know that forests have historically been safe have havens for all types of activities and entities. They are not worried about the planet. They have their own agenda, and they are using our desire to preserve and protect life to their advantage.
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IF THE UN IS SPEAKING, THEY ARE LYING!! MOST DESTRUCTIVE FORCE ON THE EARTH TODAY IS THE UN!
Conservation and Environmentalism are not what you are hoping they would be. They are being used by the NWO to control the HUMAN POLULATION and that means to KILL the Human Population. Remember, the NWO wants 90% of us DEAD! Don’t buy their lies. They don’t care about the environment or the animals or humans. Everything they do is bringing havoc and destruction.
The whole point of this post is to encourage you to see the possiblity/likelihood that the people turned to APES and ELEPHANTS by GOD are still among us. That the tales of encounters with the Sasquatch/Big Foot are real. That these beings are very human in animal form. Some of them have become repentant and God Fearing. Others, have probably continue in their defiance of GOD and become more animalistic in their behavior. There are difference in ELEPHANTS. Those that appear to display more human like behavior are very likely descendants of the same group of humans. They are humans trapped in animal form. There are likely those of them that have repented and are God Fearing, and those that remain defiant and have become more animalistic. Remember they were among those who built the Tower in direct Defiance of GOD and were judged and punished for it.
If you run into any of them. BE CAUTIOUS. They can be very dangerous. They have been living WILD for thousands of years. We might ought to pray for them. At least those of them that are redeemable.
Just open your minds, and do not limit GOD. He is well able to do ANYTHING. He is the one who created everything and there is so much about the realm of the spirit, that we don’t understand. There is a lot about our physical world, including our own bodies, minds and spirits, that we do not understand.
TRUST GOD! Keep walking in FAITH. Give the HOLY SPIRIT room to work in you and through you. AND REMEMBER… ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE WITH GOD!
Descendants of Phut
Hello i am a Somali, and in Somalia there is a region called ( translated to english) Puntland ( land of punt/phut) and it is belived all somalis came from that region Josephus writes: “Phut also was the founder of Libya, and called the inhabitants Phutites (Phoutes), from himself: there is also a river in the country of Moors which bears that name; whence it is that we may see the greatest part of the Grecian historiographers mention that river and the adjoining country by the appellation of Phut (Phoute): but the name it has now has been by change given it from one of the sons of Mezraim, who was called Lybyos.”[2] Pliny the Elder[3] and Ptolemy[4] both place the river Phuth on the west side of Mauretania (modern Morocco). Ptolemy also mentions a city Putea in Libya (iv.3.39). WikipediaWhere are Cush and Havilah today? – La Vista Church of Christ
Cush founded Ethiopia (just south of Egypt) and Put founded the country we now know as Libya (just west of Egypt). Ethiopia is called the land of Cush,not because it matches the location near Eden, but because its founding ancestor was named Cush. Havilah was also a region in the pre-flood world that is mentioned in Genesis 2:11.
The Solomon Islands experienced some of the fiercest fighting in World War II, and are most famous for the bloody Battle of Guadalcanal in 1942 and 1943.
The Solomon Islands experienced some of the fiercest fighting in World War II, and are most famous for the bloody Battle of Guadalcanal in 1942 and 1943.
It seems likely that various types of monkeys inhabited the landscape of Egypt in the earliest of times. Prehistory saw a much wetter region with a landscape considerably greener than today, and the process of its drying out into mostly desert with only the fertile 
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To Watch This Video On BitChute Click The Title Link Below:
In Śrī Lanka no other animal has been associated for so long with the people in their traditional and religious activities as the elephant. This association dates back to the pre-Christian era, more than 5,000 years. Ancient Sinhalese kings captured and tamed elephants which used to abound in the country.
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