Babylon rising: the secret on Ararat Read online

  She hadn't tied her hair back as she usually did. It was hanging long, its jet-black luster contrasting with the shining silver crucifix at her throat. The way her sparkling green eyes seemed riveted to him as he spoke, it was easy to see that she cared for him deeply. It was as if she was trying with all her being to bridge a chasm between them.

  Then, at exactly nine o'clock, Murphy strode into the hall and the chattering ceased almost instantly. His magnetic presence was such that he never had to raise his voice or ask for quiet.

  Murphy walked to the desk in the center of the room and placed his lecture materials down. He looked up at

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  the silent crowd, quickly checking to see who was there, and launched straight into the lecture.

  "Noah's Ark: Is it a fact, or is it a fable?"

  For the next ten minutes Murphy talked about the Flood story and about Noah building the ark, quoting the Book of Genesis from memory and ending with the rainbow.

  "The rainbow in the sky was God's promise to Noah that He would never again destroy the world by flood waters."

  Murphy then clicked on the PowerPoint projector.

  "As you can see from the following slides, there are many historians and scholars who, down through the millennia, have mentioned the ark as an actual stucture, and even talked of Noah. Keep in mind, these are all documented, non-biblical sources. So even without the Bible, there are plenty of pieces of recorded evidence in the historical record to conclude that a global flood did indeed occur on our planet more than five thousand years ago."

  The Samaritan Pentateuch --5th century B.C.

  Talks about the landing place of the ark.

  Targums --5th century B.C.

  Talks about location of the ark.

  Berossus --275 B.C.

  A Chaldean priest: "It is said, more-over, that a portion of the vessel still

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  survives in Armenia ... and that persons carry off pieces of the bitumen, which they use as talismans."

  Nicholas of Damascus --30 B.C.

  "Relics of the timbers were long preserved."

  Josephus --A.D. 75

  "Remains which to this day are shown to those who are curious to see them."

  Theophilus of Antioch --A.D. 180

  "And of the ark, the remains are to this day seen in the Arabian mountain."

  Eusebius --A.D. 3rd century

  "A small part of the ark still remained in the Gordian Mountains."

  Epiphanius --A.D. 4th century

  "The remains are still shown and if one looks diligently he can still find the altar of Noah."

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  Isidore of Seville --A.D. 6th century

  "So even to this day wood remains of it are to be seen."

  Al Masudi --A.D. 10th century

  "The place can still be seen."

  Ibn Haukal --A.D. 10th century

  "Noah built a village there at the foot of the mountain."

  Benjamin of Tudela --A.D. 12th century

  "Omar Ben Ac Khatab removed parts of the ark from the summit and made a mosque of it."

  Murphy let the words on the screen speak for themselves. The class seemed stunned that what they had thought of as a Bible story was so well documented in other sources. Murphy turned off the projector.

  "Any questions so far?"

  One hand went up. It was right in front of Murphy and belonged to Paul Wallach. Paul had originally come to Preston to take a business-studies course, but partly under Shari's influence, he had become an enthusiastic archaeology student.

  "I noticed on your slides, Professor Murphy, that several different mountain ranges were mentioned. There were the Gordian Mountains, the Arabian Mountains, and the Mountains of Armenia. Doesn't

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  that prove that the information was made up and no one really knows?"

  There was more than a touch of hostility and challenge in Paul's question, and Shari was now looking at Paul with annoyance.

  Murphy smiled, as he usually did, even when challenged in front of others. You could have heard a pin drop in the silent lecture theater as the audience waited for his response.

  "That's a good question, Paul. Thank you for drawing that to our attention. Present-day Armenia is just a few miles from Mount Ararat. Turkey is located in the continent of Asia, and this part of the world is often referred to as an Arabian area. With regard to calling it the Gordian Mountains, you have to remember that these writers each came from different areas and wrote in different time periods. The names of places change over time. Istanbul, Turkey, was once called Constantinople. Mount Ararat is also known as Agri Daugh, which means painful mountain . Most scholars believe that the writers were all referring to the same general area, calling it by the only names they knew at the time."

  Paul looked a little disappointed, as if the question had been designed purely to needle Murphy and it hadn't worked.

  Another hand went up in the back. It was Clayton Anderson, the class clown.

  "Professor Murphy? What did Noah say to his sons while all the animals were entering the ark?"

  Murphy could tell he was being set up.

  "I give up, Clayton. What did he say?"

  "Now I herd everything."

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  Some of the class laughed, most groaned, and more hands shot in the air.

  "Terry!" said Murphy as he pointed to a tall thin student.

  "Professor Murphy? What did Noah say to his sons when they wanted to go fishing?"

  "What, Terry?"

  "Go easy with the bait, boys--there's only two worms!"

  Murphy didn't mind a little humor, but he didn't want to lose control totally.

  "One more question. Pam, you're the last one."

  "Was Noah's wife called Joan of Ark?"

  Murphy raised both of his hands to quiet everyone down.

  "The short answer, Pam, is no. But if you're interested in who Noah's wife really was, I think I can answer that. In the fourth chapter of Genesis there is the story of Cain and Abel. Cain had a son by the name of Enoch. Some Jewish scholars believe that Cain was the inventor of weights and measures and some types of surveying equipment. They believe that because of a great city he built and named after his son Enoch. Enoch had a number of sons and one of them was Lamech."

  Murphy could see from the blank faces in front of him that he needed to get to his conclusion fast.

  "Okay, hang on! Lamech had three sons: Jabal, known as the father of those who live in tents and deal with animals; Jubal, the father of musicians, and Tubal-cain, the father of all metallurgy. Tubal-cain had a sister by the name of Naamah, which means beautiful . Many ancient Jewish scholars believe that Naamah became Noah's wife."

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  It seemed like a good time to use the PowerPoint again. Murphy waited a moment or two and then turned on the projector.

  "We left off looking at historical documents concerning Noah and the ark. The next slide gives you a list of a few other authors who have talked about the ark and its location."

  Other Historical Authors Writing About

  Noah and the Ark

  Hieronymus--30 B.C.

  The Quran--A.D. 7th century

  Eutyches--A.D. 9th century

  William of Rubruck--A.D. 1254

  Odoric of Pordenone--A.D. 12th century

  Vincent of Beauvais--A.D. 13th century

  Ibn Al Mid--A.D. 13th century

  Jordanus--A.D. 13th century

  Pegolotti--A.D. 1340

  Marco Polo--A.D. 14th century

  Gonzalez De Clavijo--A.D. 1412

  John Heywood--A.D. 1520

  Adam Olearius--A.D. 1647

  Jans Janszoon Struys--A.D. 1694

  A hand was raised in the back of the room.

  "Professor Murphy, I was told by someone that they have found pieces of the ark. Is that true?"

  Murphy took a deep breath. For a moment he

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  thought Shari had told so
meone about his adventures in the Cave of the Waters and his amazing find there. But he knew she was the soul of discretion. Even under torture she would have kept his secret.

  "Well, there have been some very interesting discoveries. Mount Ararat is about seventeen thousand feet high. Most ark sightings have been somewhere between the fourteen-thousand- and sixteen-thousand-foot elevation level. In 1876, British Viscount James Bryce climbed Mount Ararat in search of the ark. He didn't find it, but he did find wood above the thirteen-thousand-foot level. Let me quote you what he said."

  Murphy shuffled around on his desk and came up with a piece of paper. "Bryce stated the following:

  Mounting steadily along the same ridge, I saw at a height of over thirteen thousand feet, lying on the loose rocks, a piece of wood about four feet long and five inches thick, evidently cut by some tool, and so far above the limit of trees that it could by no possibility be a natural fragment of one....

  "The question is, could that piece of wood have washed down from the ark, which was higher on the mountain? Along this same line, a man named E. de Markoff, a member of the Russian Imperial Geographical Society, found wood near the fourteen-thousand-foot level. Also, in 1936, a New Zealand archaeologist called Hardwicke Knight found waterlogged rectangular timbers protruding out of the snow. These pieces of wood were nine inches to a foot square. The wood was

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  very dark and extremely soft. He concluded that they must have been submerged in water for a long period of time."

  Murphy turned and grabbed another piece of paper off his desk.

  "This represents probably the most famous wood find above the timberline. It was discovered by Fernand Navarra. In 1952, he and a search team were looking for the ark. They were walking over a clear ice field near the Ahora Gorge when suddenly they saw something.

  In front of us was always the deep transparent ice. A few more paces and suddenly, as if there were an eclipse of the sun, the ice became strangely dark. Yet the sun was still there and above us the eagle still circled. We were surrounded by whiteness, stretching into the distance, yet beneath our eyes was this astonishing patch of blackness within the ice, its outlines sharply defined.

  Fascinated and intrigued, we began straightaway to trace out its shape, mapping its limits foot by foot: two progressively incurving lines were revealed, which were clearly defined for a distance of three hundred cubits, before meeting in the heart of the glacier. The shape was unmistakably that of a ship's hull; on either side the edges of the patch curved like the gunwales of a great boat. As for the central part, it merged into a black mass. The details of which were not discernible.

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  "Navarra made two more attempts to discover what was under the ice. One in 1953 and the other in 1955. On the last expedition they found wood. In his own words, he says:

  Once on the edge of the crevasse, I lowered the equipment on a rope. Then I secured the ladder and climbed down myself, assuring Raphael I would not be long.

  Attacking the ice shell with my pickax, I could feel something hard. When I had cut a hole one and one half feet square by eight inches deep, I broke through a vaulted ceiling, and cleared off as much icy dust as possible.

  There, immersed in water, I saw a black piece of wood!

  My throat felt tight. I felt like crying and kneeling there to thank God. After the cruelest disappointment, the greatest joy! I checked my tears of happiness to shout to Raphael, 'I've found wood!'

  'Hurry up and come back--I'm cold,' he answered.

  I tried to pull out the whole beam, but couldn't. It must have been very long, and perhaps still attached to other parts of the ship's framework. I could only cut along the grain until I split off a piece about five feet long. Obviously, it had been hand-hewn. The wood, once out of the water, proved surprisingly heavy. Its density was remarkable after its long stay in the water,

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  and the fibers had not distended as much as one might expect.

  "Navarra had the wood carbon-fourteen-tested, along with other tests for lignite formation, grain density, cell modification, growth rings, and fossilization. His results suggested that it was about five thousand years old."

  The bell rang and everybody jumped. Murphy had lost track of time.

  "Thanks for your interest, people. I'm sorry we've got to end it there, but next time we're going to look at the stories of explorers who claimed to have actually entered Noah's Ark."

  As he watched the students making their way out of the auditorium, he wondered if he would soon have a story of his own to tell.

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  EIGHT

  IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL spring day on the Preston campus. Murphy had found a quiet table near where the lawn and small pond met. He got away, as far as he could, from the hustle and bustle of the students in the snack area. He was sipping a strawberry lemonade and thinking about the hand-size chunk of wood sitting in a locked cabinet in his lab.

  Murphy was an archaeologist, not a biologist, by training. But lecturing on the ark had made him think about the incredible diversity of God's creation--everything that Noah had saved from the Flood. As he looked out over the lush green campus, he could see the flowering dogwood with its blossoms of four white petals. Interspersed were the maples and the tulip trees with their yellow blossoms. He could also see the deeply furrowed cinnamon-red bark of the loblolly pine.

  His interest began to focus on the azaleas surrounding

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  the pond. The fragrant smell of the trumpet-shaped flowers filled the air. The bees were flying in and out, getting their fill of nectar. Then he spotted a Venus flytrap. It was growing on the damp edges of the pond in the direct sunlight. Its trap was lined with sharp bristles and was open, the sensitive hairs ready for its prey to come along and touch them. Murphy did not have to wait long. A small fly landed on the outside of the plant and began to work its way toward the center. Murphy watched as it got closer and closer to the trigger hairs. Then it happened. In a flash the plant closed on its lunch.

  Murphy stroked his chin thoughtfully. Was someone trying to tell him something? That beautiful things can also be deadly, perhaps?

  Before he had time to figure it out, his solitude ended.

  "Professor Murphy! Could we ask you a few questions?"

  Turning, he saw several students from his archaeology class.

  "Sure," he said, motioning for them to sit down. It was sometimes frustrating when he wanted to just sit and think, but he couldn't complain if his students were interested enough in his subject to track him down with burning questions. That was what being a teacher was all about.

  "We've been talking about Noah's Ark," said a skinny young man with long, unruly hair. "Like, could it really have happened the way it's written in the Bible? How could Noah have gotten all the animals on the ark, for instance?"

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  "Good question," Murphy said as he reached for his briefcase. He opened it and took out a folder. He looked through it and pulled out a piece of paper.

  "Here is a paper put together by Ernst Mayr. You may not be familiar with his name, but he is one of America's leading taxonomists. He lists on this table the number of animal species. Here, take a look at it."

  Murphy handed them the sheet, which read:

  Total Animal Species

  Mammals

  3,700

  Birds

  8,600

  Reptiles

  6,300

  Amphibians

  2,500

  Fishes

  20,600

  Tunicates, etc.

  1,325

  Echinoderms

  6,000

  Arthropods

  838,000

  Mollusks

  107,250

  Worms, etc.

  39,450

  Coelenterates, etc.

  5,380

  Sponges

  4,800

  Protozoa

  28,400

  Total

  1,07
2,305

  "Over a million species! No one could have built a boat big enough to hold that kind of number, could they? Especially if there were two of everything, right?" said one of the students.

  "It does seem like a lot," admitted Murphy. "But, of course, many of those species didn't have to be on the

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  ark to survive the flood. The fishes, tunicates, echinoderms, mollusks, coelenterates, sponges, protozoa, and many of the arthropods and worms would have been better off staying in the ocean. And many of the animals that did need to live on the ark were small, like mice, cats, birds, and sheep. If you look at the larger animals like the elephants and giraffes and hippos, they are the exception. Most animals are small, and many experts in the field do not believe that there were any more than fifty thousand land animals on the ark."

  "That's still a lot of animals!" said another of the students.

  "True, but there was more room on the ark than you realize. Let me see if I can help you visualize it. The average train stock car has a volume of 2,670 cubic feet. The ark was estimated to be about 450 long, 45 feet high, and 75 feet wide. That would produce a volume of around 1,518,750 cubic feet. Now, divide the 2,670 cubic feet of the boxcar into the volume on the ark and it would equal 569 standard railroad stock cars."

  "That's a long train!" said one of the students, laughing.

  "Keep following the illustration. If you double-deck a stock car, you can haul 240 animals the size of a sheep. Now multiply 240 animals times 569 stock cars and you get approximately 136,560 animals that could have been put into the ark. Subtract the estimated fifty thousand animals on the ark and you would have space for 86,560 more animals the size of a sheep. Only about thirty-six percent of the ark would have to have been used for animals. The rest could have been for food storage and living quarters for Noah and his family."