Zecharia Sitchin - 02 - The Stairway to Heaven (1980).pdf

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Contents

I. I

EARCH OF

ARADISE

, 1

II. T

MMORTAL

NCESTORS

, 18

III. T

HARAOH

OURNEY TO THE

FTERLIFE

, 35

IV. T

TAIRWAY TO

EAVEN

, 47

V. T

ODS

AME TO

LANET

ARTH

, 68

VI. I

N THE

AYS BEFORE THE

ELUGE

, 97

VII. G

ILGAMESH

: T

ING

EFUSED TO

, 118

VIII. R

IDERS OF THE

LOUDS

, 144

IX. T

ANDINC

LACE

168

X. T

ILMUN

: L

AND OF THE

OCKETSHIPS

, 189

XI. T

LUSIVE

OUNT

, 208

XII. T

YRAMIDS OF

ODS AND

INGS

, 228

XIII. F

ORCING THE

HARAOH

AME

, 253

XIV. T

AZE OF THE

PHINX

, 283

SOURCES

309

INDEX

315

In Search ofParadise

There was a time—our ancient scriptures tell us—when Immortality was

within the grasp of Mankind.

A golden age it was, when Man lived with his Creator in the Garden of

Eden—Man tending the wonderful orchard, God taking strolls in the

afternoon breeze. "And the Lord God caused to grow from the ground

every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for eating; and the Tree of

Life was in the orchard, and the Tree of Knowing good and evil. And a river

went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it was parted and

became four principal streams: the name of the first is Pishon . . . and of the

second Gihon . . . and of the third Tigris . . . and the fourth river is the

Euphrates."

Of the fruit of every tree were Adam and Eve permitted to eat—except of

the fruit of the Tree of Knowing. But once they did (tempted by the

Serpent)—the Lord God grew concerned over the matter of Immortality:

Then did the Lord Yahweh say:

"Behold, the Adam has become as one of us

to know good and evil;

And now might he not put forth his hand

and partake also of the Tree of Life,

and eat, and live forever?"

And the Lord Yahweh expelled the Adam

from the Garden of Eden . . .

And He placed at the east of the Garden of Eden

the Cherubim, and the Flaming Sword which revolveth,

to guard the way to the Tree of Life.

So was Man cast out of the very place where eternal life was within his

grasp. But though barred from it, he has never ceased to remember it, to

yearn for it, and to try to reach it.

Ever since that expulsion from Paradise, heroes have gone to the ends of

Earth in search of Immortality; a selected few were given a glimpse of it;

and simple folk claimed to have chanced upon it. Throughout the ages, the

The Stairway to Heaven

Search for Paradise was the realm of the individual; but earlier in this

millennium, it was launched as the national enterprise of mighty kingdoms.

The New World was discovered—so have we been led to believe—when

explorers went seeking a new, maritime route to India and her wealth.

True—but not the whole truth: for what Ferdinand and Isabel, king and

queen of Spain, had desired most to find was the Fountain of Eternal Youth:

a magical fountain whose waters rejuvenate the old and keep one young

forever, for it springs from a well in Paradise.

No sooner had Columbus and his men set foot in what they all thought

were the islands off India (the "West Indies"), than they combined the

exploration of the new lands with a search for the legendary Fountain whose

waters "made old men young again." Captured "Indians" were questioned,

even tortured, by the Spaniards, so that they would reveal the secret

location of the Fountain.

One who excelled in such investigations was Ponce de Leon, a profes-

sional soldier and adventurer, who rose through the ranks to become

governor of the part of the island of Hispaniola now called Haiti, and of

Puerto Rico. In 1511, he witnessed the interrogation of some captured

Indians, Describing their island, they spoke of its pearls and other riches.

They also extolled the marvelous virtues of its waters. A spring there is,

they said, of which an islander "grievously oppressed with old age" had

drunk. As a result, he "brought home manly strength and has practiced all

manly performances, having taken a wife again and begotten children."

Listening with mounting excitement, Ponce de Leon—himself an aging

man—was convinced that the Indians were describing the miraculous

Fountain of the rejuvenating waters. Their postscript, that the old man who

drank of the waters regained his manly strength, could resume practicing

"all manly performances," and even took again a young wife who bore him

children—was the most conclusive aspect of their tale. For in the court of

Spain, as throughout Europe, there hung numerous paintings by the

greatest painters, and whenever they depicted love scenes or sexual

allegories, they included in the scene a fountain. Perhaps the most famous

of such paintings, Titian's Love Sacred and Love Profane, was created at

about the time the Spaniards were on their quest in the Indies. As everyone

well knew, the Fountain in the paintings hinted at the ultimate lovemaking;

the Fountain whose waters make possible "all manly performances"

through Eternal Youth.

Ponce de Leon's report to King Ferdinand is reflected in the records kept

by the official court historian, Peter Martyr de Angleria. As stated in his

Decade de Orbe Novo [Decades of the New World], the Indians who had

come from the islands of Lucayos or the Bahamas, had revealed that "there

is an island ... in which there is a perennial spring of running water of such

marvelous virtue, that the waters thereof being drunk, perhaps with some

diet, make old men young again." Many researches, such as Ponce de

Leon's Fountain of Youth: History of a Geographical Myth by Leonardo

In Search of Paradise 3

Olschki, have established that "the Fountain of Youth was the most popular

and characteristic expression of the emotions and expectations which

agitated the conquerors of the New World." Undoubtedly, Ferdinand the

king of Spain was one of those so agitated, so expectant for the definitive

news.

So, when word came from Ponce de Leon, Ferdinand lost little time. He

at once granted Ponce de Leon a Patent of Discovery (dated February 23,

1512), authorizing an expedition from the island of Hispaniola northward.

The admiralty was ordered to assist Ponce de Leon and make available to

him the best ships and seamen, so that he might discover without delay the

island of "Beininy" (Bimini). The king made one condition explicit: "that

after having reached the island and learned what is in it, you shall send me a

report of it."

In March 1513, Ponce de Leon set out northward, to look for the island of

Bimini. The public excuse for the expedition was a search for "gold and

other metals"; the true aim was to find the Fountain of Eternal Youth. This

the seamen soon learnt as they came upon not one island but hundreds of

islands in the Bahamas. Anchoring at island after island, the landing parties

were instructed to search not for gold but for some unusual fountain. The

waters of each stream were tasted and drunk—but with no evident effects

On Easter Sunday—Pasca de Flares by its Spanish name—a long coastline

was sighted. Ponce de Leon called the "island" Florida. Sailing along the

coast and landing again and again, he and his men searched the jungled

forests and drank the waters of endless springs. But none seemed to work

the expected miracle.

The mission's failure appears to have hardly dampened the conviction

that the Fountain was undoubtedly there: it only had to be discovered.

More Indians were questioned. Some seemed unusually young for the old

ages claimed by them. Others repeated legends that confirmed the

existence of the Fountain. One such legend (as recounted in Creation

Myths of Primitive America by J. Curtin) relates that when Olelbis, "He

Who Sits Above," was about to create Mankind, he sent two emissaries to

Earth to construct a ladder which would connect Earth and Heaven.

Halfway up the ladder, they were to set up a resting place, with a pool of

pure drinking waters. At the summit, they were to create two springs: one

for drinking and the other for bathing. When a man or woman grows old,

said Olelbis, let him or her climb up to this summit, and drink and bathe;

whereupon his youth shall be restored.

The conviction that the Fountain existed somewhere on the islands was

so strong that in 1514—the year after Ponce de Leon's unfruitful mission—

Peter Martyr (in his Second Decade) informed Pope Leo X as follows:

At a distance of 325 leagues from Hispaniola, they tell, there is an

island called Boyuca, alias Ananeo, which—according to those who

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