Did Moses Really Ban Direct Spiritual Contact and Spiritual Mediumship?

      

By Stephen William

By Stephen William. He is a UK based Medium and Healer and Author of “Nostradamus His Prophecy Finally Explained.” Available on Kindle now.   https://amzn.eu/d/0czjaIns   One of the problems many mystics and spiritualists encounter from conventional religious  people who follow the main  Abrahamic religions (Christianity , Islam, Judaism etc.) is the claim our direct spiritual contact and our contact with the deceased is somehow  “irreligious”  or even evil! The basis for this accusation primarily, are  the verses in the Book Of Leviticus which forbids contact with the deceased. Here is one of them Leviticus 19:31: "Do not turn to mediums or seek out spiritists, for you will be defiled by them" .  There are other ones of a similar vein , but you get the vibe, contact with the deceased is prohibited. Statements like this have dominated Abrahamic conventional thought for many centuries. However the traditional supposed author of Leviticus is Moses , who is one of the greatest mystics of all time and was contacted himself after his passing  in the Transfiguration in the New Testament!. Also  Moses himself said this in Numbers 11:29 when Joshua reported to Moses some Israelites for making “unauthorised” prophecies. Yet Moses replied,  “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the LORD’s people were prophets and that the LORD would put his Spirit upon them all!” This is puzzling  for not only mystics , but also for some conventional religious believers. So why would Moses make such contradictory statements?   Firstly I would like to establish the probable existence of Moses himself. As many of you  may have read ,some cynics of all spirituality say, that outside of the Bible , there is no independent proof of Mose’s existence and he is probably a mythical figure. However, this is not completely true.In ancient Egyptian records of the time Moses is said to have lived, there is mention of a Levantine Semite called Irsu (Israel is in the Levant) who was hugely influential and had a life which mirrored that closely of Moses . He is mentioned in both the Harris Papyrus and the Elephantine Stele, which date from the time Moses is supposed to have lived. He is also mentioned in Egyptian records after this time.   THE PICTURES OF THE GREAT HARRIS PAPYRUS AND THE ELEPHANTINE STELE, WHICH DETAIL THE LIFE OF IRSU, A LEVANTINE SEMITE WHO TOOK CONTROL OF THE GOVERNMENT OF EGYPT AND TRIED TO DESTROY THE EGYPTIAN RELIGION. HE  AND HIS  ASIAN SEMITE FOLLOWERS WERE EVENTUALLY EXPELLED AND PURSUED BACK INTO THE LEVANT LEAVING BEHIND MANY EXPENSIVE POSSESSIONS. THIS APPEARS TO RESEMBLE PART OF THE MOSES STORY FROM AN EGYPTIAN PERSPECTIVE. THESE SOURCES DATE FROM BEFORE 1100 BCE, SO ARE OF THE ERA MOSES IS SUPPOSED TO HAVE LIVED.     SIMILARITIES BETWEEN IRSU AND MOSES. Some scholars and  historians identify Irsu (also called Arsu), a powerful Semitic official in late 19th Dynasty Egypt, as a potential historical basis for the biblical Moses. .     Key Points of Similarity Foreign Origins & Power  Irsu was a "self-made" Levantine or Semitic official who rose to immense power during a period of Egyptian decline (circa. 1190 BCE), paralleling Moses’ status as a high-ranking Hebrew within the Egyptian court. Period of Turmoil:   The Great Harris Papyrus describes Irsu’s era as one of chaos and "years of empty," during which a foreigner seized power and suppressed Egyptian religious traditions, a narrative that mirrors the biblical plagues and societal breakdown. Role as a Leader of Asians. There are other Ancient Egyptian accounts of Irsu leading a group of "leprous" or "polluted" Asians out of Egypt after a period of dominance and conflict. Israel was a West Asian territory in the Levant at that time according to the Ancient Egyptian records. Linguistic Connections  Some argue "Irsu" (meaning "the one who made himself") is an Egyptian rendering of a figure born without a traditional Egyptian lineage, while "Moses" is an Egyptian suffix (meaning "born of") often used without a preceding god's name, suggesting a similar "man without a father" motif.  Worship of Yahweh  Some theories connect Irsu to the Shasu nomads, who Egyptian records indicate may have a connection to the ancient Israelites, Many scholars suggest that the early Israelites were a subset of the Shasu, a group of Semitic-speaking pastoral nomads or "wanderers" in the Late Bronze/Early Iron Age Levant. Egyptian texts specifically identify a group called the "Shasu of Yhw” (Yahweh), indicating a potential link to the origin of the Israelite religion.     The "Shasu of Yhw".   Egyptian inscriptions from the 15th-13th centuries BCE refer to Shasu tribes located in Edom and Seir as inhabiting "the land of the “Shasu of Yhw". Many scholars,  believe this group introduced the worship of Yahweh to the northern Canaanite highlands. Lifestyle.   The Shasu were nomadic or semi-nomadic, fitting the biblical narrative of a wilderness-wandering period better than that of the settled, urbanized Canaanites. Their lifestyle appears to resemble the lifestyle of earlier Biblical patriarchs such as Abraham and Jacob. Overlap with Other Groups:   The Shasu were not exclusively early Israelites; they were a broader demographic that included, or was closely connected to, other groups like the Edomites and Midianites.    In summary, it appears some of the early Israelites were likely part of a larger, nomadic Shasu movement in the region of Edom/Midian, particularly those known for worshipping the deity Yhw. As you will notice, Shasu people were partly resident in Midian. As the Bible clearly states, Moses lived part of his  adult life in Midian and married the  Midianite priest Jethro’s daughter Zipporah. I think we can safely say that Moses and Irsu were one and the same person, even if some the events attributed to him are possibly inaccurately reported in both Biblical and Egyptian records through political,religious and national bias etc.   So what has this to do with modern day mystics you may ask? Well many of the modern spiritually inclined people of modern times are discouraged from direct mystical contact through some of the teachings attributed to him and supposedly written by him. This  prevents them from experiencing direct spiritual contact , not only to reaffirm their own faith- based belief in a spiritual dimension to existence, but also to demonstrate to people who have no spirituality in their life, that spirituality is not a bygone tradition that has no place in the modern world.   However there is an understandable solution to why an obviously mystical man such as Moses or Irsu  should appear to contradict himself or ban a practice himself that he himself may have performed ? Moses’s traditionally is credited with writing the  first five books of the Bible. These books are collectively known as the Torah in Hebrew or the Pentateuch in Greek.    The five books are: Genesis: Creation and the early history of humanity and the patriarchs. Exodus: The Israelites' departure from Egypt and the receiving of the Ten Commandments. Leviticus: Laws regarding rituals, sacrifices, and moral codes. Numbers: The 40-year journey of the Israelites through the wilderness. Deuteronomy: Moses' final speeches and instructions before the Israelites entered the Promised Land . However modern Biblical scholars have identified some discrepancies with this tradition. In Deuteronomy there is a commentary on Moses’s death and funeral.  Moses cannot have written this as he was dead. The stories in the early part of Genesis, such as Adam and Eve and Noah’s Ark etc. strongly resemble similar tales from the old heathen and idolatrous  religion of the Sumerians, predecessors to the Babylonian inhabitants of Babylonian Mesopotamia. These  may have been known to Moses, but surely he would not include them as connected to Yahweh who he apparently had directly spoken with.   Throughout these five books are different writing styles indicating different authors and events and practices which would not have been known in Moses’s time according to Biblical scholars. A BRONZE IMAGE FROM MESOPOTAMIA SHOWING WHAT APPEARS TO BE THE EARLIER SUMERIAN VERSION OF ADAM AND EVE. IT SHOWS THE SERPENT , THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE AND A CLOTHED VERSION OF ADAM AND EVE. THIS IMAGE IS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM IN LONDON,ENGLAND.   Modern biblical scholarship  generally holds that while the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) was compiled and edited during the Babylonian exile (6th century BCE) and the subsequent Persian period. It was not written entirely during that time. Instead, the Torah is understood as a compilation of several older, independent written sources and oral traditions that were brought together, rather than a new creation written from scratch in Babylon  and the following Persian period (5th century BCE).This was many centuries after Moses or Irsu died . He according to both Israelite and Egyptian sources lived and died over 500 years before this period.     Facing the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem  and then deportation to Babylonia, the Jewish elite in Babylon likely compiled the texts to preserve their identity, culture, and religious laws without a central sanctuary such as the Temple. Therefore they probably edited out general direct spiritual contact. Why? Well as modern mystics  by our personal knowledge we know, direct spiritual contact transcends religious cultures and always has done. Why would Biblical law ban it if it did not exist? Yet  the ancient monotheistic  Jewish elite knew that as captive exiles in a polytheistic foreign land ,with a very different moral and behaviour tradition (some of it very cruel) started to have a spiritual influence over their people, their people and their religion would eventually disappear into the mists of history. They were obviously correct in their judgement at that time , as the Jewish religion and culture still exist and flourish despite centuries of unfair persecution. However, the ancient Babylonian religion and often cruel practices have disappeared into the pages of history.   Nonetheless this successful survival strategy of that time , perhaps  inhibits spiritual development in our time. Spirituality is under assault in the modern world for the  mainly conventional faith only religions. They offer no proof of a spiritual dimension to existence. Modern logic often demands proof before believing in such a fundamental commitment to belief in an invisible presence. Yet our natural allies in spiritual belief refuse to accept the evidence we can provide. They would rather lose “believers”,  than review the meaning of a teaching ,which they believe to be over 3000 years old and  addressed a situation that applied specifically to the situation the ancient Jewish people in exile were in at that time.   Their position seems to be that “Okay  Moses and his successors such as Samuel, Elijah etc. had direct spiritual experiences ,but they did not contact the dead.” Well the answer to that is they are not  recorded by others as contacting the dead.   However Moses, Samuel and Elijah have all allowed themselves to be contacted since they have diedccording to the Bible itself, so it cannot be that sacrilegious !    One of the virtues of having a direct spiritual experience is that is there is required evidence of the experience of the contact to ensure that other people accept that you have had one. For example anyone can say they have been visited by an angel or God Himself. But unless you can provide evidence of this “visitation” ,even conventionally religious people may think you are delusional or suffering from a form of psychosis. For example, vicious criminals sometimes in court, in the hope of lessening their blame for their crime blame “voices in their head told them to do it “ or even “God told them to do it.” Sometimes they are genuinely suffering a mental illness , but in other cases it is seen a sign of their dishonesty and guilt and also disregarded as an excuse for their behaviour.   Moses, according to the Bible demonstrated his spiritual/supernatural abilities to the ancient Israelite people such as ,outperforming the Ancient Egyptian court magicians and the visitation of the Plagues on the Egyptian people etc.etc. So why in modern times are not modern people not allowed to have evidence of the Afterlife and a spiritual dimension to life? The concept of modern religion is built upon spiritual proof in the past ,but not in the present. However mysticism and specifically spiritual mediumship can give proof of the spiritual dimension and Afterlife. When you have evidence of the post-death survival of loved ones or someone else close to you and the information given cannot be possibly guessed at , you have evidence of the spiritual dimension. What people do with that evidence is up to them. They do not have to become spiritualists or mystics themselves(but it would be nice if they did!) and they may try to put it down to “telepathy” (which has not been scientifically proven to exist!) but they cannot deny they have not been given evidence.   Yet for some people whether conventionally religious or of no belief such evidence is transforming, as it should be. To the religious it demonstrates that their belief is not mistaken or old- fashioned nonsense and the non-religious are confronted with a new dimension to their concept of existence. In both groups it is a Revelation or as it is referred to in Biblical terms . an Apocalypse, albeit a personal one!   Something I discovered when  researching this article, is that most major famous religious teachers both in Abrahamic and in other religions did not write down their own teachings! Even those who we know to be probably literate and well educated, such Moses/Irsu himself. Generally speaking their teachings were transmitted to their close followers orally who then orally transmitted them to their followers. In many cases their teachings were not actually written down by professional scribes until many decades or even centuries after the original teacher or prophet’s death. You can check this out by your own research for your own religion or others. This of course leads to incorrect memory of the original teachings or deliberate alteration.    The reasons why it took long periods of time for them to written down vary, but remember paying scribes to write them down and then copy them again and again was expensive. Printing was not invented until about 200 -300 CE(AD) in China and did not really spread to the West until the Middle Ages. You needed a large  paying audience to justify scribes churning out many manuscripts and the religion had to become widespread for that to happen. That generally would not happen near the originator’s lifetime.   We now live in a world where we are interconnected with people of other faiths and national backgrounds through migration and trade. In fact many of us in the West live and work in environments ,which are full of products from non-Abrahamic countries. They also buy many products from us. Therefore we are interdependent on each other . Spiritual mediumship and mysticism can  bring us together also. People of different religious backgrounds by the actual knowledge of a spiritual dimension can relate to their religious background anew. Most religions preach some form of kindness and respect for fellow human beings. So whatever religious background you have , that will be enhanced by  actual spiritual knowledge. It may also encourage you to examine other religions teachings and look for the similarities rather than the differences. Some major religions in the Eastern world never rejected personal mysticism as part of their religious practice. Perhaps the West will now rediscover that as well?   ©Stephen William International Copyright. If you wish to read my book, it is available on this link at Amazon. https://amzn.eu/d/0eJF8fz5                 .