Archive 7206

CHILEAN HOLDS THAT ATLANTIS WAS ISRAEL

The journalist Jaime Manuschevich spoke extensively with Terra.cl and told unpublished details of how he managed to develop such a novel theory about the exact location of Plato’s lost continent.(TERRA.cl)

SANTIAGO, August 02, 2005.- The experienced journalist and writer Jaime Manuschevich, after many trips to the Middle East and Europe, began to put together a fairly complex theory that was directly related to a mythical continent that disappeared at the dawn of time and that thanks to the Greek philosopher Plato is known as Atlantis. From exhaustive analyzes in 2002 a book called “Atlantis, myth deciphered” came to light, and it was precisely from this writing that he was invited to the first international congress on Atlantis, which took place this year in Greece. . He was one of the exponents who drew the most applause since his original theory apparently left more than one reflecting.

How did you begin to study such an apocryphal subject as Atlantis? Is it something you have been pursuing since you were a child?

The truth is I came across the subject by chance, as happens with many discoveries. When I formulated the hypothesis that ancient Canaan or Israel was Atlantis, -which seemed novel and interesting to me, but above all, logical, since the Middle East is the cradle of civilization- I began to investigate for 3 years, concluding with a book.

As a comment to the question, it seems to me that qualifying the Atlantis or Atlantis theme as apocryphal is a mistake, since the word means false or fictitious or simulated. Until only 70 years ago we were completely unaware of the existence of the Mesopotamian or Hittite civilization; and until 90 ago, from the Minoan. That we do not know part of its meaning for now only reflects ignorance, it is not necessarily the truth. And in this you have to be very careful, since scientific work precisely seeks to overcome ignorance, sometimes having to overcome many prejudices. Without going too far, the Spanish court mocked Columbus for years, and science initially rejected Wenager, creator of the tectonic plate theory, the basis for scientific geology.

What is the research you have had to develop to generate a different theory? (it is only theoretical, in the field)

My research work was both theoretical and field, visiting Israel and the region several times, basically studying its geological and geomorphological characteristics (its shape), to see the correspondence with the myth, where I found coincidences spectacular. In parallel, I investigated other aspects of the region, such as Chalcolithic history, archaeology, anthropology, geology, paleoceanography, its botanical history, including genetics and linguistics. All the data said the same: there were all the first vestiges of civilization and everything indicated that the region was the center of a great culture.

I am the type of person who is only convinced by rational arguments, so I had to start by persuading myself that I was not considering a fantasy, checking many times the data and the theoretical assumptions with which I was working. .

It was not easy to obtain all the necessary documentation, because in Chile a lot of up-to-date material simply does not exist anywhere and several important researchers simply are not known by anyone. I had to look for a lot of material in other countries.

What areas have you visited in pursuit of the realization of your objectives?

In pursuit of the investigation, specifically all of Israel, each region in particular: Haifa, the Leesrael Valley, Galilee, the Golan, Samaria, Judea, the Dead Sea, Qunram, the Arava, the Negev, and surrounding areas such as Petra and the Sinai. Well, it also helped me to have traveled through almost all of Europe, to have seen archaeological remains in places like Ostia Antigua (the old port of Rome) or areas of Brazil and Argentina, the north of Chile, Peru, to perceive in a very exact way the gigantic changes that the earth has experienced in terms of sea levels and its effects on the climate in the last 12,000 years, an aspect that is key to understanding my theory. My last trip to Greece also helped me to obtain other spectacular data, such as a Minoan port settlement in Apollonia or characteristics of the Greek coasts that are key.

Did Atlantis really exist?

Without a doubt. My certainty today is absolute. This was the first human civilization, which made the human being jump from hunting and gathering to food production, that is, to agriculture and livestock, an essential aspect for the development of a civilization. It also allowed man to develop writing, knowledge of the annual climate cycle, astronomy, mathematics, urban planning, water management, metallurgy, government system, a first legislative system, navigation, trade, exchange systems, ceramics, technology agricultural etc

All the civilizations that arose in parallel around the 5th millennium before the common era, after its destruction -Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, Yemen, southeastern Europe, Tartessia- already had all this important technology. This fact alone is irrefutable proof of its existence. It is an enormous anthropological absurdity to even think that several civilizations emerged “spontaneously” at the same time without a common ancestor. Civilizations arise as a result of an evolutionary process, they do not spring from nothing. It is like thinking that the current Western European culture would have emerged from nothing, without a previous Rome.

How could it be possible that Atlantis was in the Sinai Peninsula and Israel?

Here is a key aspect to unravel the mystery. And the explanation is provided by geology. The Sinai Peninsula and Israel was an island until 7,600 years ago, according to the history studied by Ryan and Pitman, when the Dead Sea was still connected to the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. That precisely led me to study the region in search of this lost island. Until now, the Platonic phrase “after the subsidence caused by the earthquake” (Critias, 109) was always interpreted as the sinking of the earth, an issue that the text does not actually say. Based on Ryan and Pitman, I formulated the question backwards: the sinking of the sea. Then, before my eyes -virtually, that is to say- Atlantis emerged.

My interpretation of the facts fit with the sentence that follows after the previous one: “an impassable barrier of mud became, which therefore prevented travelers from sailing to any part of the ocean”, (Critias, 109), which which is only correct if the sea goes down.

And this was clearly so. All the new studies carried out in the last 3 or 4 years by specialists, paleoceanographers, such as Kurt Lambeck, categorically ratify, beyond all previous scientific beliefs and assumptions, that the sea has been declining for several millennia at a rate 1 meter for every 100 years. That left the Mesopotamian city of Ur, a port some 5,000 years ago, 100 kilometers from the sea today, or Ostia Antigua, the ancient port of Rome, 14 kilometers from the sea today.

This phenomenon also globally altered the climate throughout the earth, desertifying many regions of the planet, including the Middle East and North Africa.

Are there ruins that confirm such a statement? Would the ark of the covenant have nothing to do with Atlantean remnants?

In this region are the first evidences of agriculture and livestock, in a culture called natuf. Archeology tells us that there is the first port and the first known city, Jericho; that there are the first mines exploited by man; that the first chain of ports was born from this region, that ancient cities carved out of stone, such as Petra, were settled there; that in that region there are hundreds and hundreds of kilometers of canals and wadis (courses of ancient dry rivers), through which the water moved, etc. Botany tells us that the first domesticated seed was sown there and that the first domesticated animals emigrated from there, brought from other regions in the wild. Anthropology tells us that there is the cradle of monotheism, an important characteristic of the Atlantean religion; that there are also the signs of the rituality of Atlantis, such as the sacrifice of the bull. Geology tells us that in the area there are also all the scars of a great catastrophe, and that there is also a sea that has dried up in recent millennia, the Dead Sea. Botanical and paleoclimatology studies also tell us that the region, before the brutal climate change that has been going on for 8 or 9 millennia, had an enormous variety of flora and fauna. Finally, Cavalli Sforza’s studies of human genetics tell us that the first farming villages came from this area. the dead Sea. Botanical and paleoclimatology studies also tell us that the region, before the brutal climate change that has been going on for 8 or 9 millennia, had an enormous variety of flora and fauna. Finally, Cavalli Sforza’s studies of human genetics tell us that the first farming villages came from this area. the dead Sea. Botanical and paleoclimatology studies also tell us that the region, before the brutal climate change that has been going on for 8 or 9 millennia, had an enormous variety of flora and fauna. Finally, Cavalli Sforza’s studies of human genetics tell us that the first farming villages came from this area.

Regarding the subject of the Ark of the Covenant that you ask me, I don’t know for sure. Maybe it does have a link and maybe it doesn’t. That is the subject of a specific study.

Did Plato err in his narrative by locating Atlantis near the Pillars of Hercules? (Strait of Gibraltar)

No doubt this is the angular error of localization. At the time the myth was narrated to Solon by the Egyptians, it is impossible that they would have told him that he was in the Atlantic, since that name was not used until two centuries later, precisely at the time of Plato. Surely they told him that it was between “straits”, those of Tiran and Suez, between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea, where the island was actually located. But since the Hellenes were unaware of the existence of the Red Sea, they placed it to the west, at the connection between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, beyond the Strait of Gibraltar.

This interpretation of the error is confirmed if one studies the geographical accidents of both seas, since the region of Tirrenia in the Mediterranean can be perfectly well confused with that of Punt, in present-day Somalia, since in addition to the resemblance in form, Both points were inhabited by the same people: the Canaanites, Punites, Tyrrhenians or Phoenicians, although at very different times. Likewise, the Strait of Gibraltar, which closes the Mediterranean, can be perfectly confused with Bab-el Mandeb, which closes the Red Sea. This error led to the belief that the Atlanteans ruled over Europe, which did not happen, because in reality they did so over Arabia, as all the archaeological evidence shows.

According to your studies, was this an island-continent or a group of small islands? And when did he succumb?

It was a large island, the largest in the Mediterranean, associated with many other colonies towards Anatolia, northern Mesopotamia, south by the Red Sea, Egypt and Arabia. The data show the presence of this culture also in Crete and Cyprus.

The data indicates its end around 5,600 before the common era, when the island is completely abandoned, to be inhabited again some thousand to fifteen hundred years later. Its end is associated with the great catastrophe investigated by Ryan and Pitman, which was of gigantic proportions throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, with a probable epicenter on the island of Santorini.

What is the heritage left by the Atlanteans to our contemporary culture?

The first great heritage is civilization itself. Without their existence, humans would probably still be hunter-gatherers and live in the Stone Age. All the bases that allowed the evolution of science and knowledge were born from that first civilization, beyond the fact that over the millennia we have suffered various ups and downs in our civilized evolution. Regardless of the fact that today civilization seems so natural to us, this was a gigantic and miraculous change in our evolutionary history, because in some way it allowed us to generate our own resources to survive as a species.

Then there are many anthropological traits of it in many cultural aspects of the West, such as monotheism, religious ritual with a central altar, the sense of “law”, I think the Western notion of good and evil also comes from there.

Is it possible that there was some migration of Atlantean survivors prior to its culmination?

Undoubtedly, the expansion of this first civilization with colonies began at least two thousand years before its end, which was moving food production to other parts of the earth. They moved looking for resources, mainly copper. Later, when this civilization fell definitively, the survivors settled in those other points, giving rise to the civilization that we all know. All the mythologies of the first civilizations tell us about these colonizers, which regardless of whether we believe them today or not, are based on real events.

The destruction of that culture, why did it happen? Last glaciation, Universal flood…

As I said, its end was associated with a catastrophe in the Eastern Mediterranean, which in my opinion was generated by very relevant climate changes, which are only just beginning to be investigated. Ryan and Pitman, in an investigation completed in the 1990s, concluded that the region experienced a cataclysm of gigantic proportions in the middle of the sixth millennium before the common era, which caused the rupture or creation of the Bosphorus channel, for which the Mediterranean Sea flooded the current Black Sea, which at that time was just a large freshwater lake that was 100 meters lower than the Mediterranean Sea. The potential cause is located in an eruption of the volcano on the island of Santorini, which generated an explosion of such magnitude that its ashes reached the north pole. This disaster devastated the entire region, liquidating this first civilization.

Do you believe in the possibility that many religious traditions of important cultures and great heroes have had a relationship with Atlantis? Noe, Krishna, Hermes, Quetzatcoalt, Viracocha, etc…

I have no doubt that we are talking about the same event. I believe that its end and the subsequent colonization process is associated with these great mythical figures of colonizers, who in the new settlements begin to force other peoples out of hunting and gathering, perhaps with great insufficiency of food, perhaps with a widespread practice of cannibalism, and introduce them to the wondrous world of food production and civilization. I have studied it in the cases of Noah in the various versions of him, Manu, Osiris, Prometheus, Quetzacoatl, Wirakosha, the 7 Sovereigns in China. The patterns are the same. I am not so clear about the other names that you mention, which in my opinion correspond more correctly to another cultural tradition.

What is your opinion of the following theories: Atlantis in: Cyprus, Morocco, Ireland, Bolivia, Antarctica, Spain, Atlantic, Mediterranean.

There are many hypotheses on the subject, for millennia, so the answer is long and complex. The conference held recently in Greece, to advance in the seriousness of the investigation, established 24 criteria or requirements that the different theories must meet to determine where Atlantis was. I will rely on them to determine the validity of the theories they point out to me. I’ll start with the easiest to rule out.

The Atlantic theory was already discarded by science several decades ago, when Ballard showed in his studies of the underwater bed that there is no recently sunken island there, say in the last 12,000 years. The closest cataclysmic events of that magnitude are about 3 million years old. The Azores, noted by Ignatius Donnelly at one point as part of the submerged continent, are in fact emerging.

Bolivia is not because the circles that showed some satellite photos, on which the theory was built, were recently made by mining companies. There is no sea, no island, no bulls either. Its author did not even go to the Conference. As for Antarctica, so far, no trace of human life or civilization has been found. In Cyprus, the size of the area is not enough to create a civilization. In addition, if we already know that the sea receded, that territory was even more submerged, which makes it impossible for that territory to be inhabited by human beings.

The theory of Ireland was raised by Ulf Erlingsson, based on a supposed statistical similarity between this island and Atlantis, some flooding of coastal areas investigated by the author and the expansion of the megalithic culture in the region, events that occurred between 5 and 4 millennium before the common era. The time does not correspond to the Platonic story, since Ireland was covered with ice in a large percentage in the time that Plato indicates for its existence. In addition, it is clear to any expert that the megalithic culture spread from the East and not from the Northwest, as the author of this theory maintains. In addition, not even the author himself says that it was, but he believes that Plato was inspired by these events to create the myth,

As for Spain, there are three theories. One was initially raised by Marc-Andre Gutscher, who located Atlantis on the submerged islands of Spartel, located to the west of the columns of Gibraltar, in the Gulf of Cádiz. This theory was analyzed at the conference in Greece, and according to the specialists, it did not provide any proof in the direction of the 24 criteria, not even proof that the islands were inhabited, apart from the fact that there is a difference of 2 thousand years between the tsunami detected by him and the date indicated by Plato. Marc-Andre Gutscher himself pointed out that he was not looking for Atlantis, and he is not convinced that it is the mysterious city either. There is a problem of temporal concordance with what was described by Plato and the geological situation of the island. By sticking to the years of the Greco-Roman calendar,

The other is from Rainer Kuehne, who believes that the “island” of Atlantis simply refers to a region in southern Spain known as the Marisma de Hinojos near the city of Cadiz, destroyed by a flood back in the years 800 to 500 before Christ and that shows concentric circles that surrounded it, which does not correspond in almost anything with the myth. The other is from Díaz-Montexano, who maintains that the Tartessian culture was Atlantis, although there are several thousand years of difference with the origin of this civilization and the date established by Plato, and that there are no data indicating that the Tartessians disappeared due to a natural disaster. In my opinion, to build his theory, Díaz-Montexano mixes a huge number of events to give coherence to his theory, for example tsunamis that occurred 12 thousand years ago, with a culture that has between 6 and 8 thousand. He did not present any papers nor did he go to the Conference, apparently because he was in a car accident, as other participants in Greece told me.

The latest theory is the Cretan one, which is already more than 90 years old, which maintains that the Platonic myth was born from this civilization and its end, although it is not a basal civilization, its existence does not correspond to the time given by Plato, they are a set of islands and not a continent or a large island, as the myth says. Despite the years it has been and how much has been written about it, it has not managed to convince the scientific world. I have no doubt that it has similarities with the mother culture, since it is one of their heirs, but it is not the original, like Tarshish or Egypt or Yemen.

What are your future projects in relation to your research?…

My theory is already published in a book for three years, which is available in bookstores. The book is titled “La Atlántida, el mito decifrado”, and one of my goals is to publish it outside of Chile, for the entire Spanish-speaking world. Precisely because of having published the book, I had the opportunity to participate in the Greek Conference, to which I applied with my theory, which was reviewed by the organizing academic committee and I was allowed to present three papers, one orally and another two in panel mode, being the only participant who had that opportunity.

Part of my plan for now is also to spread as widely as possible this new theory, which was not objected to by any scientist in Greece and which completes without discussion 19 of the 24 criteria established by the Conference, leaving for now 5 criteria pending for debate. of some historical and geological aspects of the region, which still require a more thorough examination by the different scientific disciplines.

Camilo Valdivieso

Copyright 2005 / Terra Networks Chile SA

Posted by: Jaime Manuschevich Read 6,816 times.