PART I
OVERVIEW
© 2006 Solving Light Books
SolvingLight.com
The Parthenon Code: Mankind’s
History in Marble by Robert
Bowie Johnson, Jr. presents
overwhelming evidence for a
revolutionary and astounding
new interpretation of ancient
Greek myth and art. It is this . . .
Greek “myth” is not myth at all but rather the
history of the human race told from the
standpoint of the way of Kain (Cain).
Greek artists told the story of what happened in the ancient paradise . . .
The Greeks depicted the events leading up to Noah’s Flood, the disappearance of
the line of Kain into the earth during the Flood, and Greek artists depicted Noah
himself.
The Greeks also told the story of mankind’s successful rebellion against Noah and his God after
the Flood, and they painted many images of their celebration of the rebirth of the line of Kain after
the Flood.
Greek gods looked exactly like humans because, for the most part, they represented the Greeks’
(and our) human ancestors.
The philosopher Sokrates knew the truth of this. In Plato’s Euthydemus, he referred to the gods
Athena, Zeus, and Apollo as his “lords and ancestors.”
Greek artists have left us a true picture of their history, and an artist’s code meant to be
understood. They take us back to the woman being born full-grown out of the first man.
And to that woman’s relationship with the serpent and the tree.
The ancient Greeks recount the same events as Genesis, except from the contrary viewpoint
that the serpent did not deceive Eve in paradise, but rather enlightened her, and through her, all
of mankind.
PART II
ZEUS AND HERA,
ADAM AND EVE,
AND THE GARDEN
PARADISE
The couple Genesis calls Adam and Eve . . .
The Greeks called Zeus and Hera.
According to Genesis, Adam and Eve were the father and mother of all humanity.
According to the Greeks, Zeus and Hera were the mother and father of all humanity.
Adam and Eve were a brother-sister/husband-wife pair.
So were Zeus and Hera.
The Greek poets and playwrights traced Zeus and Hera back to an ancient paradise they called
the Garden of the Hesperides.
Greek artists always depicted the garden with a serpent-entwined apple tree.
Genesis doesn’t say what kind of fruit tree it was. It’s from the Greek tradition we get the idea that
Eve ate an apple.
PART III
KAIN KILLING ABEL
DEPICTED ON THE
PARTHENON
In Genesis, we read of Adam and Eve’s eldest son, Kain (Cain), killing his
younger brother Abel.
On the south side of the Parthenon, in a series of four sculpted scenes, the Greeks depicted their
memory of this very first human murder.
These are the drawings of those sculpted scenes by Jacques Carrey from 1678.
In the first panel, Kain, the taller and older brother, speaks with Abel.
In the second panel, Kain argues with his wife over a sacrifice. The dispute with Abel had affected
Kain’s family life.
In the third panel, Abel is depicted as being in the field.
In the fourth panel, Kain kills Abel.
This is Greek narrative art at its best and most revealing.
PART IV
KAIN AND SETH,
HEPHAISTOS AND ARES
ADAM AND
EVE
KAIN
SETH
According to Genesis, after Kain killed Abel, Adam and Eve had another son named Seth. That
means Adam and Eve had two sons who, in turn, each had offspring: Kain, the eldest, and Seth.
ADAM AND
EVE
KAIN
ZEUS AND
HERA
SETH
HEPHAISTOS
ARES
Zeus and Hera also had two sons between them with offspring: Hephaistos, the elder, and Ares.
According to Genesis, the members of Kain’s line were the first to become forgers “of every
tool of copper and iron.” The Greeks deified Kain as Hephaistos, god of the forge.
In the Greek system, Seth, the younger son of Adam and Eve, is Ares, the younger son of Zeus
and Hera. Ares is the troublesome god of conflict and war.
ADAM AND
EVE
KAIN
SETH
Bad Son
Good Son
CHRIST
From the standpoint of Scripture, Seth was the good son, through whom the line of Christ was
traced. Kain “was of the wicked one,” a reference to his association with “the ancient serpent.”
But the Greeks considered the association of Hephaistos with the serpent, and his welcoming
of the serpent’s enlightenment, to be good things.
In the serpent-friendly Greek system . . .
ZEUS AND HERA
HEPHAISTOS = KAIN
Good Son
ARES = SETH
Bad Son
. . . Hephaistos, the deified Kain, is the good son. Ares, the Seth of Genesis, is the bad son.
Zeus loved his elder son Hephaistos, and made him armorer of the gods. Zeus despised his
younger son Ares, calling him “hateful,” “pestilent,” and a “renegade.”
The Greek hero Herakles made it a point to kill the offspring of Ares, the Seth of Genesis. On
this vase, Herakles kills Ares’ favorite son, Kyknos, as Ares looks on.
From opposite viewpoints, Genesis and Greek Religion share a knowledge of the same
historical events . . .
ADAM AND
EVE
KAIN
ZEUS AND
HERA
SETH
HEPHAISTOS
ARES
. . . And they share a knowledge of the same characters, but with different names.
PART V
BEFORE THE
FLOOD, THE SETHMEN TAKE THEIR
WOMEN FROM THE
LINE OF KAIN
And coming is that humanity starts to
be multitudinous on the surface of the
ground, and daughters are born to them.
And seeing are sons of the Elohim (men
in the line of Seth) the daughters of the
human (the line of Kain), that they are
good, and taking are they for themselves
wives of all whom they choose.
Genesis 6:1-2
In Chapter Six of Genesis, before the Flood, the men from the line of Seth are described as
taking their women from the line of Kain: “taking are they for themselves wives of all whom
they choose.”
The Greeks depicted men from the line of Seth as Kentaurs, half-men/half-horses, who often carried
branches, signifying to the Greeks that they were part of a strange “branch” of humanity.
And the Greeks depicted these Kentaurs carrying off their women, just as it says in Genesis.
According to Genesis, only the line of Seth, through Noah and his family, survived the Flood.
The line of Kain disappeared into the earth.
The Greeks depicted that same horrendous event as a man named Kaineus being beaten into
the earth by Kentaurs, the line of Seth.
Kaineus means “pertaining to Kain,” or the “line of Kain.” On this partially damaged
vase, the artist has written the name KAINEUS next to the man being pounded
into the earth by the Kentaurs.
In the most ancient Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, Kain is spelled in uppercase
letters, just as it is on the vase.
Every religion celebrates something, and ancient Greek religion celebrates the resurgence of
the way of Kain after the Flood. Here the line of Kain in the person of this “pure” child reemerges from the earth into which the line of Kain had disappeared during the Flood.
According to Greek “myth,” the father of this child is Hephaistos—Zeus and Hera’s eldest son,
the deification of Adam and Eve’s eldest son, Kain.
PART VI
NEREUS
THE GREEK NOAH
The Greeks knew exactly who Noah was. They called him Nereus, the “Wet One,” and Halios
Geron, the “Salt Sea Old Man.”
The Greeks depicted Noah often on vases.
Sometimes Greek artists depicted Noah as an old man with the bottom half of a fish,
signifying that he had come through the Flood.
Sometimes they depicted him as a seated old man holding a fish.
And sometimes simply as an old man.
PART VII
HERAKLES’
REBELLION
AGAINST NOAH
Herakles, the great hero of the Greeks, was not an imaginary or mythical figure. He was a real
man—the man who led the great rebellion against Noah and his God after the Flood.
Cush was the father of Nimrod, who grew to be a
mighty warrior on the earth.
I Chronicles 1:10
Herakles is the Greek version of the great rebel Nimrod. According to the Scriptures, Nimrod
was the first man, after the Flood, “to be a mighty warrior on the earth.” Herakles’ given
name was Alcaeus, meaning “mighty one.”
Herakles is Nimrod and Nimrod means “Rebel.” The only system to rebel against back then was
Noah’s. Herakles and his followers fought to push Noah and his God out of the picture, and exalt
instead mankind as the measure of all things.
On this vase-painting, Herakles threatens Noah with his club.
Here, Herakles pushes Noah aside.
And here, the vase-artist depicts Herakles bringing Noah and his rule to a halt.
On this ancient shield band panel, Herakles grabs Nereus, the Greek Noah. The artist made
Noah’s bottom half a fish so we don’t miss the point that he came through the Flood.
Herakles demands to know something that only the Salt Sea Old Man can tell him. A flame and a
snake come out of Noah’s head. Herakles demands to know how and where to find the
enlightenment of the serpent.
Herakles’ first 11 labors and his other battles all had one objective—embodied in his 12th and
final labor—getting back to the serpent-entwined tree in the ancient garden for another bite of
the serpent’s apple.
The spirit of Athena guided Herakles in all his battles which ultimately led to the
reestablishment of way of Kain.
And Athena rewarded the great hero after he had pushed Noah and his God out of the picture
and reestablished the way of Kain.
PART VIII
ATHENA
THE REBORN
SERPENTFRIENDLY EVE
The Greeks recognized Athena as the reborn serpent-friendly Eve who reemerged
victorious after the Flood.
In this rare and revealing partially damaged vase painting, Athena stands proudly by the tree
receiving instructions from the serpent.
Hera is the original Eve of Genesis, but Athena also represents Eve—Eve worshipped as the one
who brought the serpent’s enlightenment back to mankind after the Flood.
The Greeks depicted Athena as being born full-grown out of Zeus—a picture of Eve being born
full-grown out of Adam.
The key to understanding Greek myth/art is making the Genesis connection. This fresco by
Masaccio portrays the taking of the fruit from the serpent’s tree as shameful.
According to the Greek way of looking at mankind’s past, the taking of the fruit was a triumph
for humanity. In this sculpture by Tegner, Athena is born full-grown out of Zeus just as Eve
came out of Adam, and she has come out exulting in the serpent’s enlightenment!
Two opposite interpretations of the very same event.
The essence of the ancient Greek religious celebration is very simple: after the Flood, the
reborn and victorious serpent-friendly Eve . . .
. . . Nurtures the reborn line of Kain.
What are commonly believed to be a hodge-podge of strange and sometimes incomprehensible
images painted and sculpted by ancient Greek artists, present to us, in reality, a coherent
historical narrative—the story of who the Greeks were, and where they came from—a story that
matches the Genesis account in convincing detail.